Skip to content
Home » clinic » Dell Dome Summer Rocks [MixTape]

Dell Dome Summer Rocks [MixTape]

Dell Dome by Fense

Written by Fense

If you are a large corporation targeting the youth of today, it appears there are two places you want your messaging to be front and center. The first: anything dealing with Miley Cirus or Jonas Brothers. That’ll get you a massive audience, there’s no denying it. But, if you’re targeting less of a mainstream crowd, the place to be is summer music festivals. Dell is the latest to hop on the bandwagon, pumping up their Summer Rocks campaign at festivals across the country.

It all goes down in the physical world at the aptly titled Dell Dome, a geodesic dome filled with entertainment-based happenings that can be found at music festivals around the country. Next up: Monolith and Austin City Limits. Online, it’s the Dell Lounge under the Summer Rocks section. Here’s what you need to know:

1. Summer Rocks MixTape

There are many activities going on within the dome, but this is the one I’ll focus on today—the MixTape. You can go on and make a digital mix of up to 20 songs by bands featured throughout the festival tour. Mine is covered in more detail below, but if you’d like to make your own (or copy mine), you can do so HERE.

2. Mike Ming Designed Laptops

Artist Mike Ming is present and at work at each festival, creating a new laptop cover. While the rock star hair and ping pong table and various other activities tailor to the young, I swung by the tent to check the progress on Ming’s design, a massive (I’m guessing) ten by ten canvas. I made my MixTape an album cover out of Ming’s design-in-progress, which you can see below.

3. Exclusive Band Interviews

Rather than going the typical sponsorship route and hosting a stage or event housing limited attendance, stripped down shows, Dell has opted for quick, impromptu interviews with various bands at these festivals. The interviews last no more than 15 minutes, are filmed, and feature Mike Ming gifting a specially designed laptop to the band (when you see the interviews, it’s quite apparent the bands were not expecting this and thus they were all super appreciative). I’ll be covering an interview or two in the coming weeks so you can see for yourself.

Back to the MixTape.

Looking through the songs, listed alphabetically by artist, the first thing I saw was a tune off Sing Along With The Acid House Kings by The Acid House Kings. That is one of my desert island, all-time top-ten albums. Then I noticed a track off Club 8’s latest and “Final Say” by Sambassadeur—two other Labrador Records artists.

But I decided that, since I already have all three of those albums, I would focus on new music I do not have; I gave myself a few rules… 1) I can know of the artist but I cannot own anything by the artist. 2) I will do my best to organize the tracks in a manner that flows well. 3) No changing the track list when I get home. The first was easy, the second… not so much (it was loud in there). The third? I’ll devote the next paragraph to that.

Unfortunately, some of the songs didn’t work so well. For example, the last two: first was a track by Forward Russia! which appears to cut off in mid beat after just over four minutes. Then, the closing tune, Boris’ “You Were Holding An Umbrella”, is actually a live track that isn’t mixed to the level of other songs on the album, making the song extremely quiet in comparison.

I scrapped Boris but kept Forward Russia! and simply moved an appropriate tune to somewhat fit the closing moments. That song is “A Thousand Eyes” by Crystal Antlers. It’s an awkward transition that almost works; luckily the the mix, overall, is pretty strong.

If the Dell Dome did nothing else, it introduced me to several new bands—some of which I had been planning to check out, some that were simply new altogether—that you’ll likely see featured here on FensePost in the coming weeks. Before we get into the track list (and because the past few days have been stripped down in terms of FensePost content), here are a few tracks from my mix including “The Witch” by Clinic and “Halcyon 2” by Imaad Wasif.

Clinic: The Witch [mp3]
[audio:0904_clinic_-_the_witch.mp3|titles=The Witch|artists=Clinic]

Imaad Wasif: Halcyon 2 [mp3]
[audio:0904_imaad_wasif_-_halcyon_2.mp3|titles=Halcyon 2|artists=Imaad Wasif]

I created the “cover art” for my mix using a photo I took of artist Mike Ming doing what he does best inside the Dell Dome. I now present to you the first FensePost MixTape… the Dell Dome Summer Rocks MixTape:

Summer Rocks MixTape

1. “The Plot” by White Rabbits
2. “Capricorinations” by Mika Miko
3. “Freedom Ritual” by Dark Meat
4. “The Witch” by Clinic
5. “Bag Of Hammers” by Thao
6. “Halcyon 2” by Imaad Wasif
7. “American Names” by Sebastian Grainger
8. “Hairdo” by Tall Firs
9. “Chicago” by The Uglysuit
10. “As Summer Pass” by Sofia Talvik
11. “I Feel Weird” by Steel Train
12. “Despite What You’ve Been Told” by Two Gallants
13. “No Regrets” by King Khan And The Shrines
14. “Zombie Like Lovers” by The Warlocks
15. “Unfinished Business” by White Lies
16. “Ames Room” by Silje Nes
17. “Need You Sunshine” by Autamata
18. “Gravity And Heat” by ¡Forward, Russia!
19. “A Thousand Eyes” by Crystal Antlers

Leave a Reply

Follow by Email
YouTube
YouTube
Instagram