minitek last weekend
so last friday, jonathan, lara, gordon and i went up to NY after work for minitek. this was the first minitek and it looked promising on the website - techno festival with a good lineup, innovative stuff, vendors, etc. the festival was scheduled to start friday night in downtown manhattan. we arrived around 1:00 a.m., so we thought we'd go over to the venue, pick up our tickets for the weekend and maybe catch a bit of music before heading off to bed. we were staying a couple of blocks away from the night venue, so we walked over there and got in line. as it turned out, we never got in friday night. jonathan gave up early and went back to the hotel. we waited until around 2:15 before calling it quits. the line had moved a little, but there were so many rumors floating around the line (no one without tickets were getting in, the venue was only big enough to hold 200 people when they were expecting 5000, etc) and so many cops milling around that it became clear we weren't going to get in.
four or so fitfull hours later, i got up with jonathan and gordon. jonathan was up anyway, i couldn't really sleep, and neither could gordon, so we decided to head back over the venue. the last dj was scheduled to come on at 6:00 am, so we figured we'd go over, get our tickets then b/c there wouldn't likely be a line, and we might catch some music. so they head to starbucks and i go to the venue. there was no one there. the doors were locked and a security guard told me the party had been shut down. great. jonathan and gordon stayed up and walked around the city and i went back to catch another hour or two of sleep.
fast forward to saturday afternoon. the day venue was on coney island. party was scheduled there from 10:00 a.m. until around midnight. we went down there around 12:30 or so i think. they weren't even finished setting up yet. they weren't letting anyone in and there was no music yet. so after walking a couple of blocks on the saddest boardwalk i've ever seen, we saddled up to a bar a block away from the "beach" (it was not a beach i was even remotely tempted to walk on) and had some beers. at this point, we were at least laughing and had a sense of humor about the whole thing. expectations had been reset and were just hoping to hear some music. the bartender, mike, was cool and there were clearly a bunch of other festival goers there too, so we had fun hanging out and chatting with people.
we finally get let in sometime after 2:00, when one of two areas of music was set up and running. the music was okay. techno's not my favorite genre of electronic music so at times i found it rather boring, but there were some good tracks here and there and i enjoyed one dj's set in particular, so that was cool. here's a shot of what it looked like around 4ish.
you can see there were a good number of people there, but by no means were there 1000s and it was clearly very different than what kytlove experienced at goa the other day.
here's what it looked like sometime between 8 and 9.
by that time, both areas of music were up and running. magda was scheduled to come on at 10:00 and we all wanted to hear her set, but by 9, we were running out of steam. the vendors had run out of water, beer, and alcohol, and there was still no clear venue for the night dj's - rumors going around talked about 2 different places nowhere near each other - so we decided to call it a night and head back to the city. it's about an hour on the subway, so we knew we had a ways to go and we all desperately wanted to shower.
so we skipped saturday night festivities. from what we read on message boards the next day, dj's did play at 2 different places and the sets were good, but we didn't feel bad for missing anything. we had a good time saturday and heard some good music.
sunday morning rolls around and again, festival was scheduled to start at 10:00 am and go into the night. we grabbed some breakfast, packed up, checked out of the hotel at noon and drove down to coney island. so we get there at 12:30ish and they're set up with music going on both stages, but there was no one there. seriously. there were more security folks there than there were attendees. i'd say maybe 20 people tops. here are two pictures from when we got there on sunday.
this poor teddy bear on top of the trash can kind of sums up the whole thing for me. the word that comes to mind is desolation.
people trickled in slowly, but we didn't stick around for long. it was too sad and uncomfortable. again, from what we heard through message boards, it did get going later on, but we hadn't planned on staying late anyway b/c we needed to get back to DC for work on monday. so even if we'd waited it out, we would have had to leave probably just as things were getting going.
apparently they're offering some kind of refund, but i'm not interested in that. i understand that a bunch of things went wrong and the promoters weren't deliberate or intentional in their mishaps. plus, if you want something like this to be accessible, you have to support it. otherwise, it'll never happen. it must cost a small fortune to put something like this together and the two people who organized the whole thing put up most of the money themselves.
