Smeets was waved goodbye by the audience just before the performance of Peal Jam. “Thirty-five years ago Pinkpop was founded,” said the new Pinkpop manager Niek Murray. Before Smeets took the main stage, a compilation of his great moments as Pinkpop boss could be seen on large screens on stage.
As one of the founders of Pinkpop – since the first, then still modest, festival in 1970 – Smeets was involved in the ever-expanding music spectacle – the oldest still existing in Europe. All these years he was known as mr. Pinkpop† The Limburger did not miss anything, he checked everything during the preparation and implementation of the festival. His outbursts of anger were notorious when, during his countless tours on his scooter, he saw something happen somewhere on the site that he did not like. As far as Smeets was concerned, the festival had to be perfectly organized down to the last detail. There were no loose ends in his vocabulary.
Heavy weather
He announced his retirement in 2020, exactly after fifty years of Pinkpop. The festival was then in heavy weather due to corona. Pinkpop was cancelled, and the gates of the festival site in Landgraaf also remained closed the following year. After two years of absence, the 51st edition of Pinkpop will be banging again this year, for Smeets the perfect opportunity to say goodbye as Pinkpop boss.
Smeets is not going away completely. Although he has now passed the baton to his three successors Niek Murray, Sierk Janssen and Tirsa Creusen, he remains an advisor to the festival. What exactly that means remains to be seen. Murray has already profiled himself as the new festival manager in recent days.