| T O P I C R E V I E W |
| benofbipeds |
Posted - 06/29/2004 : 07:59:12
Hey..
This is a long and boring tale and I doubt if anyone will care, never mind actually read it. Just maybe the Pixies will if it happens get through.
Me and my girlfriend have been desperate to see Pixies this summer. Neither of us saw them back then and realizing that this tour might be a once in a lifetime opportunity to do so, we've been hell-bent to accomplish the feat this year. However - with our currently limited resources we just couldn't shell out the #8776;$600 it would have cost us to see them locally, in Sweden or Denmark. So we researched all the other european gigs and worked out that the Hurricane Festival in Scheeßel would cost us about $350 total, so we decided to go there. According to the route planner on Hurricane's site, the drive there should have taken 4 hours but we made sure to drive with lots of time to spare - which we needed since we were in constant car-queue-crawl for the last 180 km's. Now, we had left home at 10.30. Arriving at Scheeßel 8 hours later, at 18.30, felt a bit hairy since the Pixies were on at 19.30 but it was no emergency. HOWEVER.. when we arrived at the roundabout where they were directing the festival traffic, we asked where to park the car and where the festival site was and (we later found out) THE ATTENDANT DIRECTED US AWAY FROM THE FESTIVAL! After crawling for another hour, we finally ended up on the other side of Scheeßel and as traffic was thinning out we realized that they had simply directed the traffic in the wrong direction. Later we figured out that they must have run out of parking spaces and simply got rid of traffic by pointing it away from the site. Had we parked the car by the side of the road at the festival roundabout, we would have had a 3 km walk and we would have seen the Pixies. We had done lots of research ahead, finding out everything there was to know about the Hurricane festival, we had used their route planner and information. We did not make any mistakes and was simply pointed away from the festival - under the pretense that parking was that way. We followed the crawling line of cars until it started thinning out in the middle of nowhere. When we returned to the village, police tried to stop us from approaching the site again so we parked the car at the first available opportunity and continued on foot. As it was, we lost almost 2 hours in gridlock in Scheeßel and then had to walk for another hour to finally arrive at the festival site. By then it was 21.00 and the Pixies had finished their gig. We spend another 1 1/2 hour trying to find someone in charge but the staff just kept sending us to the next guy.. Finally we talked to a guy from the staff that explained that there were many people that had the same issue we were having, but that FKP Scorpio (the festival promotor/production company) had simply made themselves unavailable, not wanting to deal with it. The irony is that FKP Scorpio were promoting another festival, the Southside festival, simultaneously, were the Pixies were playing the following day. Now, it would have been a long drive, but if FKP Scorpio would have been avaliable and found it in their greedy hearts to actually replace our Hurricane friday tickets for Southside saturday ones, we could have seen the Pixies there. Sure, it still would have cost us another $100 or so, but we could have done it. Bastards. So now were back home. No Pixies. $350 down the drain.
Am I done? No, this friday, July 2nd, the Pixies are playing Roskilde in Denmark. I seriously doubt if anyone cares, but if I ever deserved free tickets it is now.
So who do I have to fuck?
Ben
http://bipeds.net/ |
| 3 L A T E S T R E P L I E S (Newest First) |
| two reelers |
Posted - 06/30/2004 : 00:34:57
you are not the only one who is more than disappointed with a pixies show, see there:
http://forum.frankblack.net/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=8290
all in all i lost 100 € there (two tickets), not included the overpriced food and drinks.
well, of course the main reason for shitty experiences like ours is the idea of a "big festival" - which is basically a giant cash machine for the promoters and the bands. and that's why i do blame the pixies a bit. because with all the dolllar in their eyes (o.k., who, if not them, deserve it), they forget about their "real" fans who have the only chance to see them in such awful circumstances. and one can argue endlessly about music industry & money, but what surely remains for a long time, is a bitter taste for us.
 I joined the cult of this mouse / and now I occidentally tic-tac |
| allroy |
Posted - 06/30/2004 : 00:03:18
Oh boy, that really sounds horrible. I feel sorry for you. We only had 280km to go and we started around 11.30am as we know from previous years that the last miles might take some time. Fortunately we didn't have any traffic problems and parked our car around 3pm.
But I've read on a Bowie message board that some of his fans got similar problems.
Some years ago, when the festival only ran from Saturday to Sunday, we were stuck in a traffic jam the whole night to make the last 30km from the motorway to the site.
So it still is my favourite festival in germany. but some things never seem to change.
"I'm not a cool guy anymore, as if I ever was before" |
| fuentesjc |
Posted - 06/29/2004 : 14:47:18
I am really sorry about what happened to you, and I would hate to say I told you, but I posted something on the forum like a day before the festival and asked for people going to the Hurricane festival, and only two guys dared to answer....
I live like a hundred kilometers from scheeßel in germany, near to Hannover, we even know the roads in this Bundesland and it took us 4 hours to get there, and we did cheated (I mean, going through stables and that kind of stuff)! because festivals in Germany are always like that ... all the people that has to work arrive very late and the kids that leave school do arrive very late too... so in Germany you have to count on getting to the festivals very early.
I even went to rock am ring on a thursday, and the last 15 kilometers took me like 3 hours!
So I am really sorry, but I think it is a good idea to ask the locals how the things work on some place when you are a foreigner.
I did meet some people from Briston and Cardiff that only traveled to see the pixies and were very satisfied... and I have to say, even with the "stormy weather", the show was awesome, and the band seem very happy when playing together, so if you can afford to spend some more money, I do encourage you to catch the pixies on some other venue!
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