As the revamped yet soggy Castlepalooza Music and Arts Festival comes to a close, there are very few complaints to be made about the festival that's as intimate as a house party. With cheery and joy-driven acts like Caribou and Jurassic 5 headlining on Friday and Saturday, most gig-goers were in a permanent state of happiness despite the rain and all of its devilish attempts to ruin our fun.
Approximately 3,000 people passed through the gates of Charleville Castle this year, either as camp or day visitors, and even though the site has expanded in size, the festival has retained its rugged charm.
This is the first year that Aiken Promotions has been in involved in running the festival, co-sharing with its founders Cherrycool Promotions, and the whole thing ran like a dream. While other festivals in Ireland tend to increase the capacity year after year, Castlepalooza's capacity has never gone beyond 5,000 people so the it never feels overwhelming or overcrowded.
The poor weather was a big obstacle for a lot of people coming and going, but the small size of the site means that once you are here, you’re not trekking around for ages to get from one stage to the other. In previous years, campers could set up right beside the castle, but this year they placed the camping areas slightly further afield. However, nothing was ever more than a 10-minute walk away.
Unusually for a festival, the queues for the bar were practically non-existent and over the weekend, attendees praised organisers for providing plenty of toilets, some with running water and others with the sweet stench of a disinfectant flusher. A festival miracle.
This is the first year that people can bring their own alcohol into the festival but they were restricted to drinking it in the campsite. This resulted in a lot of people staying in their campsites late into the evening, causing the daytime acts to lose out on crowds.
While acts like Montreal’s Little Scream certainly suffered, Dublin act Hare Squead reeled people out from their tents and into action. Very cleverly, the electro and hip-hop heavy line-ups for Friday and Saturday night were designed to lift people’s spirits while Sunday’s was curated to soothe our souls, with Villagers, Cat Power and I Have a Tribe taking to the main stage.
The Big Hero Award of the weekend goes to world renowned snooker player, prog-rock lover Steve Davies who had a stage all weekend where people could try to beat him at his own game. This may not make sense to most but Castlepalooza’s magic, like most house parties, means that you had to be there.
