Bassnectar Electrifies Fans During Back to Back Sold Out Shows at The Factory

If Bassnectar drops bass in your face then Philadelphia must be two faced. That’s because the god-father of bass music opened the month of May with not one, but two sold out shows on back to back nights at the Electric Factory.

To his intensely loyal fan-base, Bassnectar is more than just a performer, he is a way of life. Much like Dead-Heads went on tour across the country following the Grateful Dead, Bass-Heads trek far and wide to get as much of Lorin Ashton as their minds, bodies, and wallets will allow.

The Bassnectar family is a community of people that look out for one another and those in need, evidenced by the two night clothing drive that took place outside of the Electric Factory. Fans were encouraged to donate items which were then provided to the less fortunate members of Philadelphia.

As further proof of Ashton’s respect for his fans and their well being, all concert-goers were permitted to bring a sealed bottle of water into the show to aid in their hydration. Once inside, water was also for sale but numerous free-bottles were also given away through-out the night by the Bass Ambassadors working at the show.

Once you factor in that his DJ and production skills are out of this world, his lighting and visuals are are a show in and of themselves, and that he routinely plays for well over two hours per event, it’s easy to see why he was one of the top three ticket selling DJs in 2012 (along with Tiesto and Deadmau5) topping out near a quarter million tickets sold.

Having seen Bassnectar numerous times, interviewing him at Ultra Music Festival 2012, and being admittedly big fans of his large music catalog, we were excited for the double dip of bass to kick off the month in style.

The first show, on Wednesday May 1st was sold out weeks before the doors opened to fans at 7pm.

The opening set of the night was given to Thiftworks. The California based DJ with ties to our area did a nice job of setting the stage the for the rest of the evening. It would be unfair to say that he warmed the crowd up as the audience members were already hot with anticipation before they even set foot inside the venue.

Up next was Detroit”s Griz who seems to be everywhere these days. We had to chance to catch him at SnowBall Music Festival back in March and were anxious to see him again on our home turf. With the venue already packed, Griz took over around 9pm and showed why he is a heavy-hitter in his own right.

His soulful, funk-infused bass sounds had the Electric Factory charged up and going hard. He’ll be making the rounds across the U.S. this summer and we highly suggest checking out his set if you have the chance.

Just after 10pm, with numerous Bassnectar logos already emblazoned on the gigantic digital wall behind the turntables, Bassnectar hit the stage with the image of a huge fluffy puppy on the screen behind him.

Playing his signature mixture of hip-hop, rock, and just about everything-else infused bass music, Bassnectar took Philadelphia on a journey into the far reaches of euphoria and sanity.

To say that the Bass-Heads lost their minds for the next two and a half hours would be putting it lightly, very lightly.

With the Electric Factory so packed that it was nearly impossible to move throughout the balcony, let alone the main floor below, the night became one big, hot, sweaty, head-banging affair.

Night two, on Thursday, May 2nd, had many similarities to night one but several differences as well. Griz was replaced by Michal Menert, who rocked the mic as well as the decks.

Night two also had a “Red, White, and Blue” theme and fans came out adorned in patriotic gear and sporting patriotic Bassnectar totems.

Because Bassnectar has such a strong following, he wouldn’t disrespect his fans by playing the same set two nights in a row. Yes, there are some elements that carry over from one night to another, especially his signature hits, but everything from the track selection to the visuals were unique to each show.

Once again on night two he played for more than two hours, in which the audience, energized by every single bass drop, returned the vibe ten fold. Even those few people we spoke with who had been dragged to the show by their friends, admitted that by the end of the evening that they were full Bassnectar converts.

There is just something about the man, his fans, and the way everything comes together at his shows (especially the smaller venue performances as opposed to larger festival ones) to form a magical experience that will make a fan and a believer out of almost anyone.

Don’t take our word for it. When he comes to your town, grab your friends, grab a ticket, and go experience Bassnectar for yourself.

Be sure to “like” Independent Philly on Facebook and follow us on Twitter!

[photo credit: Steve Garfinkel Photography & D. Jacob Miller Photography]

You can view a ton of additional photos from both nights below (click thumbnails to enlarge):

 

 

 

 

 

Ultra Music Festival 2013: Miami’s Music Mecca

Ultra Music Festival 2013 expanded to two full weekends for their 15th anniversary (with Miami Music Week sandwiched nicely between the two).

