How a clever joke evolved into an unforgettable Minecraft festival!
It’s rare to find someone who doesn’t enjoy music festivals. They offer a chance to spend time outdoors, connect with friends, and of course, listen to live music. Sounds great, right? Unfortunately, there are some downsides as well. For instance, the overwhelming crowds, litter scattered everywhere, and the high prices for basic items like bottled water. Sometimes, even the state of the facilities can be shocking…
However, at a recent festival, all these issues were addressed. “How?” you might ask. Well, it was a festival held within the game Minecraft Pocket Edition. Coalchella turned out to be a virtual concert, the hottest and most vibrant event of the year. Even Tom, our resident who despises puns, admitted that what happened was quite something. He meant it was awesome!
The name itself played a crucial role, serving as inspiration for the event’s creation. After hosting a small birthday party for Minecraft Bedrock featuring live performers, organizer Max Schramp realized he could and wanted to do something bigger and better. “The idea for another event didn’t just come from me; our entire team of organizers—electronic musicians and DJs—found that a music festival was a logical and natural choice,” says Max. However, the concept of placing everything in stone only emerged after their friend Sam came up with a funny joke.
“It was simply unforgettable. It’s been ages since I had the opportunity to work on such a massive project with my friends.”
To ensure everything went smoothly, they sought out other musicians to assemble a fantastic lineup. They didn’t want to overlook people they knew who truly deserved recognition. “We immediately reached out to artists while keeping our community informed. Our goal wasn’t to find and invite popular names everyone knows but to gather a valuable team for us,” explains Robin, one of the organizers.
Having recently organized a birthday party, they were familiar with the details, making the process much smoother. But the scale was different. Compared to the modest previous event, no one expected such a large turnout for Coalchella! “We had no idea what we were dealing with until just days before when we heard how actively it was being discussed among users. The Minecraft anniversary celebration attracted around 450 unique players. But right after Coalchella opened, we saw attempts from 900 people to join!” shared Braden, another team member. Still, having 450 attendees for your birthday is a significant number!
Braden emphasizes that quality, clarity, and openness were top priorities. “Currently, we have quite a large audience, and we aim to make our music festival universal, independent of location and financial means of attendees.”
One performer involved was pooldad, who expressed that participating was genuinely interesting and engaging. “Some events planned for Minecraft Bedrock left an indescribable impression on me and served as excellent inspiration. It was still the same wild, fabulous festival crew.”
Pooldad also contributed to building structures within the server, which, according to Braden, create a good first impression due to their simplicity. “It’s been a long time since I started working on a huge project with my friends. Now we’ve all grown up and become young adults. Most of us grew up in Minecraft, and we can return and continue doing what we did years ago. Spending months, days, and nights focused solely on construction and designing structures in-game was incredibly cool, almost like a challenge to all my early achievements and skills acquired long ago.”
After all the organization and experience gained, they were finally ready to tackle the actual event! Pooldad agreed to collaborate with another artist known as Poolboy. Together, they literally dissected songs, adding vocals to various instruments. “We spent a long time trying to get it to sound right. Often, the rearranged vocal parts sounded absurd alongside the other instruments. We would sit there, tossing it back and forth, laughing at how terrible and ridiculous it all seemed,” recounts Pooldad.
Nevertheless, they managed to create something captivating and magical. “One of the tracks we took vocals from was ‘Cha Cha Slide’ by DJ Casper from 2000. We recorded our voices while playing instruments, acting like DJs hyping up the crowd.”
“We guided the audience, telling them to mimic our dance moves at the right moments, and they did. They were immersed in the experience, enjoying the chance to dance in a video game without physically being there. That’s very important to me.”
Initially, Coalchella faced some technical challenges because the organizers weren’t prepared for such a large influx of visitors. However, despite their lack of experience in organizing large-scale Minecraft Pocket Edition events, they quickly resolved any chaos. “There were plenty of oversights at our event, and we were pleasantly surprised by how understanding people were regarding the issues we fixed along the way,” shares Umru, another team member.
As you may have noticed, a whole group of organizers worked on the festival, and their unity positively impacted the development. Additionally, the creators of the Hypixel server lent a helping hand at just the right moment. “They created and launched a completely new setup for us right in the middle of the festival. I’m still amazed at how quickly they responded and saved us from all our problems,” recounts Braden.
What matters most is that everyone enjoyed the festival atmosphere. “Seeing all those happy faces made all our problems seem trivial, easily solvable in an instant. This was one of the most rewarding experiences of my life,” says Braden.
Everyone is asking about Coalchella 2019—when and how will it happen? “All I can say is that we need to put in even more effort to make it even better! Right now, we have plans for another event early next year. We’ll definitely keep you posted about it in advance.”
Special thanks to Max, Robin, Sam, Braden, pooldad, poolboy, Umru, Hypixel, @nolongerkai and @skydoki.
