Beaucoup Buku!

In its eighth rendition, this year’s Buku Music and Arts Project blew out the stops, with bigger-name acts, bigger stages, and a bigger area than ever before. With amazing food, art, and performances not only from great EDM artists but also from New Orleans locals as well as lovers of the city, this sold-out two-day festival was just the kickoff to the festival season we needed.

Festi-fave vendors or local NOLA flare?

One of the strongest points of Buku, at least from my standpoint, was all of the ways that it seemed to be working to be a truly New Orleans festival, embracing the city’s amazing history and culture. A big part of this was displayed in the food vendors available. Rest assured that there were offerings for tacos and slice pizza, but in equal measure you could get a dish stuffed full of crawfish and shrimp, a local staple. Foods such as po’boy sandwiches, muffaletta bites, and other various regional variations were available to truly help you embrace the city that was surrounding the festival.

I may not know art, but I know what I like.

As you would expect of an event that calls itself an “arts project,” Buku had no shortage of various arts for viewing, many mixing multiple media to achieve signature looks. If there’s a single art style that defines the city of New Orleans, it would have to be graffiti, and as much as the style permeates the city, it also permeated this festival. On Friday when gets opened, most surfaces were blank slates with artists invited by the festival to add their own flare to the festival grounds. Throughout the day and night, artists worked and collaborated together to mix media and create extensive and beautiful pieces, mixing flyers/roll-on art with graffiti on top. There were also live painters on both canvas and large plywood slabs creating masterpieces of both the event, as well as portraits, road crossings, and things you only normally see in dreams. In conjunction with these more traditional art forms were things like the large light monolith known as “The Beacon,” projectors tracing lights onto the distant and aged power plant, roving carts that were part DJ ensemble and part roving performance troupe. Then there were more intricate and eclectic pieces such as a glowing tree covered in Mardi Gras beads, a cart filled with computer monitors displaying many different snippets of shows at a time, an interactive projector, and so much more.

Lights, Camera, Action!

One thing often sought after at music festivals is the almighty ~vibe~, and overall I would define the Buku vibe as lifestyle over positivity. If you are looking for a festival where you can meet festival family, show up solo and leave with lifelong friends and feel completely at ease, then Buku may not be the festival for you. Based on my experience, the Buku vibe is one of clout, influence, and status. What does this mean? It means that many attendees are here to get the perfect Instagram picture while some music plays in the background. It means that coordinated outfit colors come before comfort and relaxation. It means that by buying the VIP package you get exclusive concerts GA attendees cannot see or hear. Overall, Buku felt like it was, for many, more of the background on which social media marketing careers could be built and that the music in the background was just meant to optimize FOMO.

Headbang? Headbang!

Finally, we come to the music. Though not for everyone, this weekend brought together a strong mix of current super popular hits, electronic gods wielding bass as a weapon, and festival favorites and smaller names in the electronic genre’s. Bands like Sunsquabi and Papadosio were able to share space and fans with groups like Dashboard Confessional, We Came as Romans, and $uicdeboi$, just to name a few. Headliners included a bass assault from the likes of Excision and RL Grime as well as popular hits from Lana Del Rey, Kevin Gates, and A$AP ROCKY. Some fans could be found online saying that the bigger stages lacked some volume or lack of clean sound, but this was an analysis missed by me. I will be the first to admit I do not have the most finely tuned ear, and details of music, especially hard-hitting EDM, are often lost on me. If it sounds at least halfway decent and I do not deal with noise bleed from other stages, neither of which were an issue at Buku, then the other half of the details gets lost in the dancing and moving. The only artist I found having noticeable sound issues was Del Rey, whose vocals were clearly turned down far too low. Overall, for the average person I would say Buku curated an awesome musical experience, with well-timed variety that split overwhelming crowds up well in order to allow for most stages to be enjoyable and passable throughout the weekend.

So, what’s the verdict?

Overall, if you are an EDM/Rap/Pop fan and want to take a trip down to the bayou, Buku is a great reason to make that trip. You can choose among dancing your face off and building social media clout, enjoying some of the best street art the world has to offer, and eating some of the most innovative local cuisine all in one stop, as well as having an amazing city surrounding you to explore before and after each day’s festivities. In addition to this, you have multiple upgrade options with your ticket to make your experience into the perfect fit for you and your needs. Our one suggestion, though, is to be sure you travel with a solid group of friends to enjoy the festival with, because making new friends while at this festival may be more difficult than some others, and if you want to make the most out of your time be sure one of your group is good at finding those just-right camera angles!