Roskilde Festival 2013

Oh, Roskilde. This is a bit belated, but I wanted to compile all the writing I did over those magical five days in early July. Wednesday and Thursday were mellow, more seeing the non-musical aspects of the festival like Dream City and the camps.  Thursday evening kicked off with Suicidal Tendencies, of all things and Friday things started with Henry Rollins and ended with Rihanna, two musicians I never thought I would put in one sentence. Saturday I did the art tour and got to meet Ron English, which was an unexpected surprise. The mock ads he designed for the grandstand wall were hilarious.

Sunday was my favorite day, with a surprisingly fun set from Kid Koala. He played a song he wrote for the kids TV show Yo Gabba Gabba and got the audience to dance a long. I also conducted a few interviews. Read the one with Henry Rollins (don't be impressed, it was over email, tried to meet him in person but no luck.)  I talked to Jonathan Schultz of Schultz and Forever, who I have interviewed before, but this time we talked about his top ten influential songs. He introduced me to this William Basinski track that blew my mind, dlp 1.1 I also saw the girls from Baby in Vain and got an insider Danish view on Roskilde, that one still needs to publish.

Out, damn'd spot! out, I say! SPOT Festival May 2-4

I hope you liked that Macbeth quote. Guess who's little writing hobby, someone's small side project, someone's little fun-thing-on-the-weekend, yeah I'll do this sure why not casual music writing thingie (which is now taking almost as much time as my real job) has earned them a place as a delegate at Denmark's own version of SXSW, the SPOT Festival? Me! 
I am so excited, Rob Helbig, founder and giant creative brain behind Nothingbuthopeandpassion, asked me to come along. Launch day is this Thursday, when we board a bus with a bunch of other German media people to take a nine-hour ride to 

Århus. Read the blurb we wrote here, I'm very proud of my "use other buzzwords" sentence and the cigarette analogy.  Rob and the nice people over at Nordic by Nature came up with a Top 21 Hottest Acts of SPOT 2013.  Memorable acts that have gotten started here are Sigur Rós, The Raveonettes and  Spleen United.  Tune in to NBHAP for updates and shenanigans.

In honor of my third trip to Denmark in less than a year, I want to share this picture of the Redflesh (Danish hardcore) 7" I purchased at Spillestedet Stengade during the Distortion Festival.  I did it  because M- told me to. I didn't even have a record player. At 4 a.m. we saw someone set a bike on fire. At 6 a. m. we were still walking around Copenhagen talking about Phillip Roth. Nørrebro kærlighed. Since then, a whole perfect series of events have led me back, and the Waldo and Marsha interview I did in Århus in December was my ticket into Nothingbuthopeandpassion. See, dreams do come true. At least indie in Denmark dreams.