I was gonna start this post by poking fun out of Saudi Arabia because they’re advertising music concerts all over Kuwait as if they’re a weekend destination now like Bahrain or Dubai. But then I found out yesterday they announced the Jeddah World Festival and now I feel sad, sad that we don’t get events like this in Kuwait.
It’s currently the Jeddah festival season and they’re holding a bunch of music concerts with artists like Chris Brown, Martin Garrix, Marshmello and Afrojack performing.
Just a few days ago Backstreet Boys performed in Jeddah to a sold-out crowd and you can watch a clip of it above.
But now Jeddah upped their game yesterday even more by announcing the Jeddah World Festival which will be one of the largest music events to be held in the region and will be broadcasted live on MTV in over 100 countries. They also announced the first wave line-up which includes Nicki Minaj, DJ Steve Aoki and singer Liam Payne. The second wave line-up will also be announced soon.
So yeah, now I’m just sad and confused.
56 replies on “Jeddah World Music Festival”
if u dont like it here, then get out of this country
I’ll seek asylum in Saudi
BEST COME BACK EVER!@Mark
You owe him one for that set up
Nothing to be confused about bro. It’s exactly like the fact that Egypt (and all other countries in the world) has much better airports than kuwait, Sri Lanka (and most other countries in the world) has better roads, etc etc etc. For Christ’s sake, we still don’t have a postal system in kuwait that gets your mail delivered to your home….
Why doesn’t Kuwait have this event? because Kuwait isn’t trying to prove that it’s “open” or progressive to the Western world and media
We were never Salafi fundamentalist state like Saudi. The Western world perceives Kuwait as a friendly, progressive semi-democratic state so we don’t need to prove anything to them like Saudi.
We have the biggest opera house in the world ❤️ god bless my kuwait 🇰🇼 Music concerts happen in Kuwait all the time. They happen frequently so it’s not like we have to prove anything to the World.
Arabic music stars come to Kuwait every month including in Eid…. like Nancy Ajram at the Opera House last month
Kuwait was never like Saudi and never will be. We have always had music concerts, music is taught in our schools and we have universities and colleges dedicated to teaching music.
In Hala February we have more concerts than usual but music concerts are simply so common that it’s not out of the ordinary (like it is in Saudi)
Arabic music superstars sing in Kuwait all the time (not just hala february)
Did anybody visit the Opera House in Kuwait in Eid last month? They had several concert shows going on for Eid ❤️
Bollywood music icons do music concerts in Kuwait all the time. Even Pakistani superstars.
Saudi Arabia strictly prohibited all music since 1970. They banned music even in schools.
Kuwait never did anything like that (ever) so we have nothing to prove to the world.
I love my beloved country Kuwait 😍
Valid point but it isn’t about Kuwait proving to be modern and open. It is about having a wider range of entertainment options. I’m sure Kuwait has many fans of the artists who are performing at the Jeddah show so it would be great if they could perform here as well instead of having fans travel to Saudi/Bahrain/Dubai. Similar to how Bollywood/Arabic artists have their shows here, we need more of young western artists too. They prevented Akon from coming here, Russell Peters recently and this has happened many times in the past. We don’t even have good amusement parks, as far as I know most of them are closed down or under maintenance? The culture and values of the “youth” will not be affected if have more concerts. If it did, it would have happened a long time ago because you can bypass any form of censorship on the internet. We have happily welcomed a TON of western fast-food chains, so why not more artists?
Trust me most westerns don’t even know what Kuwait is. Have you ever seen recent news about Kuwait? It’s literally becoming a shit hole. Even universities aren’t so good.
“The Western world perceives Kuwait as a friendly, progressive semi-democratic state” so we don’t need to prove anything to them like Saudi.
According to who? Where are you pulling these statements from? or are they simply your own opinions.
Exactly. I was an Indian born and raised in Kuwait, but now an American. I will forever love Kuwait, but no one here sees it as progressive or anything positive. In fact, I have finally started telling people I am Indian and leave out the Kuwait piece, as mostly nothing good comes from it. Id rather leave that love in my heart, as opposed to try to convince people about a country which they will never believe. Kuwait played an important role with helping the USA during the toppling of Saddam Hussein, but the local population just sees it the same as all Arab countries.
