Lineup after Lineup after Lineup

This week there were huge festival announcements. The Hangout Fest in Gulf shores, Alabama and Firefly in Dover, Delaware announced their lineups on Tuesday and Wednesday this week.  Seeing that both festivals are owned by the same company called Golden Voice, this is not surprising. They are stacked with incredible artists and causing a hype since these lineup releases have come out before Coachella, which never happens. Coachella has always been the first to announce their lineups because they are the first to start the ' festival season' and start the excitement with people guessing which of the artists performing there will be at a fest they're attending.  Not only did these lineups get announced, but the second wave of artists for the inaugural Okeechobee Music Fest were also announced this week too.

 What is surprising is how early they dropped the lineups. Was this a sales strategy? Or was this a competitive strategy? I see it as more of a competition strategy. With so many different festivals in the U.S. that deliver the same artist experience, the earlier the announcement, the earlier the sales, the more likely the public will buy the tickets on impulse. I'm definitely guilty of impulse buying and this strategy does work.

Based on lineup, I would absolutely LOVE to go to Firefly. There are way more artists I've never seen, on top of some of my favorites. Location wise, The Hangout is your dream spot, right on the beach of Gulf Shores. Nothing like sitting in the sand with a tall boy listening to Leon Bridges, or Grimes.

Can I just go ahead and have my dream job so I can start my goal of hitting up all the fests?

Above & Beyond Announce New Tour and Album

The popular trance trio, Above & Beyond, are excited to announce their second acoustic album, along with an acoustic global tour in the Spring at legendary venues like the Sydney Opera House, Royal Albert Hall, and the Chicago Theater. The trio were inspired by their successful sold out two-night acoustic performance at the LA Greek Theater, following their release of the 2013 album.

This album will contain acoustic versions of their hit electronic album "We Are All We Need," along with some previous hit songs not featured on the first acoustic album. The orchestra will include 15 musicians and will feature vocals by Zoe Johnston, Annie Drury, and Alex Vega.





As for me, I'm trying to look at my budget to catch this show in Chicago. Seeing an electronic artist be able to make their music with an orchestra is an incredible talent that I would love to see. Above & Beyond is already a fantastic group, it would be incredible to see them stripped.

What I've Learned

I have a deep passion for music and live music. Once I was heavily involved, I stumbled upon Festival Snob. This blog has been the number one source of festival news for me over the past two years. This blogger has always been kind of a secret guy when revealing his identity and what he does as a profession, but I was excited when he got back in contact with me and voluntarily shared this info. His name is Nick L. and he is from Nashville, Tennessee. He is 30 years old and his profession is computer forensics. His interest in music festivals started from his first time attending Bonnaroo in 2011. Nick experienced the magic of a music festival and couldn’t wait to share his experience with everyone. He then started spending a lot of his time discussing music festivals on online forums and message boards, and still occasionally does in his spare time.  After a while, he started sharing his information he had learned on social media sites. Nick then decided to stop bugging his friends who weren’t as interested as him and start a WordPress blog. A year after that, he resorted to creating social media accounts on Facebook and Twitter and it took off quickly from there. His page updates followers on any festival news, rumors, and information. Because of his increase in popularity, Nick and his partners are able to get Media passes to festivals which means they get the front row, uncrowded view of the stage and even backstage sometimes.

 Once accumulating a decent following, he made an Instagram account to post photos of the festivals he attended and then made a snapchat account so you could follow him wherever festival he attends. At first, this blog did not receive any money; but after January of this year, he started to make a little income by adding Google Sense Ads and was able to add more partners to expand the festivals attended. Now the amount of money made doesn’t earn enough income for the festival expenses of Nick or any of the other partners, but he expects that to change.  

What makes this blog more unique than the rest is how many different social media sites he’s on. Not only is there the site and twitter, but you can follow along with him at whatever festival, which is different than the rest. Now that he has expanded, he’s added more professional photographers and uploads great shots of the bands played at the festivals, as well as the festival goers. Nick is quick to respond to tweets and emails and does a great job on updates.  And now that he has added partners, Festival Snobs is able to show live coverage of more festivals.

