Neon Desert Crews Pack Up And Pick Up After Music Festival

Event organizers breaking down and cleaning up what’s left behind from Saturday’s Neon Desert Music Festival said the turnout was better than they’d ever seen.

While most of the people who attended the festival spent Sunday recuperating, crews were still at work, taking down stages and cleaning up after the all-day revelry.

“We have about 40 people out here tearing it down getting it back nice and ready for tuesday,” said DB audio crew leader, Bill Biddle. Almost as soon as they’d set things up, they have to tear it down again. “We’re breaking down four stages. The stages consist of the stage itself, the sound, the lighting, video, walls, everything that was seen at Neon Desert.”

The empty streets and stages were a stark contrast to the performers and party-goers who flooded downtown until the festival wrapped up at 2 a.m.. But as the Neon Desert came to an end the clean-up was far from over, lasting well into the Sunday afternoon.

“Today is the part of the festival that’s not so much fun,” said Neon Desert Organizer Zach Paul. The big party was mostly all business to him. “We get out of here in the afternoon with our team. We have some volunteers we have our entire staff; everybody’s out here with trash bags picking stuff up, moving sand bags, moving fencing, getting trash bins,” said Paul.

The city also started to get things put back in order. The street signs taken down to make way for festival stages were put back up for work-week drivers.

The quick turnaround might seem like a lot of work to the average attendee, but for the organizers, “It’s worth it the minute you see friends or you see festival-goers. You just see people having a good time and dancing and thanking you for doing this, when really we should be thanking them for coming to this,” said Paul. “I think what were excited about now is that we get to start planning for next year.”

While Paul does not have official attendance figures, he says they exceed 2011 numbers.