Amen
Cool, when I was growing up in Kuwait as a Kuwaiti I used to go to mixed, stand up and dance rock shows, when was the last time we had one of those
And what fact is that? You did not specify it in the comment.
Worst airport in the world? Seriously? Dude have you been to Chicago Midway? LaGuardia?
Speaking from experience, MWD and LGA have WAY BETTER AIRPORTS than Kuwait. Have you visited the bathrooms in the Kuwait airport?! Why are they so dirty?! There is no excuse for that!
Chris Brown……hmm….
Well at least there’s some positives… u can go to the festival and see these musicians (if u like them) for a great price
Great. Now we’re officially the most conservative and backward country in the region. New records for the 2035 “financial-center” vision.
Kuwait is still a million times more Open minded and progressive than Saudi Arabia
I am so proud of my beloved country Kuwait
Hence the username: Proud Kuwaiti 🥰🇰🇼
you need to get out more. are you okay?
hes trolling……………
himself
i don’t know but i feel that the Saudi community is being force fed, and forced to approve of in a rapid manner things that were foreign to them before. when you see a friend all of a sudden flip a switch and change 180 degrees you would be concerned, so imagine a whole country it feels too forced and fake, whilst in Kuwait i would feel these events are more natural i think its a bit risky of doing so much in a short time, that once the shock of the older members of the country settles they and people who are generally against the opening up of mixed gender party atmosphere kinda venues and events might react in a negative way.
i do hope they do it right and it isn’t just a short burst of events and parties etc.. and then all the excitement will just buzz away, at the same time hopefully the community, culture and values are paid attention to and the govt. educates the people increases transparency in all matters esp.economic and justice relate and as importantly create a welcoming culture towards foreigners especially westerns whilst cutting out any racist attitude to foreigners from the east.
on a side note, have you noticed how the clerics have changed their tune? even the hard core ones who called for jihad in Afghanistan and Bosnia, (while their fam was safe at home in mansions and privately educated in unsegregated schools) have come out and apologized saying that they were wrong.
You fake it till you make it
The one thing that makes me think it could work in Saudi is just how young the population is. The 40+ population is like, a third of the Saudi population at this point. They will probably overwhelmingly hate this and disagree with it but the generation entering the workforce now is young enough to influence otherwise and will quickly be the majority.
Im amazed if this is just the start what’s coming next to Saudi
What surprised me is that the media here previously never bothered to advertise music events outside of kuwait considering they are a cultural taboo, Dubai and Bahrain had loads of music events and we never saw bill boards marketing them and now suddenly…. MARTIN GARRIX IS PREFORMING IN JEDDAH..
I Almost choked on the road while seeing these ads considering my love to music festivals, I honestly thought it was happening here in kuwait until I saw that its happening in jeddah
My conclusion to this is that I think kuwait is slowly stepping up their game in the music scene, I have noticed tons of small music events happening all over for the past couple of years where as 10 or 20 years ago it was virtually impossible to have a concert.
Jeddah advertising music concerts in Kuwait is NOT because Kuwait is stepping up their game in the music scene, it’s because of the exact opposite. Because the music festival scene in Kuwait is so bad (nonexistent) Saudi Arabia is advertising to us.
Possibly but you misunderstood my point, there was never a case of billboard advertising for music festivals such as these in the past, music festivals have been happening in Bahrain and the UAE for years and they were never advertised here.. Especially on highway billboards, sure we had some international headliners preform here at jacc but it was always advertised as a prestigious event targeted for upper class middle aged people where as the jeddah event is definitely targeted for the youth, which is unusual.
Sure we don’t have public music festivals here but we have a thriving underground scene and some of the craziest parties and raves I’ve been to were here in kuwait.
If the craziest underground parties and raves you have been to were in Kuwait then I feel you need to visit more countries.
Having underground parties and raves has no relation to having public music festivals.
