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Electric Gathering Festival 2003
A new venue for a festival that has previously only been held once; scheduled later this year indoors. The idea is great, a festival at the very end of summer in Sweden, conveniently available a few minutes from the centre of Stockholm, as both a big bang to mark of the end of summer festivals as well as a kick-off for autumn's club activates. The festival was held at Fryshuset and opened early afternoon with a full schedule. All in all there were thirteen bands performing in about as many hours. The line-up in its final state included Laibach's second date on their rather extensive Scandinavian tour, Camouflage who've just released their new album "Sensor", German Blutengel, Project-X and last minute replacements Iambia from Greece.
Swedish Malaise had the honour of getting the festival off the ground, though I imagine that many were still sound asleep from Friday's pre-party at Kolingborg. Then, at not so high a pace, the Invincible Spirit opened as first band at the Arena, the larger of the two stages, with a show that left much else to be desired regarding technical aspects as well as the always devastating rigor mortis of the band members up on stage. A concert experience takes either good sound or a really good show onstage. Unfortunately Invincible Spirit had none, and they were easily defeated by more interesting activities such as tying my shoes laces.
Although there were two stages, only one was open at a time. Though this allowed organizers to catch up with delays but it also resulted in a lot of people being bored between concerts. Especially since most people only cared to watch most bands for 20-30 minutes. Then visitors had to choose from either hitting the dance floor or drinking beer in what looked like a run down school cafeteria devoid of anything remotely comfortable. Like sitting at a truck stop drinking beer and eating sandwiches. There were some other pastimes, some performance artists, live noise in the hallway and window-shopping for merchandise. But come on, one should be able to expect a decent bar to hang back in.
After a mangling experience from the Invincible Spirit; Denmark's neofolk act Of the Wand and the Moon gave an ear soothing concert of guitars, subtle singing and cosiness. The first of many such gigs. The Fair Sex was the next act to perform at the Arena and were one of the better bands of the evening. The set list drew largely from their latest compilation release "Thin Walls part 1".
The night continued with shows from Belgian Nebula-H and Ordo Rosarius Equilibro who put on a good and aesthetically well put together show of well put to use video projection, scene presence and theatrics. People were dropping in at an increasing rate compared to earlier. Blutengel turned out to be the night's first crowd bringer. As expected they put on a full show of fire, fireworks, lightly dressed voluptuous women and ghastly singing. And then there were some problems with the sound on top of that. Fans were more than happy though, dancing, chanting and clapping for more. Who knows why?
Swedish Project-X were the band that really got the audience moving. After a short delay, an intro and then a blast of pumping beats on "Infected" and "Last Notes", both with fitting accompanying video project, the band really made an effort on stage which was reflected in the audience.
Camouflage seemed to be the only band really happy to be playing which really shone through on stage. Their live debut outside of Germany and with a brand new album to show case they gave a pretty good concert. Of course, an outside observer would probably have thought otherwise as half of the audience was sitting on the floor half asleep. But that goes for a lot of the shows at the Arena.
As easily dismissed were Boytronic. I don't know what was wrong with the sound this evening but the vocals sounded plastered onto the music, which rendered the show unbearable.
The hallway and stairs became heavily crowded as people gathered outside the doors to the Arena, waiting anxiously for Laibach to provide the evenings climax. They could have had more going for them, doors didn't open until the band was supposed to start and then there was yet another 15 minute wait, listening to "An Der Schönen Blauen Donau". Having seen eleven bands already this really didn't serve to heighten the anticipation but rather annoyed a pretty tired crowd. At long last Laibach entered the stage, video projection running, a war drummer on each side of the stage and things were under way. There was ample space to move around and much of the crowd did, chanting, reaching and stomping along to such classics as "Alle Gegen Alle" and "Leben Heisst Leben". Naturally, Laibach, touring Scandinavia currently to promote the new album "W.A.T.", played songs such as "Tanz mit Laibach" and "Das Spiel ist Aus". It all felt very Laibach, aggressive and rough, and I doubt anyone left disappointed 90 minutes later, though few seemed ecstatic.
Most people were left after that, not staying for last minute replacements Iambia. Everything had closed up except for Klubben when Iambia came on stage at three in the morning. It felt somewhat sad as only twenty people or so defied the late hour and went to see a show deserving more attention. Iambia came out on stage with a full frontal assault (and a sound wave that nearly knocked me over) of electro/ebm in the vein of Hocico and similar acts, and though none of the songs were familiar they all had the right feel to them. And with that, another Electric Gathering was over, as was the summer festival season in Sweden. A fall packed with clubs and live shows awaits us. I for one feel warmed up.
/Fredric Düring
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