Events

Beyond Wonderland Bay Area

This report was purposefully written one week after attending Beyond Wonderland Bay Area 2015 at Shoreline Amphitheatre on September 26 and 27. I wanted to wait until reminiscence of the event calms down and I can tell an unbiased story about my journey down the rabbit hole a couple of weekends ago.

Although this was my 3rd time attending Beyond Wonderland Bay Area, I set lower expectations this time around because of my personal underwhelming experience in 2014, higher ticket prices this year, and the decision by a couple of my good friends not to attend BW this year. So, I proceeded to buy my tickets with caution, constantly monitoring news for line-up updates and my friends’ posts on Facebook and other social media outlets. At the same time, there was not even a tiny chance in the world I would miss the biggest rave in the Bay Area. Skipping the middle part of my story for a second and jumping to the conclusion, I want to say that my friends and I had a great time at the event, and I would be beating myself up real hard now if I missed the event.

Without looking at this year’s map, I was slightly confused upon the entry into the venue. It turned out that the layout had changed significantly since the last time. The entrance was moved to a more secluded area, and it had at least three checkpoints to go through in order to be granted access onto the festival grounds—they checked tickets, ID, and subjected us to a TSA-style search.

Locations of the stages, art installations, and amenities were different as well. This year there were only three stages:

QUEEN’S DOMAIN (Tiesto, Calvin Harris, Knife Party, Carnage, DJ Snake)

As usual, the main stage was the place to be to see sets by the biggest names in the electronic dance music scene, and experience the unique production that included the classic Hookah-Smoking Caterpillar, waterfalls, hundreds of LED panels, and multiple pyrotechnic units (my all-time favorite stage production feature).

MAD HATTER’S CASTLE (Audien, Ummet Ozcan, Arty, Tommy Trash, Laidback Luke)

CHESHIRE WOODS (Flux Pavilion, Brillz, Kill The Noise, Markus Schulz, Simon Patterson)

Mad Hatter’s Castle and Cheshire Woods were considerably smaller stages, yet they were equipped with LED panels that created an immersive environment. Needless to say, most of the artists playing on these two stages were big enough to headline any major EDM festival, so thousands of festivalgoers gravitated to all three stages on both days of the festival.

I had a chance to have a brief conversation with a fire department inspector who worked backstage making sure that all the pyro equipment was working properly and was safe to the public. He told me that the decision to change the layout of the festival was caused by the numerous residents’ complaints about the loud music—especially the bass—that was coming from the amphitheater. The idea was to change the orientation of the stages away from the residential neighborhoods and make them face the bay where no people live. It seems like this strategy really worked. Unlike 2014, where there were 20+ articles on the local news website about drug-related arrests and noise complaints, I wasn’t able to find a single article after the event this year. Hats off to Insomniac Events for finding a way to provide an amazing experience to the festival attendees and limiting inconvenience to the public.

As I noted in the very beginning, my personal experience at last year’s Beyond Wonderland Bay Area was not the best, though it wasn’t necessarily due to the quality of event organization or line-up. I must admit that last year we attended only the first day of the festival (Saturday). Furthermore, on the day that we attended, we got to the venue pretty late, and we left when Above & Beyond just started their set. So, I wasn’t there for my favorite artists’ sets, and that’s probably why I felt like BW 2014 wasn’t nearly as fun as 2013, which was absolutely amazing in terms of ticket price, line-up, and meeting great people on both nights.

Fortunately, BW turned out to be completely different this year. In addition to attending it with an all-access pass, I witnessed what was going on backstage, which allowed me to chat with some great people and broaden my perspective of what it takes to organize an event like this (with many thanks to the Insomniac Press team who helped me and my team member to get media wristbands). All told, I had a great time with many of my old and new friends at the main stage.

It is also worth mentioning that Beyond Wonderland always attracts very friendly and likeminded people. I have been to some other events where people in the crowd weren’t very nice to each other (to say the least), but I have never observed anything like that at Beyond or any other of Insomniac’s festivals. At least not yet (knocking on wood).

When I first heard about Pasquale Rotella’s philosophy that “music isn’t the only thing that’s cool” at events, I didn’t buy it right away, as I thought it was a convenient excuse that any promoter could use to justify subpar line-ups and overpriced tickets. However, as I was becoming more familiar with EDM scene, I grew to understand and appreciate Pasqual’s point of view.

Although I go to events because of the music and my favorite artists, I realize that a successful show is much more than just music. Quality stage production is obviously more important than it seems at first glance. Have you been to an EDM show that didn’t have a cool light show? Even my friends—bedroom DJs who I like to party with—invest a considerable amount of money into lighting equipment, because they know that no matter how good they are at mixing popular bangers, music that they play is just part of the overall experience. If I don’t sound convincing, feel free to check out this video to see what a DJ set would be like without all the lights and lasers. Not too impressive, huh?

On the other hand, Insomniac Events invest so much money in stage decoration, lasers, pyrotechnics, costumed performers, art installations, etc. that the result is absolutely mind-blowing. That’s why in Wonderland there is no room for negative emotions or sad feelings. You are surrounded by tens of thousands of strangers, but you don’t feel like you don’t belong to this place. You may not know many people at the picturesque Shoreline Amphitheatre grounds during the BW weekend, but it doesn’t matter, because you will be treated by others as a close friend.

If you are new to the scene and still struggling to understand what PLUR is, you may want to consider attending Beyond Wonderland 2016—either the one in the Bay Area or in South California. I can almost guarantee that you will not regret doing it.

In case you think that several months is too long of a wait and you want to attend another event sooner, you may want to consider attending one of Insomniac’s Halloween celebrations: BOO! at Bill Graham Civic Auditorium in San Francisco on October 30–31 at the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium, or Escape: Psycho Circus at the NOS Events Center in San Bernardino on October 30–31.