Fest Donates $3,300 to Area Food Banks! Thanks to the enthusiasm of Detroit music fans, and the generosity of Detroit's musical community, this year's fest was able to donate over $3,000 to Gleaners Community Food Bank and The Food Bank of Oakland County. Thanks, New Detroit! For more details, see the Financials section. Photos Posted from 2002 Fest! We just posted a healthy batch of festival photos to the site. See the 2002 Photos & Schedule page. Festival Name Change! Unlikelihood of unlikelihoods: what you knew as MXMW will, in the future, no longer be known by that name. It's a long story: Seems some enterprising folks in Cincinnati took it upon themselves to not only appropriate the MXMW name, but they went and registered the name as a Limited Liability Corporation, too! And they've been promoting this Cincinnati impostor as a real live, legitimate music fest (with panels and everything! They get an A for effort!) Well, before we could say "litigation", the folks who run SXSW/NXNW issued the Cinci MXMW a cease and desist order and threatened 'em with legal action! As most of you know, the last thing WE wanna do is get wrapped up in some kinda conflict, so we're changing the name of our festival. That's right, if we do the festival, for a 3rd year, it won't be called MXMW. It will be called something else. We'll keep you posted with all the details. In the meantime, feel free to call us The Fest with No Name, The Festival formerly Known as MXMW, or simply The Festival.

Then it happened again.

The Festival Formerly Known as The Mid by Midwest music festival is organized for and by the Detroit music community. It takes place in the heart of the Detroit music scene, and exactly half of the event's net proceeds go to an area charity. The other half of the proceeds is offered back to the artists who make the event possible, though many of the participating musicians opt to add their pay to the overall donation.

In 2001, The Festival Soon to be Known as Something Other Than MXMW donated nearly four thousand dollars to HAVEN, an organization that provides shelter and assistance to abused women in Southeast Michigan.

Because of its homegrown roots, and because so many associated businesses generously donate their services to make the event a reality, The Festival Formerly Known as MXMW has almost no overhead. And because The Fest That Currently Has No Name but Was Once Called MXMW makes its receipt numbers available to everyone, both artists and audiences can see exactly where their money goes.

The Festival Formerly Known as MXMW was founded by a group of Detroit musicians, club owners, promoters and fans who felt a growing dissatisfaction with the manner in which the Metro Times chooses to handle its Blowout event. Some of these musicians felt that the Detroit Music Awards (the Blowout's sole charity beneficiary up until 2002) was an archaic institution, out of touch with the real and vital core of Detroit's music community. Others became disillusioned when they realized that the Blowout's prime financial beneficiary was the Metro Times itself, a commercial entity that garners revenue through the weekly sale of advertisements. In 2001, The Festival Soon to be Known as Something Other Than MXMW donated nearly four thousand dollars to HAVEN, an organization that provides shelter and assistance to abused women in Southeast Michigan.

Graphics - Tom Deja for Bossman Graphics
Layout - J. Frezzatto for Octane Grandé