Author | Ding Qianwen Editor | Fan Zhihui
In 2024, mainland music festivals will reach new heights.
Recently, Bubble Island Music Festival, Cactus Music Festival, Ocean Universe Music Festival, m_dsk Music Festival, etc. have announced some of their overseas artist lineups for this year's performances, including international artists such as yoasobi, honne, unkle, fall out boy, the chainsmokers, xg, etc. Well-known artist. Coincidentally, the Dream Future Sensenju Music Festival also officially announced the May Day performance lineup today, including 14 groups of overseas artists such as mando diao, envy, yoasobi, and Queen Bee, accounting for more than 50%.
Since last year, the increased international lineup has been regarded as the "killer weapon" by many mainland music festivals. While giving music fans a sense of freshness, it has somewhat alleviated the problem of homogeneous lineups. By this year, the major organizers' increased international lineups have become a benchmark for differentiated competition between new and old music festivals, pushing Chinese music festivals to accelerate their transformation and break through the involution.
Why do domestic music festivals start to "roll" international lineups?
After experiencing the so-called "retaliatory" recovery of the performance market in 2023, this year's large-scale performance market has not waned in popularity and competition in the industry remains fierce. With many consumer groups to choose from, diverse demands have become more difficult to reconcile.
At this stage, although music festivals are blooming all over the country, due to differences in lineups, facilities and other infrastructure, as well as differences in commercialization and professionalism, even if there are many music festivals and various categories, they can not be called IP. Very few.
Under such a supply and demand relationship, although there are still many music festivals that still follow the hodgepodge scene of "one performance lineup is suitable for multiple music festivals" and "one-time" music festivals to make money and run away, even except for musicians , voice actors, e-sports players, and variety artists can all stand on the music festival stage due to traffic; however, the infinitely repeated performance lineup makes the contradiction of high ticket prices and low experience more and more prominent.
mta Tianmo Music Festival founder Li Hongjie sharply pointed out in an interview that "consumers thought it was quite new at first, but with more and more music festivals, everyone found that the lineup was about the same, the ingredients were changed, and the experience did not exceed expectations. Naturally, he abandoned it without looking back.”
This is also true. As the number of scams increases, consumers are gradually returning to rationality, forcing music festival organizers to iteratively upgrade performance products.
Among them, MIDI Music Festival, Bubble Island Music Festival, Aranya Xiami Music Festival, Offside Music Festival and other established head IPs and new IPs that have established a good reputation are gradually becoming fast food and homogeneous. Surrounded by currencies, it sought to break through measures such as introducing high-quality overseas lineups and vertical segmentation of performance lineups. It also gained a high reputation in the mixed market last year.
Take the Bubble Island Music and Art Festival as an example. On the basis of continuing last year’s hosting of the premieres of many international musicians, this year’s international lineup at the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei Station has higher specifications, a larger proportion, and is more luxurious than last year. . For example, the currently announced lineup includes the Japanese phenomenon duo yoasobi, which became popular around the world with "idol" last year, the British avant-garde music group unkle, and the British electronic music group honne. It has also attracted the attention of the industry and music fans, calling them "Tianjin" Eat so well."
Regarding the phenomenon of major music festival organizers turning their attention to overseas artists, according to music manager Jian Cui, this is not an attempt to internationalize, but a return to the normal state before the epidemic. "In my opinion, this is not entirely about internationalization, but a return to the normal state before the epidemic to some extent. Several promoters who were responsible for bringing international artists to China have now opened their own independent Music festivals, such as Sensenju, which just announced its lineup. So in my opinion, everyone is just starting to gradually return to the lineup selection strategy that they have adhered to for many years."
Zhang Ran, the founder of [Shan Qianshou Kiloglow] who has been deeply involved in this field for many years, told Music Herald that domestic musicians with good box office performance have appeared too many times in music festivals in recent years during the epidemic. "Some domestic musicians Musicians appear too frequently, and users will suffer from aesthetic fatigue. Many names may become ineffective because they appear too many times in the same area, so everyone will look for differentiation in overseas artists." Li Hongjie also added, " For organizers, they actually don’t want their lineup to be the same as others."
And the realization of this "differentiation" is also the key to determining whether the music festival IP can establish a ticket bank, attract and expand consumer groups. Use In the words of Zhang Chongshuo, the founder of Chuangyu Wujie, it is to avoid homogeneity, create freshness and meet new expectations.
As a music festival brand that was only born last year, Bubble Island Music and Art under Chuangyu Wujie The festival has been able to carve out a place in the extreme involution, and the style of play behind it, especially the selection strategy, is worthy of reference for the industry.
