Oops!

It looks like you don't have flash player 6 installed. Click here to go to Macromedia download page.

An Interview with Jonathan Kephart of the Blacksun Festival
Posted: Sunday, July 16, 2006
By: Matthew Johnson
Features Editor

Taking place July 28-30 in picturesque New Haven, CT, the Blacksun Festival offers gothic industrial fans an opportunity to see some of the scene's biggest names in a city with small-town atmosphere. In its second year, Blacksun plays host to such European heavy-hitters as Combichrist and Das Ich, as well as local favorites like Android Lust and The Last Dance. Multiple venues, DJs from all over the East Coast, and some unique activities like a variety act, a fashion show featuring such designers as Deadly Couture, and a trivia contest add to the festival's allure, as does its location, which offers such sights as the gargoyle-topped buildings of nearby Yale University and the historic Grove Cemetery. Jonathan Kephert, the organizer of Blacksun Festival, recently spoke with ReGen about the bands he's most excited about and the logistical difficulties of throwing a party on such a massive scale.

How did you come up with the idea of doing a festival like Blacksun? How long was the first event in the planning before it actually came to fruition?

Kephart: I had wanted to do an event like the Blacksun Festival since I was promoting gothic industrial clubs in Florida back in 1996. Many of the concepts that are part of Blacksun Festival today date back to that time. A prime example of this is location—I have always known it would be important part of the concept to hold this event outside of a major city. I had originally considered Savannah, GA to be a good location for it. I still think Savannah would be an excellent host city for a goth festival, because of the beautiful setting and the facilities. However, Savannah is a bit too far away for most people.

The actual implementation of the first festival took nine months, which now amazes me in how little time I had. Planning the festival is now a yearlong process. Some of the planning for Blacksun Festival III has already started, and will begin in earnest the week after this year's event.

What made you pick New Haven, CT for the location? What is that makes New Haven a good city for this kind of event?

Kephart: New Haven is a great synthesis of atmosphere, facilities, and location. It's a city of modest size that leads to impromptu meetings of people who you saw at the show last night on the sidewalk. It's also a very beautiful city with very notable architecture. The above is not enough, but what really gives New Haven the edge is the fact it has top-notch venues that equal anything you will find in America's largest cities. Being able to walk in five minutes from your hotel to any of the venues or one of several dozen excellent restaurants or shops is awesome. Finally, it's easily accessible from anywhere from Portland, ME to Washington, DC.

Can you give us a quick rundown of this year's festival, who's playing, how the schedule is set up, and what the venues are like?

Kephart: Our two headliners are Das Ich and Combichrist, both of which are noted for their energy. Das Ich puts on such a good show that even people who aren't fans will walk away impressed. I'm not a big Das Ich fan, but when I saw them several years ago for the first time I really enjoyed the show. I expect they will make several hundred new fans in a couple of weeks! Combichrist will premier material from their Get Your Body Beat EP, live. They have added a full backing band since the last time they toured, and I expect that Toad's Place will be one giant dance floor when they go on. The rest of the lineup includes Informatik, Chemlab, Android Lust, Claire Voyant, PTI, The Last Dance, The Brides, CTRL, Null Device, Bloodwire, Jenn Vix, Caustic, 51 Peg, and Interrogation.

Toad's Place is a large live venue with a long history of hosting great bands. It's set up so that people can see the stage from almost anywhere in the venue, and there is no such thing as a bad spot there. Toad's is where we will have our main stage acts. The Lilly Pad is a small dance club located above Toad's Place. If people want to take a break from the live bands they can go up to the Lilly Pad and check out the great DJs we have booked. Alchemy Nightclub is primarily a dance club, which also has a stage. This is where our second stage is located, and where the main 'dance night' of the festival will happen. The Fashion Show and the :angeldustrial: dance troupe will also be performing in Alchemy.

This is the second year of the Blacksun Festival. What have you done differently this time? What important lessons did you learn from the festival's debut last year?

Kephart: The most important lessons that we learned from last year were the 'back end' aspects. These are things that should go unnoticed to the festival attendees, but if they go off track they have a negative impact on the presentation of the festival. One example would be that last year we had excellent stage management of our primary venue, but it was lacking in our secondary venue, and that resulted in mishaps. For this year, universally excellent stage management has been one of our top priorities. I think the result will be very noticeable to everyone who attends the festival.

You recently made some changes to the band schedule. Is the schedule finalized, or will there be more surprise guests added to the program in the coming days? Are there any other surprises people should be gearing up for?

Kephart: I certainly hope there will be no changes to the schedule! The greater number of artist you involve in a schedule increases the likelihood that there will be a problem with one of them. It's a problem that I lose sleep over, but there is a limit to what you can do. As a promoter it does nothing but harm me whenever I tell people 'so and so' is going to play and then something happens to prevent them from doing the show. The only things a promoter can do is look closely into the history of a particular artist and their fidelity to doing the shows they have booked. In the future a band's performance history will be one of the top three factors when we decide whom to invite to play the Blacksun Festival.

How did you originally come up with the list of performers? Did you pick the bands ahead of time and contact them, or did you rely more on bands seeking you out?

Kephart: About 80 percent of the bands booked to perform the Blacksun Festival are approached by us. We do make an attempt to accommodate the artists who approach us, but we have limited capacity to accommodate them.

What bands are you most excited about seeing personally? As the organizer of the festival, will you even get much of a chance to see the bands and other attractions, or are you going to be too swamped with behind-the-scenes duties?

Kephart: Last year I only got to see the performance of one of the artists, so I doubt this year I will get to see very many. That said, if I was attending the event the bands that are the easiest to say I would look forward to seeing are the headliners: Das Ich and Combichrist. They both put on awesome shows in very different ways. Other than that I think I would have to go with Informatik, whose music I have been a fan of for many years but rarely play out. Bloodwire will be interesting, because they are a band I was completely unaware of until I received their press kit to play the festival, and I have really come to enjoy their music. I want to see what they are like live.

In addition to the bands, what other attractions does the Blacksun Festival offer?

Kephart: New friends and loved ones. It sounds—and is—cheesy, but the difference of going to a concert and a three-day event is that there is much more of the opportunity to really get to know new people and socialize. A more conventional answer to your questions is that we have an art show, a meet and greet, fashion show, the :angeldustrial: dance troupe, great DJs, and after-parties. Really insane after-parties.

What do you think is the most unique aspect of Blacksun, as opposed to other dark music festivals like Wave Gotik Treffen or Convergence?

Kephart: In your question you just threw together two radically different events. I see WGT as mainly being about the bands, and Convergence as being about socializing. The Blacksun Festival is meant to be between the two: great bands and a great opportunity to socialize.

What's the most important thing for people who are thinking about attending Blacksun to know about the festival?

Kephart: The most important thing to remember is that you will have a good time. We don't claim to have the most bands at a goth industrial festival, but we are careful to book ones who we feel will give a good show. The audience is not insanely huge, but it's a good size and the people who come out tend to leave pretensions at home; that makes for a friendly atmosphere. The festival will be around for many years, and to make that happen we need to make sure that people see us as their number one choice because they know they are going to have a good time no matter who is playing or who is there.