• I hate myself. I hate myself because once again I went super emotional: you know, when you had a super good time somewhere and you want to tell EVERY single thing you lived to your friends and people around and then you go full encyclopedic… I started to write a super-long review of the Miss The Stars Fest '17, with way too much details, so I deleted it all. Then I tried to re-write it, to be more objective. And make it shorter to allow everyone to read without being like « fuck, it's 30mn I’m on it and I'm still reading that shit, when it will end??? ». It was hard, but I want everyone to feel comfortable and not being bored by reading me.
Well, you get it: I'll tell you about my little trip to Berlin, where I was going to attend one of the best hardcore / punk festivals of Europe, by far. It was the 4th edition of the Miss The Stars Fest, and the line-up (once again?) was insane. If you still don't what this fest is, here's some details : It's a small fest that take place in Berlin, mainly focused on emo scene, made with 100% DIY ethics, created by Alex, founder / writer of the blog (We Built The World And) Miss The Stars. I think it's an equivalent to the Cry Me A River Fest…
Alex seems to be in love with swedish screamo as much as I am. So it wasn't surprising to see that lot of bands came from Sweden this year, for my biggest pleasure, more than other years where there was already some swedish entities. THE SWEDISH SKRAMZ MAFIA CONGRESS YO! Holy wow, I finally had the chance to see Suis La Lune live after missing them 2 times in Paris… YES IT WAS POSSIBLE. With them, there was 2 side projects of Henning : Trembling Hands, a darker / heavier screamo, and Sore Eyelids… YES, the emo-shoegaze lords! There was also Trachimbrod, I Love Your Lifestyle, Young Mountain, and of course Vi som älskade varandra så mycket (what is MTS Fest without those boys?). With this delegation of the swedish skrim music, there was of course lots of other awesome bands coming from everywhere: Brasil, USA, UK, Germany…
Alex seems to be in love with swedish screamo as much as I am. So it wasn't surprising to see that lot of bands came from Sweden this year, for my biggest pleasure, more than other years where there was already some swedish entities. THE SWEDISH SKRAMZ MAFIA CONGRESS YO! Holy wow, I finally had the chance to see Suis La Lune live after missing them 2 times in Paris… YES IT WAS POSSIBLE. With them, there was 2 side projects of Henning : Trembling Hands, a darker / heavier screamo, and Sore Eyelids… YES, the emo-shoegaze lords! There was also Trachimbrod, I Love Your Lifestyle, Young Mountain, and of course Vi som älskade varandra så mycket (what is MTS Fest without those boys?). With this delegation of the swedish skrim music, there was of course lots of other awesome bands coming from everywhere: Brasil, USA, UK, Germany…
I have to say first that going to Berlin for 90% of the audience of the fest also involves to spend hundreds of € in vegan food… AAAH THE VEGAN FOOD IN BERLIN. It's something way more easier to find than in Paris, in example. And also far cheapier. I mean, Club-Mate is 3€ in Paris when it's not even 1 at Berlin, WTF??? It's something very, VERY important when you are going to MTS Fest : going to most of the vegan places where it's possible to go, according of the amount of time you can spend there. And for me, it was mostly at Brammibal's Donuts. It's really a killer place to take breakfast. A cosy, friendly, sweet place, where they have a great choice in donuts, menus, their « latte » coffee is super smooth, the freshmint tea is divine… It was the perfect way to prepare us for the fest, and waking us up I admit :').
It's also about spending approximatively the same amount of money at Bis Aufs Messer, the house of Adagio830. Fun fact : each time I go there, I found the drummer of No Omega / Careless / Mystery Language / Det är därför vi bygger städer :') ! This record store is a pretty nice and intimate place, where you can listen to the vinyls you wanna buy. There's a very large selection of records, in lots of music genres. You can even buy coffee ! Because hey, « coffee saves my life », says the motto of Adagio830 since 1997 ! They have a coffee called xPOWERTRIPx … Seriously, how it's even possible not to buy it?
