Parklife is one of the festivals I most look forward to. The crowds are wild; I love seeing that energy, those sweaty moshpits.
I like festivals of all kinds: in 1969, I made a film about the first Pan-African festival in Algiers, which celebrated the countries that had been liberated 10 years earlier. There was a tremendous feeling of kinship.
I definitely enjoy doing big festivals and big shows.
If I make a song, and it’s my song, like ‘Lean On,’ we’re going to make money off the synchs, the Spotify, and we get to headline festivals on it. That’s the model I want to explore.
Film fests are an opportunity to see different kinds of films that you usually don’t get to watch. When I’m part of a jury, then I get to judge films, but otherwise I attend festivals to watch two or three films a day and network with a gathering of cinema lovers from all over.
I love that there’s always something happening at festivals. It takes some of the pressure away, too, because you’re one person on the bill.
Festivals are where I see other peoples’ films, where we talk, where I get to learn what was working about the film, I get to have a discussion with viewers… and people who enjoy reading films – I enjoy reading other peoples’ films, and what discussions can come of that.
The reality is that we have all these awards and all these festivals that give out awards, so you sort of go, ‘okay, well, people liked the film, and I think it’s a good film, and it’s up for an award – well, I guess it should win the award then.’
If you had told me many years ago that I’d have been headlining Longitude, or festivals like it, I would have thought it was unimaginable.
Teller and I worked Renaissance Festivals and street performing – actually more real, no kidding around, Philadelphia street performing than we did Renaissance Festivals.
I go to music festivals, and people want to talk to me about racism. I’m like, ‘Bro, I’m trying to have fun!’
Obviously there is stuff that I wouldn’t play in a club that I play at festivals, and vice-versa, but my sets are still dominated largely by my own music. I think that’s what makes me stand out a bit. My music is also festival- and club-friendly, so it generally works out well.
I think one of the things the writers’ festival does that is very good is that it brings writers from around the world and around the country and locally and puts them all in the one spot together, and that’s what a lot of the world’s great writers’ festivals do.
I don’t like going to movie theaters or festivals. I even get freaked out at other people’s shows.
To tell you the truth, man, we spend most of the time travelling in hotels, in festivals, in concert halls, clubs, airports. The most unenjoyable part is all the security at airports.
In small towns, bored teenagers turn their eyes longingly to the exciting doings in the big cities, pining for urban amenities like hipster bars and farmers’ markets and indie-rock festivals. Like everyone else, they want the vibrant and they will not be denied.
The Festival of Books is indeed a well-oiled machine, one which leaves most of the other literary festivals in America, including vaunted Brooklyn’s, in the dust.
As things mature – whether they be real estate, rock n’ roll, politics, festivals, radio – there’s an efficiency that develops, and with it, very often, comes some soul-crushing truths.
When I think about myself as a teenager going to festivals, you look to the main stage as the main entertainment of the night.
I think people ease into this careerist professionalism, so if you’re a writer it’s your job to manufacture books as opposed to writing them and to go to festivals and spend your life emotionally invested in reviews or the awards. You have to shrink your universe in a way. To me, it’s the opposite.
The fact that Newark is having poetry festivals and peace conferences – all of these things are building an undeniable thesis that our city is making incredible strides forward.
When we finally got to play that and we had a great show there, well I can tell it was pretty awesome. Y’know, we probably did bigger festivals since then; we probably headlined bigger festivals since then, but I will always remember that.
To get noticed, I had to take my films in a space which was much more democratic in terms of cinema – the international film festivals.
