WOODSTOCK: NEW VENUE PROBLEMS

Woodstock 50 still isn’t dead—though now that Watkins Glen International racetrack has terminated the festival’s site license, discussions have turned to possible new venues. And while the participating acts have been paid their guarantees, some managers are saying they’ll have venue approval because their festival contracts specify Watkins Glen as Woodstock’s location. So the choice of new venue becomes more complicated as a result.

The slated festival lineup includes JAY-Z, the Killers, Chance the Rapper, Miley Cyrus, Imagine Dragons, Dead & Co. and Santana; the Black Keys pulled out in April over an ostensible scheduling conflict.

The latest setback follows the pulling out of Woodstock financier Dentsu Aegis, which announced that the festival was canceled. But Michael Lang and Team Woodstock insisted the show would go on during its originally slated weekend of August 16-18, and in May a judge ruled that the remaining $18m of Dentsu’s Woodstock investment would be placed in an escrow account.

The latest maneuvers coincide with the premiere of Woodstock: Three Days That Defined a Generation, an acclaimed new documentary about the original fest, which surmounted numerous obstacles of its own (including a last-minute venue switch) on its way to pop-cultural immortality.