Best grooves of the summer

What would happen if a bunch of music fans, with decades of experience in the business, got together to plan their perfect festival?

They’d find a killer venue, nestled beside a mountain lake, bring together top-tier acts like The String Cheese Incident, Garaj Mahal and Five Alarm Funk, and give them as much opportunity as humanly possible to play.

That’s exactly what the organizers of the Element Music Festival did. Now entering its second year, the home-grown festival is bringing its stellar lineup back to one of the true hidden gems of the B.C. Interior, the Snug Lake Amphitheatre in Princeton.

The amphitheatre sits snuggled amid 160 acres of wilderness, next to an alpine lake. As an attendee of last year’s inaugural festival wrote, “this is as magical as it gets for outdoor live music!”

Justin Picard is a spokesperson for the festival, and admits that, while Snug Lake is one of the most beautiful places he’s ever been, the real magic of the Element Music Festival lies in the passionate band of Canucks behind it.

Picard says he’s never met a group of organizers more devoted to making sure the music at Element is given its proper place.

“I cannot express enough how big of music fans the organizers really are,” he says. “These guys wanted to do something big with their favourite bands, and in doing that they’ve created this amazing festival that harkens back to the old jam band festivals of the late 90s.”

Everything about Element is designed to showcase the acts and make it as easy as possible for fans to actually see the shows, instead of spending their time scrambling from stage to stage as they try to catch sets.

At Element, Picard says, there are no overlapping sets. Bands take to the festival’s only stage one at a time, and no show is shorter than 90 minutes.

Many of the big acts also play several times during the course of the four-day festival, giving fans plenty of opportunity to get their groove on.

“In a time when corporate music festivals are taking over and quashing the independent festivals, here’s a handful of guys who are going against that, and creating this beautiful festival in the process,” Picard says.

This structure also means fans get the chance to frolic in the stunning, untapped wilderness that surrounds the venue.

Picard says there will be plenty of time for plunging into the alpine lake, or hiking and mountain biking along the trails that crisscross the area, and still get back to “soak in the amazing live music that will fill your soul all night long.”

The Element Music Festival runs from Aug 3-6 this year. For the complete lineup, and more information, check out the festival online.