Katie BainThe electronic music festival Lightning in a Bottle went down this past weekend at its new home at Lake Skinner Recreational Area in Temecula, hosting some 14,000 camping, sweaty, underclad people. With daytimes temperatures in the high nineties and nighttime temperatures damn near perfect, an intergenerational crowd enjoyed music, meditation, yoga, live painting, theater, healing arts, and something called “gong therapy.”
It was all quite hippie; no corporate sponsors, free water, organic food, no security guards eagerly searching our bags for contraband. Attendees could even bring in their own alcohol. All of which may have been why everyone was constantly hugging and telling each other how beautiful and loved we all are (which was actually really nice).
But it also made for some pretty out-there conversational snippets, which sound pretty funny being taken out of context!
One woman to another, in line at the sushi stand:
The last time I saw her, she was taking a nap in the teepee with the shaman she met at the plant medicine workshop.
Random Rab performing on Friday; Credit: Josh “CuriousJosh” Reiss
Man with dreamy look on his face during Random Rab's Friday evening sunset set:
This is the sound of pure love.
Man during Emancipator's Friday evening set:
People here are so nice. I'm not really used to this.
Lucent Dossier's Friday night performance; Credit: Josh “CuriousJosh” Reiss
Young man with dropped jaw during Lucent Dossier's Friday night performance:
What! What?! Oh my god. Seriously? This is incredible. Se-ree-us-lee? Oh my god. This is so cool!
Guy to his friend after Phutureprimitive closed down the Bamboo stage late Sunday night:
You're never going to want to go back to Ohio after this festival. You're just going to want to stay and live with us in California forever.
Slideshow: Lightning in a Bottle 2013
Darryl Anka, during his Friday evening lecture:
The key to enlightenment, is just lightening up.
(Anka also calls himself Bashar, an extraterrestrial entity he claims he is able to channel after UFO sightings.)
DJ Nico Luminous before launching into his Sunday afternoon set:
I'm dedicating this whole set to being grateful, because we have clean running water to drink and food to eat and legs to dance with. There are people out there who'd give anything to be able to dance. So let's dance.
Attractive woman wearing yoga pants to another attractive woman wearing yoga pants:
You look really familiar. I think we've had some yoga classes together, or maybe we just know each other from a past life.
Credit: Josh “CuriousJosh” Reiss
Young attractive blonde girl carrying a yoga mat and wearing a War Is Over t-shirt while waiting in line at the juice bar on Saturday:
I can't wait for the next year to go by so I can come to this festival again!
Author and scientist David Wilcock to the crowd during his Sunday afternoon lecture:
Hippies is an old paradigm. You're not hippies. You're all just loving people.
(Wilcock's lecture focused on his theory that all life on Earth is united in a field of consciousness that affects our minds in a variety of ways. Wilcock claims to know information on suppressed sciences that is classified at 35 levels of secrecy above the President of the United States.)
Leotard-wearing instructor during Sunday's '80s yoga dance party:
Let's sink into the sacredness that is U2. And 'I still haven't found what I'm looking for' in this pose, so let's all stretch a bit deeper.
DJ gLAdiator after completely destroying the crowd with a primal, trap-heavy Sunday evening set:
This is the best fucking day of my fucking life. Seriously!
See also: Trashed: Music Festivals Are Environmental Disasters
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