MIDI Festival 2009

MIDI is china's biggest music festival and runs over the May bank holiday every year - lasting for three days
This year was the tenth anniversay of the festival and so it was moved from its usual Beijing location to Zhenjiang in Jiangsu province. Zhenjiang is about 2 hours from Shanghai on the quick train or 5.5 hours on the usual slow train - we opted for the fast train. It was going to take place in Shanghai itself but the permit got turned down.

We had friday off work (rather than the monday the UK had and so we headed to the festival as soon as possible. Unfortunately the quick train was sold out on the sunday so we had to come back saturday afternoon. Meaning we only got to go to the first day of the festival. The festival was well attended on the first day when were there but apparently on the saturday a lot of people went back to shanghai (as we did) so there was less than half the attendance of the first day.

I'd say that the main differences between this festival and ones I'd been to in the UK are that tickets were £5 per day compared to £70 a day in the UK. the Chinese food on sale here was reaonably priced and actually tasted of something, the campsite was immaculate with tents in perfectly straight lines and rather than just having the crowd stand all at the same level they had it staged on a slight slope so everyone could see much more easily. Reassuringly the toilets were just as awful.

The line up was a mix of chinese and candian/american bands. My favourite band was playing on the sunday - so unfortunately didn't get to see them. The ones I did see were good though - including the Chinese "godfather of rock" - Cui Jian - who finished his set by inviting 20 girls on stage to dance with him. Despite being 50 he still has the right idea!
Definitely worth £5.