While a few acts were specific to one weekend or the other, the majority of the performers were on hand for both weekends (albeit not always on the same stage as the other weekend).

Independent Philly hit Miami mid-week between the two Ultra’s, in plenty of time to catch some of the warm up events and all of Ultra weekend 2.

We kicked off our coverage on Thursday, March 21st at the W Hotel in South Beach where Sol Republic, Motorola, Trident, and SiriusXM joined forces to present the Moto Music Lounge.

The invite only event served as pop-up studio for the SiriusXM UMF broadcast and saw a slew of DJs and celebrities roll through to give interviews, hit the decks, or just relax and mingle.

Thursday saw names like A-Trak, Rony Seikaly, Krewella, Calvin Harris, and Afrojack make appearances.

The music was loud, the drinks were cold, and everyone had a great time, removed from the much larger crowds at other Miami area events.

It was the perfect way to kick off the week with a very hectic schedule ahead for Ultra.

Last year, we made a point of covering as many sets as possible at Ultra’s eight stages. As a result, we had very little time to actually listen to any one set for more than 15 to 30 minutes. In 2013, we pledged to spend more time at each set we photographed. The result was less running between stages, a better experiences, and some very tough calls about some stellar choices for overlapping sets.

On Friday, Ultra Music Festival weekend 2 kicked off at 5pm with Hard Rock Sofa & Swanky Tunes on the Main Stage. From the second the gates opened to fans at 4pm, there was a constant stream of people heading into Bayfront Park in downtown Miami.

The five guys behind the decks did a great job of kicking off the Main Stage, making those in the crowd rage from the opening beat, despite the grey skies and gentle rain that began to fall around 5pm.

Up next on the Main Stage was R3hab who we hadn’t had a chance to see since last summer at Tomorrowland. There were many fans of R3hab pressed up against the gate at the front, as was evidenced by their R3hab branded gear and homemade signs.

Ultra added some more diverse acts to the festival this year, especially on the Live Stage so we left R3hab to catch Kerli followed by Matt & Kim (who we had bumped into the day before at the W Hotel).

Kerli’s singing performance consisted of a few quick songs performed in about 20 minutes so it was hard to really get a feel for her, but her loyal fans in the crowd certainly seemed to enjoy the chance to see her perform.

The Brooklyn based pop duo, brought their usual high energy on the drums and keys while they regaled the audience with tales of everything from Matt’s love of small boobs, to Kim waxing her “cha-cha” in preparation for wearing booty shorts (which, according to her, she backed out of doing because of the chilly, rainy weather).

It’s hard to keep your energy up on an empty stomach so we took a break following Matt & Kim to grab some food from one of the numerous tents throughout Bayfront Park. We found a nice spot on a grassy knoll and enjoyed our dinner while our ears took in the sounds of Avicii on the Main Stage. Avicii got somewhat experimental with his set, which we found very enjoyable. However, the crowd didn’t seem to know what to do with it and seemed rather shell shocked. Maybe they would have preferred he play a 60 minute rendition of “Levels”.

Following our break, we returned to the Live Stage to catch Boys Noize and his mega skull structure. At this point the sun had set, literally setting the stage for a killer light show to accompany Boys Noize fantastic track selection which offered something for fans of all genres.

Finally we concluded our Friday evening at the Live Stage for a live performance from The Bloody Beetroots. This was hands-down our favorite performance of the first day and one of our top 3 from the entire weekend. Having only ever experienced DJ sets by the Beetroots (Ultra 2012, Tomorrowland 2012) it was a real treat to see the added elements present in their live show. There is no substitute for the organic sounds of live instruments and vocals.

On Saturday, Ultra was open for a full 12 hours, from noon to midnight. After a late-night out in South Beach on Friday night, we were a little slow to arrive at the festival on Saturday. Once we did, we quickly regained our energy, as the heavy bass and tens of thousands of beat freaks echoed from every corner of Bayfront Park.

After strolling around for a bit,we stopped by the Trapped Stage to catch UZ. The masked man of mystery has been rumored to be any other number of DJs in disguise because he always wears a full mask and does not do interviews. Whomever the man behind the mask is, he had the crowd running the trap on the hill top over looking the bay.

From there we headed to the Drop Zone tent which was absolutely jammed with people to see Krewella. The Chicago trio threw down a great set, completely void of some of the technical difficulties they faced during weekend 1.

