CHRISTIAN FORSLUND wrote:

I did read your post in the other thread, and I don't disagree with the 1995 lineup being much better than the lineup, this year, I just think that comparing this years lineup to one, where you also have seen, what the bands have achieved in the next fifteen years is fair.

I don't agree with coldblooded about 'the tents' being full, since the attendance on Orange this year seemed signficantly lower than last year and besides Iron Maiden (I'm not sure about Portishead) no band seemed to really fill up orange the way bands like Muse, Gorillaz and Prince or even Dizzy Mizz Lizzy did last year. I could even walk into the pit for Mastodon, when I arrived three minutes before the concert (my favourite concert by the way).

I gave the festival three stars by the way (last year might have been 5 stars in my book)

Robbie Fowler is God wrote:

You misunderstand me mate. Someone else pulled the argument that the names on the 2011 lineup might become giants. I newer did. What I did say was that the names on the 95 list was all significant artists within their genres at the time they played. The fans of the genre knew them very well already before they played. The other point I raised was that even though these artists were already big at the time, they still came long down on the lineups. Most of these names would have been an major attraction this year. Cardigans, Soul Asylum, Massive Attack, Tricky, Neneh Cherry, Paul Oekenfold, Paul Weller, Silverchair, Napalm Death, NOFX, PJ Harvey, Flaming Lips, Cardigans, Jeff Buckley, Biohazard etc would all have been considered at least subliners this year. In 95 Biohazard was every bit a big selling metal name as Mastodon is today.

The rest of your points are valid, but I don't buy the argument about how many tents were full or not full. It was a sold out festival, and the crowd will go to one of an other concert wouldn't they?

Coldblooded wrote:


I'll go as far as challenging your 1995 list a bit. I would say that many (over half) of the names you mention from the small print list were in the very beginning of their careers – many of them even on their first EU tour. That kind of exaggeration weakens the argument, even though I, as I stated earlier, can see some validity in your points. Here's my view:

Examples:
Belly – piggybacked on REM on their world tour and was only in Europe because of them
Cardigans – 'Lovefool' weren't out until a year later, so yes, they were succesful in 1995, but it wasn't until 1996 that they had their real international breakthrough
dEUS – Only had one, but admittedly very critically acclaimed album out at the time.
Downset – only had their debut album out.
Echobelly – Only had their debut album out at the time with a few semi-hits on it.
Freak Power – only had one album out at the time. They fell apart a year later
G. Love – only just released their second album. Played the smallest stage
Ben Harper – Only had his debut album out at the time. The second album with 'Burn One Down' and others on it came out later.
Thomas Helmig – Rode on a nridiculed critical career-flop in 1995: The english language 'Stupid Man'.
Leftfield – Only had their debut album out.
Millencolin – Only had albums out in Scandinavia
Morphine – Played the very smallest stage of the festival. They were always an underground band, albeit a mindblowingly good one.
The Roots – only just released their major label debut at the time. Their real success didn't come until 'Illadelph Halflife' a year later.
Silverchair – barely even had their debut album out at the time!
Supergrass – Only had the debut album out, didn't even have the monsterhit 'Alright' out.
Tricky – Only had his debut album out
Weezer – Only had their debut album out at the time with one or two hit on it.

In addition, there are lots of examples of bands in small letters in the 2011 programme, who arguably are even more established than the above-mentioned bands were in 1995 in their careers at the moment. 1349, Atmosphere, Bring Me The Horizon, Matthew Dear, Destroyer, Eyehategod, Kylesa, Little Dragon, Love Shop, Screaming Females, Underøath, The Walkmen are some of them.

But I'll admit that the way the Roskilde programme is composed has changed. If I view it through my very "rockist" Rayban aviator-sunglasses, I'd definitely say it has taken a turn for the worse. The "world" bands playing at the festival are more exotic than ever, while the bands playing in the "world" tent in 1995 were, hmmm... Ben Harper, The Roots and G. Love amongst others. Is that good or bad? Well, there certainly were lots of good bands playing, and I'd love to have been there. I just don't think that the added diversity is a loss, necessarily. Maybe for people who are more genuinely focused on rock. I'm not.

