Boom Festival - Idanha-A-Nova, Portugal, August 3-9 2006

Where can I start? What should i say about this festival? Its those kind of things that you can only experience yourself and words really cant represent what you felt, saw, hear and thought.

Ok lets make it simple: Psychedelic Culture makes sense, and Boom is the proof. I love psychedelic trance with all my heart and I love the idea of this culture as an alternative of life, but i had never seen it or experienced it. Boom was 7 days of magic in all ways, from the dark to the bright side, but it was magic all the time, every detail was directed to really make a parallel dimension, from the signs, to the music, to the deco, to the workshops, and the people here in Europe really got the idea and they enhanced all this with crazy outfits, clothes and jewelry. I really dont know how to explain it without sounding a little bit cliche, but fuck it, Boom was a psychedelic culture festival, a real one, maybe the only one with full conciousness of the potential of transformation that psytrance has.

Just by looking at the areas and the concept you understand what I mean. It had all the traditional areas of a psychedelic trance festival, but this was the first to be designed to be sustainable in an ecological way, ecologic for mother earth, for our minds and bodies. They had the typical dancefloor, but the deco, structure and soundystem were amazing, and the line up was really the best music you can get in the psychedelic scene nowadays, original and creative music for all kinds of tastes and the best dark line up i ever saw. The chill out was beatiful, a very nice bamboo structure, very confortable to sleep and relax, with interesting bands like Pedra Branca and Waterjuice. The Sacred Fire was a great idea also, a whole stage dedicated to reggae/organic/ethnic fusion. And then you had the Liminal Village, which for me is what really made a difference, it was the only place where all the crazy ideas you got dancing came to shape and really start to activate this evolution of conciousness which for me is the key to change the paradigm we are currently living in.

So this is boom, a multiple platform for all freaks to coexist in this psychedelic culture, to celebrate life, and to know that making our dreams come true its possible, you just need to wake the fuck up :D.

Day 1 / August 3rd

We arrived after taking the Boom Bus on August 3rd, already in the airport there were tons of freaks, beautiful girls and a lot of energy. The bus took like 6 hours to arrive finally to Idanha-A-Nova and we finally got in the festival. We were so tired we camped in the parking lot witout realizing, but we went to explore the rest of the festival site and it was amazing, the market area, the huge flowers, the restaurants, the camping area, the lake, it was beautiful, the people!!!, the people was so important, the faces, the way they dressed, it was really a psychedelic city and the music hadnt even started yet. We met with Paulo and all the Vagos crew in the camping area, we rest and then went to the liminal village to see some movies, I saw the Outback Eclipse documentary, it was so funny to be in a festival seeing a movie about making a festival, almost like a fractal heheh. Then we went to sleep as we were very tired from all the travelling and the heat.

Day 2 / August 4th

This was the first day we felt the full heat of the location, we woke up covered in sweat and decided to move our stuff to the camping area with the Vagos guys. It was great to see the location for the first time during the day, the lake and the hills around it were very nice. We split up and went to explore the rest of the site, I met with some very nice german people that were living in portugal and were camping faraway from the dancefloor in a very cool spot where they had make a small shrine. Then we stayed the rest of the day enduring the crazy temperature, i think it was around 40 degrees all the time until the sun went down.

I also went to the Liminal Village to hear a talk about Living with Sun and Wind Energy, this was fucking great, this whole area was powered by a bus that a british couple owned with solar panels. They showed how everything worked in the bus, they were able to power all the liminal village and still be able to run their bus as usual, with lights, laptops and even a washing machine!!!. They showed how simple it was to use this technology and that you didnt actually need to know a lot of technical stuff to do it. Very inspiring and a very nice and simple way to show how solar and wind energy works. Also later in the evening there was a talk about shamanism by a Shaman from Peru, which was great, the guy looked so good in his clothings and he had an incredible vibe, he really enjoyed talking with the people and he answered all the questions very calmly and then they played Blueberry, a movie I saw later in Germany, which is a very deep and psychedelic movie, I really recommend it!.

