Well, the first thing we have to do is listen to the fans and make sure that we're not thinking that we're solving problems that don't exist or we're missing something that's blatantly obvious, you know, and that's one thing that's, again, so great about the Bonnarubians is that they'll tell you what they think.

And then when, you know, an act like that comes through, everything changes. He is an absolute visionary. His whole team is, you know, extremely creative. And you want to try to get out of the way when something like that comes your way.

Welcome back to the What Podcast, where we have joked for years and years that there are two, maybe three really great days in the entire year. Could be Christmas for you, could be your birthday, could be the birth of a child, whatever is your number one. Number two is always lineup day in our universe.

And it's earlier than ever.

And guess what? It's earlier than ever. And it happened today. And I don't know about you guys, but my head is spinning because we've Russ and I especially but I know Brian even from talking to you, you it's been on your mind all day as well. But we've done a lot of work. A lot of talking about Bonnarud.

Yeah, you guys, especially and then you know, I've also do a local thing here. I've been working on all day too. So it's been, it's been a busy couple of days, but it's it slows down from here. Me and Russ got our big local main times 24 party coming up this weekend, not ours, like we throw it but that we're a part of looking forward to that. And so yeah, it's been busy, but it's been fun. And

let's just be clear about that real quick. When you say you're part of it. That means you ride shot you ride bitch in his van.

Yeah, yeah, I just jump in the van and ride.

Well, he brings jello shots.

I am making a ton of jello shots.

Yeah, fair enough.

I'm covering up a hole that makes a hundred jello shots.

You contribute. I take it back. I take it back.

Well, I'm not looking forward to that either, by the way. I don't like it. But I love the tradition. So we will have

And to celebrate I'm wearing my PBR ugly sweater for today and I'll be wearing it this weekend as well. So

Nice.

You're in Chattanooga look for it. It's always a big time.

It is a cool event. So all right. So didn't mean to mean to get us off track too much.

But should we start with just just initial reactions to line up day here and this I mean, we've been going around and

Different different areas about it. But

let's do this real quick. Just to wrap up what I was what I what we've done today. So the lineup came out December

2nd. And I'm going to say that depending on what day you're hearing listening to this.

Hopefully December 2nd. I just did I hope you're just now listening to it. But if you're not the lineup dropped at 11

o'clock Eastern time on December 2nd, which is easily

A month and a half.

Almost two months earlier than normal and once a mind blowing how early this is. Yeah, I'm not ready. We did not. I mean, you know, we

We got a little bit of a heads up but not too too much. Not not much. And then there was no fanfare. It just dropped.

And then

Thanks to our good friends

At the festival and see three and live nation

Russ and I because of work schedules got to have an hour or so with Cory Smith and Tim Tuba Smith

he is the director of festivals for all of C3 and I

Hope I have that right and Cory is festivals and strategic initiatives is his official title the director of

Coughs at the title. Yeah

Cory's the marketing manager. Yeah, right for Bonnaroo and for Bonnaroo in the like a regional type of

They're the cheeses. They're the guys that make these decisions and we got to spend an hour with them

Russ and I did and we talked about everything from Bonnaroo radio returning to

the smaller

footprint for the farm

To the lineup and then

Last night

Tuesday night December 2nd the three of us were joined by what almost a hundred people

Had a pretty big stream. It's a YouTube exclusive go to our YouTube channel and watch it because yeah, we stream for about an hour

We had David Bruce. I am Bonnaroo photographer on and we had Lena our ticket winner from last year

We woke up in the morning wore the same clothes and then did the

Today's show. Yeah

Yeah, so anyway, that's a lot of content a lot to talk about

So if you're mostly interested in our thoughts and other people's thoughts on the lineup

you know go find that live thing if you want to hear from

Cory and Tuba the the main the I guess most regular show

Would be my option but I would highly recommend listening to both because it's awesome

It's the best

All right to your point real quick Brian before we get into these shows initial thoughts

Yeah, I'll say the same thing

I started off the other show with is that if you ever didn't believe me when I say I don't care who's at Bonnaroo

This is the year to call me out on it because I'm not I'm not

I'm not I'm not immediately wild. I mean I've gone over it and over it and over it and I

Am excited and I know it'll grow on me but I

2022

Until to this point till before today yesterday

2022 is my least favorite lineup of all

22 years at that point. We're at 23 years now

The 23rd coming up I think my math is right on that and that was by far my least favorite

This makes me long for 2022

Tool and Billy strings and Stevie Nicks things I kind of rolled my eyes at at the time

so

It's it's year to year. It's a cyclical kind of thing in a way it it doesn't mean I'm not excited

It's just it's gonna take some getting used to and some discovery and we're gonna work on that

I'm gonna work on that over the course of the next few months. I'm happy that we have it

I'm happy we have something to talk about

Russ

Kind of the same boat

I mean there are stuff there's definitely things on every day that I want to see so, you know, it's not the worst lineup but

You know, there are some things that stick out

Skrillex on Thursday, I'm interested in that and I'm not really an EDM guy

But I feel like you know when you get somebody like that you got to see him

I am glad to see you know, wet leg is on there weird out weird

I was probably my number one on this and you know, I just saw weird out at shaky knees

So I already know that's gonna be a good show

You know, we also pointed out well rainbow kitten surprise

There's a lot of stuff that's coming back that I'm happy to see and as you alluded to when we talked to tuba and

Corey and asked him about that. There's a very specific reason for

Exactly, which acts came back

which we'll get into but

Yeah, I mean

Noah Khan and Rufus do soul

I think it's pretty neat that we have interviewed two of the headliners in the past, you know before they were headliners and

