EDM Sauce is proud to present our new festival write up section and new series called ‘Fest Raiders.' Here we had Myles Shear invade the Hang Out Festival on May 17-19th in Gulf Shores, Alabama. After stumbling upon Hangout Music Festival in 2012, we knew that going in 2013 was a must. When the lineup was announced, we were excited to see the infamously diverse lineup that Hangout had put together. The beachfront festival is known for its beautiful woman, awesome music and good times. We packed up our video Camera, made sure we had all our party supplies and headed out to our 1 star hotel, in Foley Alabama.
Also Read: Best Jellyfish Lamp
Thursday, 6:00 pm
We will never forget passing by a pickup truck full of girls, holding up a sign up that said “chicks for sale.” It just so happened that the girls were selling baby chickens, but we found it rather humorous. Once we pulled into the tiny town of Gulf Shores, you could immediately see the impact that the festival had on the town. From booming restaurant business to locals using their yards as parking lots. After we parked our car in a random person’s yard, we quickly squired our way to the media entrance for The Hangout Music Festival kick off party.
Lotus gave us our first glimpse of the crowds that we were going to be vibing with for the weekend. Due to the fact that Lotus was performing right before Dillon Francis, you could see the mixture of rave kids, wookies, and jam heads. For us, it was a beautiful sight to see a mixture of the crowds of our two favorite genres. Lotus went on to play an hour-long set of music that ranged from their old albums like “Nomad”, “the strength of weak ties” and their newest album “build”. Out of all the times we have seen Lotus, we could easily say that they performed with more energy and excitement than we had ever witnessed. The lighting and smoke affects in the “Boom Boom” tent added to the groovy aroma that the band gave off and turned the crowd into an in sync groove machine.
Thursday, 8:15pm
After Lotus, was “D fran”. You could see the migration of jam lovers moving out to get a good spot for Umphrey’s McGee and a new swarm of people coming into the festival for the first time to rage to some Dillon Francis. During the 30 minute set change; the crowd transformed from what looked like 2,000 people to about 4,000 + people. When the new age producer took the stage, with his iconic “IDGAFOS” hat on, the crowd erupted with excitement. Dillon’s set consisted of his usual trap/moobahton /electro songs that had the crowd bouncing. After his set was over we had an interesting run in with Dillon that involved him believing that his name was EDM Sauce. Check out the 20 sec clip below.
Thursday, 9:45 pm
The final two shows of the night were Umphrey’s McGee and Benny Bennasi. This was a toss up for us that resulted in catching half of both sets. We chose to start at Benni and as he took the stage the crowd exploded and the room filled up with fog and blue florescent lights. As we were standing on the front gate looking for good shots of Benni, girls in the crowd decided to poke our butts and attempted to pull our shorts off. This happened to turn into a very common occurrence that would continue throughout the festival. When we got half way through Benni’s set we hustled over to the “Letting Go” stage where Umphrey’s McGee were playing. The crowd for Umphrey’s McGee was massive, so we used our cameras to our advantage and pushed ourselves up to the viewing area of our desire. Umph rocked out playing tunes like “In The Kitchen,” “Day Nurse,” “The Floor,” and many other classics. By the end of the kick off party we thought that we had gotten a good taste of Hangout, but we had no idea how crazy the rest of the weekend was going to be.
Friday, 3:30 pm
We made our way to the “Boom Boom” tent to cover Afrojack. The Dutch producer had packed out the tent to the point where it was obvious that he needed a bigger stage to perform on. Afrojack is a producer/DJ that has truly progressed and created an arsenal of music over the past few years that allows him to play most of his own original tunes during his sets. Afro had the crowd at his control as he played hit after hit. When Afrojack played “Take Over Control” a few girls in the front row started aggressively making out with each other for camera attention.
