Life is Beautiful Organizers Take Us Inside 2022’s Global Lineup
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The post Life is Beautiful Organizers Take Us Inside 2022’s Global Lineup appeared first on Consequence.
When done right, a city festival offers a unique experience that speaks to the heart of its urban surroundings. In the case of Life is Beautiful, much of this exists solely in its location within Las Vegas — rather than add to the glitz and fanfare of the Las Vegas strip, the festival takes place just a few miles north in downtown Vegas, sectioning off the famous Fremont Street and over 18 square blocks of Vegas’ classic, original townsite.
“I don’t think any festival in the country takes over 18 square city blocks,” says Allen Scott from Another Planet Entertainment, the company that assists in booking Life is Beautiful each year. He’s joined by Craig Nyman, the head of music and programming for Life is Beautiful Festival, who is similarly proud of the way the festival has transformed alongside downtown Vegas in the last few years.
This year, Life is Beautiful (taking place September 16th-18th) features three unique — and international — headliners. Arctic Monkeys, Gorillaz, and Calvin Harris lead 2022’s lineup, with several other major players set to perform like Lorde, Beach House, Kygo, Migos, and many more. With the slight exception of this year’s inaugural Primavera Sound Los Angeles (who’ve booked Arctic Monkeys to headline its final day), all three of these headliners are exclusive to American festivals, and they make for an incredibly exciting three days of music.
Each headliner was brought in for this reason alone: “It’s important to us,” Scott says, “We realize we’re a destination festival, with a large majority of people coming from outside the Vegas market. And so we need to bring something not only unique to Las Vegas, but unique to the festival market in order to get people to come to Vegas.”
Indeed, Life is Beautiful sees upwards of 170,000 attendees each year, and Scott and Nyman are keen on providing an unforgettable, global experience for music fans all over the world. “For Arctic Monkeys, this is their first US show in four years, Calvin Harris is performing at no other US festivals, and same with Gorillaz,” says Scott. “We worked diligently to provide a unique festival experience.”
Life is Beautiful Festival 2022
Though all three of Life is Beautiful’s headliners come from across the pond (Arctic Monkeys and Gorillaz from England, Calvin Harris from Scotland), Nyman and Scott maintain that it wasn’t exactly on purpose. “If you look back on all of our lineups, we’ve always been a global festival of music — we’ve brought in artists from Europe, yes, but also Australia, South Africa, and South America as well,” Nyman explains, “so I would say it accidentally became three UK headliners, but for the most part, what we always start with is asking, ‘what do our fans want to see that will get them really excited?'”
Truth be told, Arctic Monkeys in particular are sure to get fans excited — the band has only grown more esteemed and popular since they last played Life is Beautiful in 2014, and with rumors of new music on the way, their set is bound to be a spectacle of indie rock. But even beyond that, Nyman and Scott are particularly interested in booking acts that don’t have as easy of a time getting shows in Las Vegas.
To put in perspective, Vegas and its strip of destination hotels and casinos have dozens of late night clubs for DJs and arenas for top-line residencies, but only a limited amount of music venues for middle or lower-tier artists: The Cosmopolitan’s Chelsea Theater and the Brooklyn Bowl are both 3,000 person-capacity Las Vegas theaters, and the House of Blues Las Vegas has a capacity of 1,800. So, much of the booking for such a major music festival focuses on bringing unique artists to fans who otherwise wouldn’t get a chance to see them in Las Vegas — hence Life is Beautiful’s eclectic, international selections.
However, Scott maintains that it’s not just about them asking artists to come to Las Vegas, but the other way around: “People are looking to play Life is Beautiful now. There’s a lot of artists that don’t have a good hard ticket option in Las Vegas — not the bigger artists, of course, but there are lots of artists who are excited to play in front of a lot more people than they normally play for,” he says. Scott continued by noting that “all three of these headliners reached out and wanted to play. Gorillaz, who are going tour, wanted to kick off their tour at Life is Beautiful, because they had such a good time when they headlined in 2017.”
Beyond Life is Beautiful’s accomplished trio of headliners, the festival’s booking team are just as thorough when assembling the undercard. In addition to beloved American acts like Beach House, Cage The Elephant, Marc Rebillet, and Rico Nasty, Life is Beautiful will feature some exciting UK acts like Charli XCX, Sam Fender, Wet Leg, and Jungle, European talents like Pussy Riot, Lewis OfMan, and Perel, and even the exciting Brazilian producer Mochakk, whom Nyman is specifically excited for.
“At the time that we booked [Mochakk], I don’t think he was on anything in the US — and now, he’s selling out every US date and been featured on a couple of festival lineups,” Nyman says, “but it’s the energy that an artist like that brings that we’re looking for.”
Overall, Life is Beautiful 2022 promises to be one of the most special editions of the festival yet. And look out for another edition of Western Country Club, an experience within the festival that was launched in 2021 and which involves a plethora of exciting acts in country music. We’ll have to wait a bit longer for the lineup, but it promises to have the same emphasis on experience that Life is Beautiful has. At the end of the day, Scott and Nyman are always in search of curating unforgettable events.
Life is Beautiful Festival goes down on September 16th-18th this year in downtown Las Vegas; tickets are still available and can be purchased here.
This article was published in partnership with Life is Beautiful Music & Art Festival.
Life is Beautiful Organizers Take Us Inside 2022’s Global Lineup
Paolo Ragusa
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