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HALLOWEEN? | NOBODY DEBUT EVENT | 1ST NOV
BOOMTOWN FESTIVAL 2025: REVIEW - ENCHANTMENT OR DISENCHANTMENT?
BOOMTOWN FESTIVAL 2025: REVIEW - ENCHANTMENT OR DISENCHANTMENT?
26th August 2025
Once a fiercely independent festival powered by radical theatre and community with roots in the UK free party scene, Boomtown 2025 saw increased capacity, longer queues, and growing tension between ideals and reality. We asked our community how it felt on the ground this year - here’s what they told us.
Boomtown has always been more than just a festival, particularly for the Bristol community who have seen it continue to evolve. For many, it’s been a pilgrimage – a city built on chaos, creativity, connection, and enchantment.
This year, we felt that Boomtown was a bit different. It’s well known that the festival increased its capacity this year and that Live Nation owns a considerable stake, so we asked our community how these changes played out in real time - as dedicated Boomtown goers, first-timers, crew, or something else. We received an overwhelming response with feedback that was loud, passionate, and at times deeply disheartened.
Let’s start with what almost everyone mentioned: the queues.
‘Six hours queueing without water. People fainting’, read one of the first messages we received. Others echoed the same, describing waiting in blistering heat for hours, with minimal shade or updates. ‘My first night at Boomtown was gone before I even got through the gate.’
While queueing is an unavoidable part of going to a festival, and comparisons can be drawn between the wait times at Glastonbury, the latter has almost double the capacity of Boomtown and yet arguably shorter waiting times. While it's quite a simple issue, it seems like reducing wait times should be a priority for next year.
The crowd size was another major talking point. The increase in capacity was widely felt, and for many, it diluted some of the magic. ‘It felt more like Creamfields than Boomtown’, one person wrote. Another said, ‘It didn’t feel like a family anymore.’ That comment was repeated in different forms: ‘Didn’t feel safe for queer people at all’, ‘crowd felt laddish and aggressive’, ‘vibe was so different this year.’
One particularly pertinent quote summed it up nicely:
‘It felt like a music festival, not Boomtown.’
This hits at the core of what makes Boomtown special – the feeling that you were part of a story, a culture, a living, breathing experiment in radical celebration of the grassroots. And that sentiment, many felt, wasn’t quite there in 2025.
The welfare and security setup also came under scrutiny in most of our feedback, too. ‘Security were intense and aggressive’, read one comment. Another described being searched in a way that felt unnecessarily invasive, and there were multiple accounts of welfare staff being dismissive or unhelpful during mental health episodes. One person shared that a friend having a breakdown was told to ‘put her big girl pants on’ – something that felt jarringly at odds with the festival’s ethos of care and accessibility.
The cashless wristband system also caused problems, particularly for traders. One reported that band top-up glitches resulted in several meals going to waste because customers couldn’t top up or access funds fast enough. Another described the system as ‘completely broken’, with no mediation plan for when people, for whatever reason, were unable to top up their bands.
In more recent news, we've heard from festival goers that claiming refunds from their bands has caused glitches and difficulties with many not receiving their refunds in full. We would advise anyone whose claimed their own money back off the bands to double check their bank balances as this is really not on.
Yet, amongst the criticism, there were also fairly consistent positives put forward. Several people praised smaller venues like Femmegeddon, Enumbers, and other micro-stages that stayed true to Boomtown’s underground roots. ‘The only place that felt like the old Boomtown’, one message said. Others mentioned the daytime atmosphere being more relaxed, and the return of some immersive performances and circus culture, though these were noticeably reduced from previous years.
Most did enjoy their time overall, though many voices carried a slight level ofuncertainty. ‘Still had a good one, but I’m not sure I’d go back,’ one person said. Another reflected: ‘It was fun, but only because we made it fun.’
Others also noted that while drum and bass has always been central to Boomtown, this year it seemed to spill across the site, at times feeling overwhelming and making areas of the festival blur into a similar vibe.
When evaluating the overwhelming feeling from our feedback, across the board there is clear disenchantment with the direction Boomtown is taking. Many pointed to the contradiction between the festival’s anti-capitalist messaging and the increasing presence of corporate ownership and sponsors. As one of our responses remarked: ‘anti-capitalist storyline but bought by a corporation? Okay…’
Community feedback conclusion:
We hope that creating conversations like these can make a change for the better so thank you to everyone who sent their entries in.
Overall, feedback from this year’s Boomtown festival was mixed, with 59% of comments highlighting negative experiences, mostly around security issues, long queues, and overcrowding, while 27% praised music, performances, and smaller stages. Neutral or mixed reflections made up 14%, often noting personal privileges or varying experiences improving their experience.
Common suggestions from attendees included better queue management, increased security staffing, clearer communication, more water points, and maintaining smaller-stage intimacy, which could improve both safety and the overall festival atmosphere.
Security in particular requires closer oversight and better training when dealing with festival crowds and emergencies, and an audit of the welfare team may help ensure consistent care and guidance for attendees. While standout performances and memorable sets were widely appreciated also, addressing these base logistical and crowd-management issues could significantly enhance the overall festival experience for many.
It was also noted that for the festival to improve meaningfully, the culture and behaviour of the target audience may need to shift. An over-21 age policy could potentially encourage a safer and more mature environment, though it’s unclear whether this alone would fully resolve the issues.
So where does this leave us?
Boomtown undoubtedly has the infrastructure and expertise to continue being something special. It still has one of the most passionate followings in UK festival culture. But if 2025 has taught us anything, it’s that a bigger crowd doesn’t mean a better party. More stages don’t always mean more soul.
This is not to say that we or our respondents are objectively ‘right’ in their feedback, but this is surely invaluable for any festival genuinely looking to evolve and improve every year. It's fundamental because once the magic is lost, it’s very hard to rebuild.
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