Coachella Sued Over Radius Clause
Soul’d Out Productions, an Oregon-based promoter that runs the annual Soul’d Out Music Festival, has filed a lawsuit against Goldenvoice, the AEG-owned company that puts on Coachella, as Billboard and the Portland Business Journal report. Soul’d Out argues that Coachella’s restrictive radius clause—which prevents artists from booking festival appearances within 1,300 miles of Indio, California between December 2017 and May 2018—violates federal anti-trust laws. Soul’d Out organizers claim that multiple artists, including SZA and Daniel Caesar, have had to turn down playing the Soul’d Out Music Festival due to Coachella’s radius clause. Lawyer Nicholas F. Aldrich, who is representing Soul’d Out, argues that radius clauses do not greatly benefit Coachella since the festival sells out months in advance, and is asking the court to toss out the radius clause agreements.
Goldenvoice has publicly responded to the suit, issuing the following statement to Celebrity Access:
Radius clauses are common in the concert business where promoters take great risk and spend huge sums to produce marquee festivals, tours and other shows. With over 100,000 fans attending each of its two weekends, Coachella is a premier festival destination attracting visitors from across the region and around the world. The producers of Coachella will vigorously defend against this lawsuit, which calls into question a long-standing industry practice that is crucial to our ability to continue offering fans the unrivaled experience for which Coachella has become known.
