Electric Forest 2018: The magic, the heat, the music revisited

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Two weekends of musical marvels in the woods of Rothbury came to a close last weekend. Relive some of the highlights in Local Spins photos and a video, with links to Electric Forest coverage elsewhere.

Lighting the Forest: Another edition of the world-renowned music festival is now in the books. (Photo/Anna Sink)

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After nearly flawless weather held sway over Electric Forest 2018’s first weekend, the second volley of electronic music, jam bands, funk, hip hop and cutting-edge jazz simmered in sweltering conditions that qualified as the hottest Forest ever.

‘Awesome’: Festivalgoers came to Rothbury from all corners of the country. (Photo/Veronica Leigh Anderson)

A number of festivalgoers were treated for heat-related symptoms — and 27 arrested on a variety of charges, according to MLive — but the overall vibe, as usual, seemed to be upbeat and psychedelically groovy during this annual soiree at Double JJ Resort in Rothbury. (Police also later announced that the son of a Hollywood director who attended Electric Forest died of a heart attack on the Monday after the festival. Story link below.)

The music was hot, too, as evidenced by the fact that 9,000 more people attended Weekend 2 than Weekend 1 in 2018.

They were drawn not only by headlining sets from “house band” The String Cheese Incident and Bassnectar and the usual electronic music suspects, but by several sizzling acts that proved to crowd-inspiring highlights: Zhu, The Dip, Fruition, The Main Squeeze and Too Many Zooz, the energetic New York “brasshouse trio” that drew wild, approving throngs for every set of its jazz-, funk- and Afro-Cuban-propelled magic through both weekends.

And there was the somewhat “secret” Deadmau5 set performed Saturday under the alias TestPilot.

But many of the 40,000-plus festival-goers who traveled from across the country for each weekend – hailing from Maine, California, Maryland, Arizona, Ohio, Texas and beyond – were there for the experience and the festival camaraderie as much as the music itself.

Weekend Throngs: Crowds were bigger during Weekend 2. (Photo/Anna Sink)

“This is awesome,” said Taylor Stapleton, 22, who traveled from Columbus, Ohio, with friend Bailey Delacruz, 22, to get their jam-band fix after they were given free tickets to the festival.

“It’s different than anything you can find in Canada,” added a festivalgoer who identified herself only as Sachi and who traveled to Electric Forest with a group of friends from Toronto.

At one point, on the festival’s final day, storms forced Electric Forest organizers to temporarily halt performances on the venue’s stages and clear the venue for safety reasons before firing things back up for the musical finale, which extended deep into the evening and gave Foresters the climactic finish they deserved.

Check out the photo galleries and some video highlights here, along with links to festival coverage by other media outlets.

PHOTO GALLERY 1: Electric Forest 2018 photos by Anna Sink