After Afrojack, we made our way back to the media lounge to get ready for our Interview with Big Gigantic, at 5:45. When Big G showed up, we quickly sat down because their set was starting in an hour. We started out by asking some questions like “how did you come up with the name Big Gigantic? And “how did you guys meet? Dom took the first question and stated that he was walking down the streets of Boulder, Colorado one day and he said, “ I put the two words together and I was like, that’s it.” Jeremy took the second question, and said, “We met in Boulder, Colorado in the music scene out there where there is a really good local music scene. We both played in Funk bands and Jazz bands and stuff like that. We used to live together at one point and then one day Dom got a computer and it was all down hill from there.” Their funk and jazz background is what has influenced and guided them into creating the sound that Jeremy calls “huge!” and Dom calls “big or gigantic.” Our next question was, “Who are your guys’ influences?” Dom took this one and said, “Our influences range from a lot of the EDM music that is going on today to jazz, I’m a saxophone player and he is a drummer so we are into jazz, funk, soul and all kinds of stuff. We draw our influences from people like Skrillex all the way to Herbie Hancock.” When you sit back and listen to them, you can completely understand how they came up with their own jazz-electro sound. We followed up asking about any new releases coming up and Dom said, “We are working on a few remixes right now that we are thinking about potentially releasing, but we are planning on releasing a new full length album in the fall.” When we asked about the album name or possible collaborations on the album Jeremy and Dom both said, “we can’t say anything about it.” On the bright side, a new Big Gigantic album is always a great thing. Our most anticipated question of the interview was, “So lets talk Big Grizmatik for a second, is it a rumor or can you guys elaborate on it?” Dom started off saying “I can’t elaborate on it.” and Jeremy said “It’s top secret.” Dom then changed his mind and said “Well I can say that we are going to be playing in some stuff.” This was wonderful News to our ears. A Big Grizmatik touring act is something that I have predicted would eventually happen, and to hear it from them was music to my ears. Electric Forest has Grizmatik billed, as “Grizmatik and friends,” so it will be interesting to see if a Big Grizmatik performance is what is secretly being advertised.
Friday, 7:30 pm
After our interview, we made our way down to the “Letting Go” stage where Big Gigantic was getting ready to play. The audience was in full attendance a good 30 minutes before Big G was scheduled to go on. Flags, jellyfish, fan signs, and girls on shoulders looked like they were floating on top of a sea of people that stretched back for miles. When Dom and Jeremy took the stage, the crowd exploded with excitement and the electro-funk duo jumped right into their set. After the first three songs, we proceeded on to the backstage viewing area. Looking out, we saw a crowd of thousands of fans, moving in sync to the funky sounds of Big Gigantic. Behind them was a peachy colored, sun setting sky, which was just beginning to unveil the starry Alabama sky.
When the clock hit 8:30, all of the stages were wrapped up, and everyone was filtered to the main stage where Kings of Leon were getting ready to perform. This was when we decided to go home. Hangout did this for Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, creating huge crowds for it’s headlining acts…
Saturday, 3:30 pm
We arrived at Hangout at about 3:00 pm, just in time to catch Wolfgang Gartner’s set. The Nicholas Cage look alike threw down a heavy electro set that had the crowd going nuts. Within 10 minutes, the hot sun and energy from the crowd made it look as if there were sprinklers going off in the crowd due to the amount of sweat and water being tossed around. Wolfgang used to be one of our favorite producers but it had been a minute. It was nice getting to hear the old classics like “Illmerica” and “Wolfgang’s 5th Sxymphony” mixed in with his new material.
Saturday, 4:45 pm
We made our way over to the “Letting Go” stage, where Holy Ghost! took the stage. For those of you who don’t know Holy Ghost!, it is a Synthpop duo from NYC. Regardless of the size of the crowd, they played one of our favorite sets throughout the festival. This was the first time that we had seen a performance where a massive moog synthesizer was used live on stage. The movement from instrument to instrument, as well as the funky vibes coming from the music made this a set not to miss.
Saturday, 5:45 pm
We made our way back over to the “Boom Boom” tent where Kendrick Lamar was scheduled to go on at 6pm. When we arrived, the front gate was swarming with media, making it almost impossible to gain access to the pit. We quickly noticed that one of the head security guys was a rather hefty man and made a decision that helped us for the rest of Saturday and all of Sunday. We walked over and bought a Gyro from the concession stands and gave it to the head of security. From that point forward, he made sure that EDM Sauce had the best pit coverage possible. Unfortunately for us, Kendrick had missed his flight and had to jump on a private jet to make it in time for his set. MTV delayed the crowd by bringing up people from the audience and having them freestyle. They had someone jump on and start playing Kendrick’s music and then five minutes later, Kendrick sprints out onto the stage and starts going in. As soon as this happened, the packed out “Boom Boom” tent went “cray”. Having a shortened set, Kendrick laid down all of his hits and had the whole crowd singing along.
