fabrIQ festival 2012

i have told this story many times before (although maybe not on this blog?)...but before i moved over here, i asked my good friend nathan in leeds (of brudenell social club-fame) whom i should make contact with in amsterdam to find out about musical happenings and the answer was 'bas and bob at belmont bookings'. so, i did. and what was the first thing that bas recommended to me, but fabrIQ festival... it just took me a little while to take his advice (can't remember why now that i didn't go last year...). so last sunday, i headed down south to den bosch for my first fabrIQ festival which was very much fun.

this was the second (and final) day of the low-fi/acousticy/americana-esque music festival which features acts of an intrusive quality (and not anything to do with a high intelligence quotient - as i first thought), hence the capitalisation in the name. there were also artworks providing a backdrop in the venues and i loved the idea of the 'live art' projection on the 'stage' in the 'kleine zaal' behind where the acts were performing - not that i captured any good shots of this, although you can see it a very little bit in a couple of shots below from the three acts i saw in this room of the verkadefabriek venue (click on the photos below to be taken to the full set on flickr for more shots of each band). 

and in case you are wondering, the 'acoustic guitar' that afework negussie is playing is a single-stringed ethiopian 'masenko' and his performance was quite astounding and uplifting!

the large room was a seated-auditorium which was jam-packed by the time headliner (in this venue) took to the stage. damien jurado (who i already had the pleasure of seeing earlier this year), this time with his full band performing songs from his new album maraqopa, was by far my (joint) highlight of the day (there were three highlights actually, as mentioned on flickr). i'm still in a dilemma though... do i prefer damien solo or with full band... i think i might hold off until i seem him for the third time (in as many months!) when he stops by in amsterdam at the end of this european tour...).

then, it was time for a quick hop, skip and a jump across the road to the old cigar warehouse (venue: w2) first for some 'blij' swedish tunes from francis (full set here) and an awesome 'son-of-neil-young' troubadour-esque set by chad vangaalen (with beardy monty) (full set here), with his own jolly art-clad drum (if you didn't already know, chad is a talented artist and last summer i was lucky enough to get along to the exhibition of his illustrations and animations last summer, see here).





it has to be said, i was pretty gutted after seeing chad's amazing performance (joint highlight #2), that i didn't get along to his gig in amsterdam a few days earlier... but i can at least be proud of myself that the reason i didn't go was because i was good and went to my dutch class instead! (ik ben meer nodig meer nerderlandse gespreken, maar misschien niet op deze blog!)

lots more shots in the various sets on flickr: here, here, here and here. 

these shots also feature on the belmont bookings' (who, did i say, were joint organisers of the festival) bamshakalah blog: here, here and here.  

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