Middlelands: A Festival Unlike Any Other...

Last fall, myself and a few of the BASSBurger crew members heard about a brand new camping festival called Middlelands that would be invading an existing medieval renaissance fair in Texas during May 2017. AS 2 year EDC veterans, we knew how great Insomniac events tend to be. With that in mind, we bought in and began braving the cold winter in Boston with Middlelands waiting for us in May.

A month or so before the festival was scheduled to take place, the line-up dropped.

I was bummed.

I was a house fan and this was definitely a basshead festival. For a week, I debated selling my ticket to save up for the wallet-draining trip to Vegas known as Electric Daisy Carnival. But in the end, I decided that this was a chance to open my mind up to a new style of music and experience something unique. So putting all hesitations to bed, I bit the bullet and purchased a plane ticket to Todd Mission, TX.

Jake & Tim, 2 other members of the BASSburger crew landed in Texas, handled the shopping (Which consisted of more vodka than water) and set-up camp at the Texas Renaissance Fair where Middlelands would take place. Unfortunately, I had a DJ booking that night and would have to meet the rest of the crew before the festival doors opened on Friday.

As I spun mo-town for a community fundraiser, my phone would vibrate every 4-6 minutes with a text informing me that the Thursday night pre-party at Middlelands camp was getting crazier by the minute. My eyes kept checking the clock and counted down the hours until I would be stepping off a plane, jumping on a shuttle and joining my rave fam for this party of a lifetime.

My 6am flight left on time and upon arrival in Houston, I met up with Cody, another member of the BASSburger crew that had to take a red eye flight to make it in time for the kick-off of day 1. We jumped on a shuttle, had a nice chat with 2 Bassnectar fans during the 45 minute ride to Todd Mission and made our way towards the security gates. Twitter was filled with rumors about overly-tight security at the campground entrance, but we were checked in and on our way to the Google Maps pin Tim & Jake had set for our camping area.

We walked by fully furnished camping lounges & pedicabs galore until we were reunited with Tim & Jake. After a few hugs and introductions to our amazingly rad neighbors, we started getting primed for the madness that was to ensue once the festival grounds opened.

Vodka was consumed. Music was blasted. Lit we were.

That didn't stop us from stepping inside the Texas Renaissance Fairgrounds in amazement to see a full medieval village complete with shops, performers and turkey legs as far as the eye could see. But that was just the beginning...

Middlelands boasted 4 amazing stages, each with it's own flair:

MIDDLELANDS ARENA: My personal favorite stage was constructed in an area normally used for jousting demonstrations. A massive block letter statue of the "Middlelands" logo towered over the crowd, which spilled from an amphitheater-style lawn into a modest standing room paved area. Atop the statue, a flame throwing tower spewed fire between the never-ending assault of lasers and moving head lights. The sound was incredible and it was the perfect balance of intimate venue meets massive production.

CASTLE NORTHWOODS: A massive castle completely covered in LED screens and laser beams. Seriously never in my life have I seen as many lasers as there were at Bassnectar's Middlelands set. During the day, the castle was a gorgeous backdrop for acts such as Kristian Naarn (Hodor from Game of Thrones), Jurassic 5 & What So Not. The real story at Castle Northwoods happened during Griz's set when some fool climbed to the top of one of the massive trees near the stage and got himself stuck to the point of Griz stopping the music for emergency crews to help him down. The dude later bragged about the incident on Facebook/Instagram and has since been deemed the biggest dink at Middlelands.

THE STRONGHOLD: Perfectly located between the 2 mammoth stages, The Stronghold boasted beats by day with a solid performance from South Africa's house maestros Goldfish to heavy bass by night when Datsik rattled the entire area to it's core.

TRINITY VALE: Not all hope was lost to house music fans at Middlelands. Trinity Vale offered non-stop house musi from the likes of AC Slater, Will Clarke & J. Phlip to name a few. The stage was modest, but it's location smack dab in the middle of the path to Middlelands Arena drew people in all night and there was never a dull moment at Trinity Vale.

At one point, I saw Pasquale Rotella (Insomniac Founder) with his wife (Holly Madison) hanging out with their daughter in the village area. They apparently hung out with the crowd all weekend, which is a rare thing to see from dance music figures on his level.

During the time between festival operating hours, we were meeting incredibly amazing people at the campground all weekend. The camping area had a hub known as Conquerer's Court, which was full of activities to keep us occupied including goblet decorating, slack lining and Insomniac-hosting afterparties each night.

One area of the campgrounds was designated strictly for sound camps, aka areas where building your own stage was encouraged. I wasn't expecting anything crazy, but holy bejesus...these people did not hold back. The Call Of Booty had guest appearances from 12th Planet to accompany their fully contructed outdoor nightclub. Other areas boasted domes with hammocks hanging from it's rafters and platforms above massive speakers + production-grade lasers. The party literally never stopped at any point of the weekend.

To sum it up, Middlelands blew any expectation I had out of the water. It was hard to believe this was the first edition of the festival, considering how well everything was organized and how easy it was to find our way around. The venue layout was perfect, the camping was fantastic and the entire experience was unforgettable.

Unfortunately, the people of Todd Mission did not feel the same way. After a massive list of noise complaints and a town hall meeting that was cancelled by the town before Pasquale Rotella ever got address their concerns, the Texas Renaissance Festival announced shortly after the festival's conclusion that it would not be hosting MiddleLands in 2018.

The quote at 1:09 is priceless....

But don't fret fellow MiddleLands alumni. It sounds like multiple renaissance fairs around the country with local citizens that actually like to boost their economies are lining up to take Todd Misson's place. This is a good sign....however, I don't think I'll ever have a turkey leg as good at the one at TRF.