Ocean Way Festival Featuring Killers, Olivia Dean and Jack White Is Canceled, as Santa Monica Blames Beach Damage From Hurricane Forces

Santa Monica will not host the debut of Goldenvoice's Ocean Way Festival this September. City officials pulled the plug on the two-day beach gathering, which had been set for Sept. 26-27, after coastal erosion left the site unsafe for both staging and crowds. According to a city statement, storm surf generated by Hurricane Marie, combined with discharge from a storm drain outfall, carried off a large share of the festival grounds across Labor Day weekend. With only a week remaining before construction and load-in were to begin, Santa Monica concluded that calling off the event was the only responsible path. Planning is already in motion to stage Ocean Way in Santa Monica in 2027, officials added.

The city's statement detailed how the damage unfolded. Waves scoured sand from the beach south of the Santa Monica Pier, a landmark that has anchored the coastline since 1909 and sits along one of Southern California's most visited shorelines. That loss of sand would have required the festival's safe shoreline setback to shift 96 feet inland. Meanwhile, runoff from the Pico-Kenter Storm Drain outfall, a well-known drainage point that empties onto the sand just south of the pier, carved through the southern edge of the site, forcing the festival's southern boundary roughly 500 feet north. City staff weighed sand conditions, emergency vehicle access, construction and load-in needs, crowd circulation, tides, and the extended forecast. Taken together, the vanished beach made building the festival infrastructure impossible, and whatever footprint remained could not safely accommodate attendees.

Pass holders were told that refunds would be issued automatically within five to seven business days. Tickets had ranged in price from $249 to $2,250, and the festival had hoped to attract up to 45,000 people to the beach daily. Single-day and two-day passes had both been offered, with a lineup seemingly tailored to distinct audiences each day: the Killers, Jack White, and Sublime were set to headline Saturday, while a more varied Sunday bill was to be topped by Olivia Dean, Khruangbin, and Durand Jones & the Indications. The cancellation caps a rough stretch for first-time beach festivals across Southern California; the inaugural LA Jazz Festival, which had planned a key stage at Dockweiler Beach, was abandoned at the last minute, though organizers blamed financial and preparation issues. Listeners still hoping for music by the water can turn to Eddie Vedder's annual Ohana Fest, held beside the beach in Orange County's Dana Point on Sept. 25-27, which now faces no competition from Ocean Way that same weekend.

Santa Monica Mayor Caroline Torosis voiced her dismay in a statement. She said more than a year of work had gone into the festival and that she had spent much of that time telling anyone within earshot that music was coming back to the beach. Torosis described hoping to stand on the sand, watch the pier glow behind the stage, and sing along with the community. She extended sympathy to fans, artists, and businesses that had been counting on that weekend, saying she understood their feelings, but stressed that the surf had taken the very beach the plan relied on and that tens of thousands of festival-goers could not be placed on that sand until conditions were safe. She said the partnership had weathered the erosion, calling Goldenvoice a responsible partner from the outset and vowing that next year the show will go on. Goldenvoice Chief Operating Officer Melissa Ormond echoed the disappointment but said the company fully backs the city's safety-first decision, calling the 2026 cancellation the correct call and reaffirming the promoter's commitment to bringing the Ocean Way experience it envisioned for the community, artists, and fans back to Santa Monica in 2027.

The festival grew out of a push to restore Santa Monica's live-music identity. Variety ran an interview in July with Goldenvoice producer Nic Adler, son of legendary music executive Lou Adler, about the goal of bringing music back to the city on a large scale. Santa Monica has hosted few major rock or pop shows since the historic Santa Monica Civic Auditorium fell into disuse; that venue, which opened in 1958, once welcomed everyone from the Rolling Stones to the Grateful Dead before its decline as a concert destination. Adler said the idea sprang from Santa Monica's own revitalization moment, a turn toward events, culture, arts, and music to draw visitors. He cast the city as almost an underdog in Goldenvoice's backyard, noting that everyone knows Santa Monica exists but that officials want those memories to linger. He said the setting drove the booking, explaining that standing on the beach at sunset made Khruangbin an obvious choice, and that such location-inspired curation is not a routine approach for Goldenvoice.