Photos by Kelsey Winterkorn

Clean out your CamelBak, dust off your tent, purchase some bacon; festival season is here! This year the inaugural Bay Area festival is none other than Emissions: West Coast Bass Culture. Sporting a lineup featuring dubstep headliners such as Vaski, Ill Gates and The Widdler alongside heaps of emerging Bay Area talent, Emissions starts the season off with a bang.

It’s a given that the quality of an event relies heavily upon those involved in planning it, but the statement never felt more true to me than at Emissions with the Irie Cartel and Camp ? Mark coming together. The Irie Cartel is known most notably as the creator of Emissions and San Francisco’s largest weekly Dubstep night, Ritual at Temple Nightclub. In just a short year, they have managed to create a large and unique community, making it the quintessential SF Dubstep party. Camp ? Mark, originally a Burning Man theme camp, has evolved, over the past few years, into a certifiable force in the bass music community. Known for throwing undeniably unique parties both in the Bay Area and at Burning Man, Camp ? Mark carries with it a message of creativity and community that could be felt over every square inch of the campground. It’s safe to say that I had high expectations for what these two crews could put together.

The location for this year’s festival was River Ranch Campground in Tuolome, CA. When the flier listed the event as a campout, they weren’t kidding. No large fields of camping tents here. This was a private campground similar to a secluded camping spot for your family. Decorated buses, wildly colorful costumes, and renegade sound systems thumping between tents made for a lovely atmosphere akin to that of a mini-Burning Man. Nestled along a creek, it created a serene backdrop for a weekend of womping in the woods. Unfortunately, the nature of its location did provide to be painful when, on Sunday, around 2AM, it began to snow and hail. The sound stages were not prepared and suffered a crushing blow when electronics were fried and sound came to
a stammering halt. This stoppage resulted in many of our top anticipated DJs being unable to perform while festivalgoers made quick haste to shelter. A funny side note, I had stopped at a Costco on the drive up and decided to purchase a 10-person monstrosity of a tent for shits and giggles — little did I know that the tent would become a life saver as nearly my entire camp of about 15 huddled within it well in to the morning.

The main sound stages were placed at opposite ends of the campground which was about a mile across. The nonstop lineup provided dancers a place to go nuts 22 hours a day. The “main” Creek stage was essentially an island between two creeks, complete with a bridge, and it housed 40,000 Watts of PK sound beside a handcrafted Camp ? Mark wooden stage that screamed style. The lighting and laser system colored the draping forest canopy like wallpaper while fog machines filled out with light for ambiance. Staggered domes and performance areas provided festival goers with a place to relax and unwind near
the music. Top-notch Fire and LED flow performers, of all varieties including professionals, were active at almost all stages of the festival. The secondary Cove stage sported 50,000 Watts of JBL sound and provided an intimate party area huddled against a cove of trees and rushing stream.

Timeslots at both stages proved to be a strong part of my audible experience at Emissions. The lineup was complimentary, so if performer at the Creek Stage was delivering high-energy bangers, then the Cove stage was usually dropping mellow cuts and vice-versa.

Until the snowpocalypse set in, the music was terrific. I was never upset with the selection of performers at both stages. When I wasn’t in the mood for the type of music a DJ was spinning, the other stage normally had something that fit my groove. In the all-day sea of music, a few sets were rather notable. Ill Gates brought the heat on opening Friday night with a set that packed the main stage with enough excitement to carry through Sunday. After getting decimated by Ill Gates at the Creek stage, I hobbled on over to see Smasheltooth perform her brand of hyphy dubstep at the Cove stage – another one of
my favorite performances from that night as a welcome break from heavy Dubstep. Saturday afternoon, I awoke to the dubby cuts of Christiafari, which was perfect for nursing a hangover. Smooth reggae beats that got even my hollowed shell of a corpse bouncing.

Saturday night and the following morning’s lineup looked to be one for the record books. That is, until the snowstorm shut it down. I had the
pleasure of seeing two sets that really impressed me before Mother Nature took our sound. The first was Machinedrum who opened his set with howls towards the almost-full moon in unison with the crowd, Machinedrum set off to create a truly unique listening experience. A dynamic blend of breakneck-speed record selecting with live hardware manipulation and the incorporation of his live vocals had me in awe. One of the most unique sets I had ever seen and, I hope, indicative of more to come from this multi-decade veteran. Immediately afterwards, Minnesota rocked the decks with a furious energy. He opened up with his latest release; a remix-collaboration with MartyParty of Adele’s “Rolling in the Deep”. He then continued to drop track after track of
bass-infused bangers and coolers. He did a very impressive job building up a crowd for what would have been an epic night sans storms.

As I stated before, the family community at this event had me blown away. It was so strong that even when the weather took a turn for the worse, people made the best of their situation and didn’t let it ruin their good time. Renegade sound systems on Sunday offered music to keep the festivities going and Gladkill even stepped up and played a set (seeing as how his was affected by the weather). All in all, I have to give it up to The Irie Cartel and Camp ? Mark, as well as all involved, for making a truly memorable weekend.