Study shows Download Festival one of UK’s most popular music …
Long-standing Download Festival[1] is one of the most popular events in the UK music calendar according to the number of searches conducted online annually. It is second only to the Reading Festival, which is the country's longest running festival and which has been taking place this weekend.
The Donington Park festival at Castle Donington[2] has just celebrated its 20th anniversary in June and a study conducted by website Last Minute Musicians[3], which analysed Google search volumes, showed that the term "Download Festival" is searched for an average of 89,400 times every month.
This also makes Download Festival the third most Googled[4] UK music festival worldwide with 122,000 searches, following closely behind Reading (143,000 searches) and Boomtown (123,000), which takes place in Winchester.
According to the people who compiled the study, although Glastonbury takes first place in terms of turnout (with a capacity of 210,000), Reading and Download are the stars of the show when it comes to search demand.
Chris Walmsley, of Last Minute Musicians, said: "“Download’s been running since the early 2000s, making it one of the longest standing rock festivals in the UK. Loads of people go back time and time again, which is no surprise really, given its beautiful location - Donington Park - its eclectic line-up and chilled, friendly atmosphere.
"I think another one of the most appealing things about Download Festival is its location. It is really easy to get to on public transport. It's always nice to go down a few days early too, with it being so close to some great bars, restaurants and live music venues."
A total of 130,000 fans descended on Donington Park for this year's Download Festival[6], which ran for four days - one more than usual - to take into the anniversary. That number of fans made Download officially the third biggest festival this year in the UK physically with Glastonbury first with 210,000 attendees and hip-hop festival Wireless second with 135,000 festival-goers. Reading Festival's 100,000 fans puts it in fifth spot and Boomtown is 12th with 75,000 fans attending.
References
- ^ Download Festival (www.derbytelegraph.co.uk)
- ^ Castle Donington (www.derbytelegraph.co.uk)
- ^ Last Minute Musicians (www.lastminutemusicians.com)
- ^ Googled (www.derbytelegraph.co.uk)
- ^ Derby pilot recklessly flew drone near East Midlands Airport to film Download Festival (www.derbytelegraph.co.uk)
- ^ for this year's Download Festival (www.derbytelegraph.co.uk)