A festival story. The characters are imagined; the clothes are real.
At 6:52 p.m. the sun lets go of the ridge, and four people on the mountain are each looking at something small.
June Calloway is looking at a tag. In the lower lot, engine ticking, she snips it off a hooded cloak that has hung in her hall closet since March. She lives eleven miles down the valley, and every October for six years the bass from this mountain has come up through her floorboards and set the spoons humming in the drawer. A pale seam runs down the front of her left knee. She zips the cloak to her chin and walks uphill with the even stride of someone counting.
Tali Brooks is looking at four feet by six of blank white canvas. Eighteen, first festival, a pass that says ARTIST, checked eleven times since noon. On either side of her, veteran live painters are already laying down glowing eyes. Tali has a jar of brushes, a thumbprint of cadmium red on the knee of her new joggers, and nothing on the canvas at all.
Femi Okafor is looking at the set times taped to a cooler backstage. Someone has crossed out the 11:00 beside his name and written 4:00 in red marker; a headliner's flight landed late. Tucked in his laptop sleeve is a folded paper gone soft as cloth: an old ballet program, a dancer in midair on the cover. He slides it back. The last file in his set is called untitled_FINAL_v9.
Rania Haddad is looking at ice packs. First night shift as a volunteer medic, her name in Sharpie on tape across her vest. Forty ice packs in the cooler. She counts them again. Forty.
Down in the oaks, the first sub-bass rolls out like thunder that has decided to stay.
The radio on Rania's shoulder clicks. "Medic to the ridge trail."
✦
At 9:40 p.m. the ridge trail is limestone, leaf litter and dark. Rania finds June on a fallen hickory, her left leg straight out.
Rania kneels and switches her headlamp to red. "Can you tell me your name?"
"June Calloway. It's an old knee. It just spoke up on the step."
Rania writes it on her clipboard: June Calloway. L knee. Old surgery. Walking. Her pen is steady. The hand holding the clipboard is not, quite. She works a compression sleeve up over the seam and settles an ice pack on top.
Up the ridge, a glitchy bassline breaks apart and reassembles itself in half-time. June tilts her head. Her lips move. Five, six, seven, eight. She stops, frowns, starts again.
"It doesn't come out even," she says. "I've counted it all night."
Rania glances down. June's feet rest on the leaves, heels together, toes turned out in a perfect V.
"Sleeve stays on," Rania says, "and you're good to dance."
June laughs, a soft puff of white in the cold. "Oh, I don't dance."
Her feet stay exactly where they are.
✦
By ten Tali has painted three mandalas and covered all three in black. The canvas is a slab of wet night. There's a new stripe of violet across her joggers where she wiped a brush without looking.
She stops painting. She watches.
Up the trail, a red headlamp glows like a slow ember, kneeling beside someone in a cloak on a fallen log. Along the ridge, a man paces in headphones, mouthing something to the dark.
Tali takes the finest brush in the jar, touches it to red and makes one small mark low in the left corner.
The man in headphones stops beside her easel. Up close, his cloak matches the one up the trail: bands of mandala patterns in red, orange, yellow, green, blue and violet, spiraling down a dark base.
"What's it going to be?"
"Don't know yet."
He pats the laptop under his arm. "Same." He walks on.
She touches the brush to violet and makes a second mark, high in the center.
✦
At 3:58 a.m. the thermometer by the side stage reads 46°F, and the crowd has thinned to two hundred people breathing clouds. Totems sway above them: a moth, a cardboard moon.
Femi plays for half an hour like a man taking apart a clock and finding birds inside: clicks, breath, a sub-bass so deep it rattles the zipper pulls on two hundred jackets. Under the lights, the colored bands down his back seem to turn.
At the back, June sits on an upturned milk crate by the med tent, hood up. Rania stands in the tent door with a cup of tea that stopped steaming an hour ago.
At 4:31, Femi leans into the mic.
"Last one. Never played it for anybody." His breath fogs the grille. "When I was nine, my grandmother took me to a ballet in Tulsa. A woman jumped, and she didn't come down for a really long time. I've been trying to make that sound ever since. This one's called 'Calloway.'"
Everything drops out except one high note. Held. Held. Held.
Rania's cup stops halfway to her mouth.
June's hand goes flat against her breastbone. She turns toward the tent and finds Rania already looking at her.
Rania nods, once.
The bass arrives under the high note like a floor arriving under a foot.
June stands. She steps onto the open grass behind the crowd, and her arms rise through the cold in one long arc over her head. Her left leg lifts, unfolds, extends. The knee holds. She turns, and the cloak swings out around her in a wheel of color, and she turns again, and the people at the back step aside without a word to give her the grass.
From the decks, Femi sees only lights, breath and, far at the back, a spiral of color spinning like the one he's wearing.
He lets the track run.
Tali's brush hangs in the air. Then she paints faster than she has painted all night.
✦
At 6:49 the valley below the ridge is brimming with fog, and the sun comes up through it gold.
Tali steps back and wipes her hands on her joggers, which are by now more paint than print. People drifting toward the lot slow down. Then they stop.
Out of the black, the ridge: the oak line, a blue seam of first light, the stage glowing small at the center. A man at the decks, his back spiraling with color. Low in the left corner, a red headlamp kneeling beside a woman on a fallen tree. At the back of the crowd, the same woman, one leg extended, arms in a high arc, color wheeling out around her. And at the bottom edge, almost hidden, a girl at an easel with a smudge of red on her knee.
Rania stops first, still in her vest. Then June, her hood down, walking without counting. Then Femi, the laptop under his arm.
