Ludacris, Akon, Tyga Booked For Throwback Juicy Fest 2025

Hip-hop will head across the country next January for Juicy Fest Australia 2025 -- which returns with a one-day format, a nostalgia lineup, and a trans-Tasman route that raises a middle-finger to the myriad problems crushing festival-land.

Ludacris, Akon, Tyga, Keyshia Cole, Omarion, Fat Joe, SWV, Blackstreet and Jacquees headline the fest, which is scheduled to visit New Zealand for four dates, then head west for shows in Perth (Jan. 15), Melbourne (Jan. 17), Sydney (Jan. 18) and Queensland (Jan. 19).

Juicy Fest is produced by Matthew Spratt and Glenn Meikle, and the followup to a 2024 edition that was presented at eight locations in Australia and New Zealand in January 2024 which, according to reps, clocked over 120,000 pre-registrations in a 24-hour frame.

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The announcement of a major, traveling festival in Australia wouldn’t raise an eyebrow in an ordinary year.

This is no ordinary year.

Splendour in the Grass, Mona Foma and Groovin The Moo have been wiped from the 2024 calendar, with organisers of those events pointing to slow ticket sales, and experts noting the climate for operating a festival is a “highly complex” one.

A new report into the troubled festivals industry found that operational costs were one of the most significant barriers to running a music festival, with almost half organisers (47%) putting their hand up.

The Soundcheck report, presented earlier this month by Creative Australia found lack of funding and grants available (39% of festivals say this has a severe or major impact on their event), insurance costs (31%) and extreme weather events (22%) were big issues.

Researchers mapped 535 festivals in 2022-2023, and found the average festival cost $3.9 million to run. Half of all events produced a profit, one-third reported a deficit (the remainder was somewhere in-between).

Pre-registration for Juicy Fest opens May 1, with general public sales starting the following day, May 2, from 6pm local time.