Music Festival Month: Underground and Sustainable at Gottwood 2015
LIVE EVENTS
It s Music Festival Month on the Decibel Blog, and today we re turning the lens on the boutique festival scene with a quick intro to Gottwood, one of the UK s most interesting summer events. The Gottwood festival is an intimate slice of hippy-sci-future held in the forests of Wales, a woodland rave that aims for maximum sustainability.
Gottwood 2015, now in its sixth year, ran from June 11-14, and true to their underground roots, accepted no corporate sponsorship. According to an interview with one of the three Gottwood founders in the London Evening Standard:
All seven stages and other festival outbuildings are made from materials found on site. Anything built by teams of local craftsmen will remain after the event so that it can be used by school groups or community projects, while money raised by the festival is invested in improving the area. No vehicles are allowed on site and organisers ask festival-goers to use car share schemes as much as possible. Ticket sales are kept low to 5,000 customers, plus 1,000 crew so as not to damage the site.
Here s a little overview from the organizers:
And a bit more of the vibe:
The festival is held on the Carreglwyd Estate grounds, on a wooded stretch of coastline that was named Lonely Planet s Greatest Region on Earth in 2012. The estate itself has a history stretching back 400 or so years.
Carreglwyd was built in 1634 by Dr William Griffiths. He was the Chancellor of St Asaph and Master of the Rolls to Charles the First. His grandfather, Sir William Griffiths had been the Rector of Llanfaethlu for 44 years. Charles the First gave Dr Griffiths one of the five Edward Bower copies of Van Dyke s portrait at the time of his trial. This portrait hangs in the Dining Room of Carreglwyd today.
The 2015 gallery hasn t hit stands yet, but keep an eye on the Gottwood gallery page for more stunning photos of the event, like this one from photographer Roo Lewis:
Music Festival Month: Video Outtakes from Bonnaroo
LIVE EVENTS
June is Music Festival Month on the Decibel Blog, and today we take a quick gander at the best videos from Bonnaroo. Held in Manchester, Tennessee, June 11-14, Bonnaroo is the only multi-day music festival where events and shows run 24-hours, non-stop.
First, the Stats
80,000 attendees, and a 24-hour event schedule to manage? How many acres? HOW many tons of waste? Respect.
Speakers in the Shower
What s the worst thing about having a scrub-down at a music festival? Missing your favorite songs, natch. But Bonnaroo is remedying the problem with pretty sophisticated shower technology, including speakers built into the shower heads that play music from festival artists. If you re curious about the process, this is what it s like to shower at Bonnaroo.
Because Yes Please: Earth Wind & Fire
The silver pants, the silver pants!
The Domestic Weirdness Video Backdrop
Leave up to Belle & Sebastian to turn the weirdness factor up to twenty with a minimalist video backdrop of bizarre vintage Americana. Check it out start at 28:54:
The Dome (Again)
Hey, look, it s electronic wonderdude Deadmau5! We were just talkin about this guy. The Bonnaroo videographers produced a much better video of the producer s brand new Thunder Dome lighting cube, which debuted at the Governor s Ball in New York only a few weeks ago. Check out this A/V madness:
Odesza Brings the Tuba-Driven Tripiness
A perfect pairing of light and sound at Odesza s Bonnaroo set, which is almost prettier to watch than it is to listen to.
Music Festival Month: Best Instagrams from the State of Trance in Mumbai
LIVE EVENTS
June is Music Festival Month on the Backstage Pass blog, where we take a twice-a-week peek at highlights from the biggest summer concerts worldwide. This week, Dutch producer and DJ Armin Van Buuren linked arms with the promoters at Sunburn in Mumbai to bring party-goers A State of Trance, a music festival headlined by Van Buuren and named after his weekly radio show. We dug through the social media melee and fished out our favorite shots of the throwdown. We re loving
This monochrome welcome:
This screaming sea of souls:
This amazing fisheye crowd shot:
This field of cellphones:
This rain of fire:
This explosive behind-the-decks view:
This electric storm:
This trippy space lighting:
These colorful spotlights:
This gates of Heaven goodbye:
Music Festival Month: the Deadmau5 Dome at New York Governor s Ball
LIVE EVENTS
Hey hey, it s Music Festival Month on the Backstage Pass blog, and today we take a look at the biggest stage-design goss from the 2015 Governers Ball, namely, the debut of Deadmau5 s new Thunder Dome . Canadian electronic producer Deadmau5 is well known for his audio-visual gymnastics, and the Thunderdome s first live set was highly anticipated, so it was a bit of a disappointment when technical difficulties dogged the first few. Deadmau5 tweeted,
Rehearse all you want, you re still at the mercy at the fuckup who doesn t know how 3 phase power works. Lol. Amazing recovery tho!
