The When We Were Young music festival, first announced on January 18, 2022, was initially marketed as a single-day event occurring in Las Vegas, Nevada, on October 22, 2022. Featuring an impressive lineup of more than fifty bands, including big-name artists such as My Chemical Romance and Avril Lavigne, the event was pitched primarily toward an elder emo audience, composed of people from the aughts emo subculture who are now generally in their thirties or forties. After the event was announced, it quickly went viral, spawning conspiracy theories and memes. As an elder emo myself, I was intrigued.
From the outset, there were conflicting opinions on whether or not to support the festival. Audiences expressed concern over the general logistics of the event, as well as the fact that the organizers of When We Were Young—Live Nation Entertainment—were chiefly responsible for the Fyre Festival fiasco of 2017. Bands, too, were...
University of California Press