This year somewhere around 50,000 people gathered at the Sherwood Forest in Rothsbury, MI for another grand year at Electric Forest. If you have ever been to the Sherwood Forest for this event you have an understanding of the magic that occurs. I found myself thinking about Electric Forest more as a holiday than as a music festival, especially when everyone says “Happy forest” to you no matter where you go. With every individual that walks into the forest, a different unique story is sure to unfold. Between the music you hear, the things you see, and the feelings that flood into you. Countless artwork everywhere you turn, and in every style you can imagine. Thousands of kind, loving, and interesting individuals all around you at every given second. Oh, and the music, what can I say about the music that it doesn’t say about its self?
Photo of Prof captured by Jessica Rose
From Prof to DJ Jazzy Jeff, to What so Not, The Polish Ambassador, Duke Dumont, Savoy, Major Lazer, and Bonobo. That’s all we were able to catch, on night one, while many other amazing artists played on the many stages around the venue. By day two we had been sucked into the BassRush curated festivities with Bleep Bloop, G Jones, a little String Cheese Incident, Nghtmre, Keys and Krates, Bauuer, and Adventure Club (who played far later than expected). We thought by day 3 we had experienced much the forest. We were wrong. Venturing from one stage to the next on every occasion we had a new experience of some kind. Ranging from a group of people in full costume acting out something crazy amazing, to a man reading a book to countless listeners, and even random phones ringing in the forest ready to be answered. I do recall witnessing a conversation on one of those phone going like “Hello… is this god? I’ve been waiting to hear from you for a while. Oh, you’re not god, well, hello there. Happy forest my friend, I must run!” Once we found ourselves back infant of more music we listened to Hippie Sabotage, STS9 (Axe and Cables), Hermitude, of course more String Cheese Incident, Porter Robinson, Bassnectar, Apashe, and Flosstradamus who practically lit the forest on fire. Thank god that didn’t happen. Come Sunday our team was exhausted, but still ready for more. We caught ourselves getting strange at Liquid Stranger, Louis the Child, Jackyl, The Floozies, and of course GRiZ. Even after the event was officially over, Jason from Cherub played an after party out of the Work Exchange Team tent where hundreds gathered rather than rest up from the long travel home the next morning. It was so worth it.
Photo Credit and Quote: Halie H. “I ran into Julien from BTSM in the forest!”
What we were able to take in was only a fraction of the excitement happening out at Electric forest. Through out the weekend GRiZ played something like 6 sets (including a parade led by GRiZ through the forest), many crazy b2b sets occurred in the good life tent, surprise sets popped up all over, and artists who were no even on the set list showed up to have a good time including Black Tight Sex Machine and many more. We can’t wait until next year Electric Forest!
Photo Credit and Quote: Virginia M.
“Random thoughts….I saw a guy with a huge pretzel and when I said it looked delicious he offered me some without hesitation. Several groups invited me to hang out with them because I was alone. I was offered free drinks, shared food , a guy saw me collecting glow sticks to throw & he got down in the dirt, brushing against the crowd to help me collect, free bottles of water from the hydration station, new friends bought me drinks, neighbors helped me setup my tent when I was struggling, guy gave me a fruit by the foot when I insisted on taking a picture so he & his girl could be in it together, everyone saying sorry if they stepped on your toes/bumped you in the crowd…such an amazing experience. It touches my heart more every year and brings tears of joy when I can feel that much love. We truly are a forest family and I’m so happy to have met you beautiful souls.”