When it comes to music festivals, there’s nothing like a little audience participation. To stoke the fires for the 12th annual Summer Meltdown Festival in Darrington, Wash., organizers have taken grassroots involvement to the next level.
Featuring fans proclaiming “I Meltdown!” in a variety of ways, an e-commercial for the August 10-12 extravaganza debuts today (see below). It’s intended as toe-in-the-water encouragement for past and future attendees of the unique event to film their own “I Meltdown!” affirmations and either send them to the festival’s website or upload them directly to YouTube.
A little word of mouth goes a long ways. Especially when much of the Meltdown Festival’s past success can be attributed to casual recommendation. Compared to Seattle’s Bumbershoot or The Gorge’s Sasquatch festivals, Meltdown has been one of the region’s best-kept secrets. However, 5,000 or so people can’t be expected to keep mum about the event’s charm and breathtaking qualities forever; now, the cat’s out of the bag for good.
No matter what the ticket tally is any given year, organizers attest that Meltdown — nestled in one of the most gorgeous spots in the Pacific Northwest — promises to be, once again, a surprisingly intimate, family friendly experience:
“… interacting with thousands of new fans that always felt more like friends than ticket holders on the other side of a barricade. It sounds like hokum, but it’s not; Meltdown is about creating life long relationships and discovering your favorite new artist… then most probably hanging out with your favorite new artist and a thousand new friends until the sky meets the sun.”
Booking is far from complete at this date; artists confirmed for the festival include:
The Moondoggies
Dead Winter Carpenters
EOTO (featuring Michael Travis and Jason Hann of String Cheese Incident)
El Ten Eleven
That 1 Guy
Vibesquad
Medium Troy
Hot Bodies in Motion
AgesAndAges
and The True Spokes (formerly known as Flowmotion), originators and co-hosts of Meltdown
Exciting music, presumably fabulous weather… and with the North Cascades so close, with powerful binoculars one might spy the mountain goats doubtlessly peering down at Whitehorse Mountain Amphitheatre. It’s a sort of antidote for — or recovery from — the endurance tests that some other music festivals have become.
Witnesses to greatness — the Meltdown machine is serious about those DIY videos.
“My hope this year, is that the spirit of Meltdown and the I Meltdown project becomes infectious!,” said Festival Director Sarah Hall. “Send us your best/worst/funniest/most embarrassing/most awesome/most ridiculous ‘I Meltdown’ videos, or post them on your page (and tag us of course). Lets put the world on notice and show them how ‘WE MELTDOWN!'”
