Bilbao BBK Live

kerberos2506

How All Folks,

Looking for tips and advice for a stag partyof 8 (40year olds) to Bilbao BBK Live next July. Has anyone been in the last few years, can they fill me in on the experience they had. Line up not to bad as issued last week, we hope to get an apartment in Bilbao for 5 nights and work from there. Any advice would be appreicated.
Regards...:pac:

bullpost

kerberos2506 wrote: »

How All Folks,

Looking for tips and advice for a stag partyof 8 (40year olds) to Bilbao BBK Live next July. Has anyone been in the last few years, can they fill me in on the experience they had. Line up not to bad as issued last week, we hope to get an apartment in Bilbao for 5 nights and work from there. Any advice would be appreicated.
Regards...:pac:

Went last year - New Order and Arcade fire were headliners. Great venue in a beautiful wooded setting overlooking the city. Its walking distance to the City centre but taxis are cheap. Good selection of food and drink . Prices do go up as the night progresses so be careful, but fine by Irish standards.

Fran1979

kerberos2506 wrote: »

How All Folks,

Looking for tips and advice for a stag partyof 8 (40year olds) to Bilbao BBK Live next July. Has anyone been in the last few years, can they fill me in on the experience they had. Line up not to bad as issued last week, we hope to get an apartment in Bilbao for 5 nights and work from there. Any advice would be appreicated.
Regards...:pac:

Hi. I went to it this year. Somebody else asked this question earlier this year and I answered so there is another thread. But I will copy and paste what i said there to here.
Hi. I went to it this summer and I highly recommend it. Bilbao is a beautiful city and easy to navigate too. I stayed at a hotel for the duration of the festival and some days before it. There are buses every 10 minutes to and from the festival each day and they go from beside the main bus terminal in Bilbao. You have the option to camp at the festival too and I think it is an extra 10 euros. I paid 85 euros for this year`s ticket. The festival itself was completely cashless this year. Your wrist band has a plastic tag on it which is read by card readers at point of entry and when you pay for beer/wine, food etc. It worked perfectly I have to say and I had no issues. The day before the festival started we got notification that a pop up shop was in the city centre where we could get our wrist bands and top up in advance. It saved us on queues the next day. I spent 100 euros over 3 days. You can spend less especially if you are drinking before hand. You had to buy a reusable cup which cost 2.50 euros. You then used this cup for all drinks that you buy. They rinsed the cup for you too each time you bought a new drink. Beer came in two sizes. I believe the biggest size cost 8 euros which I thought was a bit steep but it was definitely more than a pint possibly a litre. I drank wine instead. I was able to purchase a cup of wine which was equivalent to half a bottle of red wine for 5 euros. Obviously with cost of alcohol you had a lot of younger people drinking outside the entrance before going in as no alcohol is allowed to be brought in to main area. But it was never messy. I didn`t see any trouble at the festival either and everyone was easy going. The locals are friendly too. The layout of the festival is smaller size than Body and soul. It is all grass too which is nice. There is a beautiful view of Bilbao at the entrance. There are 3 main stages. The main stage would have the main acts obviously but the Heineken stage would have relatively big acts too, this year it had Royal Blood, Explosions in the sky and Primal scream to name a few. When music is on the main stage there is no music on the Heineken stage and vice versa so there is no mixing of music between stages. There was a tent stage which was made out of perspex and was a bit hot to be honest..but saw some good acts like Cabbage and Blonde redhead there. Again there was no drifting of music from other stages to interfere. There was a 4th stage near the entrance but I never went there..it had Spanish acts mostly or acts I had no interest in. There was a dance stage also but it was a small area. I think this years lineup for Bilbao was better than Nos alive..just my opinion though..more acts that interested me were at Bilbao. The festival was really clean because there was nobody throwing cups away. The age group was a good mixture too. Acts like Depeche Mode and Brian wilson ensured there was an older crowd at it but then you had acts aimed at the younger audience too like Two door cinema club and The Killers. Justice and Trentemoller were great at it too and another reason why I believe the lineup at Bilbao was better than Nos alive. Accomodation in Bilbao seems to be more expensive than Lisbon though and that is probably because of the bull runs in Pamplona and a lot of tourists around for that. The bus from the airport to centre of Bilbao costs around 1 euro 45cents. There seemed to be a few Irish at the festival this year too. The city of Bilbao has a lot to offer too like the Guggenheim and various nice bars and restaurants. Athletic Bilbao`s stadium is near the bus terminal too but was closed to tours for the summer..you could however drink in the bar in the stadium which allowed you look into the inside of it. For convenience of the festival I would suggest getting a hotel or apartment close to the bus terminal or Athletic bilbao`s stadium as it would mean a short walk to and from the buses to the festival each day. The festival starts around 5pm each day and goes on until around 7am.

I wrote that 4 months ago. 2018 edition of Bilbao BBK doesn`t do much for me. I am considering going to Mad Cool festival in Madrid instead as lineup is pretty good. Or maybe go to Nos Alive. I want to see Pearl Jam.