I think we can definitely go back and revisit those episodes a little bit

But and then Kesha I think Kesha is one that like, you know in all the the talk online about

Today nobody nobody mentioned Kesha

So that's one that just kind of like surprised everyone. I think

Same with blues traveler. I mean, they're not very high up there, but I think that's one that's is gonna be great, too

Okay, I agree with all that I think you hit on all the ones I'm looking at blues traveler flip turn turnstile

Some of those

Tedeschi trucks is always a great show

I

Think Derek trucks is top four or five guitar players in the world

I could listen to him play all day long

And he's such a nice guy. And so is his wife Susan. So

So there's that I'm also curious

Because we like the sausage making to see how Bonnaroo handles this

They always do such a good job of listening to people

One of the things you'll hear in our interview with the tuba and Cory is how many responses they got it's stunning

Stunning how many responses they got to their survey?

So, you know we laugh about and and Brian you and I are a total agreement on surveys

You know the idea of somebody saying I never go it sucks, you know

that to me's

Why did you bother to?

Well, and sometimes that's a fault of the survey question too and their their first survey was I believe completely worthless

Their second one was much better. Yeah, they actually listen. Yeah, are you but are you going?

I'm just making something up, but are you going to Bonnaroo? Yes or no? I mean what kind of help is that?

I mean, yes, right like so surveys do serve a purpose and and and this one especially the second one they rolled out

It appears and I mean I'm watching the rest of the episode with the rest of you guys I was at work I

Involved which I hated cuz I love Cory and tuba especially too because we only talked to him one other time and other than seeing

Them at the festival. I don't get a chance to chit chat with him and he's a fun guy to talk to so

And then we'll have them back on the yeah, not just fun

But I mean these are the guys that making the decisions

This isn't like give us your opinion on what you think is happening this is like why did this happen?

Because I made the decision

I don't know I don't know how much online chatter because I haven't been able to be in the you know

I don't get too lost in comment sections. I actually truly mean that I'm not in them very often, right?

But the the moving of that tent is one of the most

bewildering ideas that I have heard and Bonnaroo's done a lot of

Almost were drastic might be the word to use

radical even things

to make adjustments over the years and usually they always work out and I look at that I'm like

The hell you doing to my best. That's my land. That's my way. It's like a White House. That's our house

That's my land over there. What are you doing?

So I'll be interested to see more conversation about that over and how that unfolds and you guys talk about that a little bit, too

Yeah, it is a little interesting. You'll get that it's not what you might expect

I didn't expect it. Yeah, but it made sense and

You know, we even say in the show if it sucks

They'll put it back and in the return of radio Bonnaroo

We haven't had a lot of time to talk about but is it radio Bonnaroo or Bonnaroo radio?

You know what you said that in the last show and I forgot to follow up on that. I don't know

And the reason I don't know you got me questioning it now is because sometimes especially in specialized industries sometimes

Jargon and lingo turns in to what it turns into

I know that while we were on the air whoever we is which I spent three years and it got

incrementally more each year

After the trust was built and by the third year they wanted me in there like five hours a day

I said guys I want to go to the get stone. He'll do it

He'll do that 3 a.m. Shift

When it was on the air it was almost I mean I never asked but it was

You're listening to one on one five

Radio Bonnaroo never ever did we say Bonnaroo radio and the signage said radio Bonnaroo

But I don't know like I don't know when they'd established this really really cool

Idea for this festival 20 years ago that they said here's exactly what it's called

But us on the air the three years I was around

It was you know, I don't know we got a road around here called highway 58, but it's 58 highway

58 highway you mean highway 58 no 58 highway. We'll get some clarity on this one. There's another

Radio Bonnaroo, I'm not gonna change. I want to say what you say

It's near and dear to you

We might have been arrogant

Ego-maniacs deciding how this is gonna go. I can't remember it was ten years ago. I'm with you

I'm I'm I'm team Brian on very excited

It's back and I'm very excited that this festival continues to do what they've always done

Listen to their constituents their patrons or customers. They do it and thank you for doing that. Yeah, very true

All right. Also, we've got tickets to give away

Thanks to I don't know if I should say names

But we've been able to give away tickets every year since we've been doing this podcast and we have two more GA tickets and a

parking pass

One of the guests on the live show

Was our last year winner?

We've had the good fortune of meeting most of them in the last year or two on the farm, which has been kind of a thrill

Super excited to be able to give to away

There's a couple of options you can go to

To the what dot co slash win or go

Call four two three six six seven seven eight seven seven and basically tell us

Why you should win?

That's a simple question, but please be creative

Surprise have fun with it and we'll we'll ask for recommendations later on down the road and different things but overall

Yeah, you know enter as many times as you want one of the things we loved about Lena last year was she sent us

so many different

Entrances different ways they were funny they were heartfelt they were thoughtful

And she just stood out so

Love for somebody to win. It means a lot. I wish we had more to give away. That's the hardest part

Today it sounds like a great idea in whatever two three months when we have to pick a winner it's

We've already got a lot of entries all ready. Yeah, we do and to that point we don't know when exactly we will draw

We will not drag it out

Too too long. We know you guys need to plan and we know you want to win

So but we're so early on this damn drop. It's gonna be a little bit. It's gonna be a minute

So you got plenty of time to get in plenty of time if you've already entered

We'll probably play some of these that's the other thing. It gives us some good content because we love hearing these answers

That's the thing. Yeah, you can call and give us a voicemail

You can email us and if you do, you know, we'd love to get some pictures or video or something

You could you could submit a video you can record yourself and send it

Not gonna lie. It's all stuff that we plan on using on the show. So, you know, you'll see entries

Throughout the throughout the next season for sure. Yep, exactly

Alright guys, what else?