But yeah, the main reason of our trip was above all to go to the Miss The Stars Fest, which once again took place in Tiefgrund, a beautiful place with a bar, a garden, and two stages. There was a great change this year : The smaller stage was in a bigger room. So I was sure to not miss a band because too much people (remember my bad luck with Potence last year :'( …). But the running-order was some kind of athletism : we only had like 15mn to have a break, eat something or grab records between bands, and depends what was the bands you wanted to see, it could be super hard haha! On Saturday, there was like 5 bands that I wanted to see very much that played one after all, one stage to another… And I succeeded to do it, yo! But we all found the time to relax, to drink tons more of Club-Mate, to eat those awesome vegan mini-tacos and fries vegetables with mango sauce, and UNREAL vegan cheesecakes, to grab lots of vinyls, tapes, zines… As usual there was some cools distros : I remember to have found Koepfen, Damn Fine Tapes, Moment Of Collapse, a small part of Dog Knights Productions distro / releases, Adagio830… Tina from Kalmare Print was there with her DIY patches, Christian from KIDS Artworks exhibited his silkscreen prints and other drawings, and obviously there was lots of beautiful merch 😃
picture by hnrkhlndr
And yeah, obviously, there was… THE MUSIC. And there's so much things to say… To describe every show would be too damn long I think. There's some bands I didn't see because of food and the timetable changes (so bummed that I missed LIRR :'( !), so I can't objectively say « yo, EVERY band were great! ». But I think they all were helped by the atmosphere, the mood, the happiness all around, AND that they all gave the best of themselves to have a good time. Proofs are that the bands I saw were all awesome... There was of course all the swedish bands I was so excited to see. I missed Mystery Language but I'm pretty sure I'll have another chance to see them! The « classic » of the fest, Vi som älskade varandra så mycket, had once again gave a powerful, almost epic set, always with fun and serenity. Sore Eyelids were SUPER good, even if the voice mix could have been better tho. But yeah, that was so refreshing! In the same « emogaze » vibe, but with screams, Trachimbrod played in the small stage, and omg, it was wonderful. One of my fav sets. Their music fitted perfectly with the mood, the place, the lights of a slighty warm sun… When they played « Through Walls, Floors and More », lots of people went into a passionate sing along, some of them even took the mic, for that classic « I've been waiting for this, I've been waiting for this, for all my liiiiife » . The singer / guitarist of Trachimbrod is also playing in I Love Your Lifestyle, which played before Trachimbrod, I had the feeling they were less in the mood of the songs than usual on stage but it was great anyway, Trembling Hands was one of my big suprises of the fest with their crushing, dark and heavy screamo, slightly black-metalesque in some riffs. And WOAH, Young Mountain ❤. I was waiting so hard to see them, it was epic, Kami (vocals) was truly touching, as he was almost in tears while the last song, it was a strong set in many ways. And obviously, obviously… Suis La Lune. That was an unforgettable moment. We were all waiting for that set, and they didn't disappoint. Almost one hour of intense feels and nodding. They played some of their all-time classics like « With Wings of Feather and Glue », « Cornea » or « Utter Silence Is Fragile », and it was a big party all along the set. Some people even made a human pyramid, one of the skramz seals of quality :3 .
