TO WRITE LOVE ON HER ARMS TEAMS UP WITH ELECTRIC FOREST & BASSNECTAR TO PREMIERE
A VIDEO MESSAGE FOR NATIONAL SUICIDE PREVENTION WEEK: "YOUR STORY IS IMPORTANT"
WATCH/EMBED THE VIDEO HERE
Yesterday, Electric Forest (EF) - together with non-profit partner To Write Love on Her Arms (TWLOHA) and EF2017 performer Bassnectar - released a video in recognition of World Suicide Prevention Day (September 10) and National Suicide Prevention Week (September 10 - September 16). The video, titled "Your Story is Important," features footage captured during EF2017 - where EF community members roaming the festival's Sherwood Forest answered a ringing telephone. On the other end of the line was a new friend who, unbeknownst to the person picking up the phone, was EF fan favorite Lorin Ashton, AKA Bassnectar. Lorin remained anonymous and asked questions about friendships, family, and hope. "Your Story is Important" highlights some of those heartfelt conversations, and offers a poignant reminder that we all matter, that pain and doubt and hope are all shared experiences, and that we can - and need to - support each other through darkness. Watch the video here: ElectricForestFestival.com/TWLOHA
"It's amazing what can happen when we, as humans, are open to understanding our connectedness," says EF Founder / Producer and President of Madison House Presents Jeremy Stein. "And I don't mean that to sound sappy, it's just so real. At EF we strive to use music, art and community to really inspire us to nurture our sense of connectedness. That's when the magic happens. And I do feel like these moments were magic. They helped create an open dialogue about things that matter - and that dialogue, however difficult it might seem, heightens our opportunity for an individual and collective experience of love and light and joy."
"There is this indescribable moment when you first wander through the Sherwood Forest when you realize you're not alone," said Pasquale Rotella, Founder and CEO of Insomniac. "You are completely surrounded by a community of open-minded people who are excited to connect and share their experience with you. It's not easy opening up to people you don't know, especially when it comes to deeply personal matters, but it's amazing to see what the power of human connection and compassion can do. Everyone deserves to be loved."
"Electric Forest strikes me as one of the most brilliant celebrations of life there is," says To Write Love on Her Arms' Chad Moses. "That's not because the people at EF lack questions or pain, but because there is a willingness to share whatever they have, be it heavy or light. This experiment really found its depth and value in that sense of sharing; in the asking and responding to questions, and the discovering of common ground. It was about people finding a place for their hearts to land, and a lasting reminder that life is meant to be shared. It serves as proof that every story - YOUR story - is important."
First time EF attendee Susan answered one of those ringing telephones. The conversation that followed is captured in "Your Story is Important." Within minutes of talking to her interviewer, she found herself sharing the recent loss of her cousin to suicide. Months after that conversation, Susan recalls "It was one of the most cathartic releases I've perhaps ever had. I was suddenly overwhelmed by the beauty and love I recognized all around me.I felt my cousin with me." Susan continued, "Today, I feel like I have been able to release a lot of pain associated with my cousin's death. It feels like a weight was lifted, and that brightness was given back to me and I'm able to move forward."
Bassnectar, who has performed at Electric Forest 6 times since the festival's inception in 2011, was also deeply moved by his conversations with Susan and other Forest Family who picked up the phone. As Lorin recently told Westword Magazine,
"What I noticed [at Electric Forest], which was really striking to me, is that it is one of the most fun festivals of the year to play at... it's just always so ridiculously fun. But what I noticed is that even though it was so fun, it wasn't the highlight of my weekend. What the highlight of my weekend was was volunteering inside of this little treehouse in the middle of the woods... I was this old-timey switchboard, and I had an old-timey headset on, and I'd basically see a light pop up, which meant that there was someone at a phone, and I could ring it. Or I could just ring a phone until someone picked it up, and then I would talk to them. I was slotted to do it for an hour, and it was literally four hours past, and they were literally pulling me out.
When I walked away, I was like, that was so much more fun than playing a set. That was so much more fun than making music. People were wearing their hearts on their sleeves, and they were crying, and talking about suicide and losing their friends, just deep principles of life. I was marveling at that...at this place in my life that I never intended to get to - I'm almost forty years old - having this dreamlike music career, what stands out to me is just getting to visit with some people and talk about life and death with strangers."
