Punx Still Not Dead

Creditors of beleaguered Czech promoter Punx Not Dead will hope its July 31 show with guitar virtuoso tour G3 does well enough to put more money in the pot that will eventually be shared between them.

Borek Jirik’s company collapsed after its Prague City Festival was canceled because of poor ticket sales and the local authority’s refusal to come through with any sponsorship money.

Apparently Jirik had no contract with the Prague authority regarding sponsorship but proceeded with the festival because its cultural department, which had put up money in 2011, had verbally indicated that it would do so again.

“If the head of culture and tourism promises you one thing and the city parliament does another, there is not much you can do about it,” Jirik told Pollstar, after claiming to have spent about euro 750,000 ($910,000) on the festival.

That decision has apparently left Punx Not Dead with virtually no assets, apart from any profit that comes from the G3 show at the end of the month. The G3 tour includes guitar virtuosos Joe Satriani, Steve Vai and Steve Morse.

It’s in Prague’s 4,000-capacity Tesla Arena and Jirik says that so far he’s sold more than 3,000 tickets.

Jirik is currently preparing the paperwork needed to file the company for bankruptcy and expects to complete it by Aug. 2, a couple of days after the Tesla show.

Apart from making legal efforts to seize the show’s box office takings, which would likely be a complicated and very costly move, the agents who had acts on Prague City Festival would appear to have little chance of collecting any deposits or cancellation fees they say their artists are owed.

The PCF lineup June 29-30 included New Order, Blink-182, White Lies, LostProphets, Simple Plan, Hadouken, The All-American Rejects and Black Stone Cherry.

PCF was only one of the disasters that’s decimated the Czech outdoor business this summer.

Rock for People was hit by storms of such magnitude that most of the bill had to be canceled and the festival’s future is in serious jeopardy.

Colours Of Ostrava suffered because Bjork pulled out of her headline slot, while Sazava Festival had to cancel bill-toppers Kaiser Chiefs after its main sponsor backed out.