Szántód

Balaton Music Festival is one of Europe’s largest open air music festivals and got its start in 2007. We found the festival because Mary was looking at Alison Wonderland’s tour schedule and it was listed. After researching more, we saw that Lost Frequencies, Marshmello, Alison Wonderland, Borgore, and Zomboy were all playing the same day on the same stage right after each other. Mary found her love for dubstep in college which was when Borgore and Zomboy were headliners and Marshmello was just getting started. She was a big fan of all three and of course Alison Wonderland entered the picture and our relationship; we both find her very attractive and Kieran felt a little jealous at a concert several years ago 🤷🏼‍♀️

Our home base for the music festival is Síofolk, a cute little town one train ride north of Zamardi. We took the train down from Budapest, got ready, and jumped on train filled with festival people. Quick side note on American EDM Festival Culture VS European EDM Festival Culture: the clothing styles are radically different. In the US, EDM festivals are almost like raver Halloween and an opportunity for creativity/alternative outfits (dyed air, wild make up, chains, tights, thongs, goggles, etc). At Balaton, more people were dressed for a summer party / indie rock / folksy festival. We found a few ravers decked out, but they were scarce. The second side note is that Europeans prefer house / techno / DNB compared to American EDM / UK dupstep / bro step / trap. This information is important for later, we promise.

Everyone exited the train and it was possible to follow the crowds without a map. Locals would play their own mixing equipment while we walked 20 minutes to the festival entrance. The festival line moved very quickly and there was barely any security which was wild. Guess you don’t need to pat down every person and open every pocket when people don’t own any guns 💁🏼‍♀️

After entering we relaxed by the water for a bit and eventually found the Spain VS Germany Euro game. Germany tied it up the last minute! We headed towards the stage around 8:00 PM to watch Lost Frequencies which Kieran was excited to see. We also enjoyed Marshmello (for like the 6th time) and yes there were kids with their parents because of Fortnite.

If you’ve made it this far, you should remember that Europeans hate EDM/dubstep. As soon as Marshmello ended, Mary took the lead and walked us up to the front while everyone else was moving out for drinks or to leave. As a result, we were three rows of people back for Alison Wonderland!! Kieran was sooooo happy and it’s the closest we’ve seen her. We missed her at Moonrise in 2023 because she was 9 months pregnant 👼🏻
She killed the set as usual.

Other highlights include Borgore playing Mary’s four favorite songs (two of which she hasn’t seen live before) and just dancing with some bass heads for Zomboy. The Europeans hate for dubstep made getting to the bathrooms and back into the stage very easy and we had a great time 3 rows back with ample dancing / head banging room.

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