- Cosmic Puffin Festival
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Cosmic Puffin Music Festival 
Date(s) Easter (Annually) Location(s) Mersea Island Youth Camp, Colchester, UK Years active 2 Inaugurated 2008 Website http://www.cosmicpuffin.co.uk The Cosmic Puffin Music Festival is held at Easter each year on Mersea Island at Mersea Youth Camp, near Colchester in Essex.[1]
The aim of the event is to raise money and awareness for charities. Musicians perform entirely for free, with no fee, rider or fuel costs showing their support for the charities as well as the live music scene. The event is staffed with volunteers.
Contents
History
First Festival
Dates
The first Cosmic Puffin festival was held from the 21 to the 23 of March 2008.
Charities
The Cosmic Puffin founded by Yammezz (Jamie Anderson) to help raise funds for (C.O.S.M.I.C.) in London, UK and the children's ward called the PUFFIN ward at the Basildon and Thurrock Hospital.[2] Despite adverse weather conditions the Cosmic Puffin managed to raise in excess of £1000 to share between the charities.[3][4]
Ticket Price
Entry price was ten pounds.[5]
Weather
Although there were extremely adverse weather conditions including high winds across the island and heavy snow the event still went on. Many of the bands[who?] had to improvise their lineup as various band members[who?] were unable to reach the island due to the weather conditions.[citation needed]
Bands
The bands that played at the first Cosmic Puffin festival included Death By Desire, The Fancy Dress Party, Picturehouse Big Band, The Rhizomes, Saltdog,[6] Dylan James, Darkfire, Hotwired, The Optic Nerves, The AC’s, The Hokie Joint,[7] Purple Melon, WeirdGear, CODA, Skandal, Defferred Sucess, Laura Younger and The New Town Kings.
Other attractions
Due to the weather there was very little in the form of other attractions for the first Cosmic Puffin festival, however there were circus workshops and fire eating/fire breathing displays
Promotion
Most of the bands were filmed for free by a video crew from the music promotion company MyChoonz.[8] The event was primarily promoted via MySpace and by word of mouth.[citation needed] On the 27th of March 2008 a website was created to help promote the event more effectivley, to archive various media from the event and to sell tickets for future Cosmic Puffin Festivals.[9] The website includes links to many Photographs and contains many videos from the event.[10] Many of the bands[who?] donated tracks to a compilation CD dedicated to the Cosmic Puffin and the above mentioned charities.[citation needed]
Cosmic Puffin 2
This time the Cosmic Puffin had 2 music stages (one called COSMIC stage, the other called MYCHOONZ stage)with around twice as many bands[who?] than the first year.[citation needed] Jamie Anderson (Yammezz) managed the Cosmic stage and Simon Deards (Sideards) from MyChoonz [11] managed the MyChoonz stage.[citation needed]
Dates
The Cosmic Puffin 2 took place from 10–12 April 2009.
Charities
The charities chosen this time round were BLISS (for babies born too soon) and NAS (National Autistic Society).[12][13] This time round each charity received around £1400.
Ticket Price
Entry price was twenty five pounds and included camping for the whole weekend.[14]
Weather
The weather was vastly better than the previous year with sunshine for the most part of the weekend.
Bands
The bands that played the Cosmic Puffin II included: The Fancy Dress Party, Ady Johnson, The Picturehouse Big Band, The Rhizomes, Lizzie B, Sista Suzi, Liz Williams, Kundalini Drive, Wobbly Squadron, Pro-rata (formerly CODA), Defferred Sucess, Automatic Slim, Hokie Joint, Skandal, The Iceni, Alunah, WeirdGear, Surfquake, Zubzub, The Optic Nerves, Cling, The Nanobots, The Starfighters Bob Calvert's band, House Of Thandoy featuring Mike Howlett from Gong and Basil Brooks from Zorch Zorch, DJ Weirditude, Peyote Guru, Spirits Of The Earth, Trev and Kev Trev Thoms, Peyote Mothership, Bruise, Nukli, Shom, Bubbledubble, Dream Machine, G-Delic, DJ Kozmik Ken, Electric Dub Guru, Xenon Codex, Assassins Of Silence (Hawkwind tribute band), Xoo, Dyframix, Wind Of Change and Litmus.