they wanted this to rival mutek. now, i've never been to mutek, but compared to the other parties i've been to, they have a long way to go. i'm sure they learned a huge number of valuable lessons from this one, but i may wait until there's a minitek 3 or 4 before trying it again. so a fun weekend, at times, but not exactly the one i expected to have, that's for sure.
four or so fitfull hours later, i got up with jonathan and gordon. jonathan was up anyway, i couldn't really sleep, and neither could gordon, so we decided to head back over the venue. the last dj was scheduled to come on at 6:00 am, so we figured we'd go over, get our tickets then b/c there wouldn't likely be a line, and we might catch some music. so they head to starbucks and i go to the venue. there was no one there. the doors were locked and a security guard told me the party had been shut down. great. jonathan and gordon stayed up and walked around the city and i went back to catch another hour or two of sleep.
fast forward to saturday afternoon. the day venue was on coney island. party was scheduled there from 10:00 a.m. until around midnight. we went down there around 12:30 or so i think. they weren't even finished setting up yet. they weren't letting anyone in and there was no music yet. so after walking a couple of blocks on the saddest boardwalk i've ever seen, we saddled up to a bar a block away from the "beach" (it was not a beach i was even remotely tempted to walk on) and had some beers. at this point, we were at least laughing and had a sense of humor about the whole thing. expectations had been reset and were just hoping to hear some music. the bartender, mike, was cool and there were clearly a bunch of other festival goers there too, so we had fun hanging out and chatting with people.
we finally get let in sometime after 2:00, when one of two areas of music was set up and running. the music was okay. techno's not my favorite genre of electronic music so at times i found it rather boring, but there were some good tracks here and there and i enjoyed one dj's set in particular, so that was cool. here's a shot of what it looked like around 4ish.
you can see there were a good number of people there, but by no means were there 1000s and it was clearly very different than what kytlove experienced at goa the other day.
here's what it looked like sometime between 8 and 9.
by that time, both areas of music were up and running. magda was scheduled to come on at 10:00 and we all wanted to hear her set, but by 9, we were running out of steam. the vendors had run out of water, beer, and alcohol, and there was still no clear venue for the night dj's - rumors going around talked about 2 different places nowhere near each other - so we decided to call it a night and head back to the city. it's about an hour on the subway, so we knew we had a ways to go and we all desperately wanted to shower.
so we skipped saturday night festivities. from what we read on message boards the next day, dj's did play at 2 different places and the sets were good, but we didn't feel bad for missing anything. we had a good time saturday and heard some good music.
sunday morning rolls around and again, festival was scheduled to start at 10:00 am and go into the night. we grabbed some breakfast, packed up, checked out of the hotel at noon and drove down to coney island. so we get there at 12:30ish and they're set up with music going on both stages, but there was no one there. seriously. there were more security folks there than there were attendees. i'd say maybe 20 people tops. here are two pictures from when we got there on sunday.
this poor teddy bear on top of the trash can kind of sums up the whole thing for me. the word that comes to mind is desolation.
people trickled in slowly, but we didn't stick around for long. it was too sad and uncomfortable. again, from what we heard through message boards, it did get going later on, but we hadn't planned on staying late anyway b/c we needed to get back to DC for work on monday. so even if we'd waited it out, we would have had to leave probably just as things were getting going.
apparently they're offering some kind of refund, but i'm not interested in that. i understand that a bunch of things went wrong and the promoters weren't deliberate or intentional in their mishaps. plus, if you want something like this to be accessible, you have to support it. otherwise, it'll never happen. it must cost a small fortune to put something like this together and the two people who organized the whole thing put up most of the money themselves.
they wanted this to rival mutek. now, i've never been to mutek, but compared to the other parties i've been to, they have a long way to go. i'm sure they learned a huge number of valuable lessons from this one, but i may wait until there's a minitek 3 or 4 before trying it again. so a fun weekend, at times, but not exactly the one i expected to have, that's for sure.