Sorry this has taken so long! Here is a report on what was probably the best week of my life so far…
I didn’t actually see a lot of the music at the festival as I enjoyed hanging out with people and relaxing more than losing it in the big arenas. Plus I had never skied before, so I was pretty focused on coming back with a new skill.
I arrived in Mayrhofen on Sunday night after being picked up by a massively fast driver called Bodo from Munich airport. I hadn’t had much sleep on the saturday night as I had DJed in Nottingham and not really done much packing. The journey was a good laugh. Had a great chat with Oneman about 2 step and garidge. Realised at the end that the 2 guys with beards were Jim and James Horsemeat. And the scottish guy with the journalist girlfriend was Milo. When I was dropped off at the apartment, I was under the impression that Matty J and Alex Charles 11 (my flat mates for the week) would already be there. We were staying in Haus Der Mitte which was a cool apartment block above a sports shop on the edge of the town. There was no one there though and I had to dump my stuff with come kind Bristolians who were moving in while I arrived and pick up my keys from a hotel close by. When I got to the hotel – there was a note with the keys for all 3 of us (I realised then that alex and matt hadn’t arrived) which basically said ‘here’s the keys for your room please leave ten euros deposit’. They are pretty laid back in Mayrhofen I reckon.
Mayrhofen by day…
So I got back to the flat and settled in – it was really really nice. Great views of the mountains and lots of space for 3 people. Even a small ghetto blaster which I immediately christened with Do It To The Max by The Revenge. I thought I would go out and explore so I set off to the Raquet Club (converted sports hall) to check out Oneman who was playing after Dizzy. However when I arrived I was hit by a massive misfortune. My glasses fell off my face in 2 pieces due to the abrupt temperature change. They had snapped clean in the middle on the nose bit. Cheers Prada! The record metaphorically stoppped.. I couldn’t see. How was I going to play my gig on wednesday? I had to use gaffa tape from a poster to do a bodged repair job while the Austrian security laughed at my plight and went back to the flat on a complete downer. What a crap start to the break!
I awoke the next day and went straight to artist liaison where a really lovely helpful girl called Cally used acrylic nail glue, black tape and a black marker (to hide the glue) to do a massively professional repair job. Problem massively solved!
Check out the pro repair job from Cally..
My spirits immediately rose and I spent the rest of the day sorting out my ski hire, booking skiiing lessons and hanging out with Horse Meat and Reverso 68. I had met James Horsemeat before but I didn’t know Pete or Phil from Reverso or Jim Stanton so it was really nice to chat about music, travel and art with them. We were kind of surrounded by people going mad as the festival bills itself as ‘Ibiza with Snow’ but most of the people I hung out with during the week were there to relax and do a bit of skiiing.
Having said that on the Monday night after a bit of an impromptu Jaiger Bomb session, I found myself ‘just popping in for one’ at the Arena (where the Tirk party was on wed night) to check out Zabeila and Fanciulli. Although it wasn’t my cup of tea musically, they were massively rocking the place and I ended up meeting Bodo from the airport transfer and doing a load more Jaiger Bombs with him. I think I got in at about 4.45am.
Tuesday was skiing lesson day so I had to get up at about 7.45. You can imagine how I felt. 1 Vietnam shower later and I was heading up Penken mountain in my first ever cable car experience. When I got up there I joined my group which was a mixture of ages and we began learning to ski on a nursery slope. I got chatting to 2 guys called Saul and Will who turned out to be Chase and Status. That’s the good thing about Snowbombing – the artists are totally mixed in with the punters and throughout the week I heard the people who had come to hear their favourite acts bigging up the fact that they had seen their favourite DJ or vocalist falling off while learning to ski or looking a bit ‘intense’ in the main hotel bar.
Lots of snow!
