Nateva - Oxford, Maine 4th of July weekend

I'm surprised that this thread didn't exist until now.
Nateva Festival
Oxford, Maine
July 4th weekend

Furthur headlines !!!!
Check it out.


Seriously though, am I the only person aware of this festival on here?

 

No you're not, been looking forward to this for a while. Epic lineup.

 

since furthur is headlining and since there is no rothbury...sounds like a good plan to me

 

western NY looking for a ride. if ur going threw. have gas $ and good vibes. get at me

 

how long has the festival been around for? the line up is crazy awesome!

 

first year for nateva! so close to my house! gotta love festies that are super awesome and i dont have to drive 10+ hours. see you there!

 

Just bought my ticket soooo excited. Other than the artist line-up Ive always wanted to go to maine! Its like a life goal, lol :]]

 

im surprised more people havent posted, its coming up!

 

yep, few more months!
already asked for it off from work! first one so i think im guarenteed! (kinda hard when you work at a hippie pizza place!)

 

i work at a pizza place but its not that hippieish. lol but no matter what, im going. i think my boss will let me and my friend off, hes a nice guy plus its 2 weeks before my birthday so everyone has to be nice to me, lol

 

God I wish I was back in Maine for that.

Peace Out,
Rev J

 

tix started shipping i think!

 

this festival. looks great. one of the only festivals moe. is playing, and a july 4th with furthur!

 

The following was sent out to ticket holders late on Friday of Memorial Day weekend:


================================================== =========

Dear Nateva Weekend With Camping Ticket Holder,

We are writing to let you know some important information about onsite parking policies at the Nateva Music and Camping Festival. We are instituting a carpooling rule for our onsite camping patrons. Every vehicle must have AT LEAST 2 people holding a Weekend Pass WITH CAMPING in order to park ONSITE at the venue. It's the green thing to do and the right thing to do. Besides, we want to fill our camping area with tents and people, not cars.

To make this a reality, any vehicle having less than 2 people with Weekend Passes With Camping will be re-directed to our Courtesy Camping & Parking Area, or may choose to pay an additional $35 fee to park onsite. Our Courtesy Camping & Parking Area is located at the Oxford Plains Speedway, home of the EPIC 1988 Dead Shows 3 miles from the site - and will have 24 hour a day shuttle service to and from the venue. This courtesy camping & parking area is available, free of charge, to anyone with a Nateva ticket of any kind.

This policy is new and we understand this may cause you an inconvenience. If this creates a problem for you, we will refund your money, including fees, provided that you notify us of your request for refund by Thursday June 3rd at 12 noon EST. We understand that a promoter offering a refund on tickets is pretty unusual, but we value our relationship with each of our customers and want to make certain that everybody understands the rules of the game, and plays fairly, including us.

To receive a refund you must send an email to refund@natevafestival.com by Thursday June 3rd at 12 noon (Eastern Standard Time).

That said, we hope to see you in Maine this Summer.

Thank you for your patience!

The Nateva Music & Camping Festival

=================================================================

If you go, I'm sure you are going to have a blast. The music production and talent will be top notch. But logistically, this has clusterfuck written all over it. I know most of you don't know me and I won't list my resume, but I am a 15 year vet of northeast festivals. I've been to all the big ones, and also been on the production end of countless small festivals, working gates, parking cars, sound and light, every aspect. I know festivals. And something stinks about this one. Just be careful if you go, be prepared for the worst, and hopefully things will work out. Stay close to the music and you should be okay. When you get back, I'm hoping to hear that I was wrong, that everything ran smooth and clean. Its just not looking like that right now.

 

Looks like a good time, I would be there, but I left maine and am now on the wrong side of the country.

BTllghts, what do you see going wrong, out of curiosity? And why?

I mean, it's pretty disrespectful to have a ticket drawing in exchange for people spamming forums, like this thread. But that's pretty common practice among festivals. And it's slightly ominous that the facebook page was giving me ads for an 18 month FBI degree

 

Well, staging and music will be top notch, it will look and sound great. (Excepting if they put $100k of lighting equipment up there and nobody really knows how to use it. Then it'll be a little lame. I mean, I'm an LD, but if you put me up on Kourda's rig, I'd have no clue where to even begin)

I see the problems in logistics. Are there enough portojons? Are they in the right places? Are they going to be cleaned regularly? What about food vending? Will there be enough to serve all the people who care to buy food? Will there be enough different kinds of food? (I love carnival food, but not for 3-4 days straight. There's only so much Italian sausage and crappy pizza one can take) Will they charge food vending fees that make the price of goods super high? (I really don't feel like paying $5 for a slice of pizza or $3 for a pepsi) Will there be proper garbage removal/recycling? Will there be enough security to keep everyone safe? Will it be the right kind of security? (I don't want off duty cops who want to hassle me for smoking a doob, and I don't want some roided up has been jock eyeballing me cause he's just looking for trouble.)