After a bit more wandering and a stop for some needed hydration, we hit the Main Stage for another one of our favorite DJs, Fatboy Slim. Norman Cook has been rolling out top notch production and thrilling crowds with his life sets for decades and the man shows absolutely no signs of slowing down.

His sets at Ultra 2012, EDC NYC, and Tomorrowland were some of our favorites of 2012 and while his 2013 Ultra set wasn’t quite as enjoyable as the offerings we got from him last year, it was still a treat. There are some under 21 year old DJs out there that don’t have the energy that Fatboy Slim has behind the decks, and his enthusiasm only made his live set that much more enjoyable for the masses who packed the Main Stage to see him.

When Fatboy Slim was almost finished, we headed over to the Live Stage where Delaware based band Yeasayer was working it for the smallish crowd that had formed to catch their set. Having seen Yeasayer at other festivals (Coachella 2010, Firefly 2012) we  knew we to expect.

Their chilled out live sound was a welcome break and let us sit down in the hard backed seats of the Live Stage, and mellow out to their funky stylings. The band even apologized to the audience, saying they received a bad review from a Miami area publication after their weekend 1 performance and promised to be better for weekend 2.

With the sun setting, and our hunger once again rising, we again took a break to grab some food before heading over to the Carl Cox arena to see the UK master do his thing accompanied by a breath-taking light show.

With our energy levels replenished we hit the Drop Zone stage which was crazy packed with people for a bass-drop onslaught from Flux Pavilion and Doctor P. We stayed for the rest of their set in order to be there for the beginning of another one of our favorites, Bassnectar.

Bassnectar, whose countless fans often refer to him by his first name, Lorin, puts on a ridiculous live show infused with tracks and remixes from a slew of bass-heavy EDM genres.

The crowd, packing into the Drop Zone like sardines, got down as best they could to his set as confetti canons and kryo-blasts shot from the stage. We would have loved to see his entire set but with the buzz building about Deadmau5’s Main Stage performance, we had to leave ample time to make our way through the uncanny large sea of people that lay between the two arenas.

After fighting our way through thousands upon thousands of people, we made it back to the Main Stage in time for Deadmau5. Despite his having bashed Ultra Music Festival in the past, the opinionated DJ behind the mouse helmet returned to play both weekends in 2013.

Deadmau5 is known to play (almost) exclusively his own music and that’s exactly what he did again at Ultra. While we didn’t watch any of the live video feeds from weekend 1 (not wanting to spoil our weekend 2 experience) we did listen to several sets.

While we are big Deadmau5 fans, we were a little disappointed that his weekend 2 set was almost identical to the one he played during weekend 1. While it was enjoyable, we were hoping to hear some variation. Mix it up Mau5.

We closed out Saturday night back at the Live Stage where Hot Chip, another electronica-infused live band, was closing out the evening. We love Hot Chip’s sound and the band did not disappoint.

Rocking out hits that made everyone dance (even a few folks on crutches) it was abundantly clear that Hot Chip brings the funk. With a killer laser show and tons of confetti to boot, it was the perfect close out set for us on Saturday and left us dancing and humming as we exited Bayfront Park.

It’s funny how quickly time passes at a three day festival. You arrive on Day 1, thrilled about the three full days of music ahead of you and before you know it, Day 3 has arrived and you’re facing the final hours of the experience.

After rain on Friday and clouds on Saturday, it was sunny and in the low 90’s on Sunday. The crowd took a little longer to build on the final day, an obvious consequence of late night partying in Miami taking a toll on festival goers by the time Sunday rolled around.

Our first stop was at the Toolroom Knights stage while we hung out briefly before heading off to the Main Stage for Sunnery James & Ryan Marciano.

We had the pleasure of watching their set from the sound/lighting booth where we chatted with Vello who was running the imaging for the Main Stage. The view was excellent.

From there we moved to the top of the booth to the Red Bull Flight Deck to catch Thomas Gold who put on a killer set. We had considered leaving to catch Dash Berlin but we were happy we stayed. Thanks for not making us regret our decision Thomas Gold.

From there it was off to the Press Yacht for an interview with Krewella. You can watch the interview right here:

After we wrapped up with Krewella, we dashed off back to the Live Stage to catch Major Lazer.

Diplo & company put on one of the best sets of the entire weekend hands down.

At one point they were joined on stage by surprise guest Sean Paul to the delight of fans who packed the Live Stage to the gills.