Art collective The Grand Artique created the phone system for "Your Story is Important" by modifying a 1960's telephone switchboard to connect 10 phones. Within the heart of the Grand Artique's multistory, treehouse art installation & venue - a long time, ever evolving feature of EF's Sherwood Forest - a secret room held the switchboard, and concealed its operator. Throughout EF2017, the phones allowed patrons to call each other, or to speak with a hidden operator. Bassnectar, The Floozies and others participated as hidden operators. "In each of our installations our goal is to reach as many people as we can and to increase their opportunities to interact with their environment," says The Grand Artique's Westley Thornton. "With Electric Forest we found both an effective system for delivery and an audience with open hearts and minds and a willingness to pick up the phone, so to speak. It wasn't until we brought the telephones on line that we realized the full potential of this device to connect with our fellow random humans."
"Suicide, and the moments of despair that lead to suicide, happens to all walks of life, to all kinds of families in all kinds of situations," Susan reflects. "It's not a dark secret that should be locked away. The more we talk about it, the more we can help and maybe prevent it from happening."
Anyone who is looking for support or resources for the mental health & well-being of themselves or a loved one, is invited to visit TWLOHA.com/find-help.
To stay up to date on all Electric Forest news, please visit www.electricforestfestival.com and the official Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and YouTube pages.
Electric Forest is produced by Madison House Presents and Insomniac.
About Electric Forest:
Each summer, just as anticipation for Electric Forest reaches fever pitch, tens of thousands of fans - traveling from all parts of the country, and the world, gather at the Double JJ Ranch in Rothbury, Michigan for the music & camping adventure of a lifetime. Excitement for Electric Forest has never been greater. In 2017, Electric Forest expanded to two distinct, back-to-back weekends.
Having just wrapped up its seventh year, Electric Forest is known for bringing together a passionate group of fans whose shared community spirit makes the festival a truly unique experience. The festival incorporates the natural beauty of the venue into carefully crafted art pieces and creatively themed environments, while colorful interactive characters and storylines blend with eclectic performing artists and musicians.
With its astonishing and unparalleled integration of music, art and community, Electric Forest delivers "The ultimate festival experience." From the carefully curated musical lineup, to the jaw-dropping Sherwood Forest, to the festival's unprecedented participatory spirit, to the site's incomparable features and amenities - Electric Forest creates a vibe so thick with "camaraderie and freedom...it must be experienced to be appreciated."
Known for fully embracing the possibilities of an engaged festival community, Electric Forest's Plug In Program deliberately blurs the line between event organizers and attendees. With this truly unique "open source" fan engagement platform, Electric Forest harnesses the creativity and passion of its community members, offering real and tangible ways for fans to participate in and ultimately help shape the Electric Forest experience. This is a big deal, since for Electric Forest - experience trumps all.
Hailed as "an amazing example of how music and festivals can change one's outlook on life," it's widely understood that "one of the most important lessons [to be] learned in the Forest is that we are all together," and this sense of community is truly "cherished [within the community] like the incredibly rare find it is."
About To Write Love on Her Arms
To Write Love on Her Arms is a nonprofit dedicated to presenting hope and finding help for people struggling with depression, addiction, self-injury, and suicide. TWLOHA exists to encourage, inform, inspire, and also to invest directly into treatment and recovery. Since its start in 2006, TWLOHA has donated over $1.8 million directly into treatment and recovery and answered over 200,000 emails from over 100 countries. For more information on To Write Love on Her Arms, please visit: www.twloha.com
About Bassnectar
By combining sound and force with weight, the Bassnectar experience engulfs the senses. The experience of Bassnectar is more visceral than auditory, as the music sets any stage for an adventure without rules or limitations. On Bassnectar's stage, there is no hesitation in fusing the familiar with the strange or the classic with the cutting edge.
Bassnectar is the brainchild of Lorin Ashton, and his open-sourced musical project is as diverse as it is imaginary, as raw as it is meticulous, and as fierce as it is stunning. Spanning the spectrum of sonic style, the music draws inspiration from every genre imaginable and supplies a synthesis of intense, wobbling basslines and hypnotic soundscapes for a devout international audience that desires the beautiful and the bestial in the same breath.
In whatever medium Bassnectar works, music is the lure and social impact is the sincere intention. According to Ashton, "We are so blessed, and so deeply fortunate to be alive and awake right now...it's a basic truth, but it's very powerful. I think privilege confers responsibility, and Bassnectar is a reflection of that opportunity to give back; the motion of my cells bouncing back at the world." http://bassnectar.net
About The Grand Artique
Grand Artique Productions has given the festival world full scale interactive environments filled to the brim with minute details that focus on the past and the roots of human interaction and trade. Based in San Diego and Los Angeles this production house has recreated the wild west, whisked participants away to the ancient silk road, and provided on point live musical curation. This team of actors, builders, technicians, fun lovers, and all around weirdos has brought with them a talent for entertainment and a vigorous amount of elbow grease. http://thegrandartique.com/
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Electric Forest Media Resources HERE.
