At long last, the day has come! This is the first year of Wanderland Music and Arts Festival and yours truly is checking in to see The Temper Trap perform live, and to witness how it is gonna be different from the Manila Music Festival held last year.
The Venue:
The location was wisely selected – within Makati, a city which is frequented by many Filipinos to hang out and spend time with their family/friends. The stages were too far away from the drop off points of PUVs though, a big and terrible inconvenience. We had to take a tricycle to and from the venue when I needed to go to the pharmacy.
The Crowd:
The crowd was fairly thin and I could think of two reasons: (1) it’s their first year — although I have to mention again that they had massive marketing and advertising for the event; and (2) the segregation of the already few attendees made the overall turnout look even lower. No fun in that.
But mind you, a small crowd does not always guarantee the a horrible experience. The whole day turned out to be an awesome sunny weekend filled with good music until the sun set!
A Comparison:
However, thinking about the Manila Music Fest last year, one helluva difference here was that (1) we couldn’t see much of the artists onstage as compared to last year due to the said segregation of the audience in Wanderland. Add the obstructions that were set up in the middle. This kind of counters the purpose of having one big party at a festival.
Another thing was that (2) the sound system is a lot wonky when the first few bands started playing. We REAAAALLY had a challenge appreciating the sound of Taken by Cars. This was however remedied later that day. But I also remember The Temper Trap starting a song all over again because of a glitch that happened with the sound system. They say we deserve to hear a perfect run. Sweet. I just hope they will have a better partner/provider for this very critical element if they do this again next year.
Avalanche City
Colour Coding
Tully on Tully
I have a video of UDD’s Tadhana performance but it was too dim and chaotic. Who doesn’t frazzle when Armi starts singing anyway?
Rom and I were being weird because of the hot weather + awesome music combo. We actually went nuts taking snapshots of ourselves with the colorful backdrop created by the vibrant event.
I actually think we played around a little to much. Lol.
The Activities:
There was sooooo much space and soooo many other stuff to do around the vicinity. There were sponsors and vendors selling festival merch, artist merch, food, drinks, and some fun activities too. So I was really happy to munch on our favorite pizza and MOCHIKO while enjoying the music.
Our favorite was the ginormous GAP booth and activity area where we were able to unleash our creativity through decorating our GAP tote bags printed with our photo.
After going artsy and crafty, we hung our tote bag to dry and returned to the stage area. Nada Surf was already performing by then.
The Lineup:
The list of performers had a fair share of local and foreign acts. Some of which are already popular (at least for me) such as Taken by Cars, Up Dharma Down, Yolanda Moon, and Pulso. It was a delight for me to hear Pulso perform live again. The majority of Terno artists is very obvious though, making me wonder if other fresher, less known local bands would have a chance in the future.
Nada Surf
Neon Trees
Temper Trap
Just listen to this lovely, hair-raising song from them. WOW.
See you next year!
y. pulongbarit-cuevo 