Two additional interesting facts about the 1995 lineup:

*It was actually criticised a lot because of a change in the musical profile. From having a jazz tent, a folk tent and an amateur stage, the festival from this year on focused on a narrower profile, resulting in protests from representatives from those respective genres.
*It was the festival's 25th anniversary. That could explain the extra-saturated headliner-lineup.

About the tents being full or not: Christian is right about the Orange stage. Not all the bands there could fill up the stage. The turnout at the Mastodon concert was especially measly. This was supposedly taken during the concert: http://www.rockphoto.dk/displayimage.php?pid=14949&fullsize=1

I've seen worse though. When ... And You Will Know Us By the Trail of Dead played the Orange Stage on Sunday instead of Mars Volta in 2005, you could've played soccer in the pits. It was that dead. But I guess there will always be the odd misplacement. This year PJ Harvey for example had a very packed Arena tent in contrast. What I mean is, that in general, I didn't witness many poorly-attended concerts. I even gave up on the Gloria tent completely, as it seemed that no matter what concert I tried getting into there, it would always be chock full.

I know that the festival was sold out, but with so many other festivals to choose from around Europe and seeing how cheap it actually is going to them (several of them are even the same price as Roskilde, when you add in the transportation expenses), why don't people just go there instead? Do they all have shittier lineups? And if the lineup at Roskilde was that mediocre, wouldn't the audience rather be in their camps partying their asses off instead? I don't know about the rest of the camp, but Agora E pretty much went completely limp when the music began Thursday and onwards.

But anyways, I think it's an interesting discussion, and I sure hope that the bookers are reading along in here.

Coldblooded wrote:

But I'll admit that the way the Roskilde programme is composed has changed. If I view it through my very "rockist" Rayban aviator-sunglasses, I'd definitely say it has taken a turn for the worse. The "world" bands playing at the festival are more exotic than ever, while the bands playing in the "world" tent in 1995 were, hmmm... Ben Harper, The Roots and G. Love amongst others. Is that good or bad? Well, there certainly were lots of good bands playing, and I'd love to have been there. I just don't think that the added diversity is a loss, necessarily. Maybe for people who are more genuinely focused on rock. I'm not.

Two additional interesting facts about the 1995 lineup:

*It was actually criticised a lot because of a change in the musical profile. From having a jazz tent, a folk tent and an amateur stage, the festival from this year on focused on a narrower profile, resulting in protests from representatives from those respective genres.

*It was the festival's 25th anniversary. That could explain the extra-saturated headliner-lineup.

What I mean is, that in general, I didn't witness many poorly-attended concerts. I even gave up on the Gloria tent completely, as it seemed that no matter what concert I tried getting into there, it would always be chock full.

I know that the festival was sold out, but with so many other festivals to choose from around Europe and seeing how cheap it actually is going to them (several of them are even the same price as Roskilde, when you add in the transportation expenses), why don't people just go there instead? Do they all have shittier lineups? And if the lineup at Roskilde was that mediocre, wouldn't the audience rather be in their camps partying their asses off instead?

Kaneda wrote:



Neither am I, but when the festival can't even present a wide variety in that genre, because it has to have wide variety everywhere that's not added diversity, just total lack of focus.



I don't recall it being criticized, but then, it was only my second festival, may not have given any creedence to it. But where were these jazz and folk tents? As far as I recall, jazz stopped being a major part of the festival around 1980, and it hadn't had an actual folk tent in name since 1985. None of the stages in 1994 played any genre exclusively (not even the World stage), so not sure what these representatives were protesting.



Except 1996 and 1997 weren't all that much smaller in terms of line-up.



The question is, were people actually there wanting to hear the music, or because there was nothing else they wanted to hear? There's nothing wrong in getting surprised by something you don't expect, but I've never seen an audience more confused about where to be than this year.



1. Roskilde has a legacy. People show up no matter what. The majority of years not sold out have had a previous year with bad weather, not necessarily a bad line-up.
2. The audience profile has very much shifted. And lately the general consensus, among festival goers as well as general public, seems to be that staying in your camp would be a waste of money, and would show that you're not on-the-beat enough to appreciate the eclectic music.

No matter if you care for the music, you buy a ticket, and you show up at the concerts. That would include myself.

Other than that, Lord Beef Jerky sums me up... It's harder to make a good line-up with in the current musical climate, but that doesn't stop the festival from covering it up in arrogant and naive comments on their audience.