But all good things to those who wait: when the dome did get rolling, it was all the LED insanity you might expect from a collaboration of greats. The dome was created by killer lighting designer Leroy Bennett, a twenty-year veteran of the industry who s worked with everyone from Lady Gaga to Prince.
After the technical issue was resolved, the geodesic dome split open horizontally, and the smaller dome that contained Deadmau5 opened vertically, like a hatch. This allowed Deadmau5 to lord over the proceedings, but before these Russian nesting dolls of neon geometry unpacked themselves, the structure s effect was almost eerie. Because Deadmau5 was hard to discern within it and especially because it continued to light up after the audio cut out the setup seemed to have a life of its own, existing autonomously as a pulsating electronic organism that had more agency over what was transpiring onstage than Deadmau5 himself.
Hot diggety, that s some description. Brace for sonic assault:
More, please!
Woohoo! It s Music Festival Month on the Decibel Blog.
LIVE EVENTS
It s June, and that means the world s gearing up for a solid month of muddy mosh pits, body paint and sonic experiences. So naturally, we re doing the same. This month on the Decibel blog, we ll spend four weeks taking a look at the event production, brand marketing and just plain cool highlights from music festivals around the globe.
We can t cover everything that s going on, but we sure can try. Here s what you can expect to see us commenting on in our June lineup:
The New York Governor s Ball
Photo credit: Governor s Ball
The NY Governor s Ball is a three-day, multi-stage festival that s heavy on the indie rock. Among this year s yes, please bands are Ratatat, My Morning Jacket, Death From Above 1979, and hilare Weird Al.
Sunburn Festival, Goa India
Sunburn is India s premier electronic music brand hosting Asia s largest 3-day Electronic Music Festival in Goa, encompassing various smaller festivals across the city, arena gigs and club tours. This is your straight-out-of-the-box electro-party vibe.
Bonnaroo
If you re not familiar with Bonnaroo, I can t help ya, son. And the 2015 lineup is so long and so varied, there s no single way to sum this one up. We expect to see some killer stage and lighting design, and world-class activations.
Gottwood Festival
The mystical little party hidden in the middle of the woods. Gottwood is a critically acclaimed, independent, boutique, and intimate underground electronic music festival. A tip of the hat to the logistics team responsible for getting all that infrastructure set up in the middle of absolutely nowhere.
Firefly Festival
From Tycho to Snoop Dog, the Firefly Festival (produced by Red Frog Events), is a four-day feast for the ears in the woodlands of Dover, Delaware. Attendees are welcome to camp at the festival site, meaning organizers are faced with planning round-the-clock facilities for partying, eating, sleeping and bathing. Damn.
Newport Folk Festival
From our friends over at Wikipedia, an American annual folk-oriented music festival in Newport, Rhode Island, which began in 1959 as a counterpart to the previously established Newport Jazz Festival. The festival features performances by folk, blues, country, bluegrass and folk rock musicians, and since the 1990s has featured performers from related contemporary genres, such as alternative country, indie folk and folk punk.
Warped Tour
Created in 1995, the Vans Warped Tour is the biggest travelling music festival in the US. We ll check in with the tour about halfway through the tour dates and inspect the goods.
Looking forward!
Decibel Event Wrap Up: Mighty Morphin Backdrop at the 67th Emmy Awards
LIVE EVENTS
If you re in the advertising industry, you don t watch the Superbowl for the football. You watch it because every single one of those 30-second spots cost like, 4 million dollars, and you wanna see how the big boys are spending their money. And if you re in the event production industry, you don t watch the 67th Emmy Awards for the Tracy Jordan speech (though, hey, welcome back, man), you watch it for the audio-visual and stage design goodies.