According to Zhang Chongshuo, when selecting the international artist lineup, their selection strategy is the "pinching" principle . As the name suggests, "Jian'er" refers first to the top of musical talent, and then to scarcity. For example, this artist is very rare in the world, and it is almost impossible to find similar people of the same level. Also, music fans have extremely high expectations, but they are extremely rare. It is difficult to successfully invite.
Last year, the music festival market was in a period of homogeneous performance lineups and serious aesthetic fatigue. The Bubble Island Music Festival has gathered the most international lineup in the past four years, with both popular and niche interests. More than 80 groups of Chinese and foreign musicians, including ppkritt, fkj, Kenichiro Nishihara, galdive, and motorama, have linked up with audiences in different circles, coexisted professionalism and high aesthetics, and successfully created their own brand tone through differentiation.
This is also The Bubble Island Music Festival continued to receive high-frequency exposure last year. Not only did the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei Station become the largest music festival in China in 2023, with a total exposure of more than 500 million on the entire network, it also received wma Weibo within half a year of its birth. Music Festival's "Recommended Performance IP of the Year" and "Hot Industry IP of the Year". At the same time, Bubble Island Music Festival Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei Station was also selected into the "2023 Tencent Music White Paper" "Top 10 Most Popular Music Festivals in 2023".
Just like Zhang Ran As stated by , "Any music festival brand that has ideals will look for differentiation in the lineup to form the character of its own IP." Correspondingly, this kind of music aesthetic pursuit that is not limited to traffic, but starts from the perspective of the audience, can truly Survive in the music festival market and have loyal users of the music festival brand. Jian Cui also mentioned a similar point of view. Past experience is that there are many music festivals, too many to remember. How to maintain your uniqueness may be the key to major Issues that organizers need to think about and solve.
How does the Chinese Music Festival break through?
When talking about the judgment of the Chinese music festival market in 2024, a keyword often mentioned by various organizers is "shuffle". According to incomplete statistics, there have been more than 200 large-scale performances officially announced this year, including concerts and music festivals. "Involution" is still the keynote of the domestic performance market this year, but it also means that some people will fall and others will rise.
In the context of the current low-level "involution" in China, if Chinese music festivals want to escape the low-level competition, they need to iterate in many aspects, including hardware construction, artist lineup, presentation format, catering facilities, surrounding transportation, safety guarantee, etc. , find your own way to break the situation.
But there is no doubt that the artist lineup is the one that best reflects the brand’s tone and host aesthetic.
Domestic organizers have begun to recruit overseas lineups. On the one hand, it can solve the homogeneity problem of domestic music festivals and alleviate the problem of aesthetic fatigue of performance lineups. On the other hand, the reshuffle of the survival of the fittest may also accelerate the iterative upgrading of Chinese music festivals.
As early as during the Zhangbei Music Festival, Li Hongjie had already begun to introduce international artists. As for the current trend of domestic music festivals "rolling out" international lineups, he believes that there are two reasons: first, the massive number of music festivals in the past two years has made The performance fees of some domestic musicians have skyrocketed. In comparison, overseas artists are not only more cost-effective, but can also differentiate their lineups. Secondly, "(some domestic) artists wish to attend 80% of music festivals, but they are not interested in the box office of music festivals." The pulling power is not proportional, and the overseas lineup may have much stronger works, professional capabilities, and box office than domestic artists at the same price. Why not invite something fresh at the same price?"
Of course, it is not easy to invite overseas artists. .
Zhang Ran, who has extensive experience in inviting overseas artists, mentioned that overseas artists have a relatively high threshold for invitations and are difficult to book. “Most artists will not easily reach a cooperation without meeting the person contacting them (the organizer). Legally paying performance fees, applying for approval, and even visas in different countries require different things, and larger artists will not come specifically for you (music festival). They will plan tour dates throughout Asia more than a year in advance. Nor will I participate in a music festival brand that has never had overseas musicians.
As one of the promoters of the Japanese musician lineup cooperation at the Bubble Island Music Festival, Zhang Ran said, "I just want to be there when everyone is opening a new one." When it comes to mining, I am here to provide you with the tools to mine, and we have gone through all these detours before. What we can do is help these organizers avoid detours. That’s why I started my own business, the company Sensenju Kiloglow."
It is precisely because of this that Chuangyu Wujie became the co-investor and organizer of the "Dream Future·Sensenju Music Festival" founded by Zhang Ran , judging from the current public information, the overseas lineup is also quite luxurious.
In Zhang Chongshuo’s view, “A truly valuable music festival must have a unique DNA. This DNA is not only a unique idea, but more importantly The person who has this idea is linked to a unique ecological resource and has the ability to use these resources to realize his unique idea. "
After testing the waters last year, this year's Bubble Island Music Festival's overseas lineup is bolder and more diverse, and its music elements are more inclusive. For example, the Japanese musician Tatsuya Kitani announced by the South China Station is a member of the vocaloid circle A well-known music producer, and the singer of some of the theme songs of the popular anime "Jutsu Kaisen" and "Bleach".
