Foo Fighters & Shawn Mendes to headline Ottawa Bluesfest 2018

Bluesfest 2018 will feature headliners Foo Fighters and Shawn Mendes, as well as local acts like The Town Cryers and The Bank Street Bonbons.

Tickets for the annual festival, which will take place at Lebreton Flats Park from July 5 to 15, go on sale Friday, Feb. 16, with pre-sale tickets available starting the day before at 10 a.m.

Attendance options include day passes, three or five-show passes, full-festival wristbands and VIP tickets.

Bluesfest executive director Mark Monahan told CBC’s Ottawa Morning the goal every year is to give people a lot of different genres and choices and hopefully some big names. “That’s what I think we’ve achieved,” he said.

For him, the biggest get is the Foo Fighters, but he said he’s also pleased that the lineup includes alt-rocker Beck — who has never played Ottawa — and country singer-songwriter Sturgill Simpson, who Monahan called the “real deal.”

Violence and security issues on the night of hip hop trio Migos’ performance last year wasn’t far from the minds of organizers when looking for talent for the 2018 edition of the music festival.

Monahan said festival organizers were trying not to be censors — they’re embracing hip hop because of its popularity and because of the artists doing great things in the genre — but making more of a conscious effort to be aware of the acts performing.

“I would say we’re being careful about the messages that the people we’re bringing in are [conveying],” he said.

Hip-hop acts this year include Rae Sremmurd, Machine Gun Kelly, Naughty by Nature and Brockhampton.