Chapter One: The Gathering – Boomtown 2022

After two cancelled events due to Coronavirus, Boomtown Fair returned this year with a blast The festival, has been held since 2009 yet this year was e new beginning celebrating the origin with Chapter One: The Gathering welcoming 66,000 people to Matterley Bowl in the South Downs National Park, for a music and theatrical festival that showcased over 500 artists from across the world.

The organisers coped pretty well with the heatwave, with temperatures reaching upwards of 33C, ensuring the citizens were able to stay hydrated and safe. Boomtown never disappoints and this year as well was able to throw a celebration for everybody with the likes of Kool and the Gang, Four Tet, Koffee, Nova Twins and more.

Although the site was reduced in comparison with the one from 2019, the perfectly placed nine unique districts across the festival site, gave plenty of fully immersive theatre and games for festival goers to get involved with. Nevertheless, the mind-blowing light show at nighttime and clear sound thorough all the stages, made possible to live the multi reality festival, able to transport you from post apocalyptic scenario all the way down to the 18th century Saloon in a matter of minutes.

My only criticism is that the site felt probably too busy at the time, not giving the needed space to allow the full enjoyment of the hundreds of activities, but I guess I was amongst the oldest on site, so don’t take my word for it.

Boomtown remains a festival mainly for young people but the few not so young can still have fun, as long as they camp in the right side of the festival, (note to myself, don’t camp downtown) and if you have cash to splash out, there are very comfortable solutions in the posh area.

It will take me a few days to fully recover from this long weekend, but the amount of fun we had made us loyal citizens for the years to come.

We look forward to Boomtown 2023.

William Ranieri Reports.