Vacations Announces MATES FESTIVAL in LA on 11/16 Feat. Puma Blue, Claud, Yot Club, Ian Sweet, Kacy Hill & more
August 26, 2024 BY Emma Orland
Today, two-time platinum-selling Australian band Vacations announces they will bring their MATES FESTIVAL to Los Angeles on November 16th at The Bellwether. The inaugural lineup will feature Vacations, Puma Blue, Claud, Yot Club, Ian Sweet, Kacy Hill, Jaguar Jonze, and Waax. It will utilize the venue’s numerous stages and rooms to create an indoor festival experience over the course of one evening. The festival is curated to create community across continents, highlighting other artists that the band admires. Tickets will go on-sale on August 30th at 10:00am PT.
MATES was first launched by the band in July 2022 in Australia as a way to reunite their local music scene after the pandemic with a strong focus on community and inclusivity. The ethos remains the same in 2024, with the location inspired by lead singer Campbell Burn’s partial relocation to Los Angeles (the rest of the band remain based in Newcastle).
Burns explains, “MATES goes back to where we started as a band. The festival taps into our DIY-ethos and love for fostering community. We’ve thrown events similar to this before, but nothing to this scale. For myself, personally, I truly do want to bridge the gap between different scenes around the world simply because I care, because there’s so much music that needs to be heard. If we can use our platform to bring people together, and have a good time doing it, then why not?”
The festival follows the wrap of their No Place Like Home World Tour earlier this month which included sold-out shows in Los Angeles (the Novo), New York (Brooklyn Steel), DC (9:30 Club), Chicago (The Vic), San Antonio (Aztec), San Diego (The Observatory) and more.
Tickets for MATES FESTIVAL can be found here:
https://thebellwetherla.com/events/mates-fest-241116
https://www.instagram.com/matesfestival_
ABOUT VACATIONS:
A DIY affair from the get-go, the band Vacations formed in 2016 primarily as a songwriting vehicle for Campbell Burns, Burns later adding band members Jake Johnson, Nate Delizzotti, and Joseph Van Lier. Their song “Young” is certified Gold in Canada, Australia, and Poland, and is certified Platinum in the U.S., and their single “Telephones” is also certified Platinum in the US as of December 2023. The band has racked up over 1.5 billion streams worldwide, an average of 55 million streams/month, including over 675 million streams within the last year and over 2.2m Shazam’s. They have performed at Austin City Limits, All Things Go Festival, Thing Festival, London Calling, The Great Escape, All Points East, and The Sounds Project in Indonesia. Their 2024 album, No Place Like Home, debuted at #6 on the Spotify US Album Chart and #2 on the NACC (North American College & Community Radio Chart), and is a mainstay on Sirius XMU and AltNation. So far in 2024, they have performed on Jimmy Kimmel Live!, The Late Show With Stephen Colbert‘s #Lateshowmemusic series, and on CBS Saturday Morning. The record received praise from Spin, Rolling Stone, Uproxx, Flood, Grammy.com, Esquire, and the band was nominated for Rolling Stone Australia’s Global Award (the only AU award selected by the international Rolling Stone team).
