There was a lot of concern from the stoner community as to whether the Columbiahalle was a suitable location for Desertfest at all because the arena in East Berlin was much larger. Well, the arena cost so much money in the run-up to Desertfest that the organizers had to look for another location. The choice fell on the Columbia Hall, which, in contrast to the Arena, is purely a concert hall with correspondingly good sound and light. That was an extremely good choice. Especially since the Columbia Theater was a club-like location as a second stage. A festival is like a competition for the audience and so as a spectator you had the choice between different bands that you wanted to see. So we listened to great music from different bands for 6-7 hours. 

The Columbiahallet was just a perfect location with a green space close to the Columbia Theater, a paved yard with the outdoor stage, food, beer and merch, benches and tables and a graveled yard on the other side of the Columbiahalle, also with benches, seats, beer, merch and food. What else? The sound and the lights in both venues were fantastic, and alternating between the two venues was also a kind of meeting lane. 

In fact it was like 60% of the audience were in the Columbiahalle, 15% in the Columbia Theater and the rest took a rest. Some of the rest the whole day. There was no way to panic to miss a band. It was just an excellent organization.

And Berlin as the modern Babylon was the perfect city to run this festival. Desertfest is not only a music festival, it´s an international meeting point for a worldwide underground scene. 

Another concern were the "late" starting of the festival. C´mon, it´s Berlin, that means, you can visit one hundred museums in the morning and join the concerts in the afternoon. So did we and a lot of other spectators which we met in three different museums. Actually, we can´t wait until 2024.

Thank you all who made this festival possible.

Psychlona was one of my spotted bands because we missed them a couple of days before the festival in Munich. Most of their songs linger between "Whitewater" or "Green Machine" or combine both songs in one with a more heavy guitar tone than Kyuss. A great kick-off in this festival.

Might mesmerized the audience with a hidden drummer, a jazzy female voice, trippy and heavy psych sounds. For us a bit hard to stand. So we went to see Church of Misery in the Columbiahalle,

Church of Misery is one of those bands where the number of shows I've been to is greater than the number of songs I like. And it´s always the same during a COM gig: I like them more on stage than on CD and I don´t care about the name of the songs, I care how Tatsu Mukami is able to play his Rickenbastard and the tight and humble drumming of Eric Little. It is always impressing to watch them on stage.

No festival without a Greek band. Godsleep from Athens had a lot of issues with their van before the festival. And so this festival was made to let off steam. Godsleep blended 90´s Grunge with Stoner and a pinch of Punk, offered by Scarlett Johanson (vocals & guitar) on Speed with a fantastic band in the back. We stayed for around 30 minutes to enjoy this band, we were banging and dancing at the same time, before we left for Dozer. 

Dozer has to play shows and more shows to bring themselves into this unstoppable machine mode they owned before 2009 and during their reunion shows in 2014 and 2015. The good chemistry between the members was perceptible so it didn´t matter that Freddy lost his voice and sometimes the timing wasn´t that tight. Anyway: it´s a long way back to regain the confidence on stage: By the way: the new songs were pure killer tracks.

Kanaan were one of the first bands to send me some promo stuff when I started Heavystoned in 2017. Now, to see them for the first time on stage, it made me a kind of family feeling, to see a young band, doing fantastic music with elements of Space Rock, Heavy Psych and Blues.

Without their gnome and dwarves hats, this band would be just a fantastic, semi-instrumental band from Antwerp. With their hats, they are Gnome and gnomtastisch.

You might this band call crazy, but they aren´t; you might them call "musically limited", but they aren´t; you might them call a show band, but they aren´t. The Great Machine is a real and authentic artistic band holding up the mirror to you. The music and the performance is far more than just hardcore, sludge or stoner, it's the only way to express yourself in a country that silences other opinions and silences others peoples to dead. The traditional session in the midst of the audience is, in a figurative sense, the planting of their world of thought in a saturated, tired and decadent Europe.

Finally. After a couple of tries we managed to see Wino with his band. And it was an unforgettable concert. Thanks.

We took just a few glimpse of this band - around 10 minutes - and it seemed to be just the intro for a song which we didn´t want to follow and listen.

