Bare in the Woods festival postponed

Loais music festival Bare in the Woods has been postponed until further notice after festival organisers were unable to comply with the conditions of their licence.

In a statement released on Wednesday evening, festival organisers said that despite their best efforts to “grow the festival into a fully-fledged licensed event, we have made the decision to postpone BARE in the Woods festival until a later date.” 

This year’s festival, due to take place from June 9th to 11th in Garryhinch Woods in Portarlington, Co Laois, comprised its biggest line up to date including Kiesza, Right Said Fred, Mike Skinner and the Rubberbandits.

In March this year Nenagh band Slow Seas narrowly missed out on a chance of performing at the festival despite a hard fought battle in the Le Crunch Song Contest competition which saw the Leaving Cert students make it into the top ten shortlisted acts in the country. 

Bare in the Woods was originally set up as a one-day event for 800 people in 2014 however this year the event was extended to a three-day festival.

Photo: Limerick's The Rubberbandits were due to play the festival

A spokesperson for the event said: “BARE in the Woods is a small, homegrown festival, run by a small core group of people and unfortunately, the limited time available for us to comply with the conditions on our licence, has realistically proven not enough.”

“Now, more than ever, is our utmost wish to stage a well-run, safe and ultimately entertaining event for all of our patrons, and with this limited amount of time available and duty of care in mind, we feel it wise to postpone the event, due to take place at Garryhinch Woods on June 9-11, until we can fully comply to the high standards we wish to bring to bear in our young festival.”

Breaking: @BAREfestival has been postponed indefinitely https://t.co/v5UP8RYRrE pic.twitter.com/vZpT0Sxg6h

— GoldenPlec (@GoldenPlec) May 24, 2017

“We would like to assure all of our patrons who have bought tickets for the festival that we are working hard to ensure BARE in the Woods will go ahead at a later date, but in the meantime fully understand if they would like to avail of refunds. Refund information will be on www.barefestival.com on Friday May 26th. By the same token, we would like to thank the artists and all of the people who have made commitments or worked on the event to date.”

“We are currently reviewing our options regarding BARE in the Woods going forward, and in the meantime we would like to thank everyone for their understanding and patience."