Head On October

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MEAN STREETS VS MUDDY FIELDS

Head On, October 2006, COMMENTS

Open spaces, stars and guitars or celebrating in the shadow of skyscrapers? Siobhan O’Dowd [right] of Irish festival Electric Picnic and Ear to the Ground’s Steve Smith [left], of Manchester music showcase Dpercussion, explain why their kind of festival is best

Siobhan O'Dowd:

Electric Picnic is a festival that really engages with its rural location. It’s taken place at Stradbally in County Laois for the last three years, an area we chose specifically for Stradbally Hall and the surrounding natural features: idyllic woods, glades and even a lakeside beach. I think it’s a mistake to simply parachute a great big festival onto some field rather than choosing a site carefully and working a festival into it. Our approach differs from Leeds or V Festival in that respect, but there is potential for them to do what Electric Picnic does. Glastonbury has a lot of elements that we admire.

Having the right site applies to both outdoor and urban festivals of course, but key differences exist. Some are obvious: country festivals mark the summer, whereas urban festivals can take place whenever. The logistical requirements for rural and urban are very different. But having a large space means that we can offer a universal experience: we have a disabled camping area, and a family camping area, and children absolutely love the festival.

But the biggest difference has to be the escape. There’s only six of us at Pod Concerts, the organising company, so we have a really coherent idea of the identity we’re trying to create. Alongside the natural features we wanted a lot of art exhibitions this year, including a Brian Eno art exhibition in the woods. We have huge totem poles that are interweaved with tree trunks. The site also has a beautiful ampitheatre surrounded by trees. So as well as the acts, people love to walk around to soak up all that atmosphere which is unique to a site, and not usually available in daily life.

Going to a festival is something you plan and anticipate and get excited about. And you can’t book single days at the Picnic so you have to bring a tent and camp out, which is an important part of the experience. There’s an innocence about the way in which people live very simply in tents, and leave all the unnecessary things like computers and email at home. It’s also very democratic, we all start to look a bit rustic after the first day, with twigs in our hair. That’s a key difference. You’re not in a city, you’re creating a mini city. An urban festival builds on an existing identity of a city, whereas a boutique garden festival like Picnic creates a new fictional, magical setting to which people can escape from their routine lives.

The escapism also seems to be tied to a pleasant sense of community that’s also specific to the rural festival. People offer car sharing, share their camping gear, chat openly with strangers. Pretty much anyone who had lost a mobile phone or a wallet this year had found that it had been handed in to the lost property area. There’s a sense that we’re in it all together: eating together outside, looking out for each other, sleeping under the stars.

We try to nurture that sense of coming together with various festival projects that benefit both local and global communities. We have scouts who go around helping people to put up their tent, get a fire going or open tins and bottles. After the festival they round up the tents that have been abandoned and have them sent to crisis areas around the world to provide shelter. We have a group of graffiti artists that paint amazing murals in the woods during the festival, which we give to the local hospice afterwards. We raised €70,000 for Amnesty International, Friends of the Earth and various local charities. We also bring people to the local area, and work very closely with the local council to stage our events. Again that kind of thing is not limited to rural festivals, but there has always been a traditional link between great outdoor events and global awareness. It’s a tradition we are proud of.

Steve Smith:

I’ve always been a fan of listening to music where you’re not meant to listen to it. The street for me is the best place for that - stopping cars, stopping everyday life, breaking the rules in a positive, celebratory way.

The first Dpercussion took place in 1997, a year after the bomb ripped through the city centre. Manchester was coming back to life and being rebuilt and there was a civic celebration taking place. I thought that if the city was going to celebrate then its music industry should be part of it. I was working as a promoter at the time and was in contact with labels and DJs and managers, and I brought everyone together. There was a real feeling of good will then that has surrounded Dpercussion ever since. Everyone wanted to get involved.

Holding Dpercussion in the city centre defines it. In recent years I’ve stood in too many fields watching the same bands play different events, with the festivals blending into one amorphous festival experience. When they all feel the same, you wonder why you’re there.

When you’re at an urban festival - the Notting Hill Carnival or Dpercussion or Love Parade - where people are dancing in the streets surrounded by the unique architecture of that city, you know very definitely where you are. And there isn’t a place on the planet like Castlefield. The canals are the arteries of the city and in them and in the buildings - the warehouses, the conversions, the bars, the offices and the loft spaces - you can see the last hundred years of Manchester’s history. In the architecture is the narrative of the city’s evolution. The festival is part of the latest chapter.

Over the past ten years, Manchester city centre has seen unprecedented growth and the danger is that as it regenerates and becomes gentrified it will lose its sense of identity, and the independent culture that has defined it. As the city centre becomes a more desirable place to live and residents move into new flats, there’s been increasing pressure on smaller operators over noise complaints and from rising rents. Dpercussion happens once a year yet we still get complaints about the sound levels - from people who moved to the city centre, to Castlefield, because it’s a vibrant place to live.

Dpercussion is important for the city: it brings 40,000+ people into Manchester and generates a massive amount of money, but it also acts as a huge focal point, providing a snapshot of what’s happening musically. Clubs, bars and live venues operating every night of the week, all year – they’re really important. But Dpercussion brings it all out into the sunlight, or the rain, and turns it into a showcase. More and more we’ve brought in the best operators and promoters working in the city centre to take over pieces of the festival. It helps strengthen the sense of ownership. It’s a quintessentially Mancunian party and the people of the region care passionately about it. That was obvious before this year’s event when a sponsor pulled out and it looked like we weren’t going to be able to run it. Loads of people got in touch; some were really upset.

Money is always an issue. The down side of putting on an urban event is that you inherit problems you can’t do anything about – noise restrictions, existing operators, the fact that you cant enclose the site so you cant charge even a nominal fee. If we were putting Dpercussion on in a field we could run the bars and increase our revenue. This would take our dependence off sponsors and make Dpercussion more stable. The acts that play do it for a minimal amount because we can’t afford to pay them any more.
With new flats and conversions Castlefield is getting smaller, and every year our audience is getting bigger. It’s good for the economy I suppose but it’s not good for people who want to dance.

From: October 2006 Issue

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