We stuck around at the Live Stage for Snoop Dogg/Lion. Between Major Lazer and Snoop, Yasmine Yousaf of Krewella and Adventure Club (who are dating) popped up to do a surprise quick tag-team set for the massive crowd.

Snoop hit the stage to a roar of cheers and proceeded to drop a mix of his biggest hits, other hip-hop favorites (like House of Pain’s “Jump Around”) and some of his new tracks from his Snoop Lion reggae project.

While it was amazing to see Snoop perform his classics and some newer dance-infused jams (while he puffed away on stage), we were left totally uninspired by his new Snoop Lion selections.

Up next on the Live Stage was Pretty Lights who we  had no intention of missing. His track selection and light show are second to none and we stayed for as long as we could before breaking away to head back to the Main Stage for Swedish House Mafia.

Swedish House Mafia has been one of the biggest names in EDM for the past several years and after announcing their plans to retire as a group to focus on their solo careers, Axwell, Sebastian Ingrosso, and Steve Angello decided to play their final show at Ultra weekend 2.

It was no surprise that the Main Stage was absolutely packed leading up to their 90 minute set (although their were also very large crowds for Paul Van Dyk at the ASOT600 Stage and Wolfgang Gartner at the Ultra Korea stage).

After a 30 minute break following Alesso’s set, the stage was prepped for the trio to give their farewell performance. They entered from the middle of a huge stage set-up in dramatic fashion and played exactly what you would expect, all of their productions that have made the trio famous.

After snapping some photos, we returned to the Live Stage where we had chosen to see Crystal Castles as our final Ultra set.

After taking the stage fifteen minutes late (which is arguably early for Crystal Castles) Alice Glass & Ethan Cath hit the stage in a think cloud of smoke.

They dove right into their glitchy, synth-pop catalog as Glass sang (er, screamed) away into her mic while smoking a cigarette (that has to be good for the vocal cords).

Often known to be less than warm when it comes to the media, Crystal Castles was very engaging with the audience. Glass moved to the front of the audience several times from the stage to be closer to their adoring fans.

Sunday night came to a close in much the same way Friday and Saturday nights did, with a huge fireworks display and a mass exodus of fans from Bayfront Park into downtown Miami and South Beach for any number of after parties.

All in all Ultra 2013 (weekend 2) was a blast. As always it was often difficult to choose between sets as many of our favorite DJs were playing at the same time on any given day. The sets we did hear were almost all fantastic with lots of new music being debuted. There is no place we’d rather be each March and no substitute for being there in person to take it all in. We’ll miss you Miami, see you next year!

Be sure to “like” Independent Philly on Facebook and follow us on Twitter!

[Photos by: D. Jacob Miller Photography & Jeanette Alexandra Wons]

You can view an expanded photo gallery from all three days of Ultra 2013 (weekend 2) below (click thumbnails to enlarge):

Interview with Jason Hann of EOTO

EOTO was formed in 2006 when Michael Travis and Jason Hann (of String Cheese Incident) began experimenting with their love of electronic music. It didn’t take long before their unique live shows were packing houses as they toured relentlessly around the country.

Using no pre-recorded sounds whatsoever, EOTO crafts their loops live on stage to create a one of a kind experience at each show. Add in killer visuals, and a rabid fan-base, and you have the recipe for live-tronica perfection.

For their upcoming tour they have teamed up with crunkstep creator Crizzly to bring yet another dimension to the show. Before we catch them in action on February 8th, 2013 at the Theater of the Living Arts (you can enter our contest to win free tickets here) we caught up with Jason Hann to answer some questions for us.

Independent Philly: Who came up with the name EOTO and what (if any) special meaning does it have?

Jason Hann: Travis came up with the name EOTO, which stands for “End Of Time Observatory”, and we had gone through about twenty names and already had our first gig booked and didn’t know what to call ourselves. So we went through all of these names and one of our other names actually appeared on the first flyer, and by the time the show came around we have changed it to End Of Time Observatory. The meaning just felt like a reflection of being in a world where there are so many other dimensions going on that you don’t even feel time as a separate dimension. We live in 3-D, we don’t really feel the 2-D world as much; and having that kind of relationship to time, where it’s so deep into the other dimensions and possibilities that are happening, that accessing the time dimension seems trivial.

IP: It’s been been several years since your last studio album, do you guys have any plans for a new one in 2013?

