Exciting. It's time to announce our first booked bands for GG 2018...
First up, GG favourites 3 Daft Monkeys will be with us next summer.
Celtic and Eastern influences, enchanting melodies with catchy choruses and virtuoso fiddle, 3 Daft Monkeys’ wildly infectious dancing rhythms will lead us once more on breathless, exhilarating journeys. Their new album Year of the Clown mixes traditional folk with whimsical comment and righteous rage focused on modern social dilemmas; it’s been attracting 5* reviews while making audiences laugh, dance and cry.
3DM have supported and played alongside bands as diverse as Hawkwind, Bellowhead, Show of Hands, The Levellers and Dreadzone, as well as headlining festivals and their own packed-out tours. We love that they love our festival and will enjoy welcoming them back!
Smiley and the Underclass are next up on the GG 2018 bill: expect dub, sweat and truth; a rebel shout in a world on fire; a message of hope in a time of political confusion. With catchy tunes, skanks, and mind-blowing garage guitars their new album, Rebels Out There, transmits an urgent climate conscious message, a powerful soundtrack for revolution.
One Eyed God played a storming set on Soundscape Solar Stage this year and will be back with more bouncy psychedelic ska punk in 2018. Their raucous walls of sound, sax melodies, balkan bouzouki and rousing anti-establishment lyrics wrapped in a ramshackle carnival vibe are irresistable.
FESTIVAL NETWORKS
Showmen, solidarity and sustainability...
This autumn has been a time for meeting other festival folk and working collectively to improve our festivals in important ways.
Some of us visited The Showmen's Show, a trade show where you can find everything from wristbands to funfairs to stadium seating; this year the Show joined A Greener Festival and is working on improving its own sustainability. We hope this will encourage the exhibiting suppliers to green up too, with a potential knock-on effect to bigger festivals and audiences.
While at The Showman's Show we took part in a Festival Vision 2025 gathering; these are out-of-season meetings where participating festival organisers and suppliers share ideas about reducing our festival-related greenhouse gas emissions by 50% over the next eight years. Being part of a long line of Green Gatherings, off grid and with an environmental and ethical focus from the outset, it makes sense to share our experiences with newer events and those coming from a more commercial background who now want to become more sustainable.
With a view to making connections and sharing knowledge and support more widely, last year GG joined the Association of Independent Festivals (AIF). At the AIF Congress we heard about the relaunch of Eighth Plate, a service organising redistribution of edible 'waste' food from festivals to those who need it. The Green Gathering produces minimal food waste but larger and more commercial festivals can produce a lot, so it's fab to see this project really taking off.
Published on 01 December 2017 by Ben Robinson
