If you only go between the main stages at NorthSide, you're missing out.

There's just something special about those places at a festival that aren't exactly written in big letters on the poster. The places that you might not plan to spend very long at, but still end up taking up an entire afternoon because you keep finding a new reason to stay a little longer.

That's how I've always felt about Sideshow at NorthSide.

Previously, it was a tent you could stop by, have a laugh at Glitter Wrestling, grab a beer and move on to the next concert. But this year, it's completely changed. If you walk past the Nova tent and continue further down towards the forest, NorthSide suddenly begins to change character. The music is still playing and the beers are still flowing. But the atmosphere feels completely different.

Where Sideshow used to be a tent, it's now become an entire area. And it works surprisingly well.

A whole new corner of NorthSide

The first thing you notice isn't necessarily the activities, but the feeling of having arrived somewhere else. Wooden tiles crunch underfoot, signs point in different directions, and all around festival goers sit at long tables with beer, cocktails and food, while others explore between activities and try to find out what's hiding around the next corner.

It all feels a bit odd in the best possible way.

NorthSide could have used the space for another beer bar or another area with benches and tables. Instead, the festival has chosen to build an area where people can hammer nails into a tree stump, throw bean bags, get glitter on their faces, watch wrestling, or just sit down and hang out. Maybe that's exactly why the area works. It's not about achieving anything here. It's about just being.

In the middle of the area is the small Sideshow stage, where musicians and entertainers make sure that something is always happening. There is dancing all around. Several times during the afternoon we saw people holding hands and laughingly moving through the square in long chains. No one seemed particularly concerned with what time it was or which concert they had to catch afterwards. It was as if time moved a little slower down here.

Here you go down to have a look, and maybe sit down with a beer. Then something happens on stage and suddenly another hour has passed.

Glitter Wrestling is still just as crazy

If there is one activity that has become synonymous with Sideshow over the years, it is Glitter Wrestling.

Grown-ups jump into a glitter-covered wrestling ring while the audience shouts, laughs, and cheers as if it's a world championship match. It's completely impossible to take seriously. And that's exactly why it works.

When we passed by on Friday afternoon, people were standing close together around the ring. We got into conversation with three young women who had come to cheer on their friend. Cheering might even be an understatement. They were screaming so loudly that for a moment I doubted whether I could still hear out of one ear afterwards. On the other side of the ring stood a man waiting for his friend to enter the ring.

And maybe that's what makes Glitter Wrestling so entertaining. People don't just come for the show. They come for the people in the show. For the friend who dares to step into the ring and for the buddy. For the person they know who suddenly becomes the main character in front of an audience of people they've never met before.

As glitter flew through the air and entertainers on stage threw even more glitter at both participants and audience, it all developed into a mix of sports, theater and pure festival absurdity. One of the best things about this year's edition was that the ring was filled with both men and women. More women lined up than before, and the audience cheered just as loudly no matter who was on the other side.

It was just impossible not to smile and cheer.

The forest edge completes the experience

Right next to Sideshow is Skovbrynet, which in recent years has quietly grown into one of the most atmospheric areas at the entire festival.

Here, the trees are close together around tables and benches, and between the trunks are hidden small bars and a DJ booth. The area was already full of people in the afternoon, and the longer the day went on, the closer the trees became.

It's hard to talk about Sideshow without also mentioning Skovbrynet. The two areas are naturally connected, and together with the Nova tent right next door, NorthSide has created a whole little neighborhood at the festival. A place where you go down to hear a concert, but end up hanging around for a drink. Where you stop to watch some wrestling and suddenly find yourself standing and dancing between the trees an hour later.

As darkness begins to fall, Skovbrynet transforms into something that can almost be described as a large outdoor disco. The lights between the trees are turned on, music flows between the trunks, and the area takes on the kind of festival atmosphere that is hard to explain, but easy to fall in love with.

NorthSide is still about the music on the big stages. But some of the best things about this year's festival are actually found between the concerts. In the quirky ideas and in the small areas. In the people dancing with strangers, cheering on friends in a wrestling ring or hanging out at a long table, even though they had actually intended to move on a long time ago.
If you only walk between the main stages at NorthSide, you're actually missing something.