The VH1 Supersonic team has been working tirelessly over the last three-four nights to make sure that everything is perfect before the music festival kicks off today. The three-day event will be headlined by Diplo, Illenium, Machine Gun Kelly and Divine and feature over 90 other artists on six different stages.
Based on a fantasy theme every year, this edition’s elaborate main stage is called The Flying Fortress and has a moral message. “The highest point of the stage is the LGBTQ+ flag. We want the festival to be a safe space for everyone, irrespective of their sexual orientation, economic background, educational qualification and religious beliefs. The festival is open, equal and fair to all. Music doesn’t discriminate. When you’re on the dancefloor, you don’t know whether the guy next to you is from top end university or never went to school or what religion he follows. You just enjoy the music together,” says festival curator Nikhil Chinapa.
The stage is loosely inspired by various video games and the Flying Dutchman, a legendary ghost ship from the Pirates of the Caribbean. “But when you look at the design, it looks nothing like the Flying Dutchman. So you can say that it’s inspired by many things and designed with a large slice of lunacy by Vinay Patil,” says Nikhil.
Coming to his favourite genre of music, Nikhil describes the techno stage as “ridiculously simple”. “The BUDX Awakenings Stage doesn’t look like much, but at night when the visuals are on, it is stunning. It is beyond beautiful. Since this is the only stage where we are able to provide shade, people who come in early, can sit on the grass here and listen to some fresh techno music. The beer garden is also close by,” he says, adding, “BUDX Awakenings is the biggest techno brand in the world, and we’ve partnered with them for five years. Indian artists have gone and played at their main festival that happens in June every year in Amsterdam too.”
To enhance the visitors’ experience at the festival, organisers have tried to bring a certain vibe to each stage. “The FOH (front of house) is the boxed area where you will find the sound console, lighting console, engineers, technicians, and all together. The distance between the front barricade and FOH is different for different stages. Since techno lends itself to a more intimate space, we’ve kept this space at 70 ft, so it feels a little more intimate. On the EDM stage, it’s at a distance of 125 ft, and on live stage, it is 100 ft. These subtle differences change the vibe of what the person standing on the dance floor feels because of how the space resonates around them,” says Nikhil.
The reggae stage curated by 10,000 Lions Sound System from Goa, is the first to kick off the festival on Friday at 12 noon. It is intentionally located on route to the other stages. “Whenever you pass through here, you will find at least 100 people dancing. We have put the stage here as a sort of a palate cleaner for music. When you come here from one stage, you can listen to some reggae, dance here for a few minutes and then be ready to head on to the next stage,” says he.
