Don Roberto wrote:

fucking six stars

I dont care about the size of the stages they play. I just want to party out to Afrocubism, Kuti Brothers etc. Once again the lineup was a positive surprise to me.

Coldblooded wrote:

I voted 5/6. The programme was, at least for me, clearly better than last year, and I was at a semi-lukewarm 4/6 then.

Granted, I wasn't so optimistic before the festival, but looking back, I've watched around 23-24 concerts this year, and only three or four of them weren't that good. Electric Wizard replacing Dååth was a nice serving of icing on the cake for me.

So... in my eyes, everything is always better in hindsight. I also think that's why people tend to look back at the mid 90's lineups with dewy eyes. Those bands weren't that big back then. I'll bet, in ten years people will look back at the 2011 lineup and be impressed.

CHRISTIAN FORSLUND wrote:

Since taste is subjective, nothing can be proved.
Some people might prefere to listen to an obscure african musician instead of the biggest name on Roskilde.. taste can't be dictated.

But the names from 1995 does seem a lot larger than the ones from this year, but some of the wellknown names was undoubtable new in 1995 with only one or two albums released, and therefore not established stars at that moment.
It could be interesting to look at the lineup of a year, which at the time seemed weak and see, how it looks a few years later, to see how the lineup looks now. Of cause the lineup might still look weak, but it might also have be the first look at future stars.

Coldblooded wrote:

Please link the "proof" to me

But, hey! Is size all you care about? Almost all of the concerts I saw were great, 4/6, 5/6 and even the odd 6/6 experience, if I were to dumb it all down to a bunch of stupid ratings. I will gladly pay 1800 DKK again for 20 concerts of that pedigree next year.

Robbie Fowler is God wrote:




True, but we weren't discussing taste we were discussing the popularity of the bands.

In 95 The Black Crowes was sublining, coming of an album who was top of the charts including billboard. That is just one example.

I made a list of bands who was well known in 95, at the time, in their different genres.

The list is very long

Coldblooded wrote:


I see the point, and you may also be somewhat, maybe halfway right. But take some examples from this year: Big Boi and Janelle Monáe are both Billboard top charters (both in the top 10 – Big Boi even debuted at a third place with his album).

The list is very long and impressive indeed, but I see three problems with using a list like that to prove anything.
a) You have no way of knowing if the bands of this year's poster would or wouldn't make head- or subliners in 10 or 15 years. Granted, many of the bands on the 1995 poster were popular back then, but so are many of the bands on this year's poster – even the ones in small print. My best guess is that the next time we see Janelle Monáe on the Roskilde bill, she'll be sublining.
b) A good part of the bands you're fielding in the list were not very big in 1995. Weezer for example only had one album out and one or two hits they were hedging their bets on on. You can compare them directly to a guy like James Blake who packed the Cosmopol tent full. Heck, OFWGKTA are bigger today than Weezer were in '95 (they even played a bigger stage – Cosmopol vs. Yellow (Odeon nowadays), and they're still in the small print. Morphine were always a pretty underground band. They also played the very smallest stage that year. There's a bunch of bands who are largely completely forgotten today. You had to write the name of UO's greatest hit to even remind us of who they are. Freak Power are only remembered as one of the bands Fatboy Slim were in, and then there's Downset (who!?). G Love and Special Sauce are also completely forgotten in Europe. It goes to show that you can't really predict what bands are going to grow and which are going to flop. You can only look at it in hindsight, like we are doing right now.
c) If the bands of this year weren't as popular as those in '95, why were all the tents I went to concerts in always full? If your theory about the bands is right, then people aren't coming for the music, and I would guess that they were staying in their camps partying and getting drunk then. That was not the case as I saw it. The place I lived pretty much went completely dead when the music started. I don't know if this is general – just stating how I experienced it.

Robbie Fowler is God wrote:

I don't know if I have the stamina to discuss this anymore to be honest. I guess we want to believe what we want to believe. The evidence is smack in front of your face mate.

I know very well what was what and what was not at that time (mid 90's) as I worked for the biggest record dealer in Norway and was in charge of ordering the type of music that was popular at Roskilde (Metal, alternative rock, rock etc. I had my finger firmly on the pulse as one might say.

While you can compare 1 or 2 or even 5 artists from this year and 95, there is another 20-30 from that list.

And Black Crowes, Oasis, Sinead O'Conner etc would have been a headliner this year, according to the popularity.


As I said earlier: I can't think of one single artist that I saw this year that I thought had potential to be big. Not one.

That being said, I didn't catch Monae, but from what I've heard she will be big.

And I do appreciate it's a matter of opinions, but I have an understanding of what will make it sales-wise/popularity wise and not. That is not to blow my own trumpet, but just trying to explain that I also try to look at this objectively based on what I know.

Coldblooded wrote:



I still say: You can't call that evidence. You can call it qualified guesswork at best. And the names in small print from 1995 you highlight as being ones who would've evolved into subliners/headliners are not all bands who took that path as you can see.

Your last point about sales is an important one. The music landscape has changed radically, and nowadays you can't measure popularity up in raw sales anymore. You have an entire generation who won't buy music physically. Spotify and other streamingservices are taking away from it too. OFWGKTA this year is a prime example of that. Most of the collective's albums have been available for free from their website. If you measured their popularity in sales, they are pretty much nothing. But their exposure on the internet aswell as the massive attendance in the Cosmopol tent proves that they are bigger than a good handful of the names from your 1995 list.

I'll maintain that one of the best ways to measure popularity nowadays is to see how many shows up in the concert tents. Did you see many half-empty tents, and if yes: Which ones were that?