That gets us up to date and look I'm looking forward to finding out what tuba and Cory have you say I don't know about you

And we will they promise they'll come back on later

before

June when we can ask them about more details on some of the changes

If they don't answer your question in this episode we promise we will get to it

You know either directly by asking them or having them back on so

I

Don't know what else to say other than guys

2026 it's here. You know it

Russ is this season eight or nine for us? This is season nine for us. Oh my god. Okay, here we go

Real quick why this is the earliest

You guys have released it all hours of the day

typically January February

I mean we we've been fortunate enough to get it early in some instances

This one was kind of a surprise kind of came out of nowhere

What was the thinking behind doing releasing it now and the way you did it?

Yeah, the main thing is I

Really didn't want to put try to ask anybody for any of their money in exchange for a Bonnaroo that was

You know going to have some substantial changes

Before they saw exactly what that was gonna look like

So, you know kind of you're looking at

the decision-making

Time frame that it takes for someone to you know, get their shit together to be able to

plan a boner plan going to boner and getting their friends together and

getting their camping stuff together and all that kind of stuff like

If we waited till the you know, normal kind of January time frame

And didn't do a blind presale. I just felt like we wouldn't be given folks enough time

I just felt like we wouldn't be given folks enough time

So I kind of got the team together and I was like what if we drop this thing early this year?

And everyone was like let's make it happen. So

Here we are. I have no idea if this is how we'll do it in the future. It was pretty fun

It worked out

so far

Which is good because if it didn't I think I probably would have gotten fired so

Well, the guy that can answer that is with us as well

To let's go back a little bit and I don't want to spend a lot of time talking about last summer

But I do want to know because I think we asked you before Cory at what point did you know?

We were going forward, you know that at what point did it feel like boundary 26 was gonna happen?

And that it was gonna happen in June and now we need to you know, put

Not all of it but put as much behind us as we can and focus on the future when did that start happening?

I mean it was it was really you know when we were firing off all those surveys that we did and I think you know

It's something that we talked about a lot and it's like, okay. Well, what do we?

If we got some rest and recovered a little bit, you know, and you know, how do we?

You know, what do we do here? How do we move forward and and you know, we all were in an agreement

That well the first thing we have to do is listen to the fans and make sure that we're not thinking that we're solving problems

that don't exist or

We're missing something that's blatantly obvious, you know, and and that's one thing that's again

So great about the Bonnarooians is that they'll tell you what they think good bad or indifferent, you know, and so

You know and that's you know, I think once we got that

The survey results back there were there were some surprises in there

The survey results back there were there were some surprises in there but for the most part

Keep it in June. That's where we want to be, you know, that was really what we took away from it

So I think you know pretty pretty quickly after that was when we were like, okay this will

Let's let's let's let's let it rip and not not take a beat

I'm glad you said it that way and and I'll kind of

Lay a little blame on myself or admit to not not being very smart sometimes as I've said

I

At one point on the show said, you know one thing we need to stop doing is listen to know all listing to all

The people on social media is I'm not really the naysayers, you know who don't

Who were just throwing things out there because they heard from a friend who heard from a friend who heard, you know that guy

You know that guy

But what you said the Bonnaroo people are a smart people

They love this festival as much as as Russ and I do and as much as you both do so

They they have some good ideas. Don't they they know what works? They know what doesn't work

They released what they you know works for them. So how important was that?

It with the surveys and gathering information. I

Guess what I'm saying is how much confidence did you guys have that we're getting good information?

well, the

The sample size was massive

Two of the surveys we had to turn off because I think it googled forms caps you at like 50,000

And we were about to hit that so

That's I mean, that's crazy if you think of how many people come to Bonnaroo

So when you get that many people weighing in

Especially, you know knowing that we're kind of

Releasing it via, you know email SMS

Socials kind of to like the core like we're not putting any money behind it. We're not trying to get it out there out there

So you kind of know that you're hearing, you know, and some of the questions were you know indicative of your hearing from

your core fans

You know when you get a sample size that that big the confidence level gets pretty high which is

Allows us to you know, make some hard decisions feeling like we're doing what is being asked of us, you know

To be how different and I've asked you this before how different is the Bonnaroo crowd in that regard?

I mean could you you do surveys at other?

festivals, I'm sure

I'll ask you the same question how how important was having the confidence in the people answering these surveys I

Mean it's it's it's crucial but I think that's again like, you know, that's that's where we just kind of went back to our roots

There it's like, you know, we were all everybody was shell-shocked, you know

And so it's like let's let's really just let's get a baseline here

And I think the I think the fact that that many people responded period was a massive indicator

You know if we got like no response or people were just like I'm done with you

You know, like that's that's a different thing then like no

I am gonna tell you what I think and what I feel and give you my feedback on what this is and

You know, and it's not you know, they're I don't remember clearly but I mean there weren't a lot of open forum

type of questions on there, you know, and so

you know, it's it's always easy to go into Instagram and and you know troll in the comments, but

If you're gonna take the time to open up a survey and do that and submit it then you know

You you know you care and you're probably somebody that's actually been to the event. I think you know, you mentioned that about online

I think there's I don't know. Yeah, there's a sizable portion of people on the on the socials that I don't think they've ever gone

They're just out trolling. Yeah, those are my favorite answers. It's terrible. I've never been

Check and thanks for your time exactly

Um

We ask here and we talk about it all the time the lineup

How is it a lineup driven thing? How important is the lineup for you guys this year?