Other attractions
As well as circus workshops and fire eating/fire breathing displays the second Cosmic Puffin festival had John Row storyteller and poet entertaining both children and adults alike.[15] Also there was a hand made willow labyrinth and a solar stage which invited people to perform improvised music sets.[16]
Promotion
After the second Cosmic Puffin festival, on 14 April 2009, an internet forum was set up for people to discuss their experiences and opinions of the event as well as making suggestions for future events. Once again many photographs and videos were added to the website [17][18]
Future
Cosmic Puffin 3
There are to be four official music areas: three stages and a dance room featuring DJ's
Dates
The 3rd Cosmic Puffin festival is due to take place from the 2nd to the 4th of April 2010 [19]
Charities
The charities will once again be BLISS (for babies born too soon) and NAS (National Autistic Society).[20][21]
Ticket Price
Early bird tickets were on sale for £35 including camping for the weekend until the 15th of February 2010 Full price tickets are £45 including camping for the weekend. An extra £10 is being charged for campervans and caravans.
Bands
Bands for the 3rd Cosmic Puffin so far announced include Ady Johnson, Automatic Slim, Defferred Sucess, Dilute to Taste, The Fancy Dress Party, Hobo Chang, Hokie Joint, Lizzie B, Ministry of Loud, New Town Kings, The Optic Nerves, Phil Burdett Group, The Rhizomes, Sista Suzi, Surfquake, Vardo & the boss, Wobbly Squadron, Aurora, Bruise, Bubbledubble, Deviant Amps, DJ Weirditude, Dr Hasbeen, Flutatious, The Kozmik Ken Experience, Nuadem, Nukli, Pandemonium, Paradise 9, Peyote, Peyote Guru, Shom, Spirits of the Earth, The Starfighters, Temple Hedz, Treason and Trev & Kev.
Promotion
A Facebook group has been established to compliment the MySpace page, the internet forum and the website.
External links
- Official Cosmic Puffin website
- National Autistic Society website
- BLISS website
- Mersea Outdoors (Cosmic Puffin Venue) website
- MyChoonz independent music promotors website
- Official Cosmic Puffin 3 Facebook group
References
- ^ http://www.merseaoutdoors.com
- ^ http://www.cosmiccharity.com/
- ^ http://www.gazette-news.co.uk/news/local/colchester/2141960.Mersea__island_rocks_to_the_beat/
- ^ "Wild weather for Easter weekend". BBC News. 22 March 2008. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7309343.stm. Retrieved 30 April 2010.
- ^ http://www.gazette-news.co.uk/news/local/colchester/2141960.Mersea__island_rocks_to_the_beat/
- ^ http://www.saltdog.force9.co.uk/
- ^ http://www.hokiejoint.co.uk
- ^ http://www.mychoonz.co.uk
- ^ http://www.cosmicpuffin.co.uk
- ^ http://www.flickr.com/photos/mychoonz/collections/72157604260440164/
- ^ http://www.mychoonz.co.uk
- ^ http://www.bliss.org.uk
- ^ http://www.nas.org.uk
- ^ http://www.gazette-news.co.uk/features/features/4230006.Cosmic_forces_are_at_work/
- ^ http://www.johnrow.com/
- ^ http://kaplicksolarstage.co.uk/
- ^ http://www.flickr.com/photos/mychoonz/collections/72157616685736721/
- ^ http://www.cosmicpuffin.co.uk/cospuf3_files/Page397.htm
- ^ http://www.efestivals.co.uk/festivals/cosmicpuffin/2010/
- ^ http://www.bliss.org.uk
- ^ http://www.nas.org.uk
Categories:- Festivals in England
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