Flesh Festival
The UK’s First Queer Camping Music Festival
Queer camping heaven is here for LGBTQ+ ravers, their friends, and allies. As the UK’s first queer camping festival, on the 28th and 29th of May, Flesh will present two days of queer dance music and camping within lush woodland near St Alban’s (about 40 minutes from London). We think this could be the hottest festival of the year!
With a lineup showcasing established names like Rebekah, Ellen Allien, LSDXOXO and Juliana Huxtable alongside artists from some of the best London queer clubnights and collectives like Adonis, Inferno, Pxssy Palace, misery, and Big Dyke Energy, Flesh will also spotlight a whole host of up and coming DJs like Wax Wings, Hannah Holland, and Angel D’lite.
Ellen Allien, photo via Gianluca Vitelli via KEXP.
Rebekah, photo via Beatportal.
As well as 3 stages featuring some of the best DJs in electronic music today, there will be food stalls, pop-up shops, workshops, and panels. A sober activity tent will be hosted by Riposte, a queer club night with an artistic and community-based take on clubbing. Here, you can socialise, make friends, and relax without any pressure. The charity Rainbow Mind will be hosting a workshop on Radical Self Care.
For those seeking a more intimate experience of Flesh Festival, there will be a play area curated alongside HOWL, a queer sex-positive lifestyle brand. Together, FLESH and HOWL have designed a bespoke play space complete with glowing furniture, free CBD, and comfortable seating, with atmospheric lights that will brighten up the space and the trees around it. They’ll also be hosting be a programme of talks and workshops to promote sex positivity and provide education on issues including active consent and unconscious bias.
LSDXOXO, photo via TimeOut.
We spoke with the founder of Flesh Festival, Sam, who told us about her mission to address long-standing issues in male-dominated festival programming. That’s why 100% of the Flesh lineup is made up of underrepresented artists, and 90% are women, trans and non-binary artists across a spectrum of ethnicities. Flesh is breaking the cycle by providing a space for emerging and underrepresented talent to break through on a major platform, and in doing so, they’re setting a precedent for other promoters to follow.
Resisting tokenism, the Flesh team believe in levelling the playing field – they invest time in researching and putting together their line-ups. The diversity here is not just for show, and where there is a gap in representation, they aim to fill it with education and support for new artists. Everyone involved with Flesh Festival reflects the same ethos, and the festival will be staffed by LGBTQ+ security and paramedics. Speaking with Sam, it’s clear that everything has been carefully thought out to provide a safe, inclusive setting for a legendary weekend that may just go down in London queer history.
Sam is particularly excited about their partnership with London Sound Academy, to support marginalised groups in the electronic music industry. They’ll be offering two scholarships and an ongoing mentorship for upcoming QTIPOC artists, which will culminate with live performances at the festival itself.
Many people talk about equality in electronic music but Flesh will take real-life action to make it happen.
Get out your dancing shoes – support the cause and party hard!
Find full details on the Flesh Festival website, and follow Flesh on Instagram for updates. Get your tickets now on Resident Advisor.
