a letter from the gathering
The Gathering 2000 is ON!
All 8,000-and-a-bit tickets are now SOLD, and there will, as usual, be NO gate sales. While this is a very exciting thing for The Gathering and a perfect reflection of how well-loved and respected this party has become, we do apologise to all who have missed out.
For those of you lucky enough to get a ticket - we'll see you up the hill for the millennium! Now please stop hassling the poor wee ticket sellers - they're all going slightly mad fielding so many requests for tickets they just don't have...and they've done a great job - big thanks, guys!
We're in the final stages of sorting out the zone lineups - with well over 400 submissions to choose from, it's been a mammoth task, but we're almost there, and we'll be getting contracts out to the successful few very soon. Hang in there! We'll be announcing the full lineup in next month's Lava magazine.
Strange rumours abound - as usual - the latest is that The Gathering was listed at number 7 in Oprah Winfrey's Top 10 Millennium Events on the Planet. And the reason she knows? Cos her good friend Quentin Tarantino's been to the last two Gatherings.... yeah, right! That's nearly as good as "David Bowie's playing at The Gathering" (along with Kiri Te Kanawa, Split Endz and Portishead, no doubt), which later morphed into "David Bowie's BOUGHT The Gathering so he can play the midnight slot in the trance zone....." teeheehee - all untrue, I'm sure.
Other listings... remember how we were supposed to be at number 3 in the world for millennium events according to one UK website? Well, apparently we're now at number 2... dunno who's at number 1 - and we still don't know the URL for this strangely elusive site - maybe it's just another urban myth...
Plans are well sussed for bringing the gear and sound systems onsite - we're having an open-air drum&bass zone this year, so the d&b massive get to give it up under the summer skies... well OK, actually it's 'cos the tent's been booked for the Chatham Islands, but hey! we're not complaining... we have lots and lots of portaloos, water, maybe even showers, a movie theatre, heaps of other great stuff and six zones of the best of Aotearoan electronica (with a coupla special guests from overseas...) - and of course we have the wonderfully magical venue that is Canaan Downs... and as we get power exclusively from generators onsite, we don't expect any Y2K meltdowns at G2K....
So - if you have your ticket and you've sussed your transport to The Big G - start planning what you're gonna do to make this one the best yet - it's a festival of participation after all, and this year we're going all-out to encourage you to do your thing! Check out the website - www.gathering.co.nz - for some ideas to get you started - see you up the hill.....