Marc's Public Blog - Clubbing and Trance

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Right after Ozora, it was time to go to Cluj for another Untold.

Cluj was a bit too close to have reasonable flighs, but didn't find a train (apparently, there was a dual train option I wasn't able to find), so I went for flixbus, couldn't be so bad, could it? Spoiler alert, 7h in flixbus sucks :)

But back to Untold, this report was a bit hard to write, because part of it partially felt like a letdown, and a partial downgrade compared to my first years. At the same time, it was still a lot of fun, it was even more special because I managed to get a room in the Radisson, inside festival grounds, and on top of being a very special hotel, it had its own parties to add to Untold itself. Also, I am ever thankful for the hospitality from Bogdan, Adrian, and all the team that has been running Fortune all these years, that part was loads of fun, thank you Bogdan, Adrian and everyone else!

So I'll look at this year's untold from 2 vantage points, from someone who has never been, and is looking for a festival to go to in Europe, and from someone like me who has now been 4 years in a row and seen some things not improve, or go down.

You can read my previous reports here:

Radisson Blue was eff'ing cool

very welcome

most welcome I've ever felt :)

view on the festival

special events

yummy food

white party

white party!

How Untold lost losing the magic somwehat for me this 4th year

I tend to notice the little things that add or remove magic to a festival, and Untold was doing quite well on the magic side, but this year, I noticed that it just didn't feel they tried as hard.
For starters, the iconic Untold sign was not lit up once during the 4 days that I was able to see"

so sad, why was it never fixed and lit up?

this is how it was before:

And if you're asking "what little things", I mean things like this. Those fireflies were absolutely magical. How much did they cost? A fraction of a percent of the total festival costs, but it added a lot to the "magic feel"

I also didn't notice as many fireworks compared to previous years. Was it cost cutting?

So many things are sponsored, that's not uncommon at festivals, even if undesired for me for the most part, but Untold has been feeling to me like the worst on that front

one thing I liked the least about Untold was all the promo for more smoking, in such big ways :(

ok, redbull, sure :)

Much fewer dancers/performers and the few I found were sponsored by Mcdonalds.
Everything was sponsored, it really took away from the magic :-/
I really liked the costumed performers but it was noticeable that there were a lot fewer this year. Again, cost cutting?

not only, did I see very few, but sponsored by Mcdonalds, really? Talk about killing the magic :-/

The Grounds

good map

VIP didn't get you so much unless you paid a lot more for a table, and those tables were blocking the view

One thing I still enjoyed was the small lake and watercrafts you could rent, even if you had to use the fake and unreliable wristband money to pay for them.

pretty at night

People

I always find it cute to have small children come enjoy the festival :)

no idea how this got through security, but it did :)

Lots of fun being with friends again, starting with Bogdan:

Somna's debut at Untold

Untold is a great to way to meet DJs after their set

And of course, I couldn't resist getting a few of my own:

great to see Somna again

as well as Cold Blue

and RAM :)

Richard Durand

Talla 2XLC and FactorB!

And of course, my friends I've made at Untold:

Festival Days

Day 1

Daxson was back, but more for techno than trance

Little jump to other stages and mainstage:

Day1 Summary:

Day 2

lovely to have Somna's debut

From there, went to check out a few other stages, including some DnB:

Back to Fortune for GO:

Day2 Summary:

Day 3

Unfortunately, Anthony played more of a techno set this time around (and so did other trance DJs I love):

B2B

And more B2B

Day3 Summary:

Day 4

Day 4, here we go!

Laura Van Dam went full dark techno

Ruben did an interesting set at the edge of Trance and Techno

That was a lot of techno, so I went to hop to mainstage:

fewer fireworks, but lasers were still there

Back to fortune to finish the night:

It wasn't a good party if you don't get to watch sunrise from it :)

and untold often ends with a 06:00 flight out of Cluj on monday morning with no sleep :)

Day4 Summary:

Parting Thoughts

Actually the whole check-in, and it was a required online check-in procedure which was very very broken this year (server timeouts, not be able to proceed, forcing the upload of pictures of personal info with broken gateways) and without all this, you could not register and get a bar code to get in. In more details: The new external company I was forced to go through to register my wristband with a lot of personal information a festival has no business collecting and I cannot trust them to keep it safe in the future, had some pretty massive computer failures that prevented me from registering a wristband for 2 hours straight, requiring 27 tries, re-entering private information and required pictures, that got lost each and every time until the 27th until it finally worked. OMG, why all this pain? None of this is needed, just please sell a ticket, give a QR code, you go somewhere you scan the code for a wristband, and you're done. Should take less than 1mn, not hours and then big lines of people stuck outside not able to get in because they didn't register correctly (or couldn't). I really really hope they get rid of all this computer fat, it's not needed, other big festivals work great without it.

I'm sorry, but Untold's IT has been between poor and bad in all the years I've been (from losing my ticket, losing my fake money, and more), and this year it was just as bad except worse in that they forced you to buy some video game-like "rhuna" fake money from some 3rd party company, as the only currency that would be allowed within festival grounds. WTAF?
And yes, you guessed it, that fake money was also broken, between 2 people on one group ticket purchased, it got assigned to the wrong person, and the leftovers were never refunded despite promises that they would. I mean sure, if I wasted more hours of my life to this fake money recovery, it might have worked, but I have other things to do with my life, and I'm afraid to say that I think they are "banking" on exactly that to keep lots of leftover money. So sad and so wrong :(
Ok, I actually need to put an update: apparently, contactless credit cards and pay by phone was finally allowed this year, but that was announced nowhere. I had to buy the fake money because it was impossible to get anything without it in the past and they made literally 0 announcement that real money would be finally allowed. If that did happen, even silently, well, that's a good thing. The only step left is to make it clear to everyone and it will take most of my complaints away.

My feeling that they didn't try as hard to make things magic and that untold had kind of become a money making machine, wasn't helped that they put Untold X tickets for sale in the middle of the festival, without even announcing the dates, or confirmed the location for sure. That felt very questionable and showed lack of humility in my book. I do not claim to be right, but impressions do matter, so I hope the Untold team gets this and can take it into account for Untold X.
I mean telling people to buy tickets for the next year, in the middle of a set, with unannounced dates and technically the location in the park was not even confirmed:

As I promised earlier, you can review Untold 2024 two ways: against the trance paradise it was 3 and 4 years ago, or against similar festivals on the market, today, and the short story is:

If Untold were paying me as a festival advisor consultant (they're not, haha, but maybe this should be my new job, haha?), this is what I would tell them:

Things that are great, not to change:

So there you go, how is Untold X going to be (the 10th edition)? Will it add back the few things that were missing or went down this year and make things even better, or is it going to become more tomorrowland-like, a money making machine before all? (note, I'm not trying to be harsh, I want Untold to show me my concerns were wrong, that the magic is still there, an that edition X will be the best one ever!)
Also, if you're a trance lover, how will the trance lineup be for Untold X? I recommend holding off until it is released so that you can decide whether to go. In past years, I'd have gone on faith alone, but for the next one, I'd recommend waiting to see what's announced before you buy.

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