Once again FEST approaches us and as you well know there are members of Punktastic that wait all year in anticipation of that weekend in Gainesville in Florida where they take the pilgrimage to Punk Rock Mecca. To kick off some of our Pre-FEST coverage and to get you in the mood (and buying a ticket!) we've got Maryam Hassan, Conor Mackie and Jeff Takacs talking about why they love to FEST as punters, bands and press. This week we have Conor, who tells us what it's like to be an English band playing FEST...

Think of the best people you know, no matter where they are in the world. Now imagine them all in the same place. Pretty cool, huh? Now imagine all of your favourite bands playing within a 20 minute walk of each other. Oh, and imagine the best food you’ve ever tasted. And the coldest beer. And the smoothest whiskey (from a $5 plastic bottle). And a swimming pool. Sounds impossible, right? Wrong. What you’ve just imagined is Fest.

I played my first Fest when I was 18. It was 2009 and the band I was in, Calvinball, somehow managed to convince Tony Weinbender, the brain behind Fest, that he should put our little English band on at his incredible American music festival. I think it was a little bit (read: completely) down to the fact that we played a Small Brown Bike cover, I had a leg brace on after smashing my knee up pretty bad and, most importantly, I think he was pretty wasted. I’m sceptical it had anything to do with our musical ability, or lack thereof. After our set, he told us we should come and play and we all laughed and didn’t really think about it until the next morning when Dave suggested we send him a cheeky email just to see if he was serious. It blew our minds when he replied saying that he was and that we were more than welcome to come over. I’m pretty sure we booked our flights that same day.

That was Fest 8. For some inexplicable reason, Tony scheduled us to play on the Sunday. We were the last band on the Side Stage at The Venue, just before Samiam. Holy shit. We had no gear because we couldn’t afford work visas (obviously), so we messaged the dudes in Wormburner who were playing before us to ask if we could borrow all of their instruments and they kindly said yes. At the time, I was surprised that this band who we’d never met immediately and unreservedly agreed to lend us all of their stuff, even down to drumsticks and guitar picks. But, now it seems so obvious. Of course they would lend us their stuff because, well, this is Fest. There’s such a huge communal spirit that engulfs Gainesville during Fest and it feels so great to be a part of it.

I got so drunk the night before we played. I couldn’t legally drink in America so reverted back to being a 14 year old drinking anything I could get my hands on when I wasn’t in a venue. (Fest did a real good job of making it impossible for me to drink in a venue by marking me with two HUGE X’s on my hands, so thanks for that, guys.) I got wasted with Tom Hawes and Comadre and we ended up having a transatlantic athletics tournament in the gym at the Holiday Inn. A running machine may or may not have been broken. I may or may not have lost the England vs. America press-up race. I may or may not have got knuckle and neck tattoos drawn on with a sharpie. I may or not have gone to bed at 7 in the morning after Dave told me I wasn’t allowed to come for breakfast because I was too drunk. This is what Fest means. Fest means getting drunk with your favourite bands. Fest means crying with laughter as Tom Hawes sprints on a treadmill. Fest means not believing that you’re actually going to play tomorrow. Fuck.

We didn’t really know what to expect, after all we were just a tiny band from Sheffield. No one in England knew who we were, so why the fuck would anyone in America? Either way, we were just so excited to be there and to play, even if it was to no one. But it wasn’t to no one. By the time we needed to go on, we’d already sold out of all of our merch. All of it, without playing a note. That wasn’t because we were good, it was because we were from England and Wormburner made sure to let everyone know that we’d come a long way to be there and people responded with cold, hard cash, sucka’. (That we then had to give it all away because Matt fell on Wormburner’s amp and broke it is beside the point.) Our show was ridiculous, people were falling on to the stage, people were crowd surfing on top of each other, there was human pyramids, beers were flying everywhere, chunks of the roof tiles ended up on the floor. It was ridiculous but, man, it was fun. Apparently Tony popped his head round the door at one point, took a look at the carnage, shook his head and swiftly left. That means he loved it, right?