Some strengths of this blog is what I keep saying, the live coverage. Being able to follow the blogger on SnapChat makes a huge difference. The only problem is sometimes two of the Festival Snobs partners will be at two different festivals in the same weekend, so unless you pay attention to the environment around the stages, you can’t tell which festival is which. Nick is good at putting a caption on who he is saying, but I’ve noticed other partners fail to put the artist that they’re seeing which is frustrating. The site, Festivalsnobs.com, is very well organized. It has everything you can possible find about music festivals on one page. One downfall is that there is so much info and so many music fests that all the thumbnails can be a little overwhelming. But, with the increase in the number of North American music fests, it’s understandable how many thumbnails there are to choose from.

            The advice I got from Nick was “Don't force it. I see a lot of other festival/music blogs trying to be something they aren't yet. Example: Throwing "#1 Source For Etc" on your blog, when you're only updating a handful of times a month. Let your followers come natural. Identify who your target audience is and start interacting with them on social media. From there you can identify what exact type of information your followers crave and put your focus there.”

What I learned from this interview was to be noticed, but don’t force it. I found his advice kind of ironic when he said don’t force it, only because the way I discovered him was from Nick mass following people tweeting about music festivals so we would follow him back and just to have him unfollow us. Still, I found his information useful, interesting, and exciting because of how secretive he makes himself out to be.

Festival Fashion Needs to End

Yesterday I went shopping at Charlotte Russe where I saw a line of accessories called the Coachella line. Because of Coachella, festivals have lately started becoming a fashion statement and it needs to end. Stars like Kendall and Kylie Jenner get paid $40,000 by a brand to be seen at Coachella for just an hour, and celeb fashion sitings like this is what has caused this ridiculous statement.

When you're at a festival, especially a camping one, why be fashionable when you can be comfortable? I see girls all the time with a full face of makeup, some sort of uncomfortable shoes, and a fringe top. Ladies, it is 90 degrees outside and you're standing in the hot humid sun for hours, nobody gives a damn how your makeup looks or how you're rockin' those short heels. Not to mention, any type of fringe is a nightmare when you're making a trip to the port-o-potty. I get it, you want to look cute, but I'm sorry to tell you that many people care to that extent. If you want to get noticed, where something bright and colorful or wear something with a popular image on it or a funny saying. But more importantly, wear something that will keep you comfortable for hours and hours in the hot sun.

So please, let's end this madness and enjoy the festivals for what they're supposed to be, THE MUSIC!!

Wait.. How Much?!

Earlier, I made a post about how much I spend on average at a music festival and saying I could buy a car with how much I have spent. Well, I decided to just add up the ticket prices and see how much I've spent on the most important part. With Decadence coming up, I realized that this will be my 20th attended festival and was finally curious as to how much I've spent over the past four years. I averaged the ticket prices at $275 each since my first two years of attending fests were my cheaper years and it's only been this year that I've spent well over $300 a ticket.

My average total: $5,500

Lesson of this: Don't add up the ticket prices for your own amusement and make sure you absolutely love doing this before you decide to add up the price.

Luckily for me, I view this as a cheap and awesome bunch of mini vacations.

Too Many Options!!

The one problem about wanting to go to a music festival for New Year's Eve is that there is a new lineup being dropped about every other week with a new festival in a different city. With all these great lineups, there's just too many options! The past two weeks, my friend group has been jumping back and forth between 3 different New Year's Eve options.

Lights All Night just released their lineup with DJ's I've yet to see, like Jauz and Yellow Claw, which is almost unheard of now. Dallas is so much closer and the cheapest option, but the people and the vibes that are there are not ideal. I've had awesome times at this fest, but I've also ran into a lot of rude people that have killed the positive frequency I was running on. I had a friend of a friend get punched in the stomach for no reason here. People can be ridiculous and rowdy at this fest.

Reaction released their full lineup and it's stacked with not only great DJ's, but some amazing bands, like CHVRCHES and Cherub, and rappers too, like Run the Jewels and Chance the Rapper. The problem with this one is it's in Chicago. We're getting to the point where it's hard to f
ind a car to get us to these places so far away and plane tickets are just too expensive. Luckily we have free places to stay in Chicago, but the car situation is what ultimately is keeping us from this fest.

And of course Decadence, what I blogged about earlier. Granted, my friends and I already have our tickets to this one, but I would be lying if I said we were at one point going to try to sell them for other options. Decadence has the lineup, a great location, but geez is it expensive. My ticket for this two-day fest is now the same amount as my Austin City Limits ticket. This festival is more than likely going to be our final option, but it's going to be the most expensive.


