Festivals

I'm so going to buy this, what a book to have on your shelf! I've missed my festivals this past few years, but adore the Isle of Wight festival, being an island girl myself. And my parents being goers of the original art afton. Fabulous photos & great insights into each individual festival.

File under "optimistic". If you'd got books about such things as free tourism destinations in London lined up, as this publisher has had, sometimes you have to ignore global medical conditions and just get them out there. Ditto this volume, which speeds us through a directory of the major festivals of the musical world, in chronological order of starting. Of course it mentions Woodstock, but generally it's current ones you can go to – provided they're running healthily, that is.

So the contents are pretty much guessable, from Glasto down to Bestival, Love Parade to Lollapalooza, Coachella to Primavera. Certainly when it gets to the non-British events it introduces me to a few I'd never heard of – Iceland Airwaves, Nyege Nyege, and such like. A quick rack of my brains only left Open'er on the creators' reject pile from abroad, although I am sure some people with greater knowledge will dismiss this as slight and incomplete.

So what do we get as those contents? Well, each entry gets a short essay, nicely-pitched in length and never hysterical about the alleged merits of half a million stoned hippies giving each other the clap in a field of shit, alongside the factoid box-out, the databank where it tells us date of origin, and lists notable sets and "kindred spirit" events, etc. The rest is archive photography, and that mixes wildly between randoms in the crowd, Burning Man locales, and famous faces doing their thang.

What it boils down to, then, is a little hard to define. It's not anything like as comprehensive as that there Internet thing for finding out where to go, and it's not got the depth of an academic survey of the festival concept. But it does take us from the days of "send your postal order to..." to the corporate, ever-crashing Glasto website of today, in warm-hearted fashion. It's not the headliner, but nor is it the novelty opener; this is in the inoffensive please-all slot.

Wow! What a beautiful, emotion provoking book! After going without live music for the past year this book truly hit the spot. Festivals covers around 50 festivals from around the world. Each piece includes pictures, a summary, and also stats, such as whether the festival is still in existence or not, the year(s) that it ran, as well as the musical line up. The pictures alone make this worth the read. Perfect coffee table book. I can’t wait to get my hands on a hardcover copy. Five nostalgic stars. Thank you to the Quarto Publishing Group- White Lion and NetGalley for an advanced e-copy in exchange for my honest review.

While I am not made for music festivals, I really enjoy reading about them and pretending that they are something that I can attend.  Festivals is a music lovers' guide to the festivals you need to know.  It starts in the 60s and chronologically talks about some of the biggest music festivals around the world and there are a TON of really awesome photos throughout this book. (And I just love the throwback 60s./70s vibe to the font used for the title!)  There is a page or so about each festival with how it started, if it's still happening, where it's located and then a few photos.  If you're a festival go-er, definitely check this book out to see what ones you might want to hit up next!

I received a free e-copy of this book from NetGalley in order to write this review. I was not otherwise compensated.

As a HUGE fan of festivals and live music, this book was just what I needed after this last year. A year without live music and socializing took its toll on so many of us. This book brought to life what is so special about the festival community. I loved reading about so many people and places. Absolutely recommend!

Couldn't read - I thought it was available on Kindle. I'll read it when it's out since it looks fascinating for music fans.