Imagine Festival, ironically, is very real and I was able to attend for the first time this year. This four-day EDM Festival finds itself in the countryside park of Kingston Downs, Georgia. My fresh eyes finally got to experience the chaos and magic of an EDM festival camping trip. The lineup included tons of big names, but with limited time and multiple stages playing at once, I had to choose my adventure wisely. Four days, four stages, and tons of artists performing to close out the summer season; welcome to Imagine Festival 2023.
Thursday [Pre-Party and Setup]
Day… zero? Day zero’s goal was getting myself situated at the Imagine Festival camp sites, which was a car and tent combination setup. Thursday, festival wise, included a pre-party. It is best to understand that the pre-party required a separate wristband, which I, unfortunately, was lacking.
That means that my day zero was going to be mostly setup. If you’re car camping, this is a great time to unpack, set up, and socialize with your car neighbors. There are also vendors lining the walls between the car-camping sections and other types of campgrounds. As long as you don’t pack an old, extremely tiny tent like I did, you’ll probably make it through Thursday without any problem.
Courtesy of Imagine Music Festival // Don Idio // @dvisuals
Friday [Day One]
This is where things really ramp up. If you were at the pre-party, you already saw one stage, but two more opened up on Friday with each stage offering a unique flavor for the event. I spent the majority of my Friday running around the back areas trying to find media-related places, but you readers don’t care for that kind of thing. You’re here for the music, and there’s three major acts I went to on Friday.
Deadcrow
I’m going to be honest, I got here during the last fifteen minutes. I went into Deadcrow’s set on the basis that he was primarily a WAVE producer, getting a personal recommendation from a friend. During the final stretch, he did play that style, but it was one out of about five tracks. The rest were very standard dubstep bangers, with the final being a hardstyle closer. I honestly never expected anyone to end a set with hardstyle here, as that’s not even a popular choice in this country, so that was a pleasant surprise.
Elderbrook
This is probably the most “vibey” set of the festival for me. Something about Elderbrook’s vocals and the softer house style he employs makes this set one to drift off to. Obviously, you couldn’t actually pass out to this set, but an hour of cozy and comfortable house would really chill you out. The Disco Inferno stage also does a really good job at presenting an easy view of the artist. You can really see him jam out during some of the more upbeat tracks in the mix.
Courtesy of Imagine Music Festival // DVPhotoVideo
Subtronics B2B Ganja White Knight
This is the set that would probably make the folks at Respect My Region most excited. I think this selection of artist really worked because of contrast. Subtronics, to me, delivers a lot of in-your-face headbangers, while Ganja White Knight goes more into the grimy, wobbly, deep dubstep sound (that I’ve really enjoyed recently). It was a great pairing. The only complaint I have is there were too many fake-drops (where a climax might happen, but it pulls the rug out from under you and drops slightly later). It was so frequent that it became surprising to hear a song without it.
Saturday [Day Two]
Saturday is when the all-dreaded rain kicked in. My “tent-for-babies” turned out to be worse than I thought and collapsed in on itself from the rain, with me in it. I put trash bags between my socks and shoes, stored what was dry (almost nothing) in my car, and set out back to the festival grounds. Today had a bit more to offer than Friday, so I do have four major highlights.
Leah Culver
If there’s anything I crave from live events, especially in EDM, it’s variety. The problem a lot of people have from big festivals, I’ve seen, is that everything kind of blends together. Leah Culver was the first set during the weekend for me that did have that variety on full display, this time with a live band accompanying her. This includes Frank Zummo from Sum 41 on drums, which was both exciting for me and for Leah when I got to interview her later that day (hint, hint, future content).
Courtesy of Imagine Music Festival // Don Idio // @dvisuals
Detox Unit
I used to be a future garage producer and still dabble in the style here and there. The lovely combination of rhythmic and chaotic percussion loops and thick punchy drums will forever bring me back. Detox Unit’s set also had, what I assume to be, sign language interpreters? I’m not entirely sure, but they almost stole the show.
Zomboy
This set is the highlight of the night for me. This was the craziest dubstep show I’ve seen in a LONG time. I was a bit disappointed that some of my personal favorites from his album Outbreak and projects prior to that didn’t get show, but it was understandable. This set also didn’t do the problem I had with the previous heavy mainstage set. This one had no fake drops and was just banger after banger for an hour. I stayed in the staff area between VIP and general admission; seeing the energy from the crowd was a memory I will not forget.
Courtesy of Imagine Music Festival // Don Idio // @dvisuals
Big Gigantic
Anyone who doesn’t follow EDM will love the fact that they’re called Big Gigantic, but this set was a wild ride to end the night on. It wasn’t as hectic as other sets, but the heavy basslines combined with live drums and saxophone set this show apart. It was the final set of the night, so I was physically drained, but I made sure to stay on that rail until they were finished.
Sunday [Day Three]
The final day of Imagine Festival is upon us. Starting from day one, I had pretty much been deciding my schedule the day of each day. My initial plan was to be constantly moving from start to finish each day, but a couple conflicts led to me having to pick and choose a lot more.
Courtesy of Imagine Music Festival // DVPhotoVideo
Shockone
Drum and bass music is ALWAYS hype at festivals, yet unusually absent from EDM lineups on the east coast. Usually, dubstep acts would use drum and bass to spice up sets or end shows on a crazy high note. Having it last for an entire hour would sound like overkill, but it can work. Drum and bass having both melodic and heavy aspects makes live shows easy to bring variety and flow to. Shockone spiced it up even further by employing four-to-the-floor (kick on every beat) tracks, some psytrance and hardtek elements, and ending the set on a new lovely breaks track.
Dillon Francis B2B Knock2
This was another insane set on mainstage. Crowd was packed, energetic, and absolutely going as crazy as physically possible. I was not expecting this combination to work as well as it did at first. I’ve always listened to Dillon Francis as a moombah and adjacent-genre producer first and foremost. Having him pair with a current hyped-up house producer sounded like one would be overshadowed by the other. It was that to an extent, feeling more like a Knock2 set than anything, but the splashes of Dillon’s sound did elevate the set overall.
Infected Mushroom
This set will be covered more extensively in a follow-up article later, but here’s some small notes. Infected Mushroom closed out the Aeria stage on Sunday night, so my body was pretty much out of commission the entire time. That being said, I still enjoyed myself as much as I could with pain in my feet. Psytrance was usually used as a way to add variety to other sets, so seeing it be the main focus was great. You’ll see our article on the full set up soon!
Imagine Festival 2023 In Restrospect
Imagine Festival 2023 was my first foray into the festival life. There was a lot I learned to enhance my experience for the next one (and any other festivals I go to). Overall, I really enjoyed my time at Imagine. It had a healthy number of styles for anyone into EDM to go into it blind and still enjoy themselves. In retrospect, I should probably pack a bigger tent.
Courtesy of Imagine Music Festival // DVPhotoVideo
