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9 of the worst music festival fails (and what experiential pros can learn from them)

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9 of the worst music festival fails (and what experiential pros can learn from them)
Music festival tickets are expensive. It’s rare to find general admission tickets for less than $100, and those don’t come with much more than entry inside. Only when you purchase a VIP, platinum, or insert-elite-ticket-name-here pass for three to four times as much will…
What could the future of Austin events look like?
After two years of Covid-related tumult, big-time events are back, hopefully for good. But what do people want from experiential events now, and what are the trends we’ll see more of in the next few years? This summer, the headlines about Austin, Texas, covered…
I only asked you to show me a real good time: Chromatica Ball and the return of stadium tours
On Friday, March 13, 2020, I anxiously paced my apartment and refreshed my Chrome page. No, I wasn’t on the CDC’s website, even as my office sent everyone home and the city was shutting down around me. (Besides, everybody knew we were just working…
What’s your favorite summer XP? And why is it minor league baseball games?
Major League Baseball gets all the attention. Sure, there are World Series games on the line, but with the average ticket to an MLB game going for $35 (and that’s before $12 beers, $10 hotdogs and $30 merch to look the part), where do…
High seas and higher demands: My introduction to post-Covid cruising culture
The first rule of cruising culture, I learned last week, is that you always talk about cruising culture. It was all anyone would ask on Virgin Voyages’ Scarlet Lady — my first cruise since I boarded a rickety Carnival ship to various Señor Frog’s…
Going full out at Cheer Live, and why the show-to-experience formula is such a hit
When my pandemic obsession, Netflix’s Cheer, announced that the Navarro squad would head out on a Summer 2022 tour, I knew I could, I would, I must find a show to attend. Originally, I tried to convince a group of friends to venture out…
Give the Teens What They Want: 4 Predictions for VidCon’s Return to Live Events
We’re closing in on June 22, 2022 — and hoping third time’s the charm for VidCon. After canceling 2020’s conference and then postponing, and ultimately canceling, 2021’s (Delta strikes again), the teens are finally heading back to SoCal (back in Cannes-aheim, to be exact,…
You had to be there: Our favorite (and least favorite) XP from Pop-Up Magazine’s night in Brooklyn
The program said it would be “a night filled with dark skies, whisper networks, hip shaking, bluffing, inheritance, freestyling, lingering looks and more.” A collection of loose phrases that meant as little to me then as they do to you now, but this is…
Cover me in Napa Valley sunshine: BottleRock 2022
Have you ever been sipping a nice, juicy Cab in Napa Valley, looking out over a sea of tangled grape vines, and thought to yourself, I sure wish Pink was here performing an aerial act? Sure you have… Welcome to BottleRock Napa Valley, a…
Bad Vibes and Forced Surprises at the 2022 Oscars
I was excited for the 94th Academy Awards on Sunday night — another relic from the Before Times reemerging from its Covid slumber. I curled up on the couch in my stained high school lacrosse hoodie to judge gorgeous clothes that cost more than…
A tale of two SXSWs: An Austin transplant reflects on the festival’s return
When writer Jillian Anthony visited Austin, Texas, for her first SXSW in 2019, she loved it so much she eventually moved there. In 2022, she tells us what SXSW — back in person after three long years — looks like from the eyes of…
Four ways to elevate a pop-up experience: inspiration from Single Drunk Female’s Fresh Start Mart
Way back in 2019, pop-ups were so overplayed that you couldn’t walk up Fifth Avenue without hitting at least three. But the pandemic’s experiential reset now has us nostalgic for the world of three years ago, pop-ups and all. These events’ bite-sized formats make…
Horizon Worlds isn’t the metaverse, but it’s a start
Facebook, er, Meta’s first version of its VR-based software, “Horizon Worlds,” feels more like a rough draft. The platform shows incredible potential with sandbox tools (get it? because kids “play” in a sandbox…) for users to create VR experiences like hangout spaces, games and…
Art Basel Miami? More like Art Basel Silicon Valley
Last week’s annual Art Basel Miami was a spectacle unlike any other art fair — because it’s not really an art fair anymore. The week-long event celebrated the intersection of art, design, fashion and — especially notable this year — technology. Miami’s growing startup scene was…
Artechouse: An immersive fusion of art and technology, or the world’s largest screensaver?
Have you ever caught yourself zoning out to your computer’s screensaver? One minute you’re working on a budget spreadsheet and the next you’re swirling through a black sea of neon shapeshifters. Or journeying through a brick maze to nowhere. If so, consider saving yourself…
Winter XP preview: Is it the most wonderful time of the year?
With Covid boosters available for all (in the U.S.), winter events were just starting to look as bright, shiny and new as a Red Ryder BB gun. But, while the holiday season may be poppin’, so too is the coronavirus, with the Omicron variant…
New York’s immersive Banksy exhibit: Innovative or gimmicky?