For those of you who didn t catch the full show, here it is:
The Emmys aren t known for their over-the-top production, focusing more on the classic award presentation, and the set designers tend to go less for distracting wow-factor and more for subtlety that supports the content of the show: TV clips, frequent on-off staging by a rotating roster of presenters and winners. That being the case, there s really only one thing to talk about from this year s Emmys: that mighty morphin door-portal fabricated backdrop thing.
This is a great example of a single static set piece that is all things to all people, appearing to seamlessly evolve through the clever use of LEDs. We get our first glimpse of this baby as soon as the curtain goes up at 00:00:00, with the undulating side-wall of LED and red-tone lighting, and it spends the rest of the show doing a chameleon thang:
The main wrap-around presentation screen is actually a construct of panels that all work in concert to display award category banners (00:09:10) or separately to display video feeds from the audience (00:23:13).
Set designers for heavily-televised events also must take into account close-ups on each speech, taking care to create a pretty background that s TV-friendly, that varies without becoming distracting, and that works from any possible camera angle. Again, good job on that one, guys.
So, Emmys #67: glitzy, classic, simple.
Unique Event Formats: CityDash
EVENT PRODUCTION TECHNOLOGY
This is part of Decibel s series on Unique Event Formats, where we feature off-the-beaten-track approaches to event organization, and some of the more interesting ways event producers are bringing people together.
Everyone has super agent fantasies, man. Don t tell us you ve never wanted to hand someone a manila envelope under a Viennese bridge. Or back-handspring through a laser field. Or evade Storm Trooper ninjas while cracking riddles. You want to do this. I want to do this. All people want to do this. And now you can.
What is it?
CityDash was actually created by the guys over at Fire Hazard, who specialize in high-energy immersive experiences , and who totally did not pay us to write this (no, really. We re just super into it.). With plots inspired by action RPGs, CityDash is a multi-player live action game that blends brainpower with motive power. From the horse s mouth:
[Citydash is] an hour-long team game in which players try to locate hidden codes while hiding from guards. Finding the codes scores points, but being spotted by a guard stops your team from being able to use some of the codes. The game rewards caution and stealth as well as speed and cleverness, and requires teamwork and strong leadership to win. Each team plays with a smartphone logged into the Citydash web site, which provides them with clues about the location of the codes. The codes are printed on small stickers which are hidden in difficult to find places: under benches, on the backs of signs etc.
Decibel actually batted around the idea of creating an IRL immersive experience at one point, but there were ton of moving parts, the planning required was incredibly complex and the project timeline couldn t handle starting from scratch, so we reluctantly set that aside. Seeing what has been done with Citydash, our hats are off to the organizers.
Why it s cool
I m sorry, did you not see the part about evading guards? You need another reason? Ok: how about we throw in chased by the Mad Hatter . CityDash events can be themed, like the upcoming Alice in Wonderland version slated to run in Adelaide ( Peer around corners, duck behind cover, and recruit passers-by to help you outwit and outrun the Red Queen s guards. Will you escape detection.. or lose your head? ), or the May 2015 version with a Sherlock Holmes twist ( Can you stop the evil Professor Moriarty before he destroys England? Will you uncover all of Moriarty s calling cards in time to evade disaster and attend tea? ).
How do I hold one?
Wise to get in touch with the dudes that invented it, wethinks. Yes, you could do your own, call it something else, blah blah blah. But events like this require more than knowing where to put the port-a-johns: the narrative element is key, and the timing is also touchy. So do call in and partner with the experts for consulting and help organizing.
Life of an Event Prof: #NatBookFest Breakdown
BACKSTAGE, EVENT INDUSTRY, LIVE EVENTS
Last week, we wrapped up one of our flagship events, The Library of Congress National Book Festival. It was our eighth year managing this event, and while we re veterans, we re always looking for new ways to accommodate a bigger audience and out-do ourselves from the year(s) before. With an expected 100,000 guests and a couple million more viewing the livestream at home, we couldn t afford to disappoint. Plus, our mantra is, Yeah, we can handle that .
It s true that the majority of the blood, sweat and tears goes into the planning leading up to our events. But we re still on our feet the day of, making sure everything runs smoothly. It s a small part of what we do in the event management business, but this is the day in the life of one of our event crew members: NatBookFest livestream style.
5:00 AM
Wake up call. Suit up, festival style. Means we get to wear a Decibel t-shirt today.
5:01 AM
Two shots of espresso, hold the sugar, hold the cream.