And we know from talking to Benson and Stephen that they work on this year round. So

Where did that graph line meet? I guess

Did you feel like you had a good lineup in the works? Did you feel like it had to be a super home run?

Where you don't where did where did they intersect? I mean, I think the lineup process is

basically the same every year, you know, you start at the top of your list and

You

You know work your way through that and then if if you're you know target that you just went for isn't available then you

Think oh who else would be really cool here?

And that's that's kind of the process and I think it was no different this year

I think being able to land someone like a skrillex that's been really high on all of our fans, you know

Lists is is a huge

stone to get rolling downhill

I think a Rufus to soul that's been you know asked for a lot is huge

So I think I think you know nailing some of those like super core acts

Really kind of helps get the rest of it moving

If that answers your question, yeah

And I know Russ wants to ask about the the day changes cuz I mean, you know

He's he's a show up Tuesday kind of guy. And so that's a big change. But before we do

Cuz I know a lot of people

When it ended and when we were talking about lineups wondered how many acts from last year?

Can you bring back and I was glad to see like a flip turn and some of those

How big I'm glad to see a lot of these yeah that carried over from last year

I'm very happy with that dude. One thing that was actually really cool about that is we were able to pull

Data from the app to see which acts were the most scheduled on custom schedules and

There's like tens of thousands of people that did those

So that was like that wasn't the only tool that we used obviously

But it was it was really useful for us to kind of look at it. It's a good one. You're like, yeah

It was it was interesting

That's very cool

Go ahead Russ. I set you up

Cuz I want to ask about it too, but I know it's on your mind the the thoughts about

The changes and and well we'll get into changes but let's start with two changes in the actual days the time frame

Yeah, well, I want to start you mentioned Skrillex and I think that was kind of a big a

big bomb that dropped that because you had kind of set the expectation that Thursday was gonna be more of a

Low-key you mentioned a welcome party. They'll be like maybe one act, you know, don't expect anyone big and then you know

Then you turn around with Skrillex so, you know, how did that come about and

You know, what's what can we expect because it's it's not gonna be it's still gonna be a lesser day than a normal Thursday, right?

Yeah, sorry keep stealing these two about

It's all good yeah, I feel like I was pretty vocal early on

About folks not getting their expectations for that Thursday too high like we really didn't want to oversell it

Obviously that Skrillex conversation is is going on

but just knowing

You know, it's been

What 12 13 years since he's played the show?

So when you get that much time, you know, there's been a few years that that conversation has happened and you know

You haven't been able to land it so they kind of become that white whale so you don't exactly bank on it happening

So, you know just try not to get people too excited about that and

try to plan a welcome party that is very bonnaroo and

very fun

and super like culture driven

And then when you know an act like that comes through

Everything changes. Yeah, you know, he is an absolute visionary and

you know a creative his whole team is, you know, extremely creative and

You want to try to get out of the way when something like that comes your way. So

Obviously that Thursday grew in scope a lot based on what we were originally expecting

But yeah, I think it's gonna be insane out there. It's gonna be awesome

Yeah, this seems more like and I guess maybe if it was a normal year skrillex would ideally be maybe like your big Sunday

Headliner, but I'm guessing at this stage. Maybe Sunday was already set

So like Thursday was really the only day that worked for him. Is that true?

Or was this a you wanted to open with no we tried to get it because we try to get him for the Thursday

Oh, okay. Yeah, we thought that would be awesome

And it feels like a good welcome back to me I can just picture everybody

You know checking in getting ready hugging neighbors saying hi checking out the

changes in center and everything and then

Right in your face. Yeah, he's not gonna hold back

Yes, really gonna go lightweight on it. That's for sure and we will get to those changes in center here soon, too

Because I know there's a few. Mm-hmm

You mentioned if since we're sticking here you mentioned it being like an opening ceremony type of thing

Are you still thinking that are you basically turning it over to his people and and seeing where he wants to take the?

train I guess

Yeah, I think we're wanting to let him drive and just work to kind of execute

Their team's vision on this thing nice

Well, we'll certainly I mean we always do this but we'll ideate with them as well to see you know

Are there things that we can do to you know to accentuate that and you know?

And make it more, you know, but again they they are they're in the driver's seat on that and that's that's gonna be the best thing for everybody

All right, well I'm gonna let's go ahead and jump into changes talked about

Wednesday entry and that's for campers right Wednesday entry. So no Tuesday

No Tuesday move in day Thursday to get ready for Thursday night. What was that? What is the thinking?

And I guess and also it's a smaller footprint correct the which came first or do they were they sort of parallel?

Great question. Yes

Yes to all

you know, I think the the

jump right into the Tuesday thing so

one of the biggest learnings we had from from 2025 was just

You know, we we knew some areas that get a little swampy but having to be the wettest spring in Tennessee in 85 years

certainly

Showed us a few new areas that were

were problematic obviously

and so yeah, we could do a bunch of work to try to

Increase those specific areas with better drainage and then you know that would probably trigger some sort of broader review

Environmental review because you're not you're not supposed to just expedite water off your property because that means it's going to someone else's property

Drain it where yeah, exactly

It's gotta go somewhere sometimes a lot of times frankly. The solution is well just don't put people there, you know, like yeah, you know, and so

But you know, you guys know it's like it's it's we we use up all the space out there

And so the only way to do that is to get you know to lower the capacity

Of the event and and just really just remove those those those sites from circulation

That number ended up being pretty much what we have is a batting average for the Tuesday entry as far as camping goes

The other one too is remember Tuesday usually started at noon. It wasn't even a full

