Elliot Lake heavy metal music festival officially cancelled

Less than three weeks after he postponed the Atomic Musicfest heavy metal music festival, Elliot Lake music promoter Corey McKenzie announced Tuesday afternoon via the Elliot Lake Buzz Facebook page that the show had been cancelled.

McKenzie’s post reads, "Official Statement: When the announcement was first made that Atomic MusicFest was not going to be happening on August 9-11, it was believed that some more time would have been able to correct the issues, so a postponement announcement was created."

"Unfortunately, this is not panning out and the issues still remain, so it is being confirmed that the festival is being cancelled,” he continued.

He said AstroRabbit Entertainment will go ahead with any other previously booked events. He added, "The plan for the company moving forward is to continue with events on a smaller scale, including live music, DJ."

McKenzie is asking people requesting a refund for their ticket purchases to fill out a form.

"By the end of September, the majority, if not all, refunds will be issued,” he said.

McKenzie is asking ticket purchasers to hold their tickets as proof of purchase. He said he wants the contact information to notify people when the refunds are available.

Ticket refund request information can be found here.

McKenzie said, "Funding has become a main concern and a reliance on ‘at the gate purchases’ is one of the big reasons the final decision was made to cancel the event."

"As a public company that is not a non-profit organization, an agreement with the city that names the event ‘Municipally Significant’ is required to get a ‘Special Occasions Permit’ (or liquor licence) for the event,” he explained. "When the event was postponed, the status of the event was removed, which means getting the ‘Municipally Significant’ status would require further meetings with city council and the time frame would not allow this to happen."

Corey McKenzie asked for and got permission from Elliot Lake City Council earlier this year to transfer the site of Atomic Musicfest from Elliot Lake Airport where it was originally planned to another Elliot Lake City-owned venue, the Mount Dufour Ski Hill. He said he did so for logistical reasons.

Summing up his statement, McKenzie said, "AstroRabbit Entertainment apologizes for any inconvenience this caused and it is the intent of the company to get the refunds issued in a timely manner, so we can all move past this and move on."

– ElliotLakeToday