This weekend, the first ever Forward Music Festival will transform our quiet college town into an indie-rock haven, infusing it with 72 national and local bands rocking seven different venues.
Masterminded by five young professionals, FMF has gained attention from media like Paste Magazine and online indie moderators Pitchfork with its uniquely Madison statement.
We had very similar ideas of what we wanted to see in the Madison music scene,"" said Wyndham Manning, an organizer of Madison Pop Fest, FMF's predecessor. ""So for one weekend a year, we decided to try our hand at doing little festivals we thought kind of celebrated the best that Madison had to offer with the limited budget we had.""
Pop Fest ran for three successful years, but the organizers wanted to take the movement one step beyond the campus, creating FMF.
""It's already just exponentially bigger than Pop Fest,"" Manning said. ""At Pop Fest, we had maybe 400 to 500 people in a room a day. This one, we are talking like 3,000 people.""
The festival boasts a staggering lineup of local and national artists from Mason Jennings and Dillinger 4 to Dan Deacon and Monotonix. Local favorites the Box Social and Pale Young Gentlemen also play, along with legendary noise rockers Killdozer, who will be reuniting for the first time in nine years to contribute a set to the nascent festival. Manning attributes part of the list's prestige to help from local club owners.
""They sort of stepped up right from the beginning and helped us lock a lot of the bands that we were really looking forward to seeing,"" Manning said.
Although Manning and the other organizers chose to include many prominent national acts, they kept a local focus in mind.
""We wanted to put emphasis not just on the local Madison scene but [on] trying to identify what that Midwestern sounds of music is,"" Manning said. ""Almost all of our bands have at least some sort of connection to the Midwest, whether it be their record label is in Chicago or their drummer lived in Madison.""
As the festival's first set approaches, Manning already knows what he would most like to see.
""All of us are really excited about Killdozer, since it's going to be such a rare performance,"" Manning said. ""I would be planted in the Majestic the entire weekend.""
The festival begins at the Orpheum this Friday and ends at Project Lodge this Saturday. For a schedule, check out the festival's website at www.forwardmusicfest.com.
