As the sound of one band’s guitar strums make way for another’s, traversing music festival grounds from show to show is a part of the thrill. It’s a winding trail of cowboy hats, diaphanous dresses, fans, and wristbands you just can’t seem to take off once the festivities are long over. When thinking of these temporary worlds, images of cooler-than-thou girls at Glastonbury and Coachella campers with just the right amount of mud on their galoshes to still be considered chic come to mind.
In reality however, music festivals are not always so glittery as they seem. In an often-dusty terrain, they’re more like camping trips for the musically inclined and the fashionably brave, for those who are willing to tough out hearing damage and long days of standing, rain or shine, to at last reach the barricades of a beloved musician. With temps in the ‘90s and a jam-packed lineup including Chappell Roan, Remi Wolf, and Reneé Rapp, it was no easy task to brave the heat, the crowds, and the noise of Austin City Limits.
For long-time friends and seasoned music festival-goers Mary Alicaway and Sophia Berry, their five-plus years of attending ACL have been an ongoing lesson on “getting used to crowds and not having personal space while also enjoying time there,” Berry tells Teen Vogue. After falling ill from dust ingestion, enduring wardrobe malfunctions, and getting stuck in mosh pits in the past, they’ve reached a point where they know their limits. What other personal tips have they picked up throughout that half-decade? To use lidocaine to numb their feet from potential shoe pain, keep a portable fan on hand, and always wear Loop earplugs and bandanas for protection.
“While concerts are very short-lived experiences, festivals are all-day affairs,” ACL attendee and pre-med student Ib Afolabi explains, and treating the latter as such may help in the long run. She considers rites of passage like getting lost in a crowd and rubbing shoulders with territorial fans to be inevitable, as they only reaffirm the importance of festival buddy systems and establishing a meeting place for friend groups. The more serious rites of heat exhaustion and ear damage, however, don’t have to be inevitable. Afolabi’s friend Veronica Vaughan lays it out frankly: “You definitely have to treat your body right and you have to put in the energy you’re going to be exuding, because if you don’t, you’re going to pass out.”
“I’ve definitely ingested more Liquid IV than I have water in the past three days,” admits college student Gwyn Lewellyn. “I just think about my parents and how they would probably hate this.” She and her classmate Natalie Perez made a point to enter the festival with no set expectations to see where the day would lead. Still, “it’s a lot of overstimulation of the senses…We’re figuring it out as we go,” Perez adds.
Whether it be hydrating days in advance with chia seeds and electrolytes, or swearing by unexpected anesthetics, festival must-dos vary from person to person. Afolabi and Vaughan are planners, while others like Lewellyn and Perez, are simply here for the energy and not for the stress of getting as close to the stage as possible.
In a festival setting where so much falls upon chance and spontaneity, having the ease of sound control is just one more measure to make a world’s difference. I attended the festival with Loop and tried out the brand’s new Switch 2 earplugs — admittedly, a bit inspired by Jack Antonoff donning a pair of earplugs at the VMAs to protect his hearing. The Switch 2 comes with adjustable listening modes: For louder bands and sets, quiet mode provides maximum noise reduction, ideal for overstimulated festival attendees who may have found themselves standing right by the speakers. Experience mode clouds out chatter and is versatile for live music listening, while engage mode softens ambient sounds and clarifies speech and vocals, best for those in the back of a crowd who are focused on the performance.
