As summer winds down, the calendar virtually explodes with things to do every September - the Bengals roar (or is it limp) back into town, Oktoberfest releases its goetta fueled chicken dances, every arts organization in the city opens a new production, and then comes Midpoint, Cincinnati's locally grown, all organic feast of all things cool. Soapbox dedicates a chunk of its coverage this week to the annual music festival for a couple of different reasons - first, we love it. And then there's the fact that Midpoint is the kind of event that Soapbox is all about, a celebration of talent, innovation and diversity all within an environment of electric possibility. This week, Soapbox pulls CityBeat Music Editor, Mike Breen away from the festival to talk about Midpoint as well as Cincinnati's vibrant music scene.
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SoapBlog 1 - The Mike Breen Festival
Posted By: Mike Breen
9/23/2008
I always felt like the MidPoint Music Festival should have been re-named the Mike Breen Festival. Not because I’m so awesome, but because it seemed like an event built just for me.
MidPoint represents my approach to finding new music. While some don’t do much searching when it comes to music — buying whatever the mainstream radio outlets and corporate labels are selling — I’ve long been a seeker. As a kid, I’d pour through every music magazine I could get my hands on – from Trouser Press and Option to Spin and Rolling Stone – in search of something enticing. Music videos, radio, late-night TV talk shows — wherever there was music I was unfamiliar with, I’d dive in. Needless to say, the vastness of music available digitally has helped feed this desire perfectly in the 21st century.
So when MidPoint first came to be, I was in heaven. Not only could I see many of the local bands and artists I’d become enamored with, but I could literally walk into any bar on the Main Street strip and have a 50/50 chance of finding something great. Not that everything at MidPoint was or is spectacular – I’ve stumbled into more than a couple of clunker shows during MidPoint’s lifespan – but that element of not knowing still made it all rather exciting, at least for this music nerd.
I was always puzzled why more people didn’t come to MidPoint every year. The festival was aggressively marketed to people in the area who never or hardly ever go out to see original bands unless it was at Riverbend or some other large venue. MidPoint needed to attract people outside of “the choir” (those frequent local music supporters who would show up regardless) and the previous organizers had a lot of success doing that.
But MidPoint seemed to hit a ceiling in the past couple of years, at least in terms of attendance. It felt like it needed something to push it further and that’s why CityBeat was interested in taking control. We’re hoping that by booking some more well-known artists — like Indie Rock god Bob Pollard or Pop duo Mates of State — some of those people who stayed away from the festival in the past would come to check out the big-shots, then – ideally — stick around and see what else the fest has to offer. And then, even more ideally, they’d continue to go out and see original live music not played on Q102.
I’ve actually had friends look through the MidPoint schedule in the past, then look me straight in the eye and say, “I don’t know if I’m going — I don’t know any of the bands playing.”
My answer was and will always be: “That’s the point.”