Vale Ken West, Big Day Out co-founder

9 April 2022

Ken West, co-founder of Australian music festival, the Big Day Out, died on Thurday 7 April 2022, aged 64. West established the festival in 1992 with Vivian Lees. The first event was a one show only affair, held at the iconic Hordern Pavilion in inner Sydney, and included Nirvana on the lineup. The event went onto play in other Australian capital cities, and Auckland, New Zealand, becoming an annual summer fixture.

The last Big Day Out took place in 2014. Soon after, American concert promoter and events management company C3 Presents took full ownership of the event, and cancelled the scheduled 2015 shows. While they intended to bring the Big Day Out back at some point, so far there has been no word as to when this might happen.

Update: Yeah, actually I put the bloody thing on… former Triple J host, writer, and TV producer, Marieke Hardy recounts a meeting with Ken West after one of the Melbourne Big Day Out shows in the late-nineties.