Since BoomTown Fair’s upgrade to city status in 2012, not only has the population of the city expanded but so has the amount of mini venues throwing open their doors to get down and dirty with BoomTown’s annual Fair! Across the City’s six districts, over 30 shops, buildings and residential houses halt their usual business for four days and nights, allowing all BoomTown residents to enjoy and witness the hidden magic behind the winding streets of the Fair!
These venues host a range of deranged temporary party worlds for the amusement and delight of each and every town resident! There is so much to see and do it’s hard to know where to start, but start we must, and here is a mini guided tour around all the magic, mayhem and mystery BoomTown Fair has to offer within its paradoxical mini venues…
First up, let’s take a shimmy around the streets of the brand new Latino quarter of Barrio Loco; one of the hidden treasures to be found within Barrio Loco is Samedia Shebeen, BoomTown’s only all night Shebeen and tropical music club! If you are lucky enough to stumble upon this steamy night spot ensure to venture in, grab a spot on the dance floor and get down to the hottest Afro-Funk, Latino and Tropical sounds around! Happy Slap Boutique will also be bringing their ludicrous party skills to El Barrio presenting El Espectáculo Esqueleto, which is fully fitted with freaky stage shows, music mayhem and outlandish make up! There will also be a Day of the Dead Bar where everything is themed around the celebrated Mexican festival.
As we follow a sea of colourful flags and a dancing dragon we stumble upon the mystical ChinaTown, hosting a plethora of exciting and exquisite new venues including; Prawnucopia Love Lounge, step in for a prawn pampering in the salubrious, saucy surroundings, which intriguingly offers more than initially meets the eye… This is also, Madame Electrifie’s Laundry Service, Madame has been travelling the globe cultivating the best of Electro Swing, Ghetto Funk, Hip hop, Breaks and more and welcomes both grubby and clean into her beautiful, yet perhaps a little run down, ChinaTown ghetto-inspired Laundromat! As well as Alan’s Happy Ending Cinema, showing a fine selection of Chinese films with more than a handful of kung fu movies, which then transforms into an elicit reunion between music and visual by night…
Moving upmarket, via the Magic Carpet ride (the only purposely installed ski-lift for a UK festival – ever!) we head to the ritzy, glitzy Mayfair Avenue with its diamond incrusted street lamps and gold plated curbs stones, where the usual suspects are raring to go: The Bank, back for 2013 with extended opening hours the Bearded Kitten BoomTown bank positively encourages frivolity and stupidity in their silly games and outright mad-cap mayhem! Funkington Manor, once again the upstanding citizens Mr & Mrs Fitz-Sloane are leaving their angelic teenage daughter Arabella to look after Funkington Manor while they are away on their annual break. This year Arabella, with help from her troublesome brothers, are planning a shindig so outrageous and scandalous that any of the previous year’s chandelier-swinging, champagne swigging antics will look as tame as a toddlers picnic! The Bling Bar returns to cater for BoomTown’s more chic clientele, with pumping sound and secret sets from BoomTown’s elite, where bumping shoulder’s with the city’s gutterati and downwardly mobile is a given! The Park Hotel – Enter through the revolving doors of The Park Hotel into a pamper paradise; a place to rest one’s weary head, to let loose and forget the pressures of the day in the busy town! Also back for their second year, after taking the festival by storm last year are; Bump Roller Disco, with a huge range of vintage skates available to hire and DJs throughout the day and night providing music to glide and sparkle to. Brand spankingly new to Mayfair Avenue this year is; Last Aid an all in one convenient hospital to the stars, come rub shoulders with real TV and Movie Stars and be cool and Candy Trash Beauty Boutique, offering glamorous wigs, epic eyelashes, awesome lip tattoos and total glitter transformation, think Lady Gaga meets Aladdin Sane crossed with crazy Prom Queens & 80s trash disco and you’re nearly there!
Keeping a watchful eye over in the heart of the Town Centre is the Town Hall – since the splitting of the town earlier this year, every district of BoomTown has elected a councillor to manage their affairs, and these councillors are now bidding to gain complete control of BoomTown! Each of the districts of BoomTown has an office within the Town Hall’s walls where a host of crazy and captivating experiences lies within…. From the gypsies and pirates of Oldtown to the snot-nosed yuppies of Mayfair Avenue, the tribesmen of Trenchtown to the gangstas of DownTown, the Mexicans of El Barrio Loco to the hippies of Holditdown Town, and the ancient traditions of Chinatown; there’s a BoomTown for everyone at the Town Hall! But the Town Centre isn’t all about bureaucracy and politics, it is also home to the Luna Cinema, far more fun than your average drive in cinema and no need to even drive in! Sit yourself in one of the ready parked vehicles with a bag of popcorn and a crew of friends and enjoy a movie or some music from one of the top class VJs. Also on hand with the freshest next day deliveries is BoomTown’s very own mail service the Postal Posse, and at the heart of the Town Centre’s community is the Bad Apple Bar – BoomTown’s oldest building, it will be taken over by various crews during the course of the fair, each bringing their own bad apple attitude and flavour.