The immersive “Banksy: Genius or Vandal?” exhibit launched in Brussels, Belgium, in the spring, following the international success of the “Immersive Van Gogh” (and later its rival “Van Gogh: The Immersive Experience”). Now Banksy’s snuck its way to the US, with temporary pop-up locations…
XP to get you in the mood for Halloween events 👻
It’s babies-dressed-as-pumpkins season once again! But never fear, if babies, cats or other small animals cosplaying as large, fleshy fruits with lots of seeds isn’t for you, there are many more Halloween events of a slightly more sophisticated variety to be had. Get lost…
Cemetery streaming and screaming: ‘I Know What You Did Last Summer’ at Cinespia
The what: Cinespia The when: Summer and fallXP high: A movie night with thousands of other Angelenos makes it seem like we are not alone in a city of almost 4 million peopleXP low: Parking issues, long lines for concessions It all started with…
What in the XP ever happened to…: Learning from Pokémon Go, HQ Trivia and more
What’s the ”My Sharona” of the experiential industry? Or “Ice Ice Baby?” or “Stacy’s Mom?” That one activation or experience that was everywhere and then, just like that, it was gone. As the XP Land team gears up for Q4 wrap-ups and 2022 planning,…
Fall preview, part deux: Even more pumpkin-spiced XP
Ah, fall is here. Sweater weather. Pumpkin-spiced everything (yeah, it’s a bit cheugy, but it’s also yummy). Football. Back-to-school sales. And our personal favorite: The experience of stepping on satisfyingly crunchy leaves during your afternoon walk (results may vary, crunchy leaves not guaranteed). The…
Reading the book tour revolution through the XP lens
Is this a book tour or a rock concert? Or wait, is this a virtual conference? One could be forgiven for not quite knowing the difference. Book tours, a publisher-funded promotional mechanism for new releases, are a bit all over the place these days.…
Music and books and politics, oh my! Welcome back to The New Yorker Festival
Grab your limited edition tote bag because the The New Yorker Festival is back, baby. Founded in 1999, the long-running festival gives attendees a chance to hobnob with the best and brightest minds of the culture. The multi-day event went virtual in 2020 and…
Where ‘filth’ and ‘trash’ are compliments: Welcome to Camp John Waters
“I’d love to sell out completely. It’s just that nobody has been willing to buy.” John Waters Well, it looks like the legendary filmmaker and trash connoisseur found his buyers. The fourth annual Camp John Waters took place Sept. 10-13 in the southern Berkshires…
Experiential, but make it fashion: Inside the return of New York Fashion Week
This year’s New York Fashion Week coincided with the US Open, the Met Gala (check out the lewks) and the VMAs. There are general back-to-school vibes zinging through the late summer air, making it feel like yet another big milestone in the city’s great…
The US Open is back, but is still oh-so #2021
The US Open served up a full experience this year, allowing 100 percent audience capacity and tennis, food and fun galore. Given that the 2020 event took place sans fans, attendees were more than happy to take full advantage of the opportunities presented this…
These new sports stadiums get the “W” for fan experience
It’s August, which means sports fans everywhere are gearing up to support their beloved teams across pro football, basketball and the collegiate level. Fans are breathlessly preparing for the (fingers crossed) return to IRL experiences. Capacity restrictions and mask mandates aside, franchise managers know…
MLB’s ‘Field of Dreams’ game: Is this Hybrid Heaven?
Finally, the first truly great hybrid event of the pandemic THE WHAT To celebrate the 30th anniversary of the release of “Field of Dreams” (you know, Kevin Costner, Amy Madigan, James Earl Jones, Ray Liotta, “If you build it …,” you know the rest)…
Burning Man goes digital: Burners head into the multiverse, while renegades go rogue
Strap on your Steampunk dust goggles, double-knot your vegan leather platform boots and head straight for your… computer. Yes, Burning Man is going virtual for the second year in a row (thanks, Delta variant). The 2021 “Virtual Burn: The Great Unknown” will take place…
What are the pandemic-era prospects for the new slate of experiential hotels?
In news to absolutely no one, the tourism industry is hurting. We just did the math and TSA traveler numbers show a drop so far this month of more than 20 percent compared to the same period in 2019 (you know, the before times).…
Lolla rocked out — was it the beginning of IRL XP, or the (temporary) end?
Lollapalooza wrapped up this past weekend after a memorable — perhaps one for the ages — four-day run in Chicago’s Grant Park. The festival kicked off last Thursday with a reported 385,000 attendees, about 100,000 per day. If you think, wow, that’s a lot…
How do you replicate Comic-Con virtually? You can’t.
San Diego Comic-Con is world famous not just for its scale, but also for the mind-blowingly eclectic geek-dom. Packed into one expo hall, cosplayers, celebrities and nerd culture pioneers all showcase the best (well, in their realms) in entertainment. Comic-Con achieves a core tenet…
It’s summertime and the living is XP
Blink and it’s already summer — time to slather on the SPF 100 because while the sun is hot, the XP is on fire (not literally — well, it depends). Mark your calendars to check out the projects your XP brethren have been working…
Top takeaways from the 2021 awards season
This year’s Cannes Film Festival, which wrapped this weekend, was a bit of a mixed bag, according to various reports. The red carpets wowed as usual, complete with the glamour of yesteryear (as in pre-pandemic). Moving moments such as Matt Damon tearing up at…
Was this year’s Cannes Lions a virtual success? Depends who you ask
Today, Cannes Lions is no longer the exclusive the domain of very well-heeled and well-connected VIPs. The five-day festival celebrates creative work in the ad industry and related fields. This year, it was virtual and available to the whole world (for a price), through…
SXSW 2021: Hot take on a not-so-hot user interface
You know what’s so not fun? Spending weeks being super excited about virtual SXSW 2021 then, WHAT?! On the website, there were 20 navigation items to choose from with completely unhelpful category names like “Channel 1” and “Channel 5.” And then the much-touted extended…

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