Flex and Frooms, Flex and Frooms. This is the Flex and Frooms catch up podcast.
We recently went to Splendor about a week ago, hence the voices, which again we'll keep mentioning it so we don't get any unsolicited feedback. I'm very scared for Team Splendor because that had to be one of the How can it be worse than Splendor in the March?
Oh my god, you're really coming out swinging like this.
Yeah, I think I need to be honest about what I was experiencing there. I personally had a fine time. I had a great time in Splendor in the Mud, but obviously I had the experience of those in the Capitol and you know, not gen Pop. What I will say, though, is there anyone who's been to Splendor before? All the visuals you have of a really packed crowd and heaving feral behavior nowhere to be seen this year. This year was very, very, very sparse. It's the best way I
can put it. Spas at no point where you're bumping shoulders with anyone. Plenty of space to walk, which sounds like a good thing, but not when you've traveled ten hours to be bumper a bumper with your peers.
Okay, okay, continue.
Also, this one's going to shock most of you, so please please please don't shoot the messenger. The population of people under the age of fourteen alarming. The primary demographic this year at Splendor toddlers. I want to say, thirty percent toddlers, twenty percent between the age of five and fourteen, twenty percent between the ages of eighteen and thirty, and then everyone else was thirty plus. I'm confused. I'm so confused. The energy felt like a family, family.
Festival, a family fiesta.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, like the Easter Show esque. What was with just a backdrop of miscellaneous music?
Tell us why me? Flex and her Bessie Sullly are walking around like every time, like parents had those little type things like you biel barrow, the wheelbow and Sully's like, audibly, she's disgusted that she's passed.
Off another one, another one. It was just such a strange scene because obviously I'm not sure if everybody knows this, but there is like children can go to Splendor, and under eighteens can go to Splendor, so that's not unusual. But generally they're like in a little area to the back somewhere concealed away from praying eyes. The way the children were integrated this year unbelievable. At any given turn, you'd see a child, a real child when we walked in on day two, real child when we walked in
on day two. The line to get your wristband checked for gold was just as long as the life are to eighteens. Oh number one, I personally don't think that children and adult should share any common spaces, especially reck creational ones. It's inappropriate, and especially what we would want to go down at festival, which is feral activity. It's just not a safe space for all these kidlets. It's weird, and the vibe did not change backstage majority children they were.
And I just want to say to anyone who has issue with what you've said about needing spaces to be separate, I can done that as well, because tell me why every time I go to my local park and I want to play on swing set, a child appears out of nowhere and I have to leave because it is their safe space. And yeah, I don't see any children running away from my area when I'm walking through, splending in the grass trying to get a lizo.
Okay, very strange. At one point on day two, we were in the Amphitheater going to see J Balvin Babes. That Amphitheater was at twenty percent capacity, maybe thirty percent. J Balvin is one of the most streamed artists in the entire world. Like we're talking billions of streams, and the Amphitheater did not give Where do we think Splendor went wrong this year?
So? I think that the lack of crowd we always knew that was gonna happen after Slender in the month. That was a real kick in the guard. That plus cost of living true, because how much does it cost to get a ticket?
It's expensive six hundred dollars, give or take, and then you've gotta buy your camping pass parking pass, but also getting to Byron. So let's say you drive, You're gonna spend hundred dollars in petrol. If you're not driving, gonna get a plane hundreds of dollars. Then your drinks, your food, your miscellaneous treats. I was watching this video of vox Pops at Splendor asking people how much money they spent
in accommodation to get clothing or whatever. The medium price is fifteen hundred Oh it's very boutique.
Sam. I will say now that I have gotten sick from you, I definitely like you definitely gave me honest.
We definitely want to discuss later. I don't even get sick.
I know.
So someone else gave it to us.
Well, I will say, I'll give you someone.
You're the one doing meet and breached the whole splendor. I wasn't jagging every second person who knows what you brought back to us?