Now let’s roll through the rum soaked streets of Oldtown’s pirate community, where the Gramophone Disco showcases its old timey and darkly euphoric world of bones, kitsch and chintz. Still running on a no-nonsense stream of Sarsaparilla, racy wardrobe and a strict pre-60s music policy (strictly no mono recordings – Jazz, Latin and Strict Tempo, R&B, Blues, Country, Rockabilly and Country swing, Calypso , Eastern European and World, Musicals and Music Hall , the list goes on)… Next door is the People’s Front Room, a familiar yet surreal space, raised out of the gatherings of creative folk and combined with the old ideals of the 19th Century Salon! Big Love Chapel, whether marrying for love, lust, money or simply as an excuse to play Whitney Houston records, the most sinful congregation since Sodom & Gomorrah are ready to give you the Wedding of a lifetime! The Twisted Fairground, the infamous gypsy run strange carnival of attractions and eccentric automated freak show! Need we say more? The Gypsy Disco a wandering wagon where balkan beats fly through the summer sky and dancers, jugglers and delinquents show of their many talents! With all this mayhem and madness about, there is a serious need for some law and order, that’s where the BoomTown Bobbies come in… Cap’n Fransicso’s Police Force have things under control with a firm but fair hand. A band of old sea dog’s from the darkest depths of Kernow armed with a hefty supply of Balkan, Ska, Swing, Reggae, Techno, Electro and Shanties. Beware though, as the streets of Oldtown are ruled with a hooked fist and the word of the Cap’n is the Law. The Pirate Law…
Up in the Halfway Woods is one of the biggest and best Psy-Trance crews in the country, Tribe Of Frog, as well as the more relaxing Floating Lotus with chilled out Dub, Reggae, Folk, Soul and Electronic goodness and a rapping violinist and Welsh Choir fused with beatboxers thrown in for good measure!
Finally we descend back down the hill, into the seedy underbelly of BoomTown to the DownTown district. First stop is Charlie Brown’s Casino, opening its doors at dusk and throwing out the riff-raff at sunrise, the gang ply their sordid trade of gambling and debauchery on the populous of DownTown. There will be music from the Charlie House Players and cabaret performances from Charlie’s entourage. The Old School Garage are gearing up to play nothing but the finest in UK Garage and Grime, what happens in this venue, stays well and truly in this venue, so let out the inner garage fiend and get ready to be bathed in grime and grease and maybe a sprinkling of WD40… The beloved ASBO Disco will be on hand with their full spectrum of bass centric party music delivered straight to the face! A new addition to the underworld of DownTown is the Spaceport, once a lowly back street bar this building has been acquired by the alien visitors and now used as a portal to other dimensions. Through genetic re-coding, they have mutated the building into a fully functional Spaceport transporting space tourists throughout the galaxy, resulting in a gargantuan influx of cosmic revellers seeking the intergalactic party of all space & time!
There are of course the regular DownTown favourites; the Prohibition Den, with dark amen ales, moonshine and twisted bootleg breakcore; The Leisure Centre, the premier health and phatness institution boasting cutting edge musical backdrop of the highest quality, with cream of the crop tuneage emanating from the in-house Funktion One Soundsytem! The Body Shop, catering for the BoomTown residents every need in the realm of genetic, cybernetic and cranial re-wiring and improving! And without a doubt, the infamous Dance Off crew are back, situated deep in the darkest ghetto of DownTown, no-one speaks of these depraved tournaments; they exist as sinister rumours muttered in dark alleys and as hushed hear-say around an oil-drum fire… This is BoomTown’s DownTown, a place so seedy even the shadows are scared of their shadows…
With so many buildings and venues to look after, and so many residents coming along to the UKs maddest City this August, BoomTown needs YOU! There are loads of openings for Bar Staff, Litter Pickers and Oxfam Stewards, so if being part of the biggest festival family in the UK appeals, then head on over to the website for application details: http://www.boomtownfair.co.uk/contact