by: Ami Pulaski
The inaugural Future Fest will be taking place this Saturday, March 5th at Tapp’s Art Center from 2p.m.-until. Future Fest 2016 is the first music festival being presented by Tri City Rec, Columbia’s premiere international DIY record label. We caught up with Lucas Sams, founder of Tri City Rec and the prolific musician behind Pray for Triangle Zero, to see what this music festival of the future is all about.
What is the Future Fest? What can we expect to see and hear?
Lucas Sams: Future Fest is a multimedia music micro-festival presented by Tri City Rec showcasing artists on the forefront of experimental and future music (future music being DIY produced music of varying genres, often Internet boon genres like vaporwave, future funk, nu disco) locally, regionally, and even internationally. There will be music videos from Uruguay's Lila Tirando a Violeta, accompanying visuals by Grawlix (who did work for Scenario Collective recently) and Obligatory Kaliedoscope (OK Keyes, a frequent collaborator with Ritual Abjects).
Which artists are going to be involved in the festival?
LS: Malls (one of Lucas Sams's vaporwave side-projects) Autofighter (media artist and p4t0 collaborator O'Neal Peterson's side project), local media artist and filmmaker Drew Baron's ambient noise project This Cave is Creepy (for the first time ever live), AUTOCORRECT, Pray For Triangle Zero, インターネットファクス M A C H I N E (future funk project of Vivian Penny, from NC's first live show as this alias. She will also be performing as 3ternal at the fest), L i l i n (ambient chillstep from AL's Logan Bush, who will also be performing as Depravity.),A h o m a r i, RITUAL ABJECTS, 3ternal / Depravity (Vivian and Logan performing their solo deathstep projects as combined act), Sandcastles. (Kari Lebby), and GARDNSOUND (Gardner Beson's experimental EDM project from Atlanta / Fayettville, GA.
Where can we preview the artists and their work before Saturday?
LS: The artists can be all found at their respective Bandcamp or Soundcloud pages, and many of the artists have releases that can be downloaded and streamed from tricityrec.bandcamp.com.
I see that the Future Fest is hosted by Tri City Rec. What exactly is Tri City Rec and how did it come into being?
LS: Tri City Rec is Columbia, SC's premiere DIY label of the future. All of our music is free to download (but pay if you want to), and we feature artists from SC, regionally, and all over the world, with several artists from Japan, one from Brazil, and another from Uruguay. I started Tri City Rec originally as a label for releasing my friends and my own music, and during the past year [it] has developed into a full-on international net label. I created it to promote and curate a collective of artists working on the fringes and creating interesting music outside the boundaries of convention.
When I began creating music, it was hard to find my niche, and dealing with people who didn't take what I was doing seriously, mostly locally, was disheartening. I decided not to wait until other people would help me release my music and release it myself. As I kept doing that, I wanted to help other artists doing the same thing as me have a platform to share their music, to promote collaboration and dialogue of diverse artists from all over.
What do you guys see in the future for the label?
LS: In the future, expect more physical releases (although we are so much more than a boutique tape label), more events like this, including a Future Fest 2017, if there's a world left to have it in, more artists, and more collaborations.
We believe that what we and labels like us are doing is the future of music distribution and record labels in general, so expect great things and unique experiences both real and digital.
Future Fest 2016
Tapp’s Art Center (1644 Main St.)
2 p.m.-until
Admission: $8 in advance/ $10 at the door
More info is available at the Future Fest 2016 Facebook Event page here.