So excited for Eurosonic Noorderslag! Find us on the prowl tonight, roaming the streets and starting conversations- with you! We want to soak up your vibe and hear about your experience at ESNS!! Just don’t ask for a press card 2nite, because the Dutch Journalist Union says we don’t meet the bar. Maybe we’ll just… have a fake one?
Tasty right? That was last year, and Eurosonic Noorderslag is cooking up something amazing this year too. We have been listening to the playlists on shuffle, and seriously, there’s so much tasty! No, not all of it fits on our plate sonically but that’s a given for anyone anywhere. We feel so blessed having Eurosonic right here, right now. The city we studied @ and made memories, broke hearts, had hearts broken. Groningen Forever!
And having so many amazing bands from all over Europe show up, represent, give it all… is criminally underrated. Yes there’s other festivals, but creating a cultural bond between EU countries is so important. And so ESNS is important in a different way. Especially now, with war on the continent displacing and traumatizing so many Europeans, war in the middle east that’s so incomprehensibly gruesome, and testing the world in ways unheard, earth on fire or freezing, and all of that weighing so heavily on people… that it’s traumatic to just wake up and breathe sometimes. Having a European Union is great, but having a European Heart is even better. It’s something worth pursuing. Not just for the benefit of Europe and Europeans, but everyone. Happy you.. Happy me.
So what better time to affirm that we are in fact alive, that we still love, that we still care, that we do not fear, that we love music, we love to dance, to dress up, to gather.
TO BE.
To be heard. To be seen. To witness.
And who knows, maybe Europe will become a different vibe someday, like this guy called it. Let’s make it count! And we hope to cover ESNS for many a good decade. And maybe ESNS can settle in Ε ibenik (hometown) for a one-off someday. St Michaels fortress would make for a heavenly setting. Anyway, very excited to head for Groningen tonight. It’ll be packed as a pomegranate and just as tasty sonically!
And now to settle a score.
The Dutch Journalist Union has denied us a press card. Not only that, but ESNS themselves denied us press accreditation. Guess we didn’t Flex hard enough on our application- our bad. BOO! But, live and learn right?
Rejections are part of the process. They are a rite of passage. We have plenty to improve. An army of one is strong, but it just can’t do it all at once. And also, we… I …am not just a journalist. I’m a creator. It’s the 21st century, being one thing won’t do.
Yours,
Stanko