The four of them stand shoulder to shoulder and look at themselves.
✦
Rania points to the corner. "That's my first call."
Femi looks from the painted woman with her arms raised to June, to the knee sleeve under her rolled jeans. Slowly, he slides the soft folded paper out of his laptop sleeve and opens it. Inside, in a list of names, one line: Giselle: June Calloway.
He holds it out. June takes it in both hands. On the cover, a woman of thirty-three hangs in the air over a Tulsa stage, nineteen years ago, still rising.
"My grandmother kept it tucked in her mirror frame," Femi says. "When I left for college, she put it in my suitcase."
June looks at the program until the fog below them turns from gold to white. Then at the canvas.
"I came down fine," she says. It takes her two tries before it carries. "Tonight I came down fine."
Rania's breath starts to shake, the whole cold of the shift arriving at once. June unzips the cloak, lifts it from her own shoulders and settles it around Rania's, hood and all. Femi shrugs his cloak open and lays half of it around Tali's paint-striped shoulders. The same bands of color spiral down two backs, side by side in the first light.
Tali reaches for her finest brush. She touches it to gold and, very small, at the top of the ridge in the painting, adds the sun.
The cloaks on the canvas
June's cloak, Femi's cloak and the joggers under all of Tali's paint carry Magus Fawn's Chakra Mandala design: bands of mandala patterns in red, orange, yellow, green, blue and violet, spiraling down a dark base, like a rainbow coming down a mountain at night. The Chakra Mandala women's festival cloak ($250) is the hooded festival cloak for a ridge at 4 a.m.; the Chakra Mandala men's festival cloak ($250) carries the same visionary art clothing print to the decks, the rail and the walk back to camp; and the Chakra Mandala joggers ($100; $105 in 2XL, $108 in 3XL) are rave joggers with brushed fleece inside for the coldest hour before sunrise.
- Both cloaks: micro-mink outer · ultra-soft fluffy microfiber fleece lining in black or white faux fur · listed fabric weight 200 g/m² · double front zipper · heavy drawstrings · four pockets (two interior stash pockets, one zippered, plus two deep side pockets) · unisex fit, XS–5XL.
- Joggers: 96% recycled poly / 4% elastane · listed fabric weight 308 g/m² · cotton-feel face with brushed vegan fleece inside · cuffed legs · side pockets · elastic waist and drawstring · slim fit, XS–3XL (for a looser fit, order 1–2 sizes up).
Find your own colors for the late set: women's cloaks · men's cloaks · joggers.
What do you wear to a bass festival in the fall?
Wear bold, comfortable layers built for hours of motion: a crushed velvet top or oversized hoodie, brushed-fleece joggers, grippy sneakers for the trails and a hooded festival cloak for the late sets. Magus Fawn's pick for experimental bass nights is a fleece-lined cloak over joggers, because mountain festivals in October often fall to 45–55°F after dark.
- The visionary bass dress code: the experimental and glitch side of bass culture overlaps with psytrance style, so mandala and sacred geometry prints, crushed velvet and pixie hoods all belong. Rave joggers and oversized hoodies are the uniform across the whole scene.
- Dress for the 4 a.m. set: the late slots on a ridge run coldest, and the hour before sunrise is the chilliest of all. A zip-front cloak opens when the crowd warms up and closes for the walk back to camp.
- Mountain festival terrain: limestone steps, roots and leaf litter connect the stages, so wear closed-toe shoes with grip and carry a headlamp with a red mode for the trails.
- Look for the live painters: visionary bass festivals often set easels beside the stages, and a canvas that starts blank at sundown can be finished by sunrise. Totems help your bass family find you in the crowd.
For the real thing, Wakaan, the experimental-bass label's own festival, gathers an intimate crowd on Mulberry Mountain in the Arkansas Ozarks each early October, with ridgeline nights of 45–55°F; Gem & Jam sets bass, glitch-hop and live painters among the gem-show crowd in Tucson each early February, on desert nights of 35–45°F; and Infrasound Equinox carries deep dubstep and soundsystem culture into the woods of Harmony Park, Minnesota, each September, with nights in the 50s °F.
Frequently asked questions
Is it cold at Wakaan at night?
Yes, cool enough for real layers. Wakaan runs in early October on Mulberry Mountain near Ozark, Arkansas, and nights usually fall to 45–55°F along the Ozark ridgelines. Pack a crushed velvet hoodie and joggers for the evening sets, and bring a hooded festival cloak for the late-night bass and the walk back to camp.
What is visionary art?
Visionary art tries to show what the inner eye sees: mandalas, chakras, sacred geometry, cosmic figures and dreamlike symmetry. The tradition runs from William Blake to the live painters at today's transformational festivals. Magus Fawn makes visionary art clothing, printing each original design with dye sublimation, so the ink becomes part of the fiber instead of sitting on top.
Are festival cloaks for men different from women's cloaks?
At Magus Fawn, the difference is the listing, not the cut. Our men's and women's festival cloaks share one spec and a unisex fit from XS to 5XL, so choose whichever listing you love. To wear a hoodie beneath it on cold nights, our FAQ recommends going up a size, or even two.
Written by Magus & Lylyth Fawn, the Los Angeles artists behind Magus Fawn. Magus makes VR and digital visionary art and produces Psy EDM. Lylyth makes fractal digital art and runs design and customer care. We've been selling wearable art since 2020 on Etsy (4.7★ from 144 reviews as of October 2026) and here at magusfawn.com. Come say hi on Instagram @magusfawn.
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