[een Engelstalig verslag van een random warm-up dag op Roskilde Festival 2013]
A funny looking brand of Danish soda caught our attention, but finding it at the festival ground seemed rather impossible. Until we stumbled across a 19-year old guy who was dragging a huge quantity of mostly alcoholic beverages on a cart. “I don’t want anything for it, take it! This is Roskilde! Just pay me back with a hug!” It summarizes our first day here: the reassuring feeling that nothing’s changed.
Still though, thisfestival goes trough a constant evolution of improvements, additions and -most of all- innovations. Ten years ago, there was only a small camp stage with a bad sound system. Yesterday, it was difficult not to walk by at least a handful of concerts on more than just the two official stages. The eight day format might well be justified after seeing Ice Cream Cathedral officially open the festival in the early afternoon, followed by an array of different concerts and activities. Before we knew it, “night” fell in and the camping parties were well on their way. Locals Ice Cream Cathedral bring a very promising blend of Beach House and Japanese pop melodies. They’re one of the Scandinavian bands in charge of warming up the festival on the Pavilion and Apollo stages, renamed Pavilion Jr. and Apollo Countdown during the first four days.
Another glimpse of up and coming Scandinavian quality came in the form of Rewolmer. This young producer’s music, accompanied by live percussion and occasionally a female vocalist, shows why Denmark was one of the first countries to truly emprace James Blake. It’s no coincidence the Brit will be opening Orange Stage on the last day of the festival.
Inbetween there’s always time for a walk on the camping. Cleaner than usual, but with a party atmosphere unique even by Roskilde standards. As long as there’s no rain (and it got a lot warmer today!), this vibe will only keep growing until it hits its peak sometime Wednesday night. Responsible for that are tens of insanely well prepared camps, often accompanied by a specific theme and a huge sound system. It’s no exception to see one of those being powered by more than one truck battery, they can produce up to 1000W. Members of those camps work months ahead of the festival to prepare their own merchandise, giant banners and designer sound system casing.
Every year, the organization nominates a number of camps for ‘camp of the year’. ‘Camp find Holger’ (‘Holger’ being ‘Wally’ in Danish, of course) is a likely contestant, along with previous winners like ‘Camp Crazy Legs’. Many of these are located near Dream City and its immediate surroundings, often referred to as ‘the crazy camping area’. Indeed, one can wonder how people even get any sleep over there. At Dream City, a chain of people are putting thousands of empty beer cans on strings to decorate a ‘Beer Church’ which should be open by now. Close by and passing through one of the many ‘ecological experiments’, we ended up in ‘The Dome’, the beating heart of Dream City. It’s a well built 70’s retrofuturistic design that lets in a lot of light and seems perfect for any occasion. A Jägermeister-sponsored event, for instance. After getting no less than 4 free shots of the stuff, some people working for Tuborg came in with compensating free beers and the apparent inability to recognize anyone who already had received a can. In other words, even corporate warfare turns out great at Roskilde.
A project called The Group was set to play in The Dome, and will do so a few more times in the next days. It consists of members from various bands, including Efterklang. Their Scandinavian pop re-interpretation of Bitches Brew started out great, but unfortunately ended up in a seemingly endless nonsensical mess. Luckely, the artificial beach by the quarry lake is nearby The Dome. Yoga classes, free hot tubs and hammocks are all at disposal over there.
An even better option is to go back to the Apollo Countdown area as the sun ‘sets’ (but not too far below the horizon). This inflatable stage was designed in Barcelona, and last year the festival even transported it from one camping area to the other every day during the warm-up. As there’s no longer any official ‘warm-up’ period, but rather a ‘build-up’, Apollo now sits in a fixed area, surrounded by terrific light installations on a big open field. It works wonderfully, although the music playing is not always good. Young Danish people are just like any other, they love trap these days back in 2013.