Massive Attack

Massive Attack cancelled Mad Cool Festival set over Franz Ferdinand conflict

Mad Cool Festival is in the midst of its 2018 edition in Madrid, Spain with a very stacked lineup, but some hiccups in production. The latest of those happened early Saturday (7/14) morning when Massive Attack cancelled their 1:45-3:00 AM at The Loop stage, due to a scheduling conflict against Franz Ferdinand, whose set ran from 1:30 to 2:50 AM at The Madrid te Abraza stage.

A statement from the festival reads, “Massive Attack has just canceled its Mad Cool Festival concert, scheduled to be held at The Loop, claiming that the sound of the stage where Franz Ferdinand was playing at the time would bother them during the performance of their show. The organizational team did everything possible to delay schedules of other bands and find a time slot where Massive Attack might be comfortable, but the unilateral decision of the band has been canceling their show. From Mad Cool, we sincerely apologize to all attendees for the inconvenience and possible heartbreak this may have caused.”

According to attendees on Reddit, the crowd waited over an hour for an announcement to be made, at a stage set up for Massive Attack’s performance. Some left messages on the band’s facebook expressing their disappointment:

Absolutely shocking what you guys did at MadCool last night. Not even announcing the cancellation to the thousands of people who stood waiting for you to start for over an hour shows a complete lack of regard for your fans. (via)

Fucking joke! You lost so many fans last night… (via)

Mad cool 2018 Massive Attack tantrum… (via)

You don’t deserve that nobody goes to see a concert of yours ever . You do not deserve to be able to dedicate yourself to music. You are what you are thanks to the people who listen to you and what you did yesterday was a horrible lack of respect towards all your audience. Thousands of people waiting to see you act for more than an hour and decide to cancel the concert by bullshit of 15-year-old children like you were fucked up because Franz Ferdinand was playing at the same time on another stage. Do you know that many people stopped seeing them to see you? Did not you know you were playing at a festival? Did you want the world to be paralyzed for you? At least you should have come out to face it, but you have it so hard that not even that. You have lost thousands of fans, I hope you are aware of it. (via)

Alex Kapranos of Franz Ferdinand responded on Twitter:

Mad Cool Festival got off to a bumpy start on Thursday (7/12) as well, with attendees complaining of hour-long waits for drinks and even longer lines at entrances. The festival issued a statement on Facebook about its rough start:

We are grateful to all attendees for understanding the contingencies of the first day. We deeply regret the waiting and long queues produced by a network fall throughout the compound. We are working since last night to ensure that the next two days are going to be fully developed. We are looking forward to you today! Thank you everyone! #Madcool2018