Bonnaroo draws people from all over the world. On one magical weekend in June, on an old farm, in the middle of Manchester, TN, 80,000+ people gather for a make shift family reunion. Instead of a blood bond, they share a love bond. In no other place and at no other festival will you find this kind of open harmony. 2016 will be the 15 year milestone celebration of an idea that took off and has yet to set down.
The bond those in attendance feel with the festival is so palpable that it often extends into their everyday life. In 2015, Brandon Akers of Lexington, KY decided that there simply was not enough year round coverage of Bonnaroo. He launched {@Bonnaroo365} on Instagram to fill the void he felt. “It seemed like there wasn’t enough. I wanted to get more people involved with it. I wanted to be able to share Bonnaroo pictures all day.”
Akers first trip to the Roo in 2013 was highlighted by the Sunday night closer. “My favorite part was getting to see Paul McCartney. I think anyone would say that. I didn’t get to go on Thursday. We left Friday morning and it was the longest drive ever. The first show we saw was Wilco. Half way though the set, it was like, ‘we’re here! We’re finally here!'”
It’s funny that he describes it that way, because we often find the half way through the weekend, we’re having trouble remembering what we saw on Thursday. There’s just so much music in a non stop format.
The meat of this extends to Akers organically grown social media. “We started on Instagram in December 2014. In the first month, we had 400 followers. That was already more than I was expecting. The lineup dropped in January. By the middle of January, we had over 1000 followers. It’s so overwhelming. I never expected 100 people to follow us. By the time Bonnaroo came around, we were at 7,000 followers. I was checking our Instagram when I was there. I remember sitting in the car. I could barely get service to post, but I have a followers app that tells you how many people you have gained. Over night, we had gained 800 followers. It was unreal. On the screens between sets, they (Bonnaroo) shows pictures from Instagram and Twitter and I remember seeing people tagging us. We are now at 11,900 followers on Instagram. It’s just insane. I just extended to tumblr and Twitter. In less than a year I got almost 11,000 followers.”
In the recent weeks, leaks were abundant. The lineup was set to drop on Conan, but through mishaps on the Bonnaroo app and Conan’s website, we got a look at it earlier than expected. “At about 1 am, the announcement that the lineup would be released on Conan was made. As soon as I reposted this, people were complaining about it. A lot of people don’t have cable. These days, it’s all Hulu and Netflix. People were genuinely upset. I wanted to make it available to everyone. I looked at skype and google hangouts, but they weren’t formatted to share with that broad of an audience. I did a pre-show on periscope made from where I had cut an hour of old clips. I didn’t think a lot of people would watch it. I made people follow us in advance if they wanted to view it. At first, only 50 people joined. I was sitting there watching it and it jumped to 200, to 300. While I was watching it on the tv in my bedroom, I could see people from all over the world joining.”
Akers doesn’t officially work for AC Entertainment, Live Nation or Superfly. He just loves what they do. “I dd a recap video and have been slowly getting better at video editing. I had hundreds of people send me stuff that I cut into a film. I want to make a documentary with the people that follow us. I feel like it’s more like a family then a following. This festival is completely different than any other festival. It’s just so welcoming.. I’d like to do a meet up as well. I’d love to meet some of these people that are interested in seeing all this stuff.”
