Established by hardcore music fans in 2007, 2000 Trees Festival has long since been one of the UK’s top independent festivals. Best of all: it’s just around the corner, taking place between the 5th-8th July on Upcote Farm in Gloucestershire.
The festival prides itself on bringing together a diverse community, united in their passion for music – a core value that has been preserved by 2,000 Trees’ strong roots (excuse the pun) in the independent festival scene. In the past, the festival has been praised for its welcoming arms, attempts to preserve individuality and success in bringing music to all regardless of disadvantages or disabilities.
This year’s lineup is bound to be a storm, with headliners Soft Play and Bullet For My Valentine outlined in bold font on the website and press releases alike. 2023’s turn at 2,000 Trees covers a vast accumulation of all genres and bands plastered across the charts. My personal favourites Sprints and Black Honey are to make an appearance, alongside my fellow Bristolians, Hypothetics.
I caught up with Dan (Pacini, guitarist) and Jim (Wilcox, drummer) from the band, following their new EP release, GETS LET DOWN!, to gather a few words about their upcoming performance at the festival, and what they plan to do when out of the limelight of the Neu stage:
“Having been in the past, it will be lovely to play 2000 Trees this summer,” Jim tells me. “From experience, the people are really friendly and are firstly there to enjoy the music, avoiding the pretentious aspect of some other festivals.”
Dan chimes in, “It’s going to be my first time at 2000 Trees this year. I’ve been strongly recommended by my friend to go and watch American Football, but other than that and our set (11:30 Saturday, on the Neu stage), I’m just going to mooch about and see what I discover.”
It seems that we’ve finally found a festival that puts the festival-goer first. Get your tickets if you haven’t already, and get ready to break into even more of a head-banging-induced sweat this sweltering summer.
Every year, the festival partners with some incredible charities. This year, Tree Aid and Attitude Is Everything are back as official charity Partners. In addition, the festival is working with Ecolibrium to tackle the environmental impacts from our audience travel, typically the biggest contributor to an event’s carbon footprint. When you buy a vehicle pass for 2000 Trees, they donate £3 to Ecolibrium to help balance or ‘offset’ the carbon emissions from your fossil fuel miles.
