All Points East - 01/06/18

All Points East is a brand new festival brought to 2018. It started last Friday, with music through to Sunday, a free outdoor, family-friendly fair filled with events until Thursday, with an emphasis on music again the following weekend.

As I've been prioritising revision over social life this half-term, I only experienced one of the ten day festival dates. However, should this festival return, you can bet your ass I'll be attending as many days as I can afford.

On the days leading up to Friday, the day I was attending, I tweeted All Points East's twitter account, asking if there was any possibility of me gaining a press pass, to which they responded quickly and positively, asking me to DM them about it! Unfortunately, the conversation somehow lasted for several days, and I had to keep tweeting the account to ensure I got a response. I felt very annoying, and just wished they would answer yes or no. Finally, the night before, they assured me there would be a press pass for me.

My friend Lily, her dad and I all drove to Victoria Park, Lily's dad having organised parking beforehand. He surprised us with upgrades to our tickets as Lily's birthday is the following day. The box office experience was a little chaotic, the queues slow and those inside not having communicated clearly with each other.

Nonetheless, within twenty minutes or so, we were inside.

Victoria Park is pretty big to say the least. I haven't been to huge festivals like Reading or Slam Dunk, but compared to Community Festival last year, getting from one stage to another took a chunky walk (10 minutes), which as a photographer who needed to be at sets early, left me running around like a madman.

Although it sounds like I'm moaning, that's pretty much it on the negative side of All Points East - the day was an incredible success.

Around the whole park is a huge selection of bars, pop up restaurants, and activities, all keeping queues manageable. The urinal section was as nice as a toilet at a festival can be, and it didn't smell obvious either having been sat there for a week. The actual music was played with great quality, although it had a funny way of sounding distorted around areas of the park (perhaps an aspect they wanted so as not to disturb residents near by).

All Points East packed the day to the brim with up and coming (and already established) music artists, with carefully placed stages scattered around the park so that you were never far from live music, always just a side-step away from a groove.

I had planned to prepare myself for the day by making sure to listen to the bands that had been announced, however, I've been a little busy with life at the moment and hadn't found the chance. Nonetheless, I thoroughly enjoyed myself, and below is a summary playlist of music I think you should definitely check out.

https://open.spotify.com/user/kirsty_bryan/playlist/7jZLkQdldEumVhTgQTHAdP?si=b4qKbwr3TieiHg6h3eMVcQ

I want to highlight especially The Neighbourhood's set, Jesse Rutherford,their frontman, having a vibrant stage presence and awesome voice. They were the first band I went to listen to after the festival, having been left wanting more more more after their performance (I also looked up tour announcements but alas, none yet).