From ‘shipwrecked’to ‘castaway’
FROM “shipwrecked” to “castaway,” Luzon’s biggest music festival at SM Malls actually started as a simple experiment that drew thousands of music lovers and jammers to SM City Pampanga, SM City Clark and SM City San Fernando just a few years ago.
Very recently, a crowd of more than 40,000 gathered at the SM City Pampanga Amphitheater to dance and sing along with Franco, Moonstar 88, Neo Colors, Rivermaya, The Dawn and This Band over the weekend at SM Amphitheatre.
Said SM Malls’ Chi Manarang: “The first concept we had was ‘shipwrecked.’ What we wanted to do was decongest SM malls in Metro Manila where thousands gather for the music festival. ‘Castaway’ was born in 2014 and we adopted the title of the music festival in 2014 and staged it for the first time at SM City Pampanga with Franco, Up Dharma Down, Ron Poe, McBoo, Run Manila, She’s Only Sixteen, Jensen and the Flips, Autotelic and Chiro as the local front act.”
“Seeing the success of the first ‘Castaway’resulted to staging it annually and this year, spreading it across SM malls in Luzon,” Manarang added.
“Castaway” will be staged at SM City Tarlac on March 22 and SM City Baliwag on March 23. The award winning touring music festival will jump to SM City Rosales in Pangasinan on March 24; SM City Marilao on March 29; SM City Telabastagan on March 30; SM City San Fernando Downtown on March 31; SM City Cauayan on April 5; SM Center Valenzuela on March 6; SM City Urdaneta on March 7; SM Megacenter Cabanatuan on April 12; SM City Cabanatuan on April 13 and finally back to SM City Clark on April 14.
— JTD