6:00 AM
Pile in the crew and Uber over to the the Washington Convention Center. All the gear from the day before is still in place. Grab checklist.
Radios charged. 
Power bricks charged.
Boot up the laptop.
Get to work.
7:00 AM
Call time for second wave of crew. Find a place to order 30 breakfast sandwiches from STAT.
7:30 AM
Overheard on Radio: Where s Waldo? Seriously. Someone lost the Where s Waldo costume day of the event. Waldo could not be found. If we made this up, you wouldn t believe it.
8:00 AM
Quick team meeting. High fives out the door.
8:30 AM
It s show time. Book lovers start filing into the convention center.
Set up camera for timelapse, because who doesn t love a good time lapse.
9:00 AM
Reading Cat in the Hat to test captions for livestream. Appropriate for the National Book Festival. AV and livestream team at the table, in position for the first keynote.
9:30 AM
It has been confirmed from a crew member on Floor 2 of the venue. Waldo has been found.
10:00 AM
Start first livestream of the day. David McCullough takes the stage. People from all over the world are giving shout outs to the popular two-time Pulitzer Prize winner.
11:00 AM
Bring our AV crew lunch. With an all-day livestream, they can hardly get up for a bathroom break. Extra dessert for their dedication.
11:30 AM
Celebrity Sighting #1: Found Waldo.
12:00 PM
If it s 12 PM, and we re eating our third meal of the day because we ve been up since 4. Is it lunch? Dinner? Who knows, but every meal is now called a dinner break. #EventProfProbs
1:00 PM
Our team member, Chris, is leading the team in the most steps, so far. 7.1 miles.
2:00 PM
Escalator stopped? No problem, we take the steps.
2:30 PM
Insert fourth cup of coffee.
3:00 PM
People start lining up for Condoleezza. Two hours before she s scheduled to speak.
3:30 PM
As heard over Radio: Our crew requires back-up at the lines for the Condoleezza book signing. Send in reinforcements.
5:05 PM
Condoleezza Rice takes the stage. 2,500 people make for a packed house. No surprise there.
6:00 PM
While Condoleezza is speaking, there s still book signings and children s stage activities going on. Some of our crew is at those stages making sure everything is running as planned.
7:00 PM
Final livestream wraps up.
7:30 PM
Start counting livestream stats. There were over 60K views and reached over 1.2 million users who weren t able to attend National Book Festival, but were able to watch their favorite main stage authors. That s how we handle that.
8:00 PM
As things wind down, we sneak a spot at the Teen Poetry Slam. Every year, this is a team favorite. Those kids are talented beyond belief.
8:30 PM
National Book Festival comes to an end, crowd piles out. Dismantle begins.
9:00 PM
Counting more livestream stats, giving our client updates, uploading last minute photos, and wrap-up meeting with the crew. That s a wrap.
10:00 PM
After a group selfie, we head out to Ebbitt Grill for a post-game dinner and a few well-deserved drinks from P.O.V. We couldn t have done any of it without our awesome client, Library of Congress, our hardworking crew who flew in from all over the country, and the sponsors that made #NatBookFest possible. Cheers, NBF 2017.
Top 3 Experiential Marketing Campaigns of 2017 (Thus Far)
BRAND ACTIVATIONS & MARKETING, EVENT INDUSTRY, EVENT PRODUCTION INSPIRATION, EXPERIENTIAL, LIVE EVENTS
Experiential marketing. Engagement marketing. On-ground marketing. Event marketing. Whatever you want to call it, can be very successful if done right.
The goal of experiential marketing is to form a memorable connection between the consumer and the brand to make a lasting impression, influence purchase decisions and ultimately build brand loyalty. It s proving to be a valuable part of a company s marketing plan, especially for large, faceless brands who can be viewed as out of touch with the general public.
With the explosion of new technology (like virtual reality) in the past year, combined with good ol fashion creativity, we expect 2017 to show us big things for experiential marketing. Here are some of our favorites so far.
The Casper Nap Tour & SXSW Takeover
Casper, one of the heavy-hitters in the mail order mattress-in-a-box industry, took this year s South by Southwest Festival by storm. For starters, they had their Nap Tour RV strategically stationed to help exhausted festival goers take 8-minute power naps. Attendees got to experience the comfort of a Casper mattress in a private pod, complete with slippers, a cold brew coffee, and a dog bed if they also had a furry friend.
