new yorker festival

Haim Wants to Bring Back Lilith Fair

The New Yorker Festival 2015 - HAIM Talks With Kelefa Sanneh
Photo: Thos Robinson/2015 Getty Images

Sarah McLachlan fans, take note: sister-trio pop rock band Haim wants to bring back a Lilith Fair style festival for the 2015 generation.

Speaking with music critic Kelefa Sanneh at the New Yorker Festival on Friday, the eldest Haim, Este, said, “We talk about this all the time, how there aren’t enough female-represented bands and artists at festivals. You don’t see them. And it’s really sad for us. We came up with the idea basically of why can’t we just bring back a festival that’s just ladies. Not that we don’t love the boys. Love the men.”

She went on to list her fantasy line up, which includes female-friendly artists like Lorde, Florence and the Machine, Savages, Chvrches, Haim mentor Jenny Lewis, and Taylor Swift (Haim is the current opener on the megastar’s 1989 tour).

While the 29-year-old singer never witnessed the original incarnation of the female-focused Lilith Fair, which first occurred in the indie-rock glory days of 1997, she did see many of its headliners separately in concert.

“I did see Melissa Ethridge in concert, I saw Sarah McLachlan in concert, I saw Paula Cole in concert, and Sheryl Crowe. All these amazing ladies had such an amazing outlet and place to play music, and it was really beautiful and I feel like that’s not really available anymore and that outlet isn’t there. We talk semi-jokingly but semi-seriously about making it happen. So stay tuned. I think that would be really magical.”

Haim Wants to Bring Back Lilith Fair