Really a full ingress day just because of the volume. So

You know while it's yes, it's technically

You know one less day. It's really kind of a half day and

You know volume wise, you know, it should be pretty pretty pretty close to the same

on the day to day so

That's really where the logic came in there and I will say like it's

You know talking about how the how the sausage is made like the you know, it's not

it's not inexpensive to turn the lights on on the farm and

Get the staff and get the vendors and get everybody spooled up and ready to have folks on the farm

And so that day will help us on some cost recovery on that front too. So

It's got a save on insurance too, right the the less time you have it open to the public the less

insurance coverage you're gonna need

Not necessarily, you know the insurance piece is complex but it's a

It's it's it's more based off of some of the financial numbers rather than number of days but

I I've I've certainly been pleading my case on a couple different fronts as far as

Prolation of insurance policies and things like that. So that's if we want to do a really boring what podcast I can start talking about insurance

but I think I'll

Say also

Take a nap or if you have a brand's not here we'll save the boring stuff for him. Yeah

There you go. Well, it's don't handle that

But that was a rant. What was what was the back half of that question? There was another part of that one

I think it was was it which came first

type of thing did it and

Get the number of people and the number of days and the footprint the size of the footprint

Yep, how much and I know you guys don't like talking actual numbers

But so I'll ask it this way. How did you determine what the size of the footprint would be and the

Ticket sales what?

How did that come about? I mean did you I know you guys are great with data and I'm guessing this was not a random

You know number but I think you could determine it. Well, the irony is well the capacity is lower the sites not any smaller

Because the low-lying areas aren't at the partners. I mean a lot of murder to perimeter, but they're not all at the perimeter and so

You know if we're if we're if we're full up again with the new capacity like we'll probably still be in the same areas

You're just gonna see some some low-lying areas that are gonna be just roped off and just wide open

Which again if it's not, you know, god willing it's not not same as it was last year. Then that's that's more space to

frisbee and hang out and party and do whatever so

I think it's I think it's a good thing on that front as far as the guest experience goes. So

Yeah for people who have only been there a couple of times and maybe not been there

You guys do a good job of figuring that out and making it feel like it's full no matter what like

Was it 16 which was a low number?

Estimates in the 40s and number of people

It was one of my favorites it felt great it didn't feel small it didn't feel

Lacking in any way you move some stuff around to you know that to make sure that every space is animated

so I'm not sure that I have a question there other than a you know a

General comment that because that can there's nothing worse than being in a room, you know that is

You know has a lot of people but it feels empty. You know what I mean?

No, I think there's you know, again, we'll put this on the boring boring podcast

But the you know, there's a ton of math that goes we talked about this last time you guys have me on there's

I mean there's math around everything, you know, and so

But we you know, you're absolutely right. We want to make that venue feel

You know, we need it to have the Bonnaroo vibe and that's not just having this huge expansive space

With half the people in it like we want it to be comfortably comfortably full and activated, you know, so

You know every every year and you know, some people be like how the hell did I end up all the way back here?

It's like we're we're never gonna load Plaza 11 before we load Plaza 3, you know

So it's gonna kind of fill in from the front back no matter what happens

I mean that's that that's one that I I don't know that that's a stake

I put in the ground early when I kind of came in the picture because I when I heard you know

When I noticed that I'm like the first person in line goes to the back 60

No, we're not doing that. It's just a no. Well the traffic plan

I'm like figure it out. That's not an option. If you're first in line you park at the arch. I don't care. Yeah, you know

so

All right based on the surveys other than having it in June and and bands that you wanted

What were some of the other things that people said they wanted that you get it and that resulted in changes that we're gonna see

People said that they wanted to have a Bonnarooy this year

That was a big one

Or I guess in 26 they said that yeah

We got the sense that

The mix of programming is pretty much where people want it to be if anything they'd like to see

some more guitars out there

So I think you know you see some more guitars this year

Which I'm always happy about

I

Want to think of the other stuff water stations bathrooms camp where people are camping

the plaza well, I mean I think

it's kind of jump it's a it's kind of jump around a little bit, but I think the I

Think one of the big ones that we we learned from last year's experience is just in that scenario

how we communicate and talk with the fans like we

We you know we

Seriously did the best that we could and in the heat of the moment, but you know hindsight's always 20-20 and so

You know Cory can speak to the specifics of this, but we're really excited to bring bonder radio back

And really just make that site wide you know we didn't you know and you guys know we've got the PAs in the campgrounds

And obviously there's there's way better cell coverage than there's ever been out there just from the Verizon and AT&T towers

So there's there's a lot of different ways for us to communicate there, but again

You know we're just we're excited to have have bonder radio back. Where you wanna? Yeah, yeah

I think we were here. Yeah, I'm sorry. Let me jump real quick

I'm sorry Bryan stones not here cuz he would take full credit

No, we we definitely we definitely heard a lot in relation to bonder radio

I think obviously you know that's

Kind of a no-brainer. You know some of the feedback that we're getting was

Yeah, we got a text from you guys

An hour and a half after my neighbor got it

And you know I got a I got a push notification

Today and you guys sent it yesterday, so just some of those connectivity issues

especially when everyone

You know kind of instead of being dispersed across the whole property ended up being just in the campgrounds those those issues

Kind of stacked up, so yeah, I mean I were

Bonder radio in the past is you know been a number of things

It's it's had a really big scope at times

I think the part that we are trying to replicate this year is simply the the fan communication aspect

You know we've got a good buddy of ours Ben Smith

Who we used to work with at AC Entertainment?

