The brains behind the “Alienstock” concert said Monday he will skip the event, but the gathering set to descend on a tiny Nevada town near Area 51 will still go on, according to a local report.
Matthew Roberts, who first dreamed up the viral joke-event “Storm Area 51, They Can’t Stop All of Us” before plotting the music festival, told the Las Vegas Review-Journal that too many concerns piled up for him.
“It was either going to go one of two ways,” Roberts said. “We saw the red flags and we pull out, or we could have ignored those and have it turn into a Fyre Festival 2.0 on our hands.”
Fyre Festival in 2017 saw concertgoers fly to the Bahamas for a concert-that-wasn’t, leaving them stranded.
Roberts said he will head to Las Vegas instead for an Area 51 celebration.
Alienstock’s website said as of Tuesday night that “If you planned on coming to Alienstock, we invite you to join us for the Area 51 Celebration event at the Downtown Las Vegas venue!”
The original festival has left local officials scrambling to prepare, and two counties signed preemptive emergency declarations. The concert is set to be held Sept. 20-22 at the Little A’Le’Inn in Rachel, about a dozen miles from Area 51.
The inn’s owner, Connie West, told the Review-Journal the show will go on and that 20 bands are set to play.
“It’s going forward,” West said. “I’ve also got the medical paid for and all of my permits. We’re going to throw the best party that we can.”
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