Although Dutch city Groningen inhabits a disproportionately high number of students in general and offers multiple venues for good live music and great drinking this Friday night was even special for the hip city. It’s the final hours of the Eurosonic Noorderslag event, KENSINGTON, the country’s biggest pop/rock group, just played a free show in the heart of the city and the streets are flooded with people. International delegates from the conference, music professionals, the city’s ordinary population, drunken teenagers on their way to the next club – everybody’s on the move whether it’s by feet or bicycle.
It’s a quite lovely picture that also represents the Eurosonic Noorderslag in a good way. It might be busy and full of hectic but it’s also a great way to meet a diversified selection of people and see plenty of up and coming bands, from the latest major label pop sensation to a more obscure psychedelic rock band aside the mainstream. Groningen offers so many venues all over the town although it was – unfortunately, as always – way too hard to get into all of these. ACID ARAB, KIASMOS, YEARS & YEARS … we would have loved to visit more shows but it wasn’t really possible.
Still, Europe’s finest music business get-together of the year was highly entertaining. Imagine it a bit like a big family meeting. Of course, it’s a weird family but everybody’s in there – from your drunken uncle, to the attractive cousin and weird but rich grandfather you barely talk to. In the end, we’re all (hopefully) here for the greater good of everything which is and always should be the music. And we clearly experienced a few highlights. That’s why the upcoming pages are delightfully dedicated to the nine most wonderful artists we witnessed in those past days.