Saturday, 7:30 pm
When we arrived at Bassnectar, we were nothing but smiles. The beach was completely filled with a bass army that was getting ready to have their heads ripped off by a mind blowing, liquidy bass. This was the first time that we had ever seen Bassnectar play while it was still light outside, but the transition from light to sunset to dark was synched perfectly with the set that he had put together. The entire crowd felt the cool breeze coming off the gulf and it provided a euphoric feeling that intensified the overall experience of Bassnectar’s show.
When the show was over, the entire crowd migrated to the other side of the beach to catch Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers. Exhausted from Bassnectar, we decided to end our night early again and save ourselves from the biggest sing along of “Free Fallin’” known to man.
Sunday, 1:15 pm
The last day of Hangout might have gone down as one of the best days of our lives. Our afternoon started out with the biggest name in Trap music, Baauer. The twerkets and ratchets were lined up along the fence ready to be trampled from all angles. Baauer took the stage, rocking a black RIP Tribute jersey and started off his set by dropping “Higher” Ft. Just Blaze. The crowd was bouncing and the music was right as Baauer played hit after hit as well as some of his newer stuff, including his new Disclosure– “You and Me” ft. Eliza Doolittle remix.
Sunday, 3:15 pm
Porter Robinson vs. Ellie Goulding would have to be the title of this hour-long chapter of our life. We started off this hour in the pit at the “Boom Boom” tent, with Porter. At this point it was the last day of the festival and “front row girls” were starting to look familiar. We wish we could have given them the ratchet award for being such troopers and going ham in the front row all weekend long. We stayed for the first 3-4 songs and then anxiously made our way to see Ellie Goulding. It was both of our first times seeing her and we had already seen Porter on multiple occasions. When we got to the “Main Stage” where Ellie was playing, she was already a good 25 minutes into her set and the crowd loved it. It was a great sight to see a beautiful blonde woman sing her heart out and then 5 seconds later, see her grab some drum sticks and go ham. Ellie has one of the greatest female voices of our time and it was incredible to see her show off her skills in person.
Sunday, 4:15 pm
It’s funny to say this because they have a song with the same title, but Imagine Dragons are “on top of the world” right now and it was extremely apparent Sunday afternoon. I felt really bad for moe. (Who was playing at the same time) because Imagine Dragons might have drawn the biggest non-headliner crowd at Hangout. The media pit was filled with so many photographers and videographers that we were forced to pick a side and stay there, for safety reasons. When the band walked out onto stage, the crowd exploded with cheers. A few hours ago we had just gotten an autograph from these guys and witnessing them go onstage in front of thousands of people was mind blowing.
Sunday, 5:15 pm
The last EDM act that we covered at Hangout was Steve Aoki. If you call yourself an EDM fan and haven’t seen Steve before, there’s a good chance that you have only been in this scene for a few months. For those of you who have seen Steve before, here is a quick recap: 3 cakes, champagne and a .5-mile workout.
Sunday, 8:30
Stevie Wonder. How many people honestly get to say that they have seen Stevie Wonder? Well just about everyone at this year’s Hangout Music Festival can say that now. Stevie Wonder had to have been the most anticipated act of the entire festival and ladies and gentlemen let us tell you, he did not disappoint. He literally played classic after classic and even covered Bob Marley. During the middle of his set he stopped and told the crowd that it was the first time that he had played in Alabama since the death of his mother, who was from Alabama. Tears started rolling down his face and the whole crowd could see it happening on the jumbo screens. This caused a chain reaction of people crying throughout the audience. He went back to playing and people’s tears of sadness were turning into to tears of joy. He ended his set with the funkiest 15 minute version of “Superstitious” that we had ever heard. People of all ages were jumping around, hugging each other and jamming out to one of the greatest musicians to ever live.
Fest Raiders Ratings:
Location: 9 of 10
Being on a beach created a euphoric festival atmosphere
Woman: 8 of 10
Blonde + southern accents = ….
VIP: 8 of 10
Pools, exclusive viewing areas and free beer
Lineup: 7 of 10
Very mainstream EDM lineup
Amenities: 6 of 10
Above average.
Total score: 7.6 of 10
EDM Sauce Presents Fest Raiders Official Video for Hang Out Music Fest
