Primavera Sound Festival

Primavera Sound (commonly referred to as simply Primavera) is an annual music festival held in Parc del Fòrum in Barcelona, Spain that takes place between the end of May and beginning of June. The first edition took place in 2001 in Poble Espanyol and moved to the Parc del Fòrum, a much larger site on the seafront, in 2005. The nature of the festival (urban and an integrated part of the city) and the wide range of bands represented have made Primavera Sound a meeting point for artists and spectators from all generations. Primavera Sound is one of the largest and most-attended music festivals in Europe and the biggest in the Mediterranean.

The success of the festival led to an expansion to Porto in 2012. This one takes place at the Parque da Cidade a week after the main edition. In 2022, the festival announced four new editions taking place in Los Angeles, Santiago de Chile, Buenos Aires and São Paulo. A much smaller version of the festival, Primavera Weekender, has been taking place in Benidorm each November since 2019.

The festival presents all genres including pop, indie, rock and the most underground tendencies of electronic and dance music.

Pixies, Arcade Fire, Queens of the Stone Age, The National, Nine Inch Nails, Kendrick Lamar, Neil Young, Sonic Youth, Portishead, Pet Shop Boys, Pavement, Echo & The Bunnymen, Lou Reed, My Bloody Valentine, El-P, Pulp, Patti Smith, James Blake, Cat Power, Public Enemy, Grinderman, Franz Ferdinand, Television, Devo, Enrique Morente, The White Stripes, LCD Soundsystem, Tindersticks, PJ Harvey, Shellac, Dinosaur Jr., New Order, Fuck Buttons, Swans, Melvins, Psychic TV, Spiritualized, The Cure, Bon Iver, La Buena Vida, Rosalía, Death Cab For Cutie, Iggy & The Stooges, De La Soul, Marianne Faithfull, Mazzy Star, Blur, Wu-Tang Clan, Phoenix, Radiohead, Animal Collective, Sigur Rós, The Jesus and Mary Chain and Tame Impala amongst many others have performed on its stages.

At every edition the event has grown both in terms of numbers and in terms of media exposure: press, radio and television both nationally and internationally. Its first edition in 2001 closed with an attendance of 8,000 people, an audience that by the latest edition in 2022 had become 500,000.

History

2001–2004: Beginnings at Poble Espanyol

Although Primavera Sound had existed in a small format in Barcelona since the 1990s, 2001 saw the first bigger event take place at the Poble Espanyol with more than one stage and attracted around 7,700 people. This venue is an open air architectural museum up the Montjuïc hill. It recreates the best and most famous venues and cultures within Spain.The bill included the likes of Armand Van Helden, Le Hammond Inferno, former main man of Pizzicato 5, Yasuharu Konishi, Faze Action, Bent, Los Planetas, Manta Ray, Sr. Chinarro, Samuel L. Session, Unkle, Carl Craig, Dj Godfather; and many other bands and DJs like Gentle People Djs, Leila, Zip and Gus Gus Djs.In 2002 Primavera Sound took place on 17 and 18 May. The main change was the addition of a second day to the festival. Sixty local and international bands and DJs played on five different stages that year, including Pulp, Tindersticks, Spiritualized, Echo & The Bunnymen, J Mascis, Aphex Twin, Luke Slater, Giant Sand, The Delgados, Dave Clarke, Bis, Ian Pooley, Andrew Weatherall, Le Tigre, Gonzales, The Moldy Peaches, Chicks On Speed, Clem Snide, La Buena Vida, Green Velvet, Cinerama, Lo-Fidelity Allstars and The Zephyrs. 2002 was also the first year to include non-musical performances.

24,000 people attended in 2003, and the number of acts also increased to more than 90 groups and DJs both local and international. Five areas were arranged at the Poble Espanyol site for the night shows (Nitsa-Apolo, Rockdelux by Lois, CD Drome, Nasti and Psicolabis).
An extra site was added to the festival: Mercat de les Flors, for the day time activities: the Primavera Soundtrack Film Festival and the Record label Fair, which included two stages (acoustic and electric) where the label's bands showcased their works. Acts included Belle And Sebastian, Yo La Tengo, Teenage Fanclub, Arab Strap, I Am Kloot, Sonic Youth, Mogwai, The White Stripes, Television, Beef, The Go-Betweens, 2 Many Dj's, Julian Cope, Baxter Dury, Roni Size, Ed Harcourt, Antònia Font, Lcd Soundsystem, Märtini Brös, Erol Alkan, Gold Chains, Godspeed You! Black Emperor, Hangedup, The Streets, Baby Zizanie, A Room With A View.