I’ve been to 20+ countries and to several music festivals and raves through out Europe, North America and Asia. Once you have an access to the good parties here you will never want to party anywhere else.
you’ve never been to berlin and it shows
Lol do you really want to compare Berlin and it’s notorious clubs to the parties here?
you’re the one who implied that Kuwait has the craziest parties even though you’ve attended several ‘music festivals’ and raves throughout Europe lol. acting like people would rather party in Kuwait than Berlin if they have ‘the access’ lol. get outta here man.
The main reason we don’t have these events in Kuwait is the people who attend them abroad, think it’s 3aib to have them in Kuwait, because their family might go, and “have fun” god forbid.
Smoke and mirrors. May seem like progress but KSA is having a really really hard time. Within and without. Wish them the best nonetheless
Remember when there used to be concerts in Kuwait for Hala February 10+ years ago??
Kuwait never stopped doing Hala February music concerts
There are music concerts in Kuwait all the time in the Opera House (Sheikh Jaber Al Ahmed Cultural Centre)
I love my country Kuwait 🥰🥰🥰🥰🇰🇼😍😍😍😍
Don’t Worry Kuwait is always in either catch up mode or follow the leader mode so either we will get there eventually or now because its kosher in KSA , Kuwait will follow suit 🙂
Wow amazing how everyone out here wants to sound ‘progressive’ and ‘modern’, by running by yearning for music concerts and running down Kuwait for not having these events.
How about yearning for top quality schools, universities, hospitals, etc?
Shouldn’t THAT be priority?
We need good schools and universities. No doubt.
@ Jay
We are scared to ask for those..MP Safa Al Hashem might just put forward a bill relegating them for the locals only and leave the not so good ones for the rest of us 🙂
do you come from a country where the expats outnumber the local populous?
If you follow travel influencers – Saudi is playing hard on inviting them to Saudi and lot of them have already doing it. I think Saudi is definitely working on creating a tourist destination. And yeah we kind of watch until all the fun is on us :O
Let them bring some well known metal bands then i’ll be sad and confused haha
This!!
If they announce Metallica in Jeddah…
I am down for Alan Walker / System of Down / Imagine Dragons.
Let that happen Please.
Amen.
Q 1) Did any of the organizers there even bother googling Nicki Minaj?
Q 2) If they impose some sort of moral dress code on her, i.e. not to wear anything revealing; is that not self defeating? when an artist cant fully express himself/herself…
food for thought
Nicki Minaj performed in Dubai and she didn’t wear anything super revealing
Dubai is not Saudi Arabia
And as expected, she cancelled.
Nicki Minaj pulls out of Saudi Arabia festival after backlash https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-48930029
All of these schemes in KSA have underlying political maneuvering that has nothing to do with opening up to the “west”. But hopefully the people enjoy the concerts.
Yeah and? If the general quality of life goes up who cares.
LMAO
All I can say is Wow! and good on them.
We need to feel happy for those chronically deprived and perpetually repressed people across the border rather than start making comparisons with them
Well… Nicki Minaj just cancelled her performance.
There are more events in Jeddah Season :
https://saudiseasons.com
I remember NE-YO performing in Kuwait thanks to Wataniya/Ooredoo, and it is kinda sad that Kuwait doesn’t host more western pop hits performers, I mean BTS is gonna perform in Saudi….so for sure K-POP has an audience in middle east …and Kuwait (ask DJ Aki from superstation 99.7) ….so yeah it is disappointing that Kuwait doesn’t have any good western pop artists performing here…Saudi host WWE events, and the last wrestling event in Kuwait saw them banning and having a lawsuit to Vader ( the interview still cracks me up) ….but I have to mention that Kuwait still has the best fast food restaurants 😀 , my personal opinion, I tasted KFC in dubai, bahrain, oman…even UK, but KFC in the Kuwait is absolutely the best tasting KFC by far….anyone dissapproves? 😀 Oh and not to forget Kuwait had the only international franchise to Sprinkles cupcakes….like even Dubai didnt have it! sad to say it got shut down!