So Castlefest happened, and what an experience it was! For people that dont know us, were actually quite shy, which is why most of the photos we took (youll see them soon) are taken from a distance, and we were both very nervous about the event, excited, but nervous. Its one thing talking with bands, artists and listeners over Facebook and email, but its a whole new world meeting them in the flesh. We had no idea how we would be recieved by people, or how we would fit into a festival that seems more like a giant family. So the adventure (which was only made possible due to the generosity of Mark van der Stelt of Vana Events and the hard work of the wonderful Rusmir Oz Hadziarapovic who is our festival liason) began with a 16 hour journey by train, bus, tram and ferry, Oz met us at the train station in Hillegom and drove us to a shop where we bought a little food to last us, he then presented us with two purple wrist bands which were our backstage passes.... yeah... backstage.... us.... two ordinary folks from the UK going backstage at a festival we only dreamed we could get to before. He then took us to the campsite. Once we pitched the tent we made our way over to the main festival site to meet up with Oz again. On the way over the road we heard voices shout HELLO WYLDWOOD RADIO and turned to see RASTABAN waving at us! Nem and I waved back, trying to act cool (and failing miserably) and basically said to eachother... Oh my Gods! They really do like us!. Oz showed us around some of the site and we met the beautiful Esmee Polling (congratulations of the modelling contract!!) Faber Sowulo and Klaartje Julia on the way back to the campsite to get ready for the opening ceremony we bumped into Michael van der Schoot and then we met the lovely Magda Eileen Piotrowska and carried on our facebook poke war in real life! (poke poke poke!). Next we met Kristof Denaghel, the crazy Belgian as he was signing in to the camp. The opening act was Irfan, and instantly I felt the atmosphere of the festival start to awaken. As with all the acts, Irfans performance was so very powerful, hearing their music live for the first time, felt so different, so alive. The next two bands were Dikanda and Transsylvanians, so much energy! During Dikanda, half the crowd began dancing a spontaneous Macarena, it was great to see Nem and Magda dancing together, Our first photo was with Magda. Did I expect to see a Hungarian fiddle player go crowd surfing? No, did it happen? Yes! That night we met Arjan de Groot, Bob Boukes and Alex CeltCast, which we were anxious about but so glad we did, reuniting old friendships over vanilla mead and Rapalje beer (though as a British person, I still think there needs to be a beer pouring lesson in the Netherlands... all that foam....). The next day we met Nikki and his beautiful lady. Over the next four days we met SO many beautiful people, more than I can tag in this post but damnit Ill try my best to get as many in as I can, Sara Weeda and Jasper Van Gheluwe, Thomas Biesmeijer, Monique van Deursen, Sophie, Kristian Eivind Espedal (Who I swear smiled a little... just a little), Maria Marsha Alma, Maria Franz, Christopher Juul, Patrick Broekema, Dieke Elfring, Corné van Woerdekom, Robin Skottie Slutter, Micky Silver, Lunadea Ruthy Jankiewitch, Steve Sic, Jenny Evans-Van Der Haarten, Daphyd Sens, Satrya Karsono, Niel Mitra, Sanne van Gend, Hanna van Gorcum, Sebastiaan Pongers, Evert Willemstijn, Taloch Jameson, Josh Elliott, Kees Stravers, Don Bakhuizen, Mich Rozek, Marine Libert, Stephan Groth, Stéphan Kesenne, Dominic Marchal, Luka Aubri, Kati Ran, Jerry Winkelmans, John Harford and Diana Risel, David Groeneveld and a special mention to both Oliver S. Tyr and Rob van Barschot for the beers! And we met beautiful listeners too such as Bethany (Good luck your degree and we hope you managed to move in to your flat ok?), Natha (we tried to find you again but youd vanished!) Silvia Coniglio, Mirjam von Donselaer and Jacqueline Stempher with whom we rescued a wandering caterpillar :) To have walked up to so many stalls where the owners knew who we were and thanked us for the station was utterly mindblowing, to be asked by Rastaban, Bea Versluis, Magda and others if they could have a photo with us was amazing, to be able to hear the amazing bands that we got to see (I wish there three of me so that I could have seen you all!) to be presented with an amazing Wyldwood Radio layered medalion, to be able to spend time in the company of such beautiful bands, artists and listeners and to be able to do two amazing interviews (and more to come!) has just been so totally amazing, part of me still wonders if it has all been a dream! I have been asked what my favourite acts were, and I really cant decide, though I will say Wardruna blew me away completely! The energy and comedy of La Horde, the power of Scrum, euzen, Corvus Corax, the beautiful weaving of songs into a story by AmmA including their impromptu acoustic set, the mystery of Cesair, the fire of Rastaban, the beauty of Faun, the liveliness of Zirp, the magic of Omnia.... the list goes on. Theres not one band that we could say we didnt enjoy, we loved all those that we saw. Thank you to everyone we met, to everyone who put the event together, helped us get there, thank you to Bethany and her mum for helping us when we got to the train station and needed change instead of a note, to those I have mentioned and those I havent Thank you! Some other great points about Castlefest, showers, really good showers, clean, warm, and plenty of them, clean toilets, there really were no festival toilet experiences, 24 hour tent with silent disco, the amazing costumes of the visitors and performers, the great reenactment show where we got to watch Oz swinging large bits of metal at people, the camping is close, the queues move quickly, the location is stunning (especially the Dragonflies!) and the acts were simply amazing. There were only two downpoints to the event Spending the last night curled in a corner as the tent began leaking in the rain, if you could call that rain, it was more like giant buckets of water being dumped from the sky, and having to leave. But I realised something.... Castlefest hasnt ended, its merely paused between acts See you next year!
Posted on: Tue, 05 Aug 2014 16:32:35 +0000
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