Oh, yeah, I know Ben. Yeah, he's gonna be running that show

So we're doing

Wednesday Thursday

Sunday night and Monday

fully programmed

You know specialty programs

guest hosts

throwback

sets

interviews

everything

And then once everybody gets in and gets you know kind of settled and the music starts

We will keep a very Bonnarooy centric playlist going so if you're at your campsite

and

You know want to tune in you're welcome to

But then sort of all weekend will have the ability to cut in as needed

So if you're in center and the screen say go to your car you can go to your car and turn that on you're

Gonna be able to get you know regular updates

From our team, so we're really excited about that. I think that that was that was an easy one to deliver

Yeah, and it's we're happy that worked out local radio station that you're doing this with is it the rooster

Yeah, it's the rooster mm-hmm. Okay. Is it gonna be broadcast?

Yeah, perfect name too is it gonna be broadcast from the farm or

Somewhere outside well, we're working out the exact details the the bulk of the programming when we're fully taking over on Wednesday Thursday

Sunday night and Monday is going to be from their studio in Tullahoma

Yeah, I think recorded stuff. I'm sorry to interrupt a lot of will be live

We we might have some pre-recorded elements maybe for some of the interviews and stuff that are harder to do live

But yeah, it's most of it's gonna be live

So you know we're trying to work out if we can have people call in and stuff like that so

There's a lot of cool stuff. We can do there

Well, I know a guy. I'll give you an hour or two free

Yeah, I'm stone. He'd love to volunteer Brian for that because I know he'd love to get him on there. Yeah

That's cool. I know a lot of people it was awesome, man

I love coming over that was one of my favorite coming over that mountain

Turning on Bono radio and my whole world changed. It was that was there for that

Four or five days so very cool. Yeah, I mean I think you know to your question too like

all of the improvements, you know the grass the the roads the

The drainage everything that we've kind of mentioned that we're working on out there, you know came from hearing from fans

and

You know a lot of it is

You know our fans are asking us to do something right?

And we're we're trusting the professionals and then our grounds team out there to tell us what the best way to spend that money

Is it's gonna have the biggest impact?

Or at least I am too, but actually knows how some of that stuff works

But but yeah, I think I think you know just hearing from people that this is what we need you guys to do

For us to you know feel comfortable coming back out

You know, we want to come but we need you we need we need to see it from Bonnaroo

so just for us to be able to

To do that and you know get get get some investment to go out there and work on the farm

It's just been really exciting for our team

It's kind of a weird question after 22 years, but how I mean we're six months away

How close to done?

Are you with the plans? I mean like Thursday you're saying you're still coming up with ideas

how

Two parts how close you'd have done and right now what's the one thing you're most excited for people?

To see a new thing or a different thing

programming was

anything

Anything grass is an answer

Flushable toilets is an answer. It's so crazy with this event, but those things are life-changing

Yeah, I don't know man, I mean this this this I just want I just want to have the whole thing happen

you know I

Going home was not fun. That's a good answer. Yeah, and we were we were set up

You know, we were coming off an excellent year in 23

Where we felt like things had clicked better than they ever had before and

we made some tweaks to put some polish on it and

24 was gonna be absolutely insane

So we're ready

And we need it like we need to have a full boner room. So that's what I'm excited about

I

Don't know Tuba. Do you have anything? I was just gonna jump in when you you know, I think

we talk about what state of where we add and

You know percentage graph on doneness, you know, this is this is the earliest we've ever released a lineup

And there's there's a lot, you know, there's a lot of book and still left to do both both in center and outer

Roo, so we're really excited about some of the stuff that we've got cooking there

But we we also don't want to start talking about it until we've actually got it dialed in and know that we you know

It can happen, you know last thing we ever want to do is

Get everybody whipped up about something and then we pull it down

So yeah, so we're you know, we're really excited about that as far as you know

The the work has been moving along pretty well as far as the the infrastructure upgrades and things like that

I think you guys saw that on some of the

Media we put up on on Instagram and everything. Yeah, we love the videos like that, especially with Justin

And Dale, you know that yeah, Justin

Yeah, you know those those guys are amazing and they've been been around since day one this is my Dale green hat

Get your Dale green merch it's going fast

so

but

No, I mean, you know, it's you know

Those guys are really incredible at what they do and the weather has cooperated in the fall here for them to get a lot

Of this work done. It is really

It's it's really hard to build a road on the middle of a farm when it's soaking wet

But when it's dry they can they can boogie pretty well, so

Yeah, so I think

But but with that too, like we've got a project list

It's in order of most important to least important and so they're trucking through that as much as they can but at the same

Token we don't want to start tearing stuff up a month before the show because it's not going to be recovered and ready to be

You know occupied by whoever

We want to make sure that we're not

Hurting ourselves by having some stuff that's not in a in a completed state so

All right. I got another boring sausage making because

Because you didn't want to do like a pre-sale and the typical sorts of things like how much

How far along are you on being able to predict how many?

Take people are coming back

How many new people?

You know you you have all that data or you probably were very good predict

We can expect so many returns we can expect so many new people

Are you way out of whack on that because of

Doing this the way you releasing it the way you're doing it or we have no idea

Yeah, right now, you know, I will know more

later this week

They are right now. We're

You know, yeah

We're recording this Tuesday a few hours after you release the lineup

We'll have it out either tonight or tomorrow. So for people listening, let's say it's Wednesday

That means pre-sale tickets went on no print now pre-sale for previous

Ticket buyers right went on sale this morning. We'll say right goes on sale tomorrow morning

Yeah, the third. Oh, yeah

Yeah, yeah, yeah

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, we're taught we're in the future now got it yeah

So go went on sale December 3rd

So you will know a little bit but that's got to be a little bit a little bit of a pucker factor for you guys

Not not knowing

Along I mean it always is you know, I mean look this is

You know, this is this is the pinnacle moment, you know, and it's like, okay, you know, do you like what we've done?

