This Weekend's Afropunk Atlanta Festival Has Been Cancelled

Thundercat performs at Afropunk Fest, 2015 (Photo by Vickey Ford)

It's our unfortunate task to share the news that Afropunk's Atlanta festival, which was scheduled to take place this weekend, October 3-4, has been cancelled by its organizers. Citing the need to put the safety of crowd, artist and staff first, Afropunk decided to nix the entire weekend's schedule as Atlanta braces for heavy wind and rain over the weekend.

It's really such a damn shame--a lineup including Thundercat, Flying Lotus, Tyler, The Creator and (up until yesterday) D'Angelo had many whispering that Afropunk ATL might be destined to go down as the organization's best event ever. Some things, though, are out of our control, and there's no chance that a massive music fest and hurricane-level winds would have played nicely together. Read the full, official statement from AFROPUNK below (and for the record, FOH hurricanes.)

In the interest of patron, artist, and staff safety, we are reluctantly canceling AFROPUNK FEST ATL, set to take place this Saturday, October 3 and Sunday, October 4, amidst an ongoing and increasingly poor weather outlook for the greater Atlanta area. Site operations and build have been greatly impeded due to heavy rains throughout the week, with more inclement weather in the forecast for the next several days. These unfortunate and challenging circumstances are preventing us from presenting a world class experience that measures up to our reputation and providing a safe, welcoming environment for all involved. All of the approximately 10,000 plus ticket holders will automatically be refunded at point of purchase.

See below for an official statement from the founder of the festival Matthew Morgan:

"Safety is always the #1 concern for any of our festivals, nothing is more important. Over the course of the past 10 years of AFROPUNK's existence, there has never been a serious injury on site and we plan to keep it that way with this tough decision to cancel the fest. We're looking forward to AFROPUNK ATLANTA 2016."