Casper also partnered with the Standard Hotel s One:Night app to help people find a last minute, reasonably priced hotel room in an otherwise completely booked city. Each day at 3:00pm, the One:Night app released 20 rooms that could be booked for just $99 (more reasonable than the other hotel prices in downtown Austin during this time, which ranged from $250-$1,200). Guests got to sleep in comfortable rooms outfitted with a Casper mattress, pillows and slippers. Car service was provided by Tesla, and you could even request a real mom from the front desk to come read you a bedtime story.
Thanks to Mother Nature, Casper really solidified themselves in people s memories when an unexpected snowstorm cancelled flights in the North East at the end of SXSW. Casper extended their event to help stranded attendees find rooms, and even threw a Stranded in Austin party with rapper Warren G.
Talk about turning a nightmare into a dream.
XFINITY Fast & Furious Drive-Out Cinema
XFINITY partnered with the release of the next Fast & Furious movie, The Fate of the Furious, to take two of their customers on the ride of their lives. Excited to see and sit in some of the super cars from the movie, the two contest winners strapped in to watch a sneak peak of the film. That is until the people in the driver s seat suddenly discovered that the keys had been left in the car. Cue revving engine, confusion and adrenaline.
Turns out the people in the driver s seat were the actual stunt drivers from the movie, and they take the two unsuspecting super fans straight through the wall of the theatre and into an explosion-packed stunt ride. It was literally just like a scene from the movie. While this experience wasn t had by many people in-person, the YouTube video posted about it did a great job of capturing the event. While watching, you instantly start imagining what you would do in that situation. It evokes a feeling, a rush.
Plus, it s just flat-out funny to watch these people s faces as they flail about doing donuts next to impressive pyrotechnics.
Crayola Retires a Classic
Crayola made waves in the social media sphere by announcing that they were going to retire one of their iconic crayon colors from their 24-count box. They set up a giant box of crayons in Time Square, and had a countdown going on their website to March 31, 2017 (National Crayon Day) when they were going to announce live on Facebook which color would be getting the ax. Engagement and buzz on social media was high, as Crayola encouraged people to share which color they hoped to keep around (there s lots of Cerulean fans out there).
As it turns out, a box of the new crayons made its way onto shelves one day ahead of schedule, and of course an excited fan spotted it and posted it to Twitter. We give major props to the Crayola social team for reacting to this leak swiftly and positively by saying the color Dandelion just couldn t wait, and decided to announce his retirement a day early. This fast-thinking, positive spin saved the campaign, and may even end up gaining it more attention in the long run. Who doesn t love a good spoiler scandal? Here s wishing that Dandelion enjoys his golden years.
Do you have a favorite 2017 experiential marketing campaign that didn t make this list? Let us know! Tweet us at @DecibelEvent. We re social butterflies.
8 Bad Ass Products You Need For Events from CES 2017
EVENT INDUSTRY, LIVE EVENTS, TRADE SHOW
When you re a kid, wonderment can be found around every corner. When you re an adult, there are three main places you can go to experience that same childlike rush of awesomeness: Disneyland, Legoland and CES.
Unlike Disneyland, the magic displayed at CES is real; and unlike Legoland, it isn t larger than life, it is life. These are the futuristic, cutting-edge products straight out of The Jetsons and they re right here, right now. (Or at least in prototype.)
The Consumer Electronics Show featured 3,800 companies showing off products in a record 2.6 million net square feet of exhibit space with gadgets ranging from the brilliant to the fucking insane. So, we ve rounded up our favorites for rock star event professionals. Take a look:
Razer Project Valerie Triple-Screen Laptop
(Photo Credit: Razer)
Razer has created the world s first portable laptop with triple monitors. The additional screens are built-in and fold back into a 17-inch laptop case to take on the go. Unlike most laptops, it s a 12-pounder, but has a top-of-the-line graphics card and technology to date.
It may be meant for gamers, we re imagining the Project Valerie used in a command center overlooking your event floor. Even at 12 pounds, it would be easier to lug around than your laptop and two monitors when you need extra screen space to quickly and efficiently manage your next main stage. Unfortunately, this bad boy is only a prototype for now and isn t for sale yet. Our credit card is ready, Razer. Just say the word.