Can’t remember much about tue night. Think I had an early one in preparation for wed skiing lesson. On wednesday after the morning skiing lesson I had lunch with Jen and Olivia from my group. It turned out that they were staying in the apartment next to me and Alex and Matty which was a bit weird as there were a few thousand people on the slopes. Jens boyfriend James offered to take me onto a blue run and watch over me while I tried to negotiate it. After a very shaky start (like going backwards towards a big edge unable to stop) I got my shit together and managed some turns and made it down in one piece. Phew. Not the best thing to do on the night of your gig but hey…
Give Piste A Chance…
So Wednesday was the night of the gig. Running order was Matty and Alex, then Soft Rocks and Kathy Diamond, then Lindstrom live, then Greg Wilson, then me, then Alex and Matty at the end. We all went out for a meal together and it was really nice to meet Piers and Chris from Soft Rocks and Kathy who knows everyone from Sheffield that I know. We all got on like a house on fire and suddenly we were in the Arena with the music on and the event had started. I enjoyed everyones sets. Despite my claims of professionalism, I must admit that I slightly overdid the vodka. It was really good fun chatting with Kathy about Brighton (I do like the sound of it) and then me and Greg got right stuck into to the late 80′s hip hop chat. And then the familiar friendly beanpole figure of Hans Peter Lindstrom turned up. Last time I played on the same bill as him (Bam Bam in Brum 2006) I was a bit worse for wear and thought it timely to lecture him and Prins Thomas on the evils of snuss (norwegian mouth tobacco) so it was nice to meet in slightly more sober circumstances. Alex and Matty began proceedings with a cultured set of disco, Soft Rocks and Kathy nicely warmed the place up with a cracking live PA and then Hans Peter took us all into orbit with an amazing live set that was pretty muscular to say the least. It reminded me of vintage french house at times with as cosmic edge. No floaty prog from this guy. I was pretty sloshed by this point and I remember shouting a lot during his set. It was proper dance music.
Then it was time for Greg Wilson. This was proper peaktime stuff and mentally he opened his set with my remix of Joubert Singers! It was well funny cause Chris and Piers from Soft Rocks were beside me muttering ‘what the fuck is this shit’ all the way through it. It was nice to hear it out on a proper system as I have only heard it that time at Cargo so just want to big up whoever mastered it. It sounded nice! Greg played his usual seemless set of disco, electro and housey stuff but it did seem a bit more tough than normal – maybe due to Hans Peters driving set before-hand. Then it was my turn and I can honestly say that I can’t remember much of my set. I was in ‘the zone’ but I defo played Red Cow by Jimi Oh, the Jazzanova remix of Atjazz and…some other stuff…
Matt and Alex didn’t get to play again as some Steven Seagall lookalike bouncer made us stop at the end of my set. We all trooped off back to the flat to have 4 hours bad sleep before heading up the other mountain which is called Ahorn to play to the slopes for the Arctic Disco.
Up on Ahorn…
As soon as I arrived on the mountain, I preferred it. There was much less people and the blue run was a lot wider so safer to ski down. Matty J was playing some balearic stuff when I arrived so I played stuff like Bergs edit of Wood Beez before dropping Time For Us All To Love (easy Zane) and then passed over to Piers who played a massively cultured dub reggae set. It was while listening to Piers that I really took in my surroundings. We were on a raised ice platform, flanked by snow covered peaks, gazing out over the most beautiful valley playing to people skiiing and boarding or chilling in a deck chair (easy phil cooper).
Word can’t describe it… I wish I was still there…
We were all massively hung over and starving by this point so we headed off down the hill to a cool restaurant that was so well priced – 10 euro for goulash and bread, plus a lovely handmade burger (trust me it was big) plus some fries. We all sat chilling to Gregs set and I felt on cloud 9.
Thu night was a bit of a wash out understandably – so we all went out for a meal and had an early one.
Back on Ahorn…
Friday was my last day to ski so I headed back up to the Ahorn and checked out Greg and Jon Carter playing 60′s soul and hip hop respectively and got my ski on. I was starting to really get the hang of it and began to go too fast for my skill level. Cue several massive slams with the skis about 50 yards behind me and my confidence began to wain. Some bloke in orange trousers came up to talk to me. It was Ali Renault from Italo group Heartbreak. He actually saw me slam from the cable car and came to help me! They had been brought in as replacement for some other group so it was a nice surprise to see him.
Lindstroms Buggie…
As Friday was the last night I decided to undo all of my good work and massively hit it hard. It was good fun but the spectre of the 10.42 am transfer back to Munich airport came around far too quickly for my liking. Why didn’t I meet the Canadian stripper from Ibiza a few hours earlier..When I got back to the apartment they were cleaning out the flat with my stuff in it and the airport transfer was parked outside our building waiting for me. Matty and Alex had already left so I had the most tortuous 11 hour journey ahead of me which went – Meyrhofen-Munich-Birmingham-Nottingham.
I made it. Just. Munich airport was pretty tough. I was massively ill in the toilets and would have slept there if I hadn’t set my alarm. The check in queue was full of green faced snowbombing casualties! I got back to Nottingham at about 9pm and then went out to do my usual saturday night gig. No booze for me. I still don’t feel right now!
So that was it. I didn’t check out that many bands and DJs as we spent a lot of time chilling and going out for meals and stuff. It was really nice! Just want to say massive big ups to Matty and Alex for being such good housemates! And big hello to Greg and family, Hans Peter and Family, Reverso, Horse Meat, Soft Rocks and Kathy. Plus massive thanks to all at Snowbombing – especially the girls in artist liaison!