Woodstock, IL – September 11, 2017 OWC®, a leading zero emissions Mac and PC technology company, announced that the groundbreaking and highly-anticipated new OWC Thunderbolt 3 Dock, the latest in an award-winning lineup of connectivity expansion solutions, is shipping now. With an incredible 13 ports, the OWC Thunderbolt 3 Dock provides exceptional connectivity through an included Thunderbolt 3 cable, delivering power to laptops and other devices at the fastest speed possible.
“This is the best dock that I’ve found” – Guy Kawasaki
Business maven and chief evangelist Guy Kawasaki needed a solution to keep his own devices connected to the latest Apple MacBook Pros and had this to say about his OWC Thunderbolt 3 Dock: “This is the best dock that I’ve found. It has every freaking port you know you need and some that you don’t know you need yet.”
The OWC Thunderbolt 3 Dock takes full advantage of the cutting-edge performance of Thunderbolt 3 technology with throughput up to 40Gb/s of bandwidth and allows users to realize the maximum utility of Thunderbolt 3 equipped Macs. The 13 ports offer the capability to charge mobile devices, connect one 5K or two 4K displays, add external storage (including legacy devices such as FireWire drives), import photos and videos from SD cards, access wired networks via Gigabit Ethernet, and enjoy pristine audio – all through a single Thunderbolt 3 cable.
Because Thunderbolt 3 delivers phenomenal bandwidth, the OWC Thunderbolt 3 Dock can be the foundation of a perfect custom display setup, providing the ability to drive the latest- generation 5K displays, two 4K displays or a combination of 4K, HD and other displays with the Mini DisplayPort (mDP) with DisplayPort++ support, and additional Thunderbolt 3 port.
For professionals working in the creative industries, there is typically a highly detailed workflow complete with specialized and legacy ports such as FireWire and digital audio. The OWC Thunderbolt 3 Dock supports FireWire 800 and S/PDIF digital audio, as well as an SD card reader and analog stereo audio. All that and the 2-year OWC limited warranty: OWC is proud to provide a superior level of support and warranty coverage to our customers. With OWC, the possibilities are endless.
Users and reviewers have had high praise for the OWC Thunderbolt 3 Dock:
“The OWC Thunderbolt 3 Dock is a versatile and capable device and a nice companion to a laptop computer in particular. Through its 13 ports, you can use and power a lot of different devices and its performance is good.” - Jeremy Grey, Imaging Resource
“Devices like the OWC Thunderbolt 3 Dock come along to save the day and be the bridge between the new world and the just a little bit older world.” - James Ivey, Pro Tools Expert
“Forget the rest. This is the Dock I’ve been looking for.” - Nicholas Calderone, MacSources
Video reviews of the state-of-the-art Thunderbolt 3 Dock:
AppleInsider: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KMU8yvhJ-qU
Geekanoids: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HEXJJGLJ0Yc
Chuck Joiner, MacVoices: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cQumqHK0U8k
About OWC
Having served the Apple community worldwide since 1988, OWC has become the reliable manufacturer and upgrade provider of choice for Apple and PC enthusiasts with its extensive catalog of accessories, storage, and memory upgrades for nearly every Mac made in the last decade. Recognized for award-winning customer service, OWC provides extensive U.S.-based technical support for Mac and PC users around the world and comprehensive step-by-step installation and support videos. For more information, see http://www.owcdigital.com.
Get social: follow OWC on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.
Photos:
Thunderbolt 3 Dock: http://www.thomas-pr.com/136/photos/newertechthunderbolt.html
Thunderbolt 3 Dock - Back: http://www.thomas-pr.com/136/photos/newertechthunderboltback.html
Thunderbolt 3 Dock - Back2: http://www.thomas-pr.com/136/photos/newertechthunderboltback2.html
OWC Logo: http://www.thomas-pr.com/136/photos/owclogo
Women Run the City, CREW Utah’s first annual premier all-women running/walking event. The event caters to both experienced and beginner runners and walkers with a 5k run/walk. Women Run the City is designed to encourage women and girls of all ages to engage in a healthy and active lifestyle while promoting empowerment for all.
Participants will start and finish their races at the beautiful Memory Grove Park in Salt Lake City.
Charity Partner
CREW Utah, a 501c6 (tax ID 14-1998676), will be using the proceeds to fulfill our mission- infuencing the success of the commercial real estate industry by advancing the achievements of women. A portion of our proceeds will benefit the Utah chapter of Girls on the Run, a nonprofit 501(c)3, whose mission is to inspire girls to be joyful, healthy and confident using a fun, experience-based curriculum which creatively integrates running. They envision a world where every girls knows and activates her limitless potential and is free to boldly pursue her dreams.