Robbie Fowler is God wrote:



Really good post Kaneda. I think many people's biggest frustration with the festival is the blatant arrogance they are displaying at the moment.

The festival is not in any way better in terms of lineups than it used to be, so they can't just write criticism of as old fools being nostalgic. At least just admit it harder than ever to book strong lineups. We all know the competition is increasing.

Rockmus wrote:



...well now I haven't been to Roskilde more than three times, but I (and I think there is consensus with the people at my age) think that the lineups the latest years is by far!!! so much better than anything from the 90's ...honestly big names back then was - to me - equal boring. I have grown up with napster, and I'm used to being able to listen to other stuff than what is being played on the radio (or the top 10 of the alternative chart lists - all the "alternative/indie-rock" of the 90s that grew big really don't sound very diverse in my ears) - the times they are a-changin!

Robbie Fowler is God wrote:



your post only leaves me with questions.

1: What is your age as you say it?
2: Why are big names boring?
3: Do you think that the lineups only gets praise because if the big names?
4: Napster? Remember winmx?
5: You think that those who went to Roskile in the 90's only got their music from the radio?
6: You think we are not able to listen to other stuff than what is on the radio?

Rockmus wrote:



I'm 20 years old so therefore I should be one of the major targets of the festival.

- so should established people with lots of money be . Not only can we pay, but we don't leave a mess (well not as much anyways) as you kids do

I remember one of the greatest things about the festival when I was younger, was that we met a lot of people older than us but who shared the same interest for music and having fun. I took a lot of inspiration from that, and that was really a major part of what "The Orange Feeling" really is all about

I didn't mean that big names are boring, I just find that some of those major names who headlined the festival in the 90s were not very diverse and therefore a bit boring, and if you have read the debate I think we can agree that a lot of festivalgoers (especially the ones of the 90s) give a lot of the praise due to how many big names the festival can get their hands on!

- I think if you followed our discussions about this really closely you would have picked up on the fact that all names on the list was either very much up and coming (not some bands who might turn out decent) or established. That was made the lineups stand out from todays to be honest. The band in small print were all big in their genres.

About the big headliners not being diverse? Well, mainly that is because they were so big back then, that what you would call headliners from different genres today would have been subliners. Like Chemical Brothers etc.

Just as diverse, but better all over. There were more reggae, more hip hop, there was an own ballroom for electronic music and DJ's and one for world music for example.

No I don't remember winmx, but am I wrong when I say that Napster was the first file-sharing program which a major part of the population used? If I'm right about this then I would like to go on. Because then I think it's fair to state that a larger part of the festivalgoers in the 90s got their music from the radio (or at least just the alternative playlists which I have heard MTv once was proud to show in the nighthours ) than it is today -

- I simply disagree about this. People in the 90's who were into music got their ass to the record store and listened to what they had read about in the papers, magazines or heard on the radio/seen on the TV. Or just to go and get input from the guys behind the counter who were really into their music. It is my opinion that people were more into the idea of following bands than now, when everything is so spread and diverse that it's really, really difficult for a band to gather a big fan base due to so many bands fighting for attention all over the place. Not even Arctic Monkeys could reach the skies, while had they broke in the 90's they'd probably be as big as Oasis, Suede etc.

Napster started in the 90's, most of us got on the bandwagon rather quickly. It's not like you young kids (meant in a nice way ) only, know how to use these medias. Winmx was a lot better, but that's my opinion only. Now we have torrent, rapidshare, lastfm, soundcloud, myspace (which I hate), Facebook, and that dreaded crap: Spotify (which is todays radio in many ways) etc. So more medias to chose between, but that doesn't mean that you guys use your head more now and in the 90's we were spoon-fed whatever the "radio" played. Myself I will say that radio is and has been maybe 1% of my total musical input, and that is a much higher estimate than what is the reality.

of course there were people in the 90s who was curious about what was going on in the musicscene, but I do believe that more people do so today, because it has become easier due to all this spotifying, myspacing, soundclouding and torrenting and I just think it shows in the festival - which is a direction I - and I know a lot of my friends as well - like

Markus wrote:

Det ser OK ud

HeckTo wrote:

Too much quality, need more media hype