This was the great thing about the Liminal Village, it was really a platform for multiple revolutionary and simple ways to construct alternative ways of living. You were actually learning things useful for your whole life not only for the festival, and the structure was beautiful, it was a bamboo temple, with carpets and cushions, and it was really a good spot to sleep during the day :).

After eating and chilling, the sun came down finally and everyone started to prepare for the first night. We had seen the soundsystem before, but when the first kick sounded, wow man, the earth trembled and it was like a ripple of madness around all the festival site. I entered the dancefloor around midnight and I finally saw it in full motion, the deco was amazing, the paintings in the ceiling were like fluo lizards done in this australian aboriginal design, the lasers blowed your head, and the tree with eyes in the middle was incredible.

The best was the structure of the Dancefloor, it was like a huge pagoda, but with 7 levels on the roof, all made from bamboo and designed by the same Bali who designed the chill out and the Liminal Village. Then the music: Iguana dj set was very good, energetic, fast music, good mixes and he ended with Osom track Be Cool, which I really dont like, but hearing the last part in that sound system was very funny. Then Highko came, as Kindzadza didnt play because of visa problems, very good set also, more straight and perfect for the dancefloor. Then there was a dj called Freeeaamah, which I didnt hear completely, but i was hard and dark for sure. Then Gregh on Earth came, he played one of the best live sets I heard in my life, the music was so hard and psychedelic, and the guy had so nice energy, i really enjoyed it, it was all new stuff, so it was also very surprising. After this Shawnodese played, I only listened to half of his set as I was very tired, but he played very nice music, perfect for the twilight, dark, but groovy and pumping.

After I went to sleep to the chill out but with a great feeling, the music inspired me so much I couldnt stop making tracks in my head.

Day 3 / August 5th

I woke up again covered in sweat as usual and the first thing I did was take a swim in the lake and stay in the water for at least half an hour, this was the only way to survive heheh. I visited the german hippies in their caravan, had some coffee and talked about the previous night. We couldnt believe that it was only the first night, it was too much to handle. The music had been great and the vibes were incredible, for us it was our first real psychedelic festival, so the combination of all the factors, was really mind blowing.

I walked around the festival site during the day, spent a lot of money in ice cold juices and swimming in the lake. I was tired so i also took a nap in the Liminal Village and then saw some movies, the best was COSM from Alex Grey and Elegant Universe, a little bit of art and superstring theory was good to set the mood for the night.

In the night I heard Derango, which I like a lot, but i think there was a problem with the soundsystem, because it really didnt sound good. They played new and old stuff If im not mistaken, but to be sincere i expected a lot more, but it was great to see them there playing, nice vibes and very psychedelic music. Then Zik played and it was fucking great, i expected more high bpm stuff, but he surprised me with a more groovy dj set (well not really groovy hehe), which i enjoyed a lot. Then Nathan came, but I was too tired and decided to go and chill out in the camping area. I also checked out the Chill out, but i really dont know who was playing, but there were some dubby tunes that fitted perfectly with my mood and the sun going up.

Day 4 / August 6th

This day I was really tired, so i just drank juices and ate very nice food, i spent a lot of time in the Liminal Village. I also checked the art gallery which was incredible, I didnt know any of the artists, so I was really surprised by the paintings. In the world of psychedelic cliches like fractals and shiva, this guys really flipped me out, completely original and trippy.

The first talk I heard was from Amir Rabik, which was the architect who designed all the bamboo structures, he was such a nice guy, completely humble and really enlightened. Bamboo is a crazy material to work, its like a giant grass, that grows everywhere and its very flexible so you can adapt it to any enviroment and possibility.

He really understood the spiritual meaning of architecture and the design of space and how energy flows in it, he didnt gave a fuck about Euclidean measures, he used human body proportions and spiritual measures, completely non linear architecture. He showed us all the pictures since they cut the bamboo in Bali until they build it again in Portugal, and told us all the things they went through to complete the mission.

Then Graham Hancock talked about his book called Supernatural, which deals on the importance of psychedelics on the human evolution, it was very interesting, he showed all kinds of drawings from our ancestors showing UFOs and crazy things, which really made you think about the history of conciousness and art and its relation with psychedelics. Then I watched the 2nd part of Elegant Universe and another documentary called The Corporation, which discussed the role of this entities in our current world.

