Swingamajig

Swingamajig has been held in Birmingham for a good few years. I’ve always wanted to go, but as it’s held on the May bank holiday — I always remember too late and have something else planned. The stars seemed to align for this weekend and after obtaining tickets, I arranged to meet up with Caroline B and a couple of out of town friends to head down for a day of gypsy-​electro-​swing mayhem of a Sunday.
The event is held in the Custard Factory over multiple venues. We managed to get our wristbands without any queueing and after buying our reusable plastic glass, we entered the main atrium of the Custard for drinks and mayhem. First stop — The Mockingbird. These guys were hosting a cabaret/​burlesque stage for the day and offered pints for £3 (a significantly cheaper drink than elsewhere until they totally ran out of draught). As the day ended up being (mostly) sunny, we took a seat by the pool and just drank in the atmosphere. People of all ages dressed up the nines in 40’s, 50’s and 60’s gear were smiling, dancing and generally really getting into the swing of things.
Next stop — The Oobleck. A draught pint was £3.50 here (again, until everything ran out) and we caught a really fantastic brass band who played covers of all sorts of different genres and eras. I was particularly impressed with the mash up covers of Daft Punk, Eurythmics, Prodigy and Chemical brothers. Again, the atmosphere was really fantastic and everyone was dancing away — even at 4pm!
After this we decided to explore the rest of the stages. The main stage and acoustic (I think), were well signposted around the corner from the main atrium under the arches. This area also boasted lots of delicious street food (Pietanic proved the be a great choice) and portaloo’s (for those who didn’t want to walk back to the venues). The main stage was in the warehouse area. This area is massive and coped with the crowds, even when the bigger names were scheduled later in the day. You could crush up at the front, but we chose to hang at the back and have a dance for the acts that we caught.
The second stage seemed to have more gypsy folk style music, but still proved to be popular with the crowds. The sound quality (despite it being outside) was pretty good and we caught a little of the acts here before heading back into the venue.
A pit stop at Alfies (who had also run out of all things draught) was a great choice. The bar queue was insane, but they were offering food and had plentiful tables out so you could rest your weary legs. The menu was more limited than usual (totally understandable), but it still had a great atmosphere and our friends noted that it’s a shame that they don’t always play the music they had on — it seemed very fitting for the venue.
We had a really fantastic time! A couple of things to note were that the bars ran out of draught within the first couple of hours (which seemed a little ill-​planned) and the Custard Factory didn’t open their main toilets (which would have been really useful considering the crowds that were there), but the music was fantastic and I really liked the layout of all the stages. It would have been good to have printouts/​posters of the line up on the day, but short of this — it was a well run, friendly and ridiculously fun festival.
If it sounds like your kinda thing, it’s worth getting in there early for super early bird tickets (which work out really cheap). Hat’s off guys, we’ll be seeing you next year!