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Thursday, March 28, 2024

With mud underfoot, pumping fists overhead and the music of 160 bands thundering through the air, thousands of people braved rain, wind and cold weather for three days to support artists and migrant farm workers at the St. Johns County Fairgrounds.

Five stages held bands ranging from aging British punk artist Billy Bragg to the political rap group Dead Prez at the second annual Harvest of Hope Fest, which was held to benefit the Harvest of Hope Foundation.

By 3 p.m. Friday, fest goers from all over Florida and around the nation-one fan even took a bus from New Jersey-- were shuffling like pack mules into the primitive camping area with backpacks, sleeping bags, guitars and sloshing coolers slung over their shoulders.

By 5 p.m. they had erected what looked like a small city of about 700 brightly colored tents.

Some donned galoshes; others went barefoot; still some squished through the mud in old sneakers. It didn't matter, as most of them were caked with mud from the knees down.

They stomped through the mud in droves between tents where they gathered in front of stages in groups of more than 200. Music flooded out of amplifiers as they swayed together and shouted lyrics.

Bands played until 11 p.m. Afterward, the crowds dispersed to the campground where they could be heard in drum circles and with acoustic guitars, howling the lyrics of songs they had just seen the bands perform.

Hours later, around 9:30 a.m., the thumps of bass drums and repetitive guitar chords erupted from amps, summoning the sleeping crowd from the tent village as bands conducted sound checks of their equipment.

This Bike is a Pipe Bomb, a folk punk trio from Pensacola, had a political message for its audience.

"I would hope that people walk out of here realizing that they just endured politics," said Ted Helmick, the band's drummer, who said the band planned to promote the charitable aspect of the festival before it played Saturday night.

Helmick referred to the festival as a "socially engaging arena" where people could talk about politics freely.

Geoffrey Hing, guitarist and vocalist for Defiance, Ohio, an acoustic punk rock band from Bloomington, Ind., said he hoped fest-goers would change their eating habits when they learned about the conditions migrant farm workers lived under as they harvested food.

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"You'll probably walk away with a more critical gaze the next time you walk in a supermarket," Hing said.

 

 

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