It’s pretty much official: after the deaths and chaotic logistics of this year’s Future Music Festival Asia in KL, the FMFA isn’t coming back next year.
FMFA’s Festival Director Brett Robinson told The Music Network that the Future Music Festival, whose original iteration is based in Australia, has concluded its contract with Kuala Lumpur, and is going to announce a new Asian home for 2015 some time next month.
“Future Music Asia has always been a brand that we wanted to move around Asia,” he said.
“We’ve had a three-year deal in KL and we are now building towards an announcement next month in a different Asian city; but we’ve got great Government support from that city and we’ve got a lot of strong support from that city.”
That might be a bit misleading; this year’s FMFA at the Bukit Jalil Sports Complex saw its third and final day cancelled after six patrons died of drug overdoses, and 12 more were hospitalised for drug-related illnesses.
29 people were arrested at the festival for drug abuse and possession.
The Home Ministry also threatened legal action against Livescape Asia, the Malaysian organisers of the FMFA, if it was proven that they were lax in enforcing anti-drug laws on the festival grounds.
Robinson said that due to huge demand from Asian audiences, the Future Music Festival might choose to become a roaming event, moving from one Asian city to another every year.
“We want to make sure that Future Music Asia truly becomes Future Music Asia and not Future Music Malaysia […] We want to try and be able to be dynamic and jump around a little bit.”
Livescape Asia itself has moved on from hosting the FMFA as its tentpole event, and is now heavily promoting It’s The Ship, a five day/four night festival on a cruise ship set to sail from Singapore to Langkawi and back, set to begin on November 21.
Read:
Future Music Festival Asia final day canceled due to drug deaths
12 overdosed FMFA patrons still hospitalised, in stable condition