JH: Right now, no. We’re having fun releasing just our live shows. We both produce on our own but it seems with the way our schedules have been, because we’re on the road so much, that getting an extra week in our off time to make that happen seems like a little more of a burden. It wouldn’t feel fresh, kind of like we were just doing it to do it, and we’re gonna try to work on (while we’re out on the road), having a recording situation where, at sound check or something like that, we can work on some new material or some set up where we can record ourselves. I’m not really sure what we want to do with it, if we just want to make it our own thing or if we want to collaborate with other producers and have them remix our stuff. Live, we feel like we’re just exploring all the time so there’s a lot of satisfaction when we put out a live-recording where you can really see the enrichment of our development.

IP: Did you make the conscious decision from the get-go to never use prerecorded sounds in your live sets, and if so, what went into that decision?

JH: It has been with us since our inception and the project really came out of us not trying to put a project together and just setting up random instruments and jamming on them from like 10pm til 4 or 5am. We got in the habit of doing that on a night to night basis, and just having fun playing different instruments, and as we recorded ourselves, the stuff that we thought sounded most interesting was when we would emulate some form of electronic dance music. Those always seemed to be more inspiring than if we were just trying to do some rock-fusion thing or funk thing. When we would hear ourselves back, it just kind of gave us the incentive to say “Hey, let’s do this in front of an audience”. It was just two of us but knowing that we could play for hours and hours on end, gave us the confidence to know that we could do that night after night and just make stuff up. It was really hard at first, we didn’t fully realize what we were taking on, but we really learned how to work through any kind of writer’s block, or player’s block.

IP: You mentioned a moment ago collaborating with other producers, and we know you’ve worked with several producers and artists in the past across a wide range of genres. Are there any specific people you haven’t worked with before that you’d love to in the future?

JH: Wow, that’s a good question. It’s funny because when we were coming up, it was right around the time when Bassnectar had broken open pretty big and Glitch Mob had broken open and I remember there was more talk around that time about doing some collaborations with those guys. You know if we just sent them a stanza of what we had. We haven’t talked with Tipper about doing something together but we talked with Tipper about doing some remixing in relationship a to String Cheese (Incident) project and yeah, it’s one of those things where there’s really a lot of young producers out there that it would be really cool to just get our material to and see what they have. I feel like everyone at this point could be pretty worthy of that. So part of it is us just getting together and recording all of our tracks in a multi-track forum. Right now when we do our live shows we just record to stereo output so we don’t have control of all of the individual instrument tracks, so we’d have to update our live set-up in a really different way to pull that off. It’s kind of one of the reasons that we haven’t tried to go for the studio thing.

IP: What can fans expect from a live EOTO show if they haven’t seen you perform before and are there any new elements that you’re unveiling for the new tour with Crizzly that maybe no one has seen before?

JH: Yeah. Visually we are adding stuff to our projection mapping. We have quite a few new images that we had our animators work on. We have a unique sort of laser production that we’re adding to that show too so there’s all this kind of visual stimulus, from our lotus sculpture projection mapping set up, and we’re looking to add some other visual textures with the lasers, like showing them on these sort of transparent films so it looks like holograms floating in the air and not just shooting lasers from the front of the stage to the back of the stage. So there’s definitely things we’ve done to try to make the show more unique from a visual perspective. Musically, our last gig was at the beginning of December, we were integrating all of these sort of new concepts of productional music that had just recently come out. Trap music is the thing that might be building around, ad nauseum to a certain degree, but there are no live bands that are pulling that off so we just really found a way to hit that style hard, and then some minimal techno stuff, and discovering this gamut of what we did before but adding new styles to it so it’s just a bigger journey musically. 

IP: Sounds great. You guys are known for doing these grueling stretches with your live shows. How do you prepare mentally and physically for a long tour?

JH: Well usually it’s back to back to back, so it’s not anything we’re preparing for necessarily, it’s just more like a continuation. It’s almost never ending. Going into this tour was actually pretty different for us. I’ve had the last three weeks off and I’m a little bit curious. This week I’m really starting to play and sing on a day to day basis so that all of my stamina is there for when we dive in because we haven’t done that before. In the six years we’ve been together we did a festival spring tour, right into summer tour, right into fall tour, so in all those years we really haven’t taken much of a break. We’re just kind of doing our own thing now in terms of trying to relax and just enjoy home as much as possible, so I’ll let you know when tour starts where our heads are at but I think we’re both feeling really refreshed and ready to dive into the music. 

