Inside Oslo’s 2024 Øyafestivalen: A true utopia of a festival
Imagine everything you hate about festivals, and then imagine it all gone. The obnoxious crowds that switch between disinterested chatting and bladdered screaming. The off-the-grid locations where entry requires a train, a sweaty shuttle bus and a half-hour trek with no service for Google Maps. The bad food that costs extortionate prices and sits thanklessly in your stomach while you’re trapped in the remote den of ghost kitchens and burger vans. The litter, filth, gross toilets and general layer of griminess that seems to cover your skin for days. The mornings spent doing absolutely nothing as you bake in a tent or simply twiddle your thumbs, waiting for the action to kick off again. The 11pm curfew where only a rave tent or a tired silent disco is there to meet you after. Imagine all the downsides of a festival, then imagine it all gone; that’s what Øyafestivalen is like.
Oslo’s beloved celebration has a lot to boast about. It sports countless incredible and proactive initiatives. It could brag about being the world’s greenest festival but they don’t, instead they spend time year in and year out actively improving upon their processes to make it better and better. By now, the attendees of the festival have a weekend of lower emissions than the average Norwegian, as everything from the power sources to the bins has been thought of with efficiency in mind. It goes beyond a conversation about climate, too, as they expand their conscientiousness to a whole manner of issues, with the 2024 event setting out to tackle period poverty and sustainability, making it a far nicer place to be for people with wombs when usually the thought of being at a festival during your time of the month is enough to make even the best lineups feel not worth it.
There are reams upon reams of glowing words that could be rightfully bestowed upon Øya as an incredibly forward-thinking and vital addition to the festival scene. However, what makes the event so special is that even amongst their considered actions, the energy is in no way lost. In fact, Oslo’s festival delivered the best festival atmosphere I’ve experienced, maybe ever.
The only word that feels apt to describe it all is “utopia”. From the first moment, we made the easy walk from the stunning coastal city centre to the festival grounds in under 40 minutes; it felt like a dream. When we joined our first crowd to find an entire sea of dancers there and ready for Nia Archives in the afternoon with no gurning faces but a whole gaggle of smiles, with friends and fans of all ages all bobbing to the tunes, it felt like a fantasy. Then, as we wandered to PJ Harvey to discover complete, astonishing pin-drop silence that let the musician’s incredible vocals float across the lush green field unaffected but met with rapturous applause after each song, it didn’t feel real.
That word “utopia” cropped up each day of the trip. From Wednesday through to Saturday night, Øya not only brings a world-class lineup that any other festival would be jealous of, delivering far more variety than many others, but it allows you to fully immerse yourself in Oslo. As the festival starts around 3pm each day and thanks to the city being so accessible and walkable, the mornings can be spent actually doing stuff.
There’s no rolling out of uncomfortable tents and attempting to get your energy back up by merely drinking through it. Instead, you sweat out the hangover with a sauna and then bring yourself back to life with a cold plunge into the fjord. You can go see Evdard Munch’s Scream painting at 2pm, then jump immediately on a ten-minute metro to be at the festival ready to see Wednesday or Andre 3000 or Alvvays a matter of minutes later. You can get on a boat and take a tour of the green islands, have some lunch, then walk over in a sea of all the other festival goers who have done the same and are all seemingly in the same great mood that the city seems to exude.
Then, at the event itself, the site is small enough to make day planning easy. The lineup is carefully curated to avoid clashes. The food is delicious and affordable. There’s a chance to see huge names along with plenty of opportunities to discover new artists, especially up-and-comers from Norway’s own scenes. Then, when it’s all done, Oslo’s thriving nightlife comes to life with plenty of options to keep the party going way into the early hours, whether that’s going to see emerging Irish indie from Cardinals or American rising star Nourished By Time at Revolver, a post-headline DJ set from Idles or a night of karaoke at Syng.
Maybe that’s the true root of Øya’s magic: the pure joy that comes with a gorgeous quality of life and a culture that seems to go all in when it comes to fun but in a way so different and, honestly, so much better than the UK could manage. Oslo is free from the annoying side of the UK’s festival culture, which is just people in a field on a mission to get black-out drunk, with the actual music being kind of beside the point.
It’s free from the kind of festival energy that often arises at the detriment of the music. Instead, each and every crowd at Øya seems dialled in, enjoying themselves and being respectful whether they know the artist or not. They’re there for the cultural outing and getting joy out of that, with that joy spreading across the entire grounds. The crowds were the most engaged sea of music fans I’ve ever seen at a festival, where often, amid today’s often ramshackle line-ups, a sense of disconnect can float in.
In short, it was a utopia. Not only are Øya changing the game when it comes to what a festival can and should be doing to make the live music scene a more sustainable and conscientious place, but Oslo’s energy should be a game changer when it comes to festival culture in general. They kept in all the good bits: the great music, the drinks, the dancing, the discovery of new artists. They added in even better bits when it came to the programme of walkable late-night gigs, impromptu parties and the days spent exploring a city. But they axed all the bad stuff, cleaning up the whole act of a festival from the environmental impact it leaves to simply the way it makes a music fan feel.