We really hope you know

You know, it's really

Yeah, a lot of work goes into it. But at a certain point you gotta you know, you gotta put it out there and let it run

so

What did you get from last year because it was for us?

It was a great event up until the rain, you know on Friday

Like you said Cory it felt great felt like 23 going into 24 was

25 was gonna be you know amazing

What were the changes from

Last year that you're keeping the things that work or the tube was it too early to tell because it ended so quickly

Yeah, I don't know if you have anything specific

there I've been kind of just telling people like

You know rinse and repeat the plan as far as you know business as usual festival wise and then kind of react to

You know some of the weather related stuff that we can improve

Okay came out what yesterday or today moving one of the you're moving what?

They always get them wrong that that tent that tent is moving over by the what stage what precipitated that change? Yeah

One of the there's there's a couple different factors on that one that we took into account

you know the the biggest one is is

Benson and Steve do a great job of in my opinion overbooking those tents

They put amazing artists in those tents, and it's like okay. Well now the tents are loaded

and

Unlike this tent that tent has actually become a little bit more limited year over year because these beautiful trees that we've planted have grown

So if you're on the west side of 4th Avenue, you can't see the stage

You can't see that it's hard to see the screen

We actually moved the screen to the west side of those trees to try to be able to get some better viewing there

there's there's some safety factors that we need to look at because

instead of a bunch of

van and trailer you know van with a trailer type artists

We've now got buses and semis and the only way to access the backside of that stage is from the roadway that leads is the

primary pedestrian path up to the arch

And so we've got you know big heavy traffic mixing with patron traffic

We never ever ever want to do that if we can help it so

And then last but not least is you know the other stage is not getting any quieter

so

You know if anybody picks up an acoustic guitar, and somebody's really getting after it at the other stage

You know they're just gonna get swallowed up over there

So you know and I you know again if we move that over the you know kind of center field at the what field?

I think that's gonna make that stage more more accessible. It's gonna service more fans there

It's gonna activate the what field more than just that single stage which which should help us with a little bit of patron traffic

back and forth

So you know there's there's a lot of discussion that went into that, but I you know

You know and I'll put the asterisk by it like look if it doesn't work. We'll move it back. You know but

We want to continue to you know we want to continue to try to evolve and move things forward and

You know Cory, and I'll be the first ones to tell you sometimes we we miss you know, but we got to try you know so

How will it impact the programming on the on the what I mean they're they're gonna be sort of facing each other right?

Yeah, it's just about somebody

They'll just go back and forth okay, and that's kind of if you look at the grids

A little bit how it's kind of set up already you know

Nice, what about the what about the who stage is it staying in outer? Ooh, or is it coming back to center?

Yeah, I think the the who stage is still something that we're trying to figure out so no no official

updates there

One way or the other

But definitely try to get some more information on that and some of the other stuff that's still hanging out there soon

And then the the where stage is in center now that was the was formally in where in the woods right?

What does that do? What does that do for where in the woods?

Are you still gonna have any programming out there is that just gonna be a just a chill hangout spot now?

Yeah, that's the ultimate hang zone now

Shade all day put your hammock up chill out

You know that that real estate's precious on the farm and

Obviously that place looks you know absolutely incredible at night when it's lit up, and you know there's a party in there, but it

Is not the most conducive to having a safe show

Because of just how people filter in there

And how we have to run that operation, so you know putting that putting that cool stage that we already own

Over and sort of an empty underutilized field

Kind of opens us up to be able to do more

And you know I'll be the first to say like we don't have any acts booked on that stage yet

I don't want people to get their hopes up

But it is it is sort of like a blank canvas

in a place that we are able to offer up to acts that are you know wanting to

Jump up and go late

Do a little something special for the fans

And we haven't really had that place in the past few years where we could execute that safely so

And you'll have if if there aren't any cool like pop-ups or anything which is you know certainly possible

It'll you know kind of function is that corner has in the past from clap

He was over there, and you know just be a place to

To to dance the rest of the night away

Yeah, you know we've heard from fans that people love that experience, so yeah

A lot of people asking about late night this year, so that sounds like that might be the place for it

It's gonna be fun art installations

or less

More of a focus less of a focus about the same

That's something that I'm hearing from a lot of people hopefully more especially regarding other festival things

They love seeing you know it is the music at Bonnaroo music and arts festival, so yeah

We're December 2nd right now

So I'd say too early to share

But there's at least a couple conversations that I know of right now that would push us into the more category cool good

Pricing and

Go back. I know our our buddy Brad Parker

We kind of teased last week that he threw you a through you under a bus and said one thing

For sure the general the the lower tier will not be going up if anything it goes down

Was that his was that his gift to you on the way out or is that?

That the way things are gonna be

No, I mean we've we've got pricing up right now

We're we're offering the

True pre-sale price from last year

to the 2025 buyers pre-sale this year

and

We're you know we're gonna. We're gonna keep selling those until until Friday

So we're making sure that if people want to get their ticket at that tier one price they can do it

and I think

You know one of one of our priorities on Rue is

To keep the price down. You know we we know what it costs to get there

We know that you also have to buy you know whether it's just a campsite or it's you know a pre-pitched tent or whatever

Like that's an incremental cost food etc

You know we know that it's a little more remote than you know like a Lollapalooza or an ACL

And we want to make sure that you know people are getting value

And that's sort of like you know I like to look at like a price per band

You know I want I want that number to always feel just crazy low you know

So it's a big priority on that show, and I think if you look across

Kind of the festival landscape right now, and you know if you're if you're pricing out against other camping festivals

I think you'll find that we're always going to be at the bottom price wise

And we're gonna keep doing that

So yeah

All right, I probably just a couple more Ross. What are we missing? What are some of the other things are here?

