https://www.austinchronicle.com/daily/music/2021-12-29/spoons-new-years-eve-concert-at-acl-live-canceled-over-omicron-concerns/

Spoon’s New Year’s Eve Concert at ACL Live Canceled Over Omicron Concerns

By Kevin Curtin, December 29, 2021, 11:45am, Earache!

One of Austin’s marquee New Year’s Eve music events is being canceled over COVID concerns – as infections surge with the Omicron variant. Friday’s concert at ACL Live featuring Spoon, John Doe Folk Trio, and Sweet Spirit has been called off. It’s the first prominent 2021 NYE concert to have the plug pulled due to COVID.

The concert had been largely sold out with only a small amount of balcony seating tickets available. The event did include a health check, with organizers requiring proof of vaccination or a negative test from attendees.

Headliners Spoon announced the cancellation today with the announcement:

"We’re beyond bummed to report that due to COVID cases amongst artists on the bill as well as the extremely sharp rise in COVID cases in the Austin community, we’ve made the difficult decision to cancel the New Year’s Eve show at ACL Live.

We hate it. We all needed this show on multiple levels and we wanted nothing more than to celebrate the end of this year with you.

We realize that many of you were planning to travel to Austin for this gig and we’re especially sorry for the inconvenience that this will cause. Thank you to all for buying tickets in the first place and for planning to spend your New Year Eve with us.

Ticketholders will be emailed directly with refund options.

Here’s hoping that there will be some calm and lots of shows in the not so distant future. We’re working on setting up dates for later spring right now. We love y’all. Be safe out there."

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Nationally decimated data shows a sharp rise of COVID cases in Travis County over the last 14 days. The music venue Cheer Up Charlie’s announced temporary closure on December 16 to take “extra early precautions so that we can all be healthy for New Year’s Eve.” Several bands playing Free Week have cancelled their performances due to COVID-related issues and Justine’s Brasserie called off a NYE appearance by Camilo Lara from the Mexican Institute of Sound due to Omicron’s transmission being “irrefutable.”