IP: What’s the craziest thing you’ve ever seen at one of your live shows?

JH: It probably gets X-rated at some point but I’m not sure I want to go into that… here’s a nice safe thing, there’s definitely some shows we’ve gone to with some haunting experiences with like ghosts and stuff. That’s kind of lame huh? (laughs)

IP: You mentioned ghosts so, Bigfoot, Martians, Zombies, and Ghosts… which of those do you believe in?

JH: Definitely ghosts. Martians in the sense that a lot of us are kind of Martians. Bigfoot? Maybe not in full-on Bigfoot form like you would picture as a Yeti or Sasquatch, but there are definitely other species that haven’t been discovered. What was the other one?

IP: Zombies.

JH: Oh yeah, Zombies, I freaking love Zombies! I only believe in them in the sense that I’ve been to Haiti before. There’s a lot going on down there in the form of, people that are influenced by a certain chemical made from plants that can definitely alter your body’s functions so that you could come back in a state where you don’t have your mind, but maybe not in the sense of “The Walking Dead” Zombies where they’re up and eating people. They do have them, but that’s more Bath Salts. I don’t consider that Zombieism; that’s just bad drugs.

IP: Yeah, drug induced Zombies don’t count…

JH: You have to only be able to die by being shot in the head to qualify as a Zombie. But I do love The Walking Dead. I’ve followed it since the fourth issue of the comic, or graphic novel. When it was first starting, someone turned me on to it and I was like “Oh my god, this should be on TV!” and now it’s on TV, so there.

IP: In addition to graphic novels, have you read any good books recently?

JH: I’m not much of a book reading guy these days. I’m a full news/political junkie guy. On a certain topic or news story that’s going around I’ll fully dive into the politics of what’s being put out. One of the last books that I read is “Best Democracy Money Can Buy” by Greg Palast. Man, that was just a fascinating book. He’s an investigative journalist, and you know, they don’t make investigative journalists anymore. Journalists on TV tend to be so careful because if they report too bad of a story they won’t get an interview with other people again because there are so many other people that was to interview important figures that they don’t want to rock the boat. They’ll go PG on it unless it’s super obvious that some crazy crime was committed. But other than that, investigative journalism is really a lost art form. So Greg Palast is probably the best in the world right now for what he investigates, which is mostly big oil and voting fraud and stuff like that. But it’s real nuts & bolts and when you read his stuff it’s like you’re looking into a crystal ball because he’ll write some stuff that was two or three years ago, especially with the voting laws being put into place, and suddenly election season comes around and all of these things have been put into place. It’s scary somewhat but it makes sense with the nature of politics and power grabbing. So that’s what fascinates me even though I’m ultimately jaded.

IP: Can you tell us something about EOTO that would surprise or even shock our readers?

JH: Nope (laughs), nope, we’re open books. There are so many navigational tools I’m going through right now but let’s go with a cool fact on Travis’s  side…Travis’s dad, his name is Neil Travis, has an Academy Award for Best Editing for that movie “Dances With Wolves” with Kevin Costner. With me, I don’t know whether you have my particular bio but I played on the 2001 “Chronic” Dr. Dre record.

IP: Both things we did not know.

JH: Well look at this! And we didn’t even have to get all dirty and freaky and creepy.

IP: We’ll save that for the next interview.

We can’t wait to check out EOTO’s new visual aesthetics, as well as the incorporation of new genre’s of sound into their live show, when they play the TLA on February 8th! For those of you not in Philadelphia, you can check out the tour schedule here before it kicks off on January 31st!

 

Counterpoint Music Festival: First and Foremost

2012 was a huge year for concert festivals and an even bigger year for the multi-day events that focused on the many sub-genres of electronic dance music. While several festivals returned to celebrate another year, there were also several festivals that were held for the first time.

Of these brand new 2012 events, the one was the biggest buzz surrounding it was Counterpoint Music Festival. Although this was the inaugural Counterpoint Music Festival, the promoters already had numerous notches on their festival belt, having thrown Camp Bisco, Lights All Night, Lollapalooza, and several other events.

