Please Welcome to the Stage: Playground Fest

By Dylan Crews

Playground Music and Art Festival 2025. (Dylan Crews/Tower Yearbook)

Gainesville’s very own Heartwood Soundstage hosted Playground Music and Art Festival 2025, highlighting Flipturn and The Brook & the Bluff as the bands to see. The doors opened at 1 p.m. on Saturday, Jan. 18, and local artist Buboy kicked off the show. 

Playground Fest is an annual music and art show that hosted a myriad of booths displaying clubs, merchandise and other products, but the main draw was the music. Crowds gathered at the base of each stage as the artists performed. Heartwood Soundstage supports two stages, each facing each other, allowing multiple artists at once. A tandem back and forth, the stages were constantly a flurry of motion. One band stepped down, the next stepped up. 

One band in particular stood out the most: Space Prom. Instead of performing originals, they sang beloved covers and invited a variety of other festival performers to join them on stage. 

Lucas Butler, a University of Florida student and attendee of Playground Fest Particularly enjoyed their set. “I loved Space Prom because they really made it feel like a party,” he said. “They cycled in new vocalists constantly and never lost momentum.”

From moshing to crowd surfing, the audience felt like one collective enjoying the music. By incorporating lead vocalists from each set, Space Prom highlighted what it meant to perform at Playground Fest: everyone is one with the music, it unites and inspires. 

Crowdsurfing in the audience at Playground Music and Arts Festival 2025. (Dylan Crews/Tower Yearbook)

The crowd emulsified as the night went on, small groups sitting together on blankets or joining hands and spinning in circles together. Whether it was a crooning voice or thrumming bassline, sounds rooted themselves inside the listeners to create a singular experience. The crowd became a single entity, strangers joining hands and swaying as one unit. 

To highlight this experience, attendee Frankie Just spoke on her perspective. “Playground was even more fun than I could’ve expected,” she said. “Everyone there was so into the music, I was able to dance like I’ve never danced before with people who appreciated it just as much as I did.” 

As the headliner Flipturn got ready to perform their set, the final set of the night, it began to pour. That didn’t stop the crowd. The bar handed out ponchos to the attendees and groups huddled close, too enthralled by the music to pause and consider the pelting rain. Neon lights through the sheets of droplets, shining on the faces of each person waiting in awe for the beat to drop on Flipturn’s opening song, “Juno.”

Beach balls bounced through the waiting hands of the crowd as they burst into ecstatic motion. For the next 45 minutes, Flipturn had the audience captivated.

When they slowed their set down to play their No. 1 song, “August,” people began to melt into each other as they belted out lyrics. The crowd became one backing track to the music, drowning out the voice of lead singer Dillon Basse. 

Though the night ended in rain, each person left Heartwood Soundstage beaming with post-concert excitement, chittering on about how they couldn’t wait for next year. 

Space Prom performing at Playground Music and Arts Festival 2025. (Dylan Crews/Tower Yearbook)