In 2004 the festival kept growing in length (three days in the Poble Espanyol), artists and attendance. Attendance increased to up to 40,000 people. Headliners included PJ Harvey, Primal Scream, The Divine Comedy, Wilco and Franz Ferdinand. The size of the simultaneous record label and industry fair also increased, with 30 stands representing the leading independent Spanish record labels, as well as specialized press and associated companies.

2005–2009: Expansion

In 2005 the festival relocated from the Poble Espanyol to the Fòrum site. This new site was built explicitly for the 2004 Universal Forum of Cultures. It is a 14-hectare multipurpose public park meters away from the Mediterranean Sea. It is best known for its public art, the Museum of Natural Sciences of Barcelona and its underground auditorium, its seaview and solar panels, with the last one becoming one of the emblems of the site. Other points in favour was the proximity to commercial and residential areas of Sant Adrià and Poblenou, which has been described as the "hipster" part of the city, and its great connection with public transport through the Metro Line 4 and the Trambesòs.

2005 saw the first use of the Auditorium building where some of the main performances of that weekend took place, such as Antony & The Johnsons, Vic Chesnutt and Tortoise. Headliners included New Order, Iggy Pop’s Stooges live comeback, Sonic Youth, Steve Earle and Gang of Four.

2006 saw only minor changes in the layout of the stages and some improvements in the infrastructure. Performers included Lou Reed, Motörhead, Yo La Tengo, The Flaming Lips, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Babyshambles, Animal Collective, Gang Gang Dance, Deerhoof, Richard Hawley, Isobel Campbell, José González, Vashti Bunyan,

2007 saw the audience increase to over 60,000 attendees. With thirty per cent of the audience coming from other countries, The 150 acts included Wilco, Smashing Pumpkins, Sonic Youth played the legendary album Daydream Nation integrally and the Forum vibrated with the concert of the veteran Patti Smith, The Good, the Bad & the Queen, The Durutti Column, Maxïmo Park, Buzzcocks, Grizzly Bear, Billy Bragg, Low, Band Of Horses, Diplo, Erol Alkan and many others.

2008 saw around 160 artists perform in venues both in the Parc Del Fòrum and into the centre of Barcelona city. Performers included Portishead, MGMT, Public Enemy, Vampire Weekend, Cat Power, El Guincho, Bon Iver, Dirty Projectors, Explosions In The Sky, Why? and Caribou.

2009 saw a total of 171 concerts and over 80,000 spectators. The audience was spread around the fourteen stages of the festival, six of which are on the Parc del Fòrum site (76,000 spectators) and another eight distributed around the centre of Barcelona with Primavera in the city, which attracted 4,600 more spectators. The starting signal was given in various underground stations of the town centre on Saturday 23 May and the usual presentation showcases, organized with the collaboration of different record companies and taking place from Monday the 25th in the Apolo, and Sidecar. The main event took place on the 28th, 29th and 30 May and the second edition of Primavera at the Park (free concerts in the Joan Miró) consolidated itself in 2009 with twelve concerts which prolonged the festival into the Sunday 31 May.

Headliners included My Bloody Valentine, Yo la Tengo, The Vaselines, Phoenix, Aphex Twin, Squarepusher, Andrew Bird, The Horrors, Bloc Party, Throwing Muses, Saint Etienne, Jarvis Cocker, Art Brut, Damien Jurado, Sonic Youth, Herman Dune, Deerhunter, Simian Mobile disco, Liars, Michael Nyman, Ghostface Killah, Black Lips and Neil Young.

2010–2019: Reafirmation and internationalization

2010 saw over 100,000 spectators attend the festival for the first time, and featured the first edition of PrimaveraPro, a gathering more than 400 music industry professionals from different countries and different areas within the sector such as labels, booking agencies, promoters or festival programmers.

Performers included Pavement, Superchunk, The Fall, The XX, Pixies, Beach House, Pet Shop Boys, Orbital, Ben Frost, Van Dyke Parks, Built To Spill, Grizzly Bear Dum Dum Girls, and Los Campesinos!.

In 2011 attendance grew to over 120,000 people. Performers included Caribou, Echo & The Bunnymen, Mercury Rev

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