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Rocking the Daisies 2012 has come and gone and was, as we suspected, a huge success. We sent one of our sidekicks, Michal Granicki, down to Cape Town with a group of his mates and asked him to come back with some photos and his experience of this years 49M Rocking the Daisies. Finally recovered, Michal did exactly that and sent us this write up and the super sweet photos you’ll see below: 
A few days ago we hit up the 7th 49M Rocking the Daisies annual music festival. As usual we were back to Darling, to the Cloof Wine Estate for a sold out event that would definitely test the tranquility of this wicked spot about an hour outside of Cape Town. We dig this event so much we fly in from Joburg every year, okay maybe not every year.
Off the bat, the weather was crap. Cape Town weather really flipped this year’s event and our image of half-naked babes walking around in bikinis (like last year) was ruined. Instead we saw jerseys and ridiculous furry animal hats on everyone. Even the hipsters weren’t warm in their vintage sweaters. The dam was barely used although the changed dynamic this year was everyone partying so much harder to stay warm. 
As always, there’s way too much awesome stuff going on at the festival. You’ll be lucky if you even see half of it during the weekend. Friday night’s Main Stage got rocked by Isochronous and The Kongos. Backdrops this year were impressive LED screens with some simple switching techniques. They were great and effective and you could see any acts members at once. It was a nice change from just seeing a lead singer’s mugshot the entire act. Jagermeister had a Rock Lounge this year which overlooked the main stage. Limited to VIP’s it was a great place to view the acts while hitting a few jagers.
Jeremy Loops was one of Saturday’s favourites, his style and method of music making on the fly is fun and always gets the crowd involved. Arno played well and brought in his Nudies classics. Main headline act Bloc Party had sound issues. They were supposed to sound better than they did. With no AV support Bloc Party (they didn’t want the screens) they still played a fantastic set of their tracks. 
The Mainstay Beach Bar (a.k.a the Jock Trap) was back this year. Described as “jocking the daisies”, this bar was always busy and we avoided it completely. It had to have great tunes from One Track Mike and Rob Taylor but that conclusion is solely based on how much fist pumping I saw while walking past during their stage times.
I spent most of my time at the Redbull Electro Tent that weekend. Friday specials were Grandmaster Flash and Pascal & Pearce. Grandmaster was pretty disappointing and it wasn’t the set people thought it would be. He played through tons of short samples of really good loops and tunes. It all just seemed like he wanted to play his best music at once and it never went anywhere.The lighting was improved and the AV this year made the tent even better. 
Toby2shoes got everyone Electro-swinging on Saturday and was one of the best acts at the festival. DJ Yoda was a big BOO because his laptop decided to pack out. RUDEONE was loud, and dirty but fantastic. His Drum & Bass is worth experiencing.
We kept ourselves busy during the day by watching local comedy at the Lemon Tree Theatre. Martin Evans and Shaun Fickling made me spill my beer I was laughing so much. The Schnit Cinema played weird and interesting films of varying lengths, we didn’t watch a single one. The food court was crowded but waiting times weren’t bad. The food as always was so damn good so we ate ourselves stupid. RTD is a wicked experience and if you haven’t been to one, put it on your calendar for next year. It is an event that gets better each year and the effort put in is noticeable. The only thing that would have made this event better would have been warmer weather.
Check out the awesome collection of photos Michal snapped at Rocking the Daisies:
