Chillderburg Vier
A weekend living in a pop-up Anarchist Village, in Texas!
Summer is coming to a close, and finally, my write up of one of my highlights from the season is done. Once more, I ventured down to Texas for my favorite Liberty community event: Chillderburg. The fourth year, Vier, was a much needed reprieve from our current cartoonish state of affairs for many! A chance to break from the exhaustive norms of the rat race we all seek to move past and live in a pop up Anarchist/Voluntaryist/Libertarian (insert niche descriptor here) community over Memorial Day weekend, a much needed dose of sanity, sense, relaxation and generally, one hell of a good vibe that is hard to experience all too often elsewhere!
You can read my impressions from my first year ‘What is Chillderburg?’ covering last year’s ‘Not a cult’ gathering, but I’ll be getting into less the background on the event this time and more where we find ourselves after what I would argue was Chillderburg’s breakout year. Now firmly becoming vowed tradition for friends all across this loose culture and movement, Chillderburg has cemented itself as an essential yearly liberty gathering, and with good reason! The short and sweet of the event is it’s an annual, non-politically motivated gathering of like minded people across the liberty spectrum over Memorial Day weekend to catch-up in person, enjoy live music and comedy and generally to foster a sense of community building that not nearly enough get to experience in their day to day lives.
I pulled up with my group nice and late Friday night, the ‘early bird’ day with yet more arriving Saturday morning. Before searching for a spot in the dark to set up camp, I found my way to a chorus of familiar voices, some I’d met, some I hadn’t yet. Most surprising of all to bump into was Pete Quinones (turns out, he’s a hugger!) alongside the Chillderburg regulars such as Car Campit of Timeline Earth and The Signal, Eric the host of Rebel with a Cause, my road trip buds from last year: Spirit of Resistance and Typo of Biting the Bullet, Austin Jones of Atlas Arms and a bunch of others I couldn’t quite make out in the dark and after over half a day jammed in a car. After the warm reception, we had to find a spot for our camp.
Being my second year, and the only ‘Chillderburg Veteran’ of my group, I came with a more structured plan for my setup this year, having decided on ‘Little Amsterdam’ quite adamantly after last year’s festivities. Now, in the dark, I felt like we had a prime spot a fair ways into the campgrounds. An appropriate spot for a camp that was going to be more than likely, the main hub for my Gunstagram liberty types to gather at, but after setting up, settling in and awaking the next morning, I saw that we were front and center aside from the family camp as you came in. Not ideal as it was a fair trek across camp with how many people were attending, but we had a beautiful view of Muleshoe Bend and a quieter spot once the sun had set and Woodstock shenanigans started up.
Saturday was an appropriately chill affair, the only responsibility on our agenda was finding some internet so my girlfriend could wrap up some business prior to enjoying the festivities. Somehow, our mobile hot spot worked, what I didn’t consider was that Chillderburg isn’t the CHAZ of Texas, we have goods and services on hand! Had we ventured out earlier we would have come across not only Wi-Fi service on offer, but a whole Agora of food, merchandise, plants, party favors and otherwise available!
Last year, we had a small variety of people selling art, hot sauces and a few other bits and pieces, but people got serious for Vier! My personal favorite being the ‘Hunt & Gather Nomadic Bistro and Smoothie Bar’ food truck. I grew up attending hippie festivals in the back of a classic VW Campervan, and these guys brought that much needed energy to Chillderburg with delicious cold fruit smoothies in the Texas heat, along with Waygu Beef Burgers, Veggie Burger, Filet Minon and more on their impressive menu! For those looking to vibe on a different frequency, or outright crank it to 11 and speak to God, they had some substances available for that too! According to one camper on Shrooms, “The trees had eyes and my entire body was numb,” he went on to clarify he enjoyed every bit of the trip! I brought my own, so I can’t speak from experience of theirs, but the Triple Berry smoothie was a lifesaver whilst chilling at Muleshoe Bend.
One of the great things about this event is just how many insanely knowledgable people are brought together from all sorts of different pockets of the liberty community/movement. Popping in to Little Amsterdam, I had Ace (AceArchist) and Pat Watson of Uncensored Tactical and a variety of the more gun centric liberty guys stop by to chat. It wasn’t long before Pat had ‘taken hostages’ and duct taped and later zip-tied a volunteer’s wrists together to teach some on the spot evasion 101, damn near exactly what I hoped to see him doing after being absent from last year’s festivities and Grillburg getting locked out of his car the first night!
