Blissfields Festival is paving the way for a hungry pack of up-and-coming independent festivals. Ian Easton examines what it means to be independent, and why Blissfields Festival is the leading example of that exclusive niche.
So, you have V Festival, Isle of Wight Festival, Download Festival and Reading/Leeds Festivals - what of it? These are branding festivals, moneymaking whirlpools displaying massive advertisements and keeping punters enclosed by intimidating and impenetrable fences. Do you want to be a cog in that corporate advertising machine?
Sneaking in through the backdoor across the country is a range of smaller, non-branding, independent festivals that are quickly becoming highly celebrated for being closer to the original grass-roots spirit of a music festival. That is where you want to be, and that is where you are. Welcome to Blissfields festival.
If you look at the short forty-year history of music festivals, you can see a changing trend over time. It may be hard to believe but Reading festival was once a blues and jazz festival, which only later morphed into a heavy metal festival. Festivals began as small gatherings of people, sometimes less than 100 strong. These gatherings took place in the countryside, keeping any brick cityscapes with concrete carpets at arms length. They brought with them a feeling of exclusivity for those attending, for they were of the select few who were there to experience those magical events in time.
There has always been independent festivals, yet it is the recent rise of independent festivals that may overtake the cult status of indie-turned-commercial festivals. Some say it is the spirit pooled together from promoters and artists wanting to bring something authentic to the forefront of festival-goer’s minds. Yes I say, this may be so, but what is it exactly that is bringing events such as Blissfields to the forefront of the independent festival infrastructure?
After only an eight-year existence, Blissfields produces that so sought after feeling of a communal counterculture. The winner of 2007’s Best Small UK festival award boasts some of the best independent artists on the market, and since 2001 fans and artists alike have been brought together by word of mouth and ingenuity. Blissfields is an independent music festival that has grown from a single nucleus of friends, an idea brought to fruition through a dream and success. How Blissfields has booked acts such as The Super Furry Animals, Laura Marling and Mumford and Sons in 2009 is a credit to its cult status and the fantastic name it has gotten itself over the last eight years.
So what does it mean to fans attending an independent festival such as Blissfields? It lets us distance ourselves from the transnational corporate festival machines raking in revenue. It lets us escape to something authentic, something grass roots that is truer to the original spirit of festivals of yesteryear. It is a return to true festival form in every aspect. These are positive times, with Blissfields paving the way and spreading the word about the independent festival again, at last. Never forget that right now Blissfields has a modest capacity of 3,000, giving it that illustrious and sought-after air of a private party. Those who are here should be honoured and excited, because who knows, in forty years time you could be saying ‘I was there!’
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