You mentioned Brad Parker, and I was gonna ask how is that handoff going Brad leaving and then Shelby is that correct is coming in

How is that transition working out?

Cory Cory gave him a boot you know in the back on the way out the door. He's not here to defend himself

So this could be the it's the holiday this is the airing of the grievances towards Brad

It's best of us now. I I say that in jest we love Brad Brad's been a huge part of this show obviously for a long time

And his heart and soul really really showed through but what I can also say though is

You're not losing any you're not losing a step with Shelby. You know so

You know she's she's always been in the mix

in a ton of ways over the last decade, but

You know she's really been we we we joke behind the scenes that you know while Brad may be the face

That's out talking about the event Shelby's the one that actually does the work

So

You know so I would say there really isn't a transition. We just kind of you know let her run

And she's incredible on that front. We're really excited to have her in that role

to move forward so

Well it'd be hard-pressed to find somebody who was more active and out in front on socials and then Brad and especially along with you

Cory, so I don't know if I assume that'll slow down some but

Fact that you guys are both on here with us today. I can't thank you enough and yeah, I'm hoping you'll come back on

Before the event so we can ask those specific questions again ask again

What are you most looking forward to and what are the big changes and that sort of stuff?

I understand. This is December 2nd as we're talking so some of it hasn't been invented yet, right?

Right. Yeah. Yeah. All right. What else Ross anything?

I'm not seeing anything. We think we got most of the questions that were kind of thrown out there

Thursday

You know Skrillex Forte events and spiritual cramp. Is that all gonna be on the what stage I said?

Okay. Oh, yeah, that's a good question. Yeah. All right. What is a surprise who I'll ask you both

Who's the who's the act I need to I need to be checking out?

boots few nights

I've got all their records. I got a killer guitar player. Hey, by the way, we missed you Cory and Chattanooga

When when they played I heard you had some FOMO from not being at that show

Yeah, I was planning on doing that one and it didn't work out

But oh well, yeah, I don't know I'd say

I'm pretty psyched on

Mountain grass unit

OCs I

Actually still haven't gotten to see flip turn

So I'll make sure to see that one

Turnstile

Yeah, I was glad you got turnstile turnover and then flip turn so you got the the trio of turns here. Yeah, exactly exactly

Forte redemption show it's gonna be nice

Wednesday I'm super excited about

I mean, let's do let's do a little bit of a little bit of a traveler. Yeah blues traveler

Yeah, oh, yeah the desky trucks. I mean just always great to see them. Oh dude

People I'm excited for people. I'm excited for the chats

Yeah, yeah chats are awesome

Of course weirdo who?

Russ got to see forget about weirdo. Yeah weirdo late late night romper out there. Oh, yeah

I

Posted yeah, it does say Saturday late night review. What is a what is that gonna be like? I don't know

It's gonna be late night and it's gonna be cool

Okay

Don't ask you love to ask

Mr. Al about that one. I don't know. It's funny

I mean first thing weird last there. I don't know. Yeah, it was just a funny joke

driver's license

Tube I'll ask you first anything. I didn't we didn't ask you that you want to make sure we mentioned

Now I'll just say it again get your Dale Green merch

I'm trying to get our marketing guy to get it up there so we could move some product for

He doesn't strike me as a guy who would have his own website

No, no, he gives me a little commish. I'd probably do it. Yeah

No, I think that's I think that's just you know, Dale and Bill check those two guys

Are incredible and just you know, they've been there since day one. So just couldn't be happier

I just encourage

Anybody that's listening to this podcast or watching it

You know find those guys on site they're out there they're working

Go up and tell them thanks and that you love them and and happy Rue and that and they'll love it. So

Love it

Alright Cory same question. Yeah. Yeah, I think I think what tube has said for those guys obviously and you know to all of our volunteers

You know that were with us last year and are coming back this year

and

then you know, I think I just want to say like

Keep talking to us like you got if you got something do you want us to hear?

I would try to pop up in the festival's discord at least twice a week

And we read every single comment so

We are listening. We want to know what people think

We're gonna keep rolling out updates for the next couple months as you know, those projects

Get a little further along on the farm

Just so people can see what's going on out there and then obviously all of our normal

You know late night announcement schedule

Secondary programming etc. So

Stay tuned and I mean, you know, I just I can't wait to get back out there with everybody and just blow off some steam

Man, it's gonna be good. It's gonna feel so good

Best show ever did

Hard I can't argue I can't dispute it. Yeah, you were great

Some of your best work that was a lot of fun and so super nice of those guys to jump on and join us and

Like I said at the beginning if they didn't answer your questions this time

We will do our very best to get them answered for you

Either by asking them, you know ourselves or you know, maybe they'll come back on sometime later soon

But yeah, please enter the contest. We would love to hear from you guys

Tell us why you want to go to Bonnaroo

also use that those in that

Opportunity to just ask questions that you'd like us to get answered maybe

Yeah

Yeah

Who to listen to on this lineup if you got a good recommendation for us, you know

Kind of what we all like you've probably watched the show a bunch

So, you know, tell us what we should listen to and go on YouTube

Go on YouTube and watch the live thing. We just did as well

Yep. There you go. All right, cool. That's it. It's been a long day. It's a great day

It's second best day of the year. Yeah. All right. Yeah. See you guys. Yeah