UK’s biggest reggae and dub festival, One Love celebrates Marley’s mantra of peace, love and music.
“One Love Festival is a melting pot; a multi-cultural, multi-ethical, free trade and environmentally-friendly event, buzzing with creativity, fun, ideas and soul.” – official webste
For eight years, One Love Festival has been bringing the best reggae and dub acts to UK, along with faithful fans of the respective genres. This year, at Gloucestershire, UK, the festival returns with a promise of joy and peace. And The Sherp has a list of some of the most wonderful things about the festival. Check them out below.
It supports a charity.
The festival’s mantra of love and peace isn’t just for namesake. One Love, with every new edition of the festival, chooses one charity to donate proceeds to. This year, for example, One Love has chosen to support St Michael’s Hospice, St Leonards on Sea. Very recently, a fire broke out at the hospital, causing several casualties. One Love will donate part of their proceedings to the hospice, honoring their motto.
It’s actually quite a family-friendly affair.
In spite of being trippy in essence and demeanor, this festival sees a lot of families every year. One to be easily mistaken for a stoner festival, One Love displays in bold letters on their website, “It’s a family thing!” And a family thing it is, with child inclusive activities and environment.
And also an environment friendly festival.
We don’t have details about how the festival contributes to the preservation of its environment, perhaps it’s the leave-no-trace tactic adopted by many festivals these days. Either way, the website claims the festival to be ‘environment-friendly’, thus we assume the organizers take necessary precautions when it comes to waste and cleanup of the festival.
The idea behind the festival.
Thirty-six years ago, Bob Marley and The Wailers performed at the One Love Peace concert (Kingston’s National Arena, 1978). In an attempt to dissolve the feud between Jamaica’s then feuding political parties, Marley symbolically joined the hands of bitter rivals Michael Manley and Edward Seaga on stage. It’s said that the conflicting parties then cooled off, seeing their leaders join hands in front of thousands.
One Love Festival, to this day, not only honors Marley’s symbolic gesture, but is built on its very foundation. The concept of the festival, in itself, propagates peace and love.
The festival takes place on September 4-6 this year, you can buy your tickets here.
(All Images Courtesy: One Love Facebook)