You don't know what you've got till it's gone...

You don’t know what you’ve lost till it’s gone. And now Unorthodox Paradox festival has joined those great festivals-in-the-sky, kept alive in the hearts of everyone who were lucky enough to be there over the thirteen year span. An Unorthodox Paradox is something that sounds like a contradiction but actually works as a perfect, mysterious world of its own. Created and curated by the glorious Spragg family, it has been a haven for people who would otherwise be telling the wall about all this good stuff they’ve been hearing, all these little known musicians who deserve to be shouted about. Where else would we have seen, in one field, the likes of Paddy Steer, the Holy Family, ZOFFF, a.P.A.t.T, Chemtrails, Colossal Squid, Chrysalid Homo, The Display Team, Kugelschreiber, Scaramanga Six, Cod O’Donnell (who kept the paper bag on his head all weekend), Howie Reeve, Craigus Barry, Ask My Bull, Haq 123, Crayola Lectern, The Monkey Poet, Thick Richard, Mr B, and so many more who we’d never heard of until Unorthodox Paradox sent us off into our home zones to seek them out again (or put them on).

For the organisers, it was a paradox of creating a joyful space and doss for us all, with the strain of organising a festival under increasing financial risk. On May 8th, Neil Spragg sent the word out that the coming festival was going to be the last:

“Just twice, in the 13 years (which equates to maybe 9 or 10 or 11 events, I’ve lost count) have we managed to break even or turn anything like a profit. In the other years, cumulatively, we have lost many thousands of pounds. … The main thing to realise is that it has never been intended to be a money-making exercise. It’s not a ‘business’. That said, we can’t afford for it to lose money either, so it’s a very delicate balance, especially for an event of this relatively small size, whereby the fixed costs just to put it on in the first place are still quite high, but the theoretical return from ticket sales are barely enough to cover those costs – even if you sell out. So yeah, if it wasn’t set up to make money, then why exactly *do* we do it?. As it says on the website, “The main reason we started Unorthodox Paradox was to give everyone a rare opportunity to REALLY get together with their friends”. …a fairly small ‘cosy’ and cheap event, that would run over a weekend, and allow myself and my friends, and a small number of like-minded individuals, to party hard in beautiful locations accompanied by mind-bending and wondrous music, and have a generally fabulous time together, making precious and rare memories. Sounds idyllic and lovely, eh? Well, I like to think that for many of the people that have attended, this has been exactly what has happened, and that in itself is a great thing. Hurrah! Unfortunately, that has rarely been how it works out for us. The minutiae of keeping the wheels on an event like this (in the absence of being able to afford to pay people to run every single aspect) mean that I actually get very little time to ‘socialise’ in any meaningful way with all the people that I dearly love who have made the effort to attend, the people who ‘get it’. REALISATION 2 – this is a biggie, and maybe the most important of my ‘realisations’ as far as why the whole thing ‘works’ or ‘doesn’t work’. I don't want to be (and never have wanted to be) a 'promoter', with all that entails. Jobs in marketing might work for some people if their sole interest is to earn money, but Bill Hicks had good stuff to say about that. I don’t want to try and sell stuff to people, or persuade them what they should spend their money on… Fuck that. I want to be spending more time in fields, with people I love, listening to great music. Oh, the irony. …Which all brings me neatly back to where I started. After *much* consideration, me & Libby have decided that we need to draw a line under Unorthodox Paradox, so this year’s event *will* be the last one, in the form that it currently is. We are considering options for doing even smaller (and hence less expensive / stressful) events, but I’ll leave those ponderings largely until UP2024 is out the way and the dust has settled”

And it was a joyous event (with moments of twingeing sadness as the Unorthodox Paradox clock ticked towards its end) but the Rain Gods were tactically astute for the most part and pissed themselves at convenient moments (except for Saturday night) (Bastards!). Random acts of kindness were everywhere (you couldn't lose anything without someone forming a posse to look for it, and many of us would still be in the field in a mud-stuck camper van if not for the push of many hands). Great grub, proper beer, lovely friendships, bosting music. How to share this? If you look at google, you’ll find that “The Gathering Doubt is the solo project of Scott Rimington who is also a member of Pleasure Complex”. But if you were at Unorthodox Paradox you’ll know that these flat phrases hide true magic: a solo voice and piano in the rain, nervously and triumphantly navigating his way through Cardiacs’ heart-rending “Stoneage Dinosaur”. And getting it slightly wrong, and starting again. On the youtube clip you can see the yellow rain ponchos of the intrepid onlookers reflected in the skin of the bass drum

And that is why Unorthodox Paradox was SO special.

But for now - This is it. The Day is Gone. If you missed Unorthodox Paradox, you will be hearing of its legend forevermore at Cardiacs gigs and whereever the unorthodox never fear to tread. At the end of the final set on the final night (AK/DK bouncing us into ecstacy), Thick Richard joined them onstage for a ranting, rousing “Nobody Shouts Anymore”

And his parting words were “goodnight Paradox, whereever you are”. And we are everywhere, putting on small gigs, drawing strength from another sweet paradox: through music we find the togetherness which sustains us to take these seeds back into our separated zones and inspire others to GET IT. Have a look at these Facebook postings to see for yourself why Unorthodox Paradox punched way above its weight.