With PromoWest Fest, these challenges first arrived in the form of family illnesses. You’re building a city.”Īs with any city planning, bumps in the road inevitably emerge. “You have to have all the restrooms and concessions and barriers and police and medical. “You learn everything about logistics ,” Stienecker said. Intensive planning for PromoWest Fest kicked off in July 2015, just weeks after the company finished putting on Cincinnati’s Bunbury Music Festival (PromoWest purchased both Bunbury and its country cousin Buckle Up in late 2014), an event that will serve as a template for the Columbus fest moving forward. “And that feel is right here if you look at the lineup: Flaming Lips, Ryan Adams, Noel Gallagher, Fitz and the Tantrums, X Ambassadors, the Wombats, Red Wanting Blue. “We do it all, but we mainly do your what’s-hot-in-the-AAA (adult album alternative), CD102.5-type acts,” Stienecker said. To counter this, Stienecker stressed the importance of focusing on “PromoWest-type acts” to lend the festival its distinctive voice. Indeed, earlier this year, The New York Times announced plans to shy from coverage of the major music festivals, Coachella and Bonnaroo included, citing the increasingly interchangeable nature of the events, which tend to draw from similar performer pools.

(Here in Columbus we’ve already seen the addition of Fashion Meets Music Fest and Breakaway Music Festival, which is making its return this summer following a two-year absence.)

Each year, a handful of new, regional events pop up, and the glut can make it hard for new launches to stand out in an increasingly packed field. President and Chief Operating Officer Brian Ellis first tossed around the idea of hosting a three-day bash in the heart of the Arena District. Of course, much has changed in the festival landscape since Stienecker and Nationwide Realty Investors Ltd. Though the inaugural PromoWest Fest kicks off Friday, July 15, the idea for the music festival was actually hatched three or four years ago, according to PromoWest President and CEO Scott Stienecker.

Breakaway music festival lineup 2016