The list could go on and on with how many New Year's shows I've seen and thought about going to instead. I like the fact that there are options because you know the event won't be so heavily populated with thousands of people flooding to other arenas and convention centers for different shows; but, I hate it as well. If you give me too many options, I panic and buy a festival ticket on a knee jerk reaction without thinking my options through, and then have my friends get irritated with me. I can't handle all these options! I need to just start letting my friends decide for me.

Another Weekend at Austin City Limits

Even with the high 90 degree weather, crowded stages, and the red sunburn on my back, ACL weekend 2 was one of my favorite years I've attended. Starting with the Thursday night pre-partying on 6th Street, to a fantastic ending with fireworks, ACL had it all. I got to see some shows I've never seen, and see some shows that I've already seen and was blown away by. Met so many new friends and created amazing experiences, I was not ready to go back to the real world today. So I thought the easiest way to talk about my time would be to break it down to my top 3 favorite acts, and my top 3 least favorite.

Best Acts

Disclosure

My favorite dynamic duo did not disappoint. This was one act I was most looking forward to and they delivered the BEST performance of the weekend. Their lights and visuals were amazing and looked great along their music. They played a good combination of their first album along with their newest and I would call you crazy if you didn't fall in love with it. They brought out Lion Babe and performed their latest single "Hourglass" which was beautifully put on. I could and did go on and on about this show all weekend, one of the best shows I've ever seen at ACL.

The Weeknd

The Weeknd came and he delivered an awesome performance. Even though his headlining spot only was an hour long, he gave an incredible performance and had the crowd singing along with every song, myself included. He played all his hit radio singles as well as his new album music and songs from the popular Trilogy album. He was better than I would have ever expected and would even go to say he's probably the next Michael Jackson, without the dancing and way more vulgar lyrics. I'm not a big R&B fan, but I'm definitely a fan-girl for The Weeknd.

Run The Jewels

Run The Jewels has been an act that I've been dying to see. They've been mentioned in many blogs and music news articles as a must-see performance and one of the best acts at festivals; and let me tell you, they were not wrong. Never have I been to a rap show that could hype up a crowd of the masses quite like EL-P and Killer Mike. They really got the crowd going and made me wish that I was deep in the crowd ( I'm a back of the show kind of girl, I hate standing next to sweaty people in 94 degrees). Out of all the rap acts I've seen, not many can top Run The Jewels. Even in their solid black attire, with the sun setting right on them, they put on one of the greatest performances. Props to them, I could barely dance the entire time without dying of a heat stroke.

Worst Acts

Drake

Man... I was so disappointed by this one. I love Drake and was so excited to finally see him. I had warnings from other friends who had seen him at Weekend 1 or Coachella that he was boring, of course I didn't listen because I like to form my own opinions. Unfortunately, they were right. He opened with some weaker songs and anytime he played a hit, it was never the full song. I was not having fun and was actually getting frustrated. We left to go see Deadmau5 where I saw the same set he put on at Bonnaroo, and still had a better time than at Drake. After Deadmau5 ended, we went back to Drake to see that he had brought out J.Cole, still wasn't impressed. Finally, he started playing his heavier hitting songs, but by that point we left because we were so over it. Overall, really upset about his show. Lesson learned, I'm going to listen to my peers experiences.

Leon Bridges

I love Leon Bridges, he brings that old school 50's R&B sound and he's got a smooth voice and is one talented guy. Too bad his stage performance was boring. Due to the sound of his music, it's mellow and easy going and hard to enjoy in 94 degree weather. I ended up laying down and falling asleep at his show because it was just so boring. You can have a great voice and great music, but stage presence has a huge impact on getting the crowd to like you and Leon Bridges lost me

Halsey

This was an artist I decided to check out. I've only heard her name but never listened to her music. I have found so many new artists this way and usually am never disappointed, but Halsey was not that great. I don't if it was because the screaming high school girls all around me or Halsey's attitude that she was better than everyone on the stage, but she didn't have me sold. Her opening song was amazing but the rest was pretty mediocre. I honestly blame her fans for my terrible experience at this show.


ACL is a great festival filled with great people of all ages, great music, and priceless memories. I can't wait to go back and see what I get myself into!

-Blaze