After spending the first half of the day at camp mixing with people, I was sure to not make the same mistake last year and hit the lake nice and early in the weekend rather than just at the end so I might enjoy it a couple times! Just as I’d remembered, the water was perfect and brought me back to life, that was essential with the music and comedy show at Iron Wolf coming up!
Being on a very loose schedule we were just relaxing when we were told by a few kind campers that people were beginning to migrate over to Iron Wolf Distillery (about a ten minute car ride away). Naturally, whether you had a vehicle or not, people found their way over as new friends offered rides over to the distillery and others ferried campers back and forth. Tickets for the show were pay what you want. Proceeds went towards covering the cost of Chillderburg Vier. Anything beyond the costs go to FreeRoss.org.
After getting in a pizza order at the distillery food truck and getting doxxed by the pizza guy when he shouted out my real name, a pretty funny issue I hadn’t even considered, I made my way over to the tables in front of the stage with my lady pretty early. Pretty sure I missed the first act while I was ordering, but next up was the musical talents of Owen-Glass and the Palace Saints who anchored the vibe prior to the comedy show. Now, I’ll be real, throughout the music and comedy show, the crowd was a little low energy for my liking. I put that down to a few things: A crowd primarily made up of introverts, being out in the heat all day, alcohol and weed and having picnic bench style seating at the front of the stage. I like it a bit more rowdy, and whilst being a quieter guy myself, I find low energy crowds to be a bit rude, but I digress! Everyone seemed to enjoy themselves regardless, following the music was live comedy starting with Rachel Tobias!
Female comedians take a lot of flack, and there’s a number of reasons for that in the era of preachy ‘shut up and listen’ activist comedy, but Rachel is the real deal. Last year in-between selling fantastic hot sauce, Rachel was performing stand-up at the campground to small groups of 5-10 people as she visited with people. That struck me as genuinely being very inspiring, it’s a hell of a ballsy thing to tell jokes to strangers without the atmosphere of a comedy show or the guarantee they’re going to give you a laugh, but she was out there working through her material to a bunch of stoned, sun burnt, libertarians. It was great to see her on stage this year and I’m hoping we see much more in the future, be sure to give her a follow on Twitter!
Following Rachel we had Brian Breckenridge, Kyle Ruff and headlining once more, Robbie ‘The Fire’ Bernstein. By this point in the night, the crowd had loosened up a bit thanks to the bar, and we started moving towards the kind of atmosphere that resulted in ‘Woodstock Shenanigans’ last year, championed by Robbie’s call to action at the end of his set:
“Alright, you guys were a ton of fun! We’re gonna do some fucking drugs at Chillderburg! Let’s do it people!”
Coming back from the music and comedy show was like flicking a switch last year, and the same was true for Vier. I don’t know quite what the equation is for unleashing our collective chaotic energy, but as night fell, people got fun and wild. The bulk of the crowd gathered at the opposite end of the campgrounds to where Little Amsterdam was situated, more around the Timeline Earth, SlurpGang camps where Bird(archist), Robbie and a few others prepared for a ‘ceremony’. Now I’m a big fan of enabling chaos where I can, and figured in the dark, my color gel lights might help set the tone for said ceremony…
Well, set the tone they did. Alongside Bird clad in a black hooded cloak, a drawn effigy of Dr. Anthony Fauci from SkullsNScalps and a tiki torch wielding, skinhead looking Robbie, the red light made the whole affair look… just a little sus. It’s okay! Robbie is Jewish so no hate crimes were committed, probably. Just the trial of Fauci for his many crimes which were read out to the crowd, Covid nonsense and AIDS being the primary grievances Dr. Fauci has committed against the public. Chants of “Shame!” came from the spectators. More concerning than those crimes however, after being sentenced the effigy simply wouldn’t burn. I don’t care what you believe, check the photographic evidence for yourself, we accidentally also discovered Fauci is a witch! We shouldn’t be surprised, but the revelation sent the crowd into a frenzy. We moved from the