MS Dockville happened last weekend – and it’s been quite an experience. Spread out on the stream island Wilhelmsburg, it’s been once again a sold-out festival on all three days. What’s really lovely about Dockville is the great number of little things happening around the 50 acres festival area. Because let’s face it. Foals, The Lumineers and Woodkid are all great O.K. on a CD or reasonably sized concert, but on a stage from 100 meters away, it’s actually quite hard to entertain every last one. Takes cojones. So Team Poule never really “gets” this festival vibe. I mean, they were all alright, but [tweetable hashtag=”#dockville #pouledor” alt=”It’s the smaller stages where the magic happens.”]it’s the smaller stages where the magic happens.[/tweetable] And luckily Dockville has quite a few of them. Like, Star Slinger slinged his stars on one for a good hour – epic! So did Aparde, great set on Friday night in front of a couple hundred people. Denmark’s Rangleklods also, expectedly, put on an epic 60 minutes show.
New York’s MSMR had the audience eating out of their hands and Austra quite gracefully marked the highlight on Sunday with a great set under the sunny sky. Denmark’s Mø was great to see too. And then there are all these little art side projects and installations. Every year, Dockville marks the end of a month-long art exhibition. It adds a really nice vibe to the former harbour territory. Like for instance a sort of fake tree with balloons or something in it. It didn’t really make much sense to Team Poule but it certainly raised (and still raises) questions – which means mission accomplished for the curator I guess. Or a pile of bicycles. How about that. Now and because Wilhelmsburg is an actual island in the Elbe river, it is quite green and you can hear crickets at night. And there are bumble bees. And then there was this light, in a tree.
It’s hard to pick a favorite after any festival I guess. Crystal Fighters certainly never get old. Even though they play like three festivals every weekend in summer, they still manage to be absolutely amazing. Every single time. Definitely a band crush on this end. Another favorite for sure was the epic three hour set by Hei & Lej on Saturday – nicely set at the Klüse stage on the lower end of the festival area right by the Elbe river and the harbour industry on the other side. Magical. Dockville, you had quite a lot of these magical moments. If you let us, we will be back next year. Early bird tickets go on sale October 5th.