Smart Shoes from Under Armour
As if we didn t love them enough already, Under Armour has won our hearts again. Smart Shoes have been tracking running speed and cadence for about a year now, but this new update takes the cake. Jump six times in a row, and Smart Shoes 3.0 will measure how tired you are, letting you know if you re ready to run, need a break, or need an extra warm-up. Now if only they could design a smart shoe with a built in foot massager for those endless event days on the trade show floor. 4.0 release, pretty please?
Samsung Gear VR 4D Experience
(Photo Credit: Samsung)
One of the most popular demos at #CES2017 was the Samsung Gear VR 4D Gyro Experience. It had people seeing, hearing and FEELING the thrills of a space race. The line for this ride was super long, but also super worth it. Building a custom amusement park ride on your show floor really ups the ante for VR, and it wasn t the only virtual reality demo Samsung brought either, they had quite an impressive lineup! We re big on VR over here at dB, and can t wait to see where this technology will take us in the near future.
LG OLED TV Tunnel
(Photo Credit: Steve Marcus/Reuters)
LG is known for showing everyone up at CES, but they really outdid themselves with this stunning LG OLED TV Tunnel display. The TV Tunnel was a totally immersive display that transported you to another world, without the need for a virtual reality headset. It s made up of 216 55-inch LG OLED 4K TVs, working insync to display spectacular views of the solar system, jellyfish, whales and other astounding images.
While this display is showcasing the outstanding abilities of LG TVs, we can see this TV Tunnel being used at a variety of different events. Right off the top of our heads? We re thinking red carpet movie premiere entrance. Boom. You re welcome.
Kanex MultiSync Folding Bluetooth Keyboard
Here s a smaller, simpler, yet super helpful device spotted at CES 2017. The Kanex MultiSync folding keyboard is an uber portable keyboard that connect to any of your devices by Bluetooth. Event days are long and fast-paced, and the last thing you need slowing you down is slowing punching out an email on your smartphone. Whip out this bad boy and you ll get that email done in half the time, assuming you can type on a keyboard faster than you can text, that is.
The best part? The keys really compress just like those laptop keys you know and love. Bonus: it retails for just $50.
BACTrack Skyn World s First Wearable Alcohol Monitor
(Photo Credit: BACtrack)
There s nothing quite like enjoying an ice cold adult beverage after working a long event day. (Truth be told, we prefer Don Julio to Dos Equis, but don t tell The Most Interesting Man in the World.) Chances are if you don t have another early call time, you ll need to be up early to catch a flight home, so monitoring your alcohol consumption is key. And that s where BACtrack Skyn comes in.
BACtrack Skyn is the world s first wearable alcohol monitor. While wearing the sleek BACtrack Skyn, you can learn when you re approaching higher alcohol levels so you can make better decisions about when it s time to call it a night. There are currently two working prototypes, a standalone wearable that goes around your wrist, or a band that integrates with your Apple Watch for seamless alcohol consumption tracking, continuously and in near real-time. Bottoms up.
Fossil Releasing More Than 300 Fashion Smart Watches in 2017
(Photo Credit: Sarah Tew/CNET)
Move over, Apple Watch. Fossil Group is releasing a line of smartwatches this year, but promise to continue to focus on being fashion-first. So you can still look sharp while getting your emails, checking your event schedule, and tracking your steps.
There are over 300 connected watches to be released in 2017 from brands like Armani Exchange and Misfit, in addition to 2016 s brands Kate Spade and Michael Kors, to name a few. Classy yet functional, that s how #eventprofs roll.
Moshi s Arcus Backpack
The Arcus Backpack may not be the flashiest item at CES, but it certainly is quite useful for hard-working, ridiculously good-looking event professionals like you and I. Described as the clown car of backpacks by CNET, this bag certainly has a place for everything. It can easily fit a DSLR camera and several lenses, as well as a 15 computer, tennis shoes, notebooks, cords, candy bars and more. It has a special crush-resistant compartment for your cell phone, glasses or other delicate items, as well a side water bottle holder to keep you properly hydrated.
The designers at Moshi said they wanted to create a backpack that they would actually use, and we can honestly say we would be happy to use this one.
What did we miss that could be useful in our event management corner of the universe? Get at us on Twitter at @decibelevent or on Instagram at @DecibelManagement and let us know!