The three day event took place on September 27-29th in Fairburn, Georgia (about 30 minutes outside of Atlanta) on a 350 acre water-front property and featured numerous stages with some of the best EDM talent in the world performing. From headliners like Bassnectar, Skrillex, Pretty Lights, Avicii, and Steve Angello to scores of other DJs and live acts that sell out shows night after night around the world, the line-up was top-notch, and when it comes to line-ups, if you build it, they will come.

There was also a food truck compound, carnival rides, extreme sports demonstrations, an arts village, a slew of tasty brews and food, and both man made and natural fireworks (on day two, the festival had to be evacuated for two hours due to violent storms in the area, but quickly resumed as soon as it was safe to do so).

Fans flocked to Georgia from all over the country, as well as from over-seas, to attend Counterpoint, many of them opting to camp for three days to get the full festival experience.

From the moment that the cars began rolling onto the festival grounds and unloading tents there was a palpable buzz in the air. Decked out in everything from skimpy outfits to elaborate costumes, party goers packed into the fields, rides, dance floors, and tents from the first set of the weekend until the last.

At the end of each night, after the headlining sets, the fun continued into the wee morning hours in the late-night dance tent as well as in the camp ground. While the weather at times put a slight damper on the weekend’s festivities, not even Mother Nature herself could kill the vibe of Counterpoint.

[all photo credits: Chorale Miles Photography]

If you were there and want to relive it, or are just dying to see what you missed, we have an expansive photo gallery for you to check out below:

 

 

 

 

Firefly Festival 2012: Basking in The Glow

The first annual Firefly Festival kicked off in Dover, Delaware on Friday, July 20th 2012.

The three day camping festival at Dover International Speedway featured four stages of music, food, drinks (including beer and wine gardens), VIP areas, hot air balloon rides, fireworks, after parties, and one hell of a good time.

The camping lots opened at 6am Friday morning as cars lined up hoping to get some premium spots for their tents and RVs. Many fans also helped sell-out numerous hotels in the Dover area and of course there were those who attended single or multiple days without accommodations.

While it was impossible for us to see every single band/act that we wanted to, Firefly did an excellent job of scheduling the stages to make it easier than most festivals to catch as many as possible. At the end of each evening, the main stage was the only one still running, leaving no one competing against the headliners.

Let’s break down our highlights of Firefly Festival on a daily basis. You can click on the headings to see the full photo gallery broken down into groups for Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.

FRIDAY (click for photos):

The doors opened at 2pm on Friday with the music kicking off 30 minutes later. Although the camping lots were well handled by staff, making it a fairly easy process to check in, it took us a while to get our tents set up and everything squared away before a light rain began to fall.

We managed to make it inside the Festival by 5pm in time to catch Mayer Hawthorne. John Legend was up next on the main stage and put on a great performance.

The biggest highlights of the first day came next as Dubstep icon Bassnectar threw down a dirty 75 minute DJ set
that had fans going crazy in the rain.

As the bass drops ended, the rain drops did not. That didn’t stop Jack White from closing out Friday on the main stage in grand fashion. While we prefer the sounds of the White Stripes, White still put on a memorable show.

SATURDAY (click for photos):

The festival gates opened at 11am on Saturday and we were up early to catch Imagine Dragons at 1145am. There is a ton of buzz surrounding this rock outfit from Las Vegas and it was easy to see what all the hype was about. We wouldn’t be surprised to see these guys on the Main Stage by next year.

From there we moved to the Main Stage to catch the Felice Brothers but their country-esque sound wasn’t really our cup of moonshine tea and we headed back to the Backyard Stage to see Charles Bradley.

Bradley’s modern day James Brown style act is extraordinary and really set the table for the rest of our amazing day.

At 230pm we took in Michael Franti and Spearhead. Franti is one of the most charismatic performers around and his high-energy sets and liberal social commentary are second to none. Franti danced around stage (barefoot as always) and ventured out into the crowd more than once. With news of the tragedy in Colorado (a mass shooting in the new Batman movie) on everyone’s mind, Franti addressed the situation, “It’s crazy to live in a country where it’s illegal to possess marijuana, but you can own an assault rifle.” Amen to that.

The Lawn Stage hosted Grouplove next and we were there to catch it. It was our first time seeing Grouplove and true to their name, we loved it. With multiple vocalists and musicians their rock sound is upbeat and fresh. It was definitely one of the highlights of not only Saturday, but the entire festival.

This was one point where we felt a scheduling conflict as The Knocks were playing at the exact same time on the Backyard Stage so we left Grouplove halfway through their set and walked briskly through the woods to catch the EDM duo’s live performance. The Knocks are fantastic. It was impossible for us to not join the crowd in dancing along to their infectious house-music sound.