These things all larger festivals have issues with. This is the first year and any rookie will stumble on these points. But it double concerns me that Livenation is involved in running this show. Weather its them officially, or its their people contracted out, this is still a Livenation event. And lets face it, they're pretty good at cutting corners and gouging customers to maximize profits at the expense of the ticket holders.

Then there's the camping situation. First, they don't have a big enough camping area, so they need to relay on shuttles and satellite camping. So you have to pay extra to camp on site (gouge). They'll sell you an on site camping pass, but are very vague about when it will fill up and who actually gets in to camp there. Apparently it has to do with that extra ticket you bought, but it also has to do with how the grounds fill up. (Remember Berkfest 2000?) So, well, you want a good spot, so you come on Thursday. Another $20 gouge. But wait there's more. 6 months after tickets went on sale, they changed the policy. Now, if you're coming solo, you can't park onsite, you have to park elsewhere and lug your shit. Your car (means of securing valuables) will be 3 miles away and basically inaccessible and subject to its own vandalism and theft. But if you really want to, fork over another $35 and we'll let you park anyway. Another gouge.
Changing the rules in mid stream is total bull and its because they don't have their act together. They didn't get the right permits, so they may not be able to use 1/3 of their campground. Not my problem as a ticket holder, but now it is and I'm going to pay for their fuckup. Of course, they'll give you your money back. But they changed the rule and sent out emails on friday night of a long weekend, and you have to apply for a refund by tommorrow. In other words, you have 6 days to respond, but 4 of them were a holiday weekend. Nice slick move there. If you don't think that was calculated, well, ignorance is bliss, right?
So when you get there, fork over more than what you expected for less than you expected. And if you get there past, say, friday 8pm or so, I wouldn't expect to camp on site weather you paid for that extra ticket or not. Be prepared to sit in a long line only to be told that your ticke matters not, the campground is full, turn around and go somewhere else to park and camp, and we'll run shuttles for you. A school bus can only move 45 people at a time with no gear. Add in time to travel down the road and time to load and unlad the bus, how long do you think the average with time will be? my guess is 45 minutes - each time you want to go to your car/camp - each way.

Many years I have attended festivals. Big fests that didn't grown organically are trouble in their first years because they don't understand the logistics. Satellite camping and or parking lots are always a cluster and never work smoothly. (and I mean never. I've never seen shuttle go over well) Permit issues and space constraints add to my worry, and overarching it all, Livenation is running the show. Its scary shit, and I want people to be fully aware of all this before they decide to drop $250 on a ticket and drive 10 hours for this show. If you go into it full knowing all these things, you accept them, and you are prepared for them, that's great good for you. But I'd hate to get up there not having a clue and running into the clusterfuck of all clusterfucks. That's why I'm warning people, not to rain on their parade, but to make sure they know what they're getting into. I'll be at Sterling Stage that weekend, see this thread for more information. They've been doing it for 15 years, and they know what they're doing. If you still need a Furthur fix, this venue is about an hor from Herkimer where they play on the 3rd.

 

Well when you put it like that..... dammmmmn....

 

Well hopefully they have learned an important lesson from Moneyfest (er...Woodstock) '99. I was at the Great Went and that seemed to work out OK. But I don't know if they got anybody from that organisation involved. Maine cops for the most part are pretty chill. That doesn't mean that there aren't some assholes though. The people in the town should be fairly welcoming. As for getting your shit broken into. That is a rarity in rural Maine. If it does happen that chances are it will be another concert goer that does it.

I'm not saying you will be completeley safe. Use common sense. You also aren't going to get lynched by townies. This is mainley because you outnumber them and for the most part you are a novelty to them bringing them money. Since I grew up out there I can honestly tell you that the state never recovered from the depression of the 1930's.

Peace OUt,
Rev J

 

Hey I call em like I see em. I'd love to be wrong about this, and I might be. Just trying to keep people ready for everything. Thanks for reading, I really do have a thought process behind my opinions.

PS - Great Norrtheast (Awesome production company. Phish Fests and Bonaroo, now, I think, know what they're doing. If they were in charge, everything I said above would be null and void.)

 

Hey man I'm not telling you you're full of shit. It does have potential disaster written all over it.

Peace Out,
Rev J