• Spanish

WHAT: Sziget Music Festival
WHERE: Obudai-Sziget, Budapest
WHEN: August 6th-13th, 2012

By Veronica Estrada

@_nica_

With the Spring’s arrival it’s time to schedule which summer festival we are going to assist. In this case forget about London, Barcelona and even the oh-so-trendy Berlin, in CoolHunting Project we recommend you the cooler festival of them all: Europe’s Sziget Fesztivál in the lovely Hungary.

Sziget means island and this nonstop one week party has activities 24/7. It’s made in Obudai-Sziget, a big island on the Danubio in the heart of Budapest. It’s a place to disconnect yourself from reality. There you can stay inside a tent while you are enjoying multiple activities; you’ll find concerts, circus acts, theatre, movies, sports and expositions.

Sziget’s content manager, Fruzcina Szep, says the tagline for the festival is “to live an experience about freedom”. This is an open minded event where more than 60 different nationalities get together in a single place. Aproximately more than 400.000 will step into the island during the festival.

This year the Sziget Festival will be from August 6^th to the 13^th and even though there are a few acts still to be confirmed, names like The Horrors, The XX, Mando Diao, Korn, Bebel Gilberto, The Vaccines, Placebo and The Stone Roses reunion are on schedule to perform. Muchachito Bombo, Inferno, Che Sudaka y Selva sur will be the Spanish representation while Molotov and Los de Abajo will be the ones on charge to show how Mexicans bang their heads.

The Danubio’s Woodstock, like many people called the festival, was awarded last year like Best European Festival by the European Festival Awards and several musicians put it high up there between his five favorite places to play (Artist’s Favorite European Festival). On the other hand, the English newspaper The Independent has it in his top 5.

Do you really need extra reasons to go inside this incredible musical adventure in the heart of the mystic central Europe?

• Spanish

WHAT: KROQ: Weenie Roast 2011
WHERE: Verizon Wireless Amphitheater
WHEN: June 4th 2011

By Isaac Bonyuet

@isaacbonyuet

KROQ, one of the most recognized radio stations about modern rock in LA organized last weekend the Weenie Roast 2011 a festival that has its name referring to all those people who like to do barbecues in a field and spent hours under the sun.

Lateral stage:

Neon Trees

The Airborne Toxic Event

Everything began on this side with Young Giant, Foster the People, The Airborne Toxic Event. Neon Trees put the last dot with their post punk new wave that exited the public.

Main Stage:

Bad Religion

Bad Religion

Cage The Elephant

On this side we had more punk and garage rock. Face to Face, A Day to Remember and KROQ spoiled brats: Cage the Elephant. These last ones are from Kentucky and they offered a mix of rock-punk & blues with influences from Nirvana. Then, the legendary band of Californian punk Bad Religion was the next in line with the right repertory to start a mosh pit.

The cameo:

The Strokes

The Strokes

Rise Against

The Strokes were also part of this party and their show lasted only 40 minutes between hits and new songs. They entertained with Last Nite, You Only Live Once y Juicebox. The next on stage were Rise Against, a punk rocker band with hardcore doses, beloved by KROQ public.

The twist:

Foo Fighters

Foo Fighters

Foo Fighters

All of a sudden, the surprise of the night: Foo Fighters who showed up playing All My Life. “Surprised?” screamed Dave Grohl a second after the song ended. They followed with Rope from their last record Wasting Light.

“If this was a Foo Fighters gig, they would need 3 hours for their hits, every single song is a hit, but they only have an hour so I’ll better shut up and this way there will be more time to play”, said Grohl before returning to his guitar. We listened to The Pretender, Learn to Fly and they closed their show (of course) with Everlong.

The closing:

Weenie closed with Linkin Park. They and their nü-metal are still alive thanks to the Transformers movies. On that precise moment I decided to leave with the memory of Foo Fighters in my head like the last band of the night.