Young the Giant was next on our agenda and the Cali rockers took the Main Stage by storm. While, admittedly, we were only familiar with some of their biggest hits, we enjoyed their set immensely. We’ll definitely be checking out more of their music on the intranets.

Chiddy Bang and Cake were both playing next and we opted to chill out at Cake’s set for 30 minutes as our feet needed a rest.

Refreshed, we headed back to the Main Stage to catch Modest Mouse. We were thrilled when Firefly added them to the line-up and we couldn’t help giggle at the image of a hot-air balloon rising behind the stage as they played their hit song “Float Away”.

Passion Pit was one of the acts we were most looking forward to seeing but they had to be replaced at the last minute by Yeasayer who took the stage and actually apologized for not being Passion Pit. They didn’t need to be Passion Pit or anyone else because Yeasayer puts on one hell of a show in their own right. We hadn’t had a chance to catch them since Coachella in 2010 and we loved every minute of their local performance (they hail from Delaware, Maryland, and Philly), forcing us to skip Lupe Fiasco.

The night ended with a blockbuster performance (complete with fireworks) on the Main Stage from The Killers. A massive crowd formed to take in the Las Vegas rockers and Brandon Flowers and company gave everyone their money’s worth. Surprisingly, it was our first time catching The Killers on stage and it was every bit as memorable as we’d expected. You never forget your first time.

SUNDAY (click for photos):

As it often happens at festivals, the final day came all too soon. The weather was a bit nicer on Sunday and the gates once again opened at 11am. Our first stop was at the Lawn Stage to catch Penguin Prison which was the perfect way to start our day.

We then bounced between the Main Stage to see  The Head and The Heart and the Porch Stage to catch Reptar. We enjoyed both sets but had to conserve energy for what we knew was coming later.

The gauntlet started at 220pm with Awolnation on the Lawn Stage. If you’re only familiar with Awolnation for their song “Sail”, check out some more of their stuff immediately, it’s not what you think. You can thank us later. Their rocking set had fans jumping and crowd surfing (band encouraged).

We’d circled The Cold War Kids as a can’t miss performance on the Main Stage so we made sure we were there before they took the stage. We love these guys. Their rock sound is always in rotation on the Independent Philly iPOD and that won’t be changing anytime soon. They certainly didn’t hang fans out to dry. Thanks to a generous dose of Dayquil, lead singer Nathan Willett’s illness did nothing to affect his vocals.

Tinie Tempah was up next and it was good to get some hip-hop mixed into our day. One of the things we loved most about Firefly was the wide range of musical genres and we wanted to experience as many as possible.

Death Cab For Cutie hit the Main Stage at 615pm and killed it as we agonized about what to do next.

The Flaming Lips and Girl Talk had the exact same set time. This was the biggest failure of the scheduling on Sunday. We caught the first 45 minutes of The Lips to catch the magical fanfare of giant balloons, confetti, smoke, and even a walk across the audience in a giant inflatable hamster ball by front man Wayne Coyne. It’s amazing that after 29 years, these guys still kick out one of the most incredible performances on the planet. It pained us to have to leave early but we knew Girl Talk’s set would be what it always is, one gigantic party.

Gregg Gillis (Girl Talk) mashed up sample after sample as the crowd went absolutely bonkers. Even the promoters, staff members, and media were rocking out and singing along.

The night, and the Firefly Festival, wrapped up in grand fashion with The Black Keys on the Main Stage. In just over a decade, these guys have pumped out album after album and hit after hit. It was truly a pleasure to end three amazing days of music to the sounds of the Keys in a sea of tens of thousands of other music lovers.

WRAP UP:

Firefly Music Festival was one of the highlights of 2012. It ran very smoothly for any festival (let alone one being thrown for the first time). We were initially surprised that the festival was held in Delaware (as were many of the bands who commented on how strange it felt to say “What’s up Delaware?!” to the audience) but it turned out to be the perfect venue. The place stayed very clean (including the bathrooms), the prices for food/drinks weren’t as high as at other festivals, and the music was out of this world. It’s no surprise that the pre-sale tickets for Firefly 2013 have already sold-out. We can’t wait to see what is in store for next year’s Firefly Music Festival and we hope you’ll join us in Dover next summer.