IndieGene '24 : The Good, The Bad, and The Fixable

Hey guys, I'm one of the artists AND one of the core organizers of the recently concluded Indie Music Fest **IndieGene**. This was originally supposed to be a reply to a comment in a previous reddit post by u/Traditional_Juice583, but since they gave valid points to talk about, this couldn't be contained as a single comment, so hence this post. Okay, first things first, let me talk about why I stressed on being an artist and part of the core organizing team. That's because almost all of the artists that performed in that event **were** the organizers. That was our dream: an event for the Indie artist by the Indie artist. Because, like it or not, the independent music scene in Tamil Nadu is pretty much undiscovered, unappreciated, and underground(not talking about the discovered 2% of the artists), let alone in a city like Coimbatore. The people we first pitched this idea to were not receptive. Literally the first question they asked was, "Yen cinema paatu illa?". We were literally mocked by people who said, "Idhukula 20 peru vandhale perusu" constantly even when we decided to have free entry. So that's when we decided we didn't care about the cost, but we needed to put our music out for the general public and should be celebrated. So every one of us pooled in our money, and that's how IndieGene became the first-ever Indie Music Fest in Coimbatore. :) Yes, we agree that the timing was advertised as 6 pm, but we started at 7:20 pm. We take full responsibility for that. There were a lot of internal problems; one of the major problems being the power cutting off and coming back up periodically on the day of the event, so we had to improvise then. But yes, we could have been better prepared. Regarding the chairs, we wanted to give an open concert feel, aka "standing with your mobile phone flashlight on, waving and vibing" kinda feel, and since it happened in a turf, we thought it would complement the idea that we were going for. Chairs were strictly meant for older people who couldn't stand for longer periods of time, and we had announced the same as well! But beyond these turbulent experiences, we are glad to say that the CBE audience was kind enough to stay back, enjoy the performances, and give us the recognition, time, energy, encouragement, and the confidence to put on this wonderful display of equally unique artists. They were not disappointed at all, and I'm proud to say that at the time of the peak performances, we had close to 300 people vibing! That may be a small number, but it's a huge win for Coimbatore as an independent music scene! I really respect everyone's comments on this and worry not, because we will take your inputs, and we will come back stronger than before!