I’ve played at Fest three times. After Fest 8, we returned the following year after touring down the East Coast with our now best-buds, Arms Aloft. As a 19 year old kid who’d just dropped out of University, to be able to go to America and play in my stupid punk band at the most amazing festival I’d ever been to (for the SECOND TIME) was such a dream. Tony Weinbender is a saint, a saint who grants wishes and fulfils dreams. Oh, don’t forget Sarah Goodwin, too. I guess you could say she occasionally does some work in making the whole of Fest run smoothly. Sometimes. Fest 9 saw us play during the day on the Saturday (Tony said that he didn’t want to give us a whole day to get drunk before we played again) and we played just after Grown Ups, who are pretty much the best band I’ve ever seen live. Fest means things like that – playing alongside your favourite bands that you would never have a chance of doing so in the UK. Fest means buying every flavour of Four Loko and mixing them all in your hotel bin along with some red bull and whiskey and what may or may not be speed and calling it ‘moon juice’. Fest means wearing sunglasses upside down and finger-gunning everybody and calling yourself ‘Party Conor’. It’s so stupid, man. It’s the best.

I played my last Fest at Fest 12. Calvinball had come to an end (almost) with Joe living in Australia and Dave, Matt and me living in different cities to each other. We convinced Seth and Alex from Arms Aloft to fill in for Joe and Matt and Dave and I played one last set at Fest. It was so amazing, everybody was so nice and Loosey’s was the coolest place to play. All of Calvinball have a Fest tattoo, which I guess shows how amazing it was for us to play there. Fest means spending a perfect weekend with people you won’t see for years. Fest means eating Boca Fiesta tacos after watching Donovan Wolfington. Fest means watching Dikembe play all of Chicago Bowls back to back and feeling like everything is perfect. Fest means watching J. Robbins and knowing that you’re the happiest you’ve been in a long time, even if it’s just for a weekend and it won’t be the same once you get home. Fest means you’ll have the best time, no matter what.

If I’m honest, playing at Fest is the worst bit about the whole weekend. It drags you away from that heady sense of excitement that hangs over the whole weekend and you get filled with nerves thinking, “Holy shit, I just saw Lubrano from Iron Chic is standing over there and we’re about to play our stupid songs in front of him”. Like Maryam said, though, there is no hierarchy at Fest. Sure, I’ve played there, but so has virtually every other person in attendance. No one (well, almost no one, I won’t name names) acts as if they’re above anyone or better than anyone. It’s the best feeling in the world to be watching one of your favourite bands and look over and see your other favourite bands singing along to every word. You feel that connection. People always talk about community in punk and there’s a lot to argue for or against that being the case and whether it applies everywhere and for everyone. There’s still so much to be done. At Fest, though, it feels like we’re there already. It feels like it’s real and it’s there and it’s special and we’re the ones who found it and made it and fuck anyone who told us we couldn’t do it and we couldn’t be here. It fills you with hope and excitement and genuine optimism and happiness courses through every part of your body. But, before you know it, it’s Monday morning and you have to say goodbye to all the friends that you made over the weekend, all the people you hugged, all the people you shared beers with and sang songs with and fell asleep with. You promise each other you’ll be back next year and you promise yourself that you’ll try and keep this positivity flowing through you all year until next time. Then you get home and you have to sit on the fucking tube for an hour and go to fucking work and you’re reminded why you go to Fest in the first place. It’s the shining light in a world full of shit.

Everyone is your friend and every single person you meet will share something in common with you. I’ve met some of my closest friends at Fest and even if we don’t see each other at all in between, we know that, in October, when we meet it’ll be as if we were never apart. Fest is magical. There’s something indescribable about it. It really does feel like home, even when you’re a pasty, sweaty, awkward English teenager standing in the middle of an insanely warm American college town. If you haven’t been, go. If you have been, go again. You won’t regret it. Fest is best.