Brooklyn Mirage Cancels Summer Season’s First Show Due To Inspection Delay
The Brooklyn Mirage canceled its first show during the venue’s scheduled opening weekend, with a performance by Sara Landry on May 1 being affected. The company announced the news on its official Instagram page, saying they were unable to meet the final inspection deadline after reconstructing the venue. Avant Gardner, the promotion company behind the Brooklyn Mirage, was set to debut its new renderings this weekend including more balconies and space for fans.
On social media, fans have been posting the progress of the construction and theorizing that the venue might not be completed in time for its first round of dates. The cancellation was announced just hours before the show was scheduled to take place, and fans will be issued refunds for tonight’s show.
The venue has further shows scheduled throughout the weekend, including Sara Landry again on May 2, City Fox on May 3 and Black Coffee on May 4.
Pollstar reached out to Josh Wyatt, CEO of Avant Gardner, for comment.
“We’ve been extraordinarily transparent along every step of our Brooklyn Mirage rebuild – showing the long hours, the progress and the passion behind it all,” the Brooklyn Mirage said in a statement on social media. “We want to be clear: the venue is show ready and the new Mirage has been built to exacting safety, structural, mechanical and technical specifications. However, we are not able to meet the final inspection deadline today. Abiding by all appropriate city, local and building authorities is paramount to our core values. Therefore, tonight’s show is canceled. All ticket holders for tonight’s show will immediately be receiving a full refund on tomorrow’s show as soon as information becomes available with respect to final inspection and sign off.
“We, as a company, take full responsibility,” the statement continued. “This isn’t about construction, but compliance. We’re working closely with city officials and will continue to be transparent throughout this process.”
Avant Gardner, the promotion company that owns Brooklyn Mirage (an outdoor venue with a 6,250-cap in the larger Avant Gardner complex, which contains the Great Hall [3,000-cap] and Kings Hall [220-cap]) unveiled its new renovation plans in March, promising a fully kinetic shutter system to open and close a 270-degree LED screen with 30k resolution and 100 million pixels. More than 100 speakers and subwoofers are also expected to be placed throughout the venue. The main dancefloor is expected to be double the size of the former venue’s floor, with second and third-level dancefloors also built in the mezzanine.
On April 27, Avant Gardner CEO Josh Wyatt showed fans on TikTok how the construction would be completed in time for Landry’s show on May 1. “Every 15 minutes they’re dropping in another CLT Cross Laminated Timber component,” Wyatt said in the video. “It’s like literally just snapping in one after the other. We have three LED walls 270-degree, 40-foot-high LED walls. Really going from the base level all the way up to the roof. We’re about halfway done with the wall. Walls typically go up anywhere from 12-36 hours.”
The video also featured Wyatt asking a construction worker, “How long do you think it’s going to take to get up the stage?” The worker responded, “Three days.”
Avant Gardner, owned by Jürgen “Billy” Bildstein, has faced several high-profile challenges. Labor Day 2023’s Electric Zoo festival, which Avant Gardner purchased from Made Events in 2022 for a reported $15 million, faced litigation and scrutiny by city officials after its opening day was canceled due to delays in building stages, had a delayed opening on day two and reportedly hit capacity on day three leaving hundreds, if not thousands, of disgruntled fans waiting outside. Some denied entry stormed the festival gates. According to the Gothamist, police accused the organizers of overselling the festival by 7,000 tickets. Fans were eventually refunded more than nine months after the fact. The festival did not return in 2024 and is not expected to return in 2025.
Read more: Mismanagement Abounds At Electric Zoo With Cancellation, Cap Limits & Security Breaches
Wyatt joined the company last fall, becoming its first CEO, with Bildstein remaining on as creative director. Wyatt told Pollstar last year that a financial investor came in to back the venue and help with paying out fans. “I can’t disclose the name, but the financial investor is a venture capital fund that has extensive, decades-long experience in music.” He shared the partnership is “an amazing situation to be in, freeing the company to really operate from a position of confidence.”
Read More: Avant Gardner Names Josh Wyatt First-Ever CEO, ‘We Have Big Ambitions Here’
The venue has also come under scrutiny as several bodies were found in the nearby Newton Creek. In the summer of 2023, the bodies of two fans who’d attended shows at Brooklyn Mirage were found. Another body was found in the summer of 2024. That person had attended a show at the nearby Knockdown Center. In order to address this, Avant Gardner promised to install dedicated Uber and Lyft pick-up and drop-off areas and increased signage for fans leaving the premises to direct them to rideshares or the nearby subway station.
“It’s not Knockdown Center’s problem, it’s not Avant Gardner’s problem, it’s not Elsewhere, it’s not SAA’s problem, it’s all of our problem and we need to work together as a coalition,” Wyatt told Pollstar. “I’m willing to put time and money on this. I’m a 50-year-old man with three kids. My kids are not old enough to go to a venue like this, but they will be one day, and you better believe that I take the safety and security of fans seriously. As a parent, this is a meaningful issue for me. It’s a tragedy what has happened to these three people over the last year and a half.”
The Brooklyn Mirage was ranked No. 2 on Pollstar‘s Top 100 Clubs charts in 2019, with 293,847 tickets grossing $14.79 million. The Mirage is closed during the winter months and is open from early May through October.
UPDATE 7:45 PM ET: Sara Landry responded to the show’s cancellation, posting on her Instagram, “Hi guys. This was not the video I was expecting to make today. I am so gutted to be in this position. And my heart is broken. All I wanted when we agreed to do these shows and agreed to do this opening weekend was to make sure that we could give my fans a really world-class experience. And myself and my team has worked so hard over the last six months in conjunction with Josh Wyatt at the Mirage to give a really good experience and take your feedback and your notes on this venue into account. But, sometimes, the universe has other plans for us and shit happens. So, I just want to apologize to you guys and say, I’m sorry that things are not going to be working out as we thought that they would tonight. But, we got this news an hour ago. I am here with my team. We are working incredibly hard to find solutions for tonight, tomorrow and other days this weekend to make sure that every single person who’s bought a ticket to come see me is able to leave this weekend knowing that they’ve had a great time, a good experience, got a couple techno sets maybe, we’re going to find out – part two to come. But for me, my concern immediately was you. … You’re money is refunded like Mirage has said, and there will be more information to come on the opportunities… I found out about this around the same time you did, and my heart is broken. And I’m so sorry.”
UPDATE 9:43 P.M. ET
Sara Landry will perform at Brooklyn Storehouse tomorrow (May 2) for fans who had tickets to tonight’s show at the Brooklyn Mirage. Ticketholders for tonight’s shows will still be refunded and will receive a link for the new show via the email used to originally purchase their ticket. The show takes place from 5 p.m. to 10 p.m.
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