I really didnt go to the dancefloor this night but I listened to Ilse set, which was very good, dark and psychedelic stuff, but none of the acts were my cup of tea and I decided to just wander around, talk with people and relax and save energy for the rest of the days. This was also the day of the full moon, so we had this crazy white ball glowing over us and shining in the lake, it was beatiful.


Day 5 / August 7th

This for me was the climax day of Boom, not only because it was the last night of dark music, but also because the festival was ending and we were also so used to living there, that everyone was so confortable that the vibes were incredible. I visited the german hippies once more, relaxed and swam in the lake and then at night I went again to the Liminal Village. I listened to the panel discussion between Daniel Pinchbeck, Graham Hancock and Mark Heley about 2012. I dont know about this year, but I really believe that we are about to suffer a deep change soon, and it was interesting to hear this 3 minds and their point of views about the idea of 2012. I also remember now that I listened to Daniel Pinchbecks talk before this, it was very interesting, this guy is really deep into the 2012 idea, but he talked about his experiences in Africa and Brazil and how he contacted archetypes, which I found very interesting, like having spirits contacting you for giving you a mission.

It was beautiful to hear crazy people talking about crazy things, that they really believed in, it made the other side look far more tangible. After this I saw the third part of Elegant Universe, very interesting theories about the way the universe works and a documentary about Crop Circles. A lot of information was swirling through my mind, it was really inspiring to hear people talk about this, you dont even need to believe in the things they say, but the exercise of discussing this crazy things, its very imporant for the construction of a new paradigm.

Then the nigth came, and wow what a night. First Amanda as dj, which I heard from outside the dancefloor, but it was very very hard music. Then Quasar, which for me was also a huge surprise, very groovy and psychedelic, I think there was a problem in the soundsytem too, but it really didnt matter, the music blowed my mind. Then Anar from Vertigo played a very good dj set, heavy but danceable music, perfect for the night. And then Penta... wow man, what can I say, it was the best live without a doubt, all the tracks he played were awesome and the production level was incredible, he played a more morning set, but it was completely psychedelic, the climax of the festival for sure. I stayed after Penta in the dancefloor as I had a lot of energy, and this was my first experience during Boom in dancing during the daylight, which was actually great!!!, even the full on dj set Paul Taylor played was very nice and I stayed in the dancefloor enjoying the sun.

After this I went to chill out around the Liminal Village and I took a swim in the lake and the went to sleep in the Chill out. I spent a lot of time thiking about how hard it was to build our tour, and that it was finally hapenning, it was beautiful to realize we were actually trying to make our dreams true, and it was so simple and human, nothing to do with the complex and bizarre fear in my mind before doing it.

I just stayed there sitting so happy and amazed, i had the feeling that i had been afraid all my life and suddenly the fear was gone, this knot in my stomach had dissapeared. It was really one of the best moments in my life.

Day 6th / August 8th

And then the last day came, it was so fast, I had almost believed that the festival would go on forever, we were so used to be there, we already knew how to survive in this enviroment and we really liked it. This was our first big festival, and we really didnt know how to approach it, I have the feeling next time we will be able to really enjoy it, after all I felt a little bit like an observer from another world, understanding this crazy people and culture.

The last day the music ended early, so I was in the dancefloor for the last dj set from Tsuyoshi, which for me was not very good, but it was great to feel the energy of all the people dancing the last tunes, specially the last one, and suddenly there was silence again, and I looked around and everybody seemed so happy. It had been an incredible festival and there was no need even to talk about it, so many moments kept spinning in my mind after it.

We packed our stuff and we walked to the Boom Bus once again, it was very hot and not very good organized, but we made it to the bus and head back to Lisbon, to Tiagos house. He was not home so we dropeed our stuff in a bakery and went to walk around Lisbon. Once in his house, we rested for one day and on the 11th of August we left for Italy, to play in a festival called Summer Celebration near Ferrara.