Gareth Cooper came up with the idea of Snowbombing after becoming bored with the terrible music usually played in ski resort nightclubs.
“We thought, well, if the mountain won’t come to the music, the music will come to the mountains,” Cooper says.
So in the spring of 2000, a group of 200 people, including a few DJs and their record bags, set off for the first Snowbombing, in the tiny French resort of Risoul. It was chaotic and disorganised but raucous and unique, setting the foundations for the event.
The first few years saw Snowbombing try a variety of European resorts,
trying to find the perfect location. And in 2005 it did, as Cooper took
Snowbombing to Mayrhofen.
For a start, the resort embraces après-ski
with a passion all winter long, so the locals were unlikely to be
easily shocked as they were in some of the smaller French resorts. But,
crucially for such a late event it has an amazing spring-snow record
and is just 20 minutes free bus ride up the valley to Hintertux, a
glacier ski area with the country’s highest lift and guaranteed skiing
all summer long, not that lack of Snow in Mayrhofen has yet been a
problem.
The appeal of the festival took hold and in 2010 the lineup includes Grandmaster Flash, Dizzee Rascal and The Cuban Brothers.
Snowbombing’s success has caused the originally alien concept of a winter music festival to catch on, with music festivals springing up across the Alps.
