ATLANTA — Tens of thousands of Music Midtown festivalgoers are no longer going to descend on Atlanta’s enormous Piedmont Park next month to cheer on hip-hop star Future or watch cherished rock band My Chemical Romance take the phase.
In truth, some individuals are persuaded Atlanta — center of the country’s hip-hop music scene — will lose more music celebrations and efficiencies on public land as organizers and artists findout that state law makes it almost difficult for them to stop individuals from bring weapons amongst the alcohol-fueled crowds.
That possibility hasactually sparked a brand-new battle over weapon rights in Georgia that is roiling the guv’s race, casting a shadow over Atlanta’s vaunted music scene and including to stress inbetween the city and state.
Live Nation has declined to state why it justrecently called off September’s Music Midtown, a longtime component for pop music enthusiasts.
But news outlets, mentioning confidential sources, ascribed last week’s statement to a 2019 Georgia Supreme Court choice that laidout limitations on the capability of personal business to restriction weapons on public home. The judgment stemmed from a 2014 state law that broadened the areas where weapons were permitted.
Democrats, led by Georgia gubernatorial prospect Stacey Abrams, pounced on the news, casting the cancellation as an example of the sort of financial fallout the state would experience from Republican Gov. Brian Kemp’s “extreme weapon program.” Though the weapon law pointedout in reports about Music Midtown was enacted under Kemp’s Republican predecessor, Kemp was a secret backer of a brand-new state law this year that removed the requirement for a license — and with it, a background check — to bring a pistol in public.
An Atlanta Journal-Constitution editorial alerted the weapon policies threaten Atlanta’s status as the “cultural capital of the South.” Atlanta City Council President Doug Shipman complained the loss of this year’s Music Midtown, as well as its timing.
“All of these things are culminating at the minute when we oughtto be coming out of COVID with music celebrations and individuals collecting, a lot of financial activity,” he informed The Associated Press.
Beyond the instant fallout, the battle likewise included to a detach inbetween Georgia’s greatly Democratic capital city and the GOP-controlled state Legislature that has justrecently broadened weapon