Okay, let's talk about what was, for me, apart from the swedish crew, the best gigs of the fest. First : FUCKING YURI. Woah, that was crazy! It was very short, but so is their discography haha! Abi was rushing into the crowd, was stage-diving hard with everyone, screaming and rolling on the floor… It was super spontaneous, chaotic, but also super safe. What a cathartic gig! AND they also had a human pyramid ¯\_(ツ)_/¯. Swain was also a killer one, I didn't expected to see so much enthusiasm and excitement, because I listen to them way more than their past as This Routine Is Hell, and for me their music as Swain is more like a « bedroom music » than a party one. But woah, I had the impression to see Turnstile rather than Swain hahaha! What a lot of 90's grooves and dance skills! The band and audience were in osmosis, the frontman was super posi in his attitude, message and prestation, all band members were giving the best of themselves… I was also blown away by Lentic Waters, that I discovered at this fest. They played their album The Path front to back, and WOW, it was heavy as fuck. Somewhere between a frenchy post-hardcore/neo-crust vibe, and a crushing, metallic hardcore. My very best discovery of the fest! Also, the very first band that played this year, Anti-Corpos, was a discovery for me, and they are active since at least 13 years!! Some of their songs, strongly rooted in powerviolence and hardcore, reminded me old french screamo bands, stuff like Anomie and Stonehenge Records bands, that was amazing!! They played with so much anger and energy. I was also impressed by Archivist, which wasn't a band I love that much musically to be honest (sorrysorrysorrysorry) : the frontwomen looks SO SERENE. I mean, she's smiling everytime! That's awesome. She's a brightful person, and so was Alex which was screaming with her. It was a beautiful set, both musically and humanly. That was very… Peaceful? Exactly what we all needed.
Ruined Families was an explosion of anger and strenght (and with a super nice frontman), I Hate Sex was heartbreaking and captivating, Thisismenotthinkingofyou was lots of love and courage, Drei Affen was breathtaking, Coma Regalia was impressive, The Tidal Sleep was powerful and crushing as always (and with a MAXIMUM VOLUME on guitars hahaha!), Saligia was another great discovery, dark and fast screamo / metalcore. And unfortunately I also missed Kepler, uragano, Boneflower and Charlotte Light & Dark... :'(
This fest couldn't be possible, and never with that lot of safeness, good vibes, good bands and good food, without the staff that is working hard for this fest since the beginning, and trying their best to keep all that makes this fest something unique. There's a lot of people that was complaining about the fact that this year's edition was sold out in a hour, some of them wanted the fest to be in a bigger place. But hey, Miss The Stars Fest isn't Fluff Fest, and it's the goal of the MTS Fest to be something smaller, intimate. They want keep that 100% DIY spirit, without becoming something too big. It's hard for them to keep everything this way, as years after years this fest is becoming increasingly popular and important. Also, I think that this choice to stay a « small fest » allow them to have a 100% free choice about the layout of the place, the prices, the line-up, the ethics… And also something very important : the male - female equality on it, which was perfect this year!
We definitely feel like a family in that fest, at least we feel somewhere where there's no fear of being who you really are, to be a women, to be a punk, to be whatever you want. Everyone is welcome, everything is here to share love. There's no hate, no gender roles, no social constructs, no machism, no sexism, no racism... ZERO form of hate and restrictions (except to be kind to each other). This is a lesson to punk and a life lesson. This is something we still need to built in shows of our cities everywhere in the world, because all those simples ways of acting are far from being fully acquired.
We definitely feel like a family in that fest, at least we feel somewhere where there's no fear of being who you really are, to be a women, to be a punk, to be whatever you want. Everyone is welcome, everything is here to share love. There's no hate, no gender roles, no social constructs, no machism, no sexism, no racism... ZERO form of hate and restrictions (except to be kind to each other). This is a lesson to punk and a life lesson. This is something we still need to built in shows of our cities everywhere in the world, because all those simples ways of acting are far from being fully acquired.
I don't think my words can truly retranscribe all the things that makes this fest as awesome as it is. It's just some kind of personal praise, and I just want to make you wanna go there next year with raw emotions. But yeah, that was my 2 cents about the Miss The Stars Fest 2017, a big breath of fresh air, an escape, something that reunites so much beautiful people, so much friendships, so much good bands, so much essential ethics and ideas to make this creepy world better. Thanks Alex, thanks Edouard, thanks Jessica, thanks everyone involved in this fest. You made a wonderful, inspiring, essential job.
picture by eduard_orbitron
picture by hnrkhlndr
Blackbooze Prints ❤ - picture by eduard_orbitron
picture by tacoslosnopales
picture by eduard_orbitron
picture by la.cuca_
me reppin' da fest. ❤
I miss the stars.
See you next year. ❤
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