Okay, my highlights of slender On the Friday night, you, Sally and I. My plus one wasn't there yet. Jordan Yes left me on Red so we were all hanging out. I was kind of plus one ning with you guys. No, it's the three of us, okay, in the gold bar, which is available to all the public. So I one to explain this to everyone without feeling any kind of fun. What was it that I caught everyone?
Uh?
Common folk?
Common folk?
She never let me live that down, Mickey, What do you think about that phrase? A bit of a sore spot for me. It's so brutal because it's up there with muggle. You know, when you say something that's misconstruts, you keep bringing it up. That's what this is. The highlight for my slender was seeing j Balve not gonna lie. I didn't know who he was before, and I have some experience with reggaeton music.
You liar, you don't, Okay. I live in Bondai Beach like she's an indulged a Brazilian backpacker.
Yeah, I'm hearing Brazilian drums on the grassy n every Sunday from my house in South Bonday. Like, go to any house party in South Bondai, You're bound to be hearing Regaton on report. Okay, So you know I have dabbled in the past. However, this gave me a whole new lease on life of that genre of music. Jay Bowen had this electric stage presence which I'm not sure I saw with any other artist at Splendor. Mind you only saw him and one other artist redacted, Lizzo.
I'll always be here to set.
No. I love Liza, It's just that we didn't get to act together, so he missed my favorite song to be Loved. Yeah, that was a bit of a sore spot. But I will say another one of my favorite situations was when Mey, You and Sally went to the mosh pit, and we just kept finding ourselves, like standing in in walkways, like no matter where we walked or somehow.
Something was I don't know. What's really frustrating about me is some of the experiences I love the most are experiences that pissed me off. I love being in the pit. The moment someone even grazes me, it's game over, do you touch me? But in particular, what I hate about festivals is being or standing in a position that ends up being a walkway or a thoroughfare. And I don't know what it is about me or the energy that
I bring into a space, but it happens consistently. I don't care if I'm like sandwiched in between a crowd. It kept happening. So the three of us started, you know, kind of like the top of the bottom section, the top of the amphitheater, and I'm like, okay, can we move down a little bit. We're in a thoroughfare. As soon as we move, give it five minutes, and we're just it's just us in this deep sea of nothingness.
We go further in, we're surrounded by people for maybe thirty seconds, a deep sea of nothing that's please everyone why are you leaving her? I just want to be close to someone.
I will say. Some chicks came up to you. I don't like going down.
I stepped back a bit.
They pointed at you.
They're like, it was so for me. This is how you know Fremy's on a ride or die she's not. Because okay, we're all standing there having a good time, right, having a good time whatever. This group of girls in front of us. One of them turns around. She sees me. She's clocked me. It's like she's clocked a ghost and like a megatron at the same time. She gets her pointer right in between my pupils and says podcasta podcaster? Who are you?
When she said who are you?
Th me literally, she's like that the one Simpsons me might know of Homer still come backward into the hedge is exactly what food? She laugh.
I said, I can't say this girl down. How to give you privacy for that? That was like, what's it called? Not like a mercy kill.
I'd never put more abandoned in my life. I'm so sorry. I do worry for Splendor. I feel like it's not coming back next year. They would have lost so much money, not selling those tickets. And I think what a lot of like legacy or heritage brands get wrong is that they assume that gen Z has any type of loyalty. Brand loyalty is a very millennial thing, a very boomoth thing.
Gen zs don't do loyalty in the same way. And also I think that very millennial, boomoth thing to do is to assume the higher the price point, the more worth it it's going to be. So we see that like, this is a premium festival, We've got to go. We dont want to miss out. And I think everyone's like, wait a second. If I can see this same thing on TikTok, or I can see this same act in my city for a fraction of the price, why would I? And I think the question that a lot of these
festivals can't answer is why would I? Because going to see a performer you really like is not the incentive you're paying to do that. And so it's okay, of course, when paying five hundred bucks, I'm going to see someone I like, what else are you offering? They're not offering anything else, or if they are, it's a watered down version of what they did last year. Or the year before we've seen it.
Oh, it's fine, Well, if I get invited, backup considered Naturally.
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