Festival report: Hultsfred 08 (pt. I)
Man oh man, Hultsfred 2008 sure was one of the busiest occasions so far; never a dull moment. When not trying to attend all the concerts I had circled in my notebook, there where interviews to be done and other important people to talk to, including the Boss himself, Avi Roig, and Craig Bonell from Swedesplease.net - both flown in as honoree guests by STIM, our version of a composer's union over here. To be honest I didn't know what to expect of this year's version of Hultsfredsfestivalen; as a direct result of last years' lousy run Rockparty had much to prove, some people had even started talking about the outcome of this years' festival as a matter of survival (or non survival) of the entire festival itself. And the outcome? Well, I don't know. Ticket sales were not extremely good (except for the one-day tickets / Thursday, when a certain Rage Against The Machine hit the stage), but Rockparty still managed to sell more tickets than last year. With Linkin Park, one of the headliners, cancelling in the last minute (for the second time around) I assume Rockparty made a buck or two there too, hopefully this adds up to the return of the festival in 2009. We'll just have to wait and see.
On to the shows. Having nagged about how much to do and how little time to do it in, I still managed to catch a whole bunch of bands. One of the downsides of having a fascination close to obsession for music, and thus going to nearly every concert and festival available for many years now, is that it's hard to fully enjoy an artist or a band when having already seen the act far too many times. Sure, The Hives, Håkan Hellström, Mustasch and Kristian Anttila are all good bands/artists, but none of their shows were anything out of the ordinary. The Hives were just as crazy and powerful as always (but honestly, what is there for Pelle Almqvist to say or do that Howlin' Pelle hasn't already said and done?), Håkan was emotional as always and the charismatic Ralf Gyllenhammar of Mustasch played his robust clown card (although you need to be a native to fully understand all of his blabbering) perfectly. The same goes for Ane Brun and Tingsek. I still enjoyed their concerts, but I didn't expect anything else and therefore, was hardly surprised. What did surprise me was the massive crowds that turned up to support both Timo Räisänen and the up-and-coming rockers in Takida. I knew Takida had a big following (you tend to have that when just about every song has a chorus fit for everyone to sing along to) but Timo seemed hardly taken by surprise - instead he put on a show worthy any successful indie/pop artist from Göteborg you can think of.
And then there was Annika Norlin. Why, why, why did Rockparty place Annika and her friends in Säkert! on the main stage in mid-daylight? Never mind the daylight come to think of it, but the stage was far too big and the crowd far too small for Säkert! to be able to really get in under your skin. 'Cuz she's got the songs, Annika Norlin is without doubt one of the best Swedish songwriters there is at the moment, but Annika Norlin is not a stage persona. It's a shame, with a more enthusiastic Annika, and a smaller and more intimate venue, Säkert! will surely blow your mind. Speaking of blowing your mind, you didn't miss Johnossi, did you? Because if you did, you missed one of the coolest and greatest live bands there is. Having their second record out, "All they ever wanted", John and Ossi is once again ready to explode from within as soon as they hit the stage. Having seen the lads a couple of times before, with the latest occasion just a month ago, they did alright. With alright I mean they rocked the arse of all other bands that night, you should see them when they really hit the spot - unbelievable.
I did get to see a couple of first timers as well. Crushing hardcore from Raised Fist, electrifying... whatever you call it from the Finnish Disco Ensemble and soothing singer/songwriter from the young sisters Söderberg in First Aid Kit. And Those Dancing Days of course, finally I got a chance to see for myself what the buzz was all about. Nothing, it turned out. Been a long time since I've been to a concert that dull, but they're still young, so hopefully they'll come around. They reminded me about the short performance I watched with Little Marbles when they played a short set backstage. Young skitty girls with horrendous clothing and skitty little melodies, I just don't get it. So, trying to summarize Hultsfred 2008 I must say that I'm satisfied, even though I missed a few acts that I really wanted to see (Lykke Li, A Beautiful Friend, Robyn and Firefox AK, to name a few) and that Petter Seander, bass player in the Kristian Anttila band, didn't keep his promise to take me to that Håkan Hellström barbecue party in the garden of the house rented by EMI (free beer you know...). He now owes me one.
- Christian Stenbacke