Fatso Jetson is the more 60´s and proto everything influenced side-project of Mario Lalli (Yawning Man). A bunch of relaxed white and matured men were jamming along Garage Rock and Punk, some surf tunes and Protorock songs. Quite entertaining to see their beautiful looking and sounding guitars. Yes, Sean Wheeler entered the stage, did some poetry slamming thing, which was a bit too far for our and also a European state of mind.

Generally said: we usually prefer bands whose songs start between 5 and 50 seconds. To wait 5 minutes for a change of tonality or the start of singing isn´t our cup of coffee. As a musician I appreciate the urged skills and the effort to produce a record and to write a song, If a band doesn´t grab me within 5 - 10 minutes I leave the scenery.

Since 2016, as the project Greenleaf stopped and the band Greenleaf was installed, this band is always a pillar for each festival where they were invited. No matter if they play among Punk bands or Stoner bands or Progrock bands. Their musical basement is blues and actually they put the roots of all modern music in their songs. So you can´t can´t love them. And they always have lucky fingers for a well chosen setlist throughout their musical career. Briefly said: as always a fantastic concert with a lot of Greenleaf moments like forgotten riffs, a lot of ironic in-a-between the band members. Fantastic.

Ryan (voc & guitar) obviously found the perfect mix of different characters 3-4 years ago that fit perfectly with the music of Valley of the Sun. The dynamics, be it the tempo of the individual songs or the change between quiet and loud instrumental or vocal parts, make the music and every concert a special experience. The quality of the concerts does not suffer from tour stress or illness of band members; the freshness, the carefreeness and the pure joy of performing and the likeable members make a concert of Valley of the Sun a unique experience, no matter how big the stage or the number of spectators.

The Motörhead within the Sludge scene: If Kirk Windstein enters the stage, you will have the fattest riffs, the dirtiest voice and a grooving, devastating rhythm. So it was again.

It is more than possible that My Sleeping Karma will not exist in their line-up that long anymore. Which will be very sad.

Musically, Mother Engine are the legitimate successors. The individual themes and riffs revolve precisely timed like a mantra, only to flow into another theme that repeats itself like a mantra. The whole musical construct is built up with a bit more distorted guitars and more jam, so that the Mother Engine is a bit closer to Color Haze. As the two bordering bands show, Mother Engine have taken their cues from the heavyweights of the stoner and psychedelic scene. A fantastic concert.

Messa rushed from Warszaw to Berlin for playing the Desertfest. They had to play later in the running order and for me it was already a miracle to do a soundcheck within 25 minutes for an acoustic guitar, a bouzouki, a flute, a mandolin, a saxophone, 70s keyboards and synths, a 12-string e-guitar, drums, bass and vocals. On a really small stage. (Okay the mighty, mighty Mantar  - 2 persons - were supposed to play on the big stage.)

I´m not that much into Messa. I like a few songs which I put on several playlists. But the idea, to transform a 4-headed, quite usual epic Doom band into a medieval sounding symphony orchestra was an unusual idea. This orchestral composition of the band opened the range and the potential of their songs, even on this small stage in a venue with a limited sound. It could be an idea for the future musical development of this highly talented and sympathic band.

The first band with a bass player who played bass, a band with complex and catchy songs, a witch as a fronter and a kraken behind the drums and actually two guitars on guitar. The short hiatus was the best cure for this band, to make them return fresh and relaxed, despite their tour.

Lemmy once said: "Hawkwind without the jinglelingaling like synthies, saxophone, keyboards, is a quite heavy band". i guess, Ecstatic Vision did exactly what the master said and so it was a tremendous concert which reminded me heavenly to Hawkwind light.

Gaupa didn´t care about musical boundaries and styles; they put the musical range of the whole Desertfest in one or two songs and sealed it with Swedish lyrics. Great discovery and surprise.

Slift will be the "new" Hawkwind in the next two or three years. Not only musically, also concerning the lights and stage aesthetics and stage acting. We saw them at the Hellfest 2022 and the band could conserve their high level of musical and aesthetic skills. And Columbiahalle was the right and suitable around for their music.

We left before Uncle Acid after what we saw during the day. A fantastic festival came to an end at our personal highlight.