Furthermore, what is different from other competing products on the market is that "internationalization" is even a bubble It is an innate concept of the island, and its selection strategy is also continuously optimized. Zhang Chongshuo said that the Bubble Island Music Festival is trying to optimize its goals from two aspects: first, further pursuing the "top" standards (top, rare , rare to see); the second is to try to expand the overall proportion of international artists. Last year, the proportion was 15%, and this year’s goal is 35%.
Take the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei Station lineup that will be sung during the May Day holiday as an example. Its starting lineup brings together well-known artists such as yoasobi, honne, Caodong No Party, An Pu, etc., interweaving multi-cultural backgrounds and niche music categories, comparable to the mainland version of "Chicken Flying Music Festival".
relies on its confidence in the taste of invitations , Bubble Island insists on not playing safe and not doing the same "assembly line". By introducing many overseas artists who came to China to perform for the first time, it has successfully attracted the attention of people from different circles. This not only provides the market with "the right choice" The new viewing choice of "choose expensive" also affects the international trend of consumer audience's aesthetics to a certain extent.
In Zhang Chongshuo's view, they are not interested in repeated things, and even think that repeated things are of no value. He Mentioned that the original intention of launching new IPs such as Bubble Island in 2023 was to try a new paradigm and new standard for Chinese music festivals. This paradigm and standard include aesthetics, content, experience, operation model, etc. As for the content of Bubble Island, they always hope that Bubble Island will be a future-oriented music festival. The goal is to invite Chinese musicians who are going global, Asian superstars who have already made their mark in the world, and the world’s top music festivals. The most unique and charming top musicians gather on Bubble Island.
Looking back, music festivals headed by Bubble Island did lead the trend of domestic music festivals starting to “roll” international artists last year. But when the novelty wears off, overseas lineups inevitably have a high repetition rate of conservative-oriented artists. Hybs, who frequently appeared in the few overseas lineups at many music festivals, was jokingly called by music fans as "rooted in the music industry" last year. Mainland".
In this regard, Chuangyu Wujie has implemented Zhang Chongshuo’s “refuse to repeat” and brought new vitality to the brand and market with its adventurous spirit and industry responsibility.
On the one hand, in terms of the main IP creation, after last year Tianjin established an international label and Guizhou and Yunyou Music Festival jointly created the "Guiyang Rolling Circle New Year", this year's South China Station will focus on luxury Japanese music lineup, and the North China Station's international and Hong Kong and Taiwan lineups are said to be As high as 60%; on the other hand, it also boldly launched multiple new IPs. Last year, it also launched the first official aerospace-themed music festival "Universe Island Music Festival" in cooperation with the National Space Administration Press and Publicity Center, and founded the first Chinese hiphop to go overseas to Singapore. The concert project "china hip-hop power live" and other performance brands have plans to go overseas this year.
However, Li Hongjie also believes that most current music festival organizers lack the spirit of "long-termism". He pointed out that music festivals not only need to use international artists to differentiate their lineups, but also use their own characteristics, distinctive IP attributes, and stable and reliable venues to shape consumers' consumption habits. To a certain extent, this is also reshaping consumers' consumption concepts and perceptions of music festivals, which is conducive to feedback and driving the development of the industry.
In other words, "recruiting" international artists is an inevitable trend. In the long run, it will be beneficial to the industry and users, and it will become a new productive force for the development of the industry. However, as Chinese music festivals enter the stage of competition with new paradigms and new standards , the conservative approach may no longer be effective. Only truly professional organizers can withstand the test of the market, thereby leading to a disruption in the music festival market.
Conclusion
Today, watching performances has become a common way of life and entertainment. Whether it is a music festival or a live house performance, the temperament and tonality displayed may cause the flow of consumers.
As the main force in the cultural consumption market, the young people of Generation Z who advocate individuality and uniqueness are undoubtedly controlling the trend. This also means that organizers need to adopt a more professional operating model to meet the needs of cultural consumption. Lead the market's aesthetic trend and form real product differentiation. At present, the lack of top K-pop and European and American artists may become the next competition point in the music festival market.
As Zhang Chongshuo said, in fact, "internationalization" is not the purpose, it is just a representation. The purpose is to do valuable things. "Valuable things" may be difficult in the short term, but if measured over a longer period of time, you will find that "valuable things" are actually the early elements of future success and are meaningful to users, the industry and yourself. Only then can you achieve long-term returns.
We also believe that with the involution of the "Bubble Islands", the Chinese music festival market will also explore a successful transformation path, truly enter the music festival scene in Asia and even the world, make a Chinese voice, and build its own brand .
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