Flowability 2006

After months of preparations last saturday it finally happened, the second edition of the Flowability hip-hop festival. The first edition was six years ago, and different in many ways, but we still had the same concept : bringing great bands to a town with little or no hip-hop tradition. We had a young band named Amok who where first to perform, after that came Pita from Mechelen, [tag]Phillibustas[/tag] from Leuven, [tag]Manza[/tag] and [tag]CNN199[/tag] from Brussels. Pita, Phillibustas, CNN, these are the bands we looked up to six year ago, and now they're coming to our party deleviring a great show and enjoying the ambiance. Now look at what nice opportunities life can offer sometimes.

We had about 130 paying customers, on a total capacity of 360 people. Together with about 25 volunteers and 25 band members, the place was full enough to have some atmosphere. The bands got pizzas and drinks, and the soundman was a real pro. Really the sound was just perfect, as a fellow sound engineer I have only one word for Jimmy : respect! We allmost got break even, which is a bit of a pity, on the other hand it was a f*cking great party, everybody loved it so who am I to complain about a few hundred euros.

Most people came from Leuven, Mechelen or Brussel, we hardly saw any familiar Aarschot faces. This is of course an achievement, getting all these people to come all the way to our party, but it also shows how little interest there is for the moment in Aarschot for some quality hip-hop. Put two unknown punk or hardcore bands on stage and the place is packed, program five of the best belgian hip-hop bands and nobody shows up. Ahhh kids :)

Hip-hop must be one of the most underestimated genres. It's been around for over 30 years. Ever since in the Bronx, NYC in 1973 Afrika Bambaata combined breakbeat DJ'ing with MC'ing, breakdancing and graffity hip-hop has been evolving. It has been influenced by nearly any genre in existence. It has transformed and reinvented itself decade after decade after decade. And somehow the only names people know are Eminem or 50 cent. Sigh...

[tags]Flowability, Hip-Hop, Music[/tags]