2016 Music Bank Gangnam Festival

Every year around this time in Gangnam they block off the main street outside Coex and set up a huge stage for Gangnam Festival. It's without fail total chaos and the view is usually awful because there are trees and light poles all up and down the street. Logistically it must be a nightmare but they do it every year regardless so respect for their resilience I guess.

First time I went was when SHINee debuted Everybody and Symptoms at the festival and it was insanity. Three days of lining up and the standing area was so packed and crazy people were hurting each other. The festival usually falls when there's a public holiday on Friday and the concert itself is on Sunday so people used to line up for three days to get a good spot inside the standing area. This year they changed things around and combined with Music Bank, moving the festival to Friday. There was a lot less lining up and I think the situation was less crazy than usual.

However, anyone who's been to Gangnam Festival knows the wide sidewalks are empty and you can stand on the sides and see the stage better than where they cram you into pits so...the sidewalk also gets extremely crazy.

I got there after work from the other side of Seoul and the first performance was starting by the time I got there. A lot of fan sites of other groups were clearing out as their idol performed so I was able to shift up, but as far as visibility goes I didn't get to see too much of SHINee at this event. They came out onto the end stage for Beautiful and I could see them much better. Basically the event was another chance to make a lot of noise for SHINee and fan chant like crazy. The concert isn't really enjoyable when you're so squished and cramped among a lot of grumpy people ^.^ But SHINee looked like they were having fun and they were being cute in their super short interview. I enjoyed that SHINee were the only group interviewed and that they got to perform 2 songs~ SHINee are doing well these days~ :D

Getting out of the festival was an ordeal in and of itself. Such a small space and so many people were crowding the back where the idol tents were. As we were crossing the road some member from 2pm actually rode past on a bike and a few people recognized him so that was pretty strange ^.^;;

Basically....I wrote this for the sake of keeping up my goal to write about every SHINee event during this comeback period. So yeah...Gangnam Festival...another event I'd only recommend if you're a big fan of multiple groups. Chaos~~~~~