FINALLY: A Female Headliner for Outside Lands?

Article by: Laura Mason|@masonlazarus

Fri March 30, 2018 | 14:20 PM


After Outside Lands celebrated its milestone 10-year anniversary in 2017, the grumbling and complaining became louder than ever. For years, both the media and attendees had reprimanded the San Francisco festival for never featuring a female artist in its headlining spot – because it had never done so before. For one of the most successful, highest-profile mainstream music festivals in the country, it was a continuously glaring, tone-deaf omission, especially in the face of the ever-growing movement for women's equality in pop culture and basically every other aspect of life in the 21st century.

Today, finally, it seems things will change. Outside Lands announced Janet Jackson as a performer for its 11th annual festival in Golden Gate Park. While her inclusion was only released as an #OutsideLandsClue, an artist this legendary can only be presumed to fill a headlining spot on a festival lineup. In fact, shortly after Outside Lands' tweet, Jackson was announced as the headliner for FYF 2018, followed closely by Florence + The Machine.

Last year in an interview with Consequence of Sound, Outside Lands production company Another Planet Entertainment’s Vice President Allen Scott responded to questions regarding the festival's lack of female headliners by flimsily stating: "We would love a female headliner, or multiple female headliners for that matter...We’ve had offers out to different artists, but the stars just haven’t aligned yet." Whatever the reason for Outside Lands' dearth of female headliners for the past decade truly is, it looks like the stars are actually, finally aligning.

Outside Lands' full lineup announcement drops April 3 at 10 am. The festival goes down August 10-12, 2018.