The Oya festival 2015 has started, and the first day is over. The headliner on the big stage was Chic featuring Nile Rodgers, while In Flames closed in the tent stage, Sirkus. Before that, there was music on 6 stages for 9 hours, from 2 until 11 PM. Here are the bands I managed to see yesterday. (Photo above: Nile Rodgers from CHIC)
The Oya festival is over, and it is a whole year to next time. This year the festival was held in a new location, which proved successful for the audience and hopefully also for the artists. It worked just fine for us photographers too, with good conditions and possibilities for some good shots. Here are my personal favorites from the bands I photographed at the festival. (Picture above: Bryan Ferry’s drummer Cherisse Osei.)
Mayhem are Norway’s longest existing black metal band. It is also the band with the most controversy surrounding it. On Friday they celebrated their 30 year anniversary at the Oya festival with the stage full of carcasses and pigs’ heads and some good new and old school black metal. Here are pictures from the concert.
Bryan Ferry played the big stage at the Øya festival last night, and he is still the stylish guy, even at almost 69. His voice is the same, smooth and inviting, and the songs are good as always. Bryan Ferry is a pop history legend with his background from Roxy Music, and a big and happy crowd enjoyed his concert yesterday.
If you want to see only one of today’s soul artists, you should start with Janelle Monae. Yes, there are others, they sell buckets of records, but they don’t have the natural charm and musicality of Janelle Monae. And their stage shows are bigger, costlier and much more cynically predictable. Yesterday Janelle Monae scored a new victory at the Øya festival in Oslo.
The last time I saw Queens Of The Stone Age, or QOTSA for short, was at the Norwegian Wood festival in Oslo in 2008. That time Josh Homme was sick with food poisoning, but they still delivered a very good concert. Yesterday QOTSA headlined the opening day at the Øya festival in Oslo, and the band showed that they are still the kings of stoner rock.
Friday at Oya was sunshine again. Most of the mud had dried, and it was good to come down before the music started. This was the day of Kraftwerk, and many had come to see them. But before they entered the stage and the fans put on their 3D glasses, there were lots of other great acts to see.
The two big brit pop bands in the mid 90’s were Oasis and Blur. Suede and Pulp were also there, but didn’t reach the same level as the other two bands. I saw Oasis at the ACL festival in 2005 and wasn’t impressed. Yesterday Blur played at the Oya Festival in Oslo, headlining the big stage, and I saw a vital and well played band.
Jeff Tweedy, the singer and front man of Wilco, is 45 years old today. For almost 30 years he has been one of the most important men in the Alternative Country movement, with a background form Uncle Tupelo and Wilco.
Charles Bradley has got one of the greatest soul voices I have heard. It took him 54 years to debut as a recoding artist. Lucky for us he is still touring and putting out records ten years after his first one. This weekend he played the Oya festival in Oslo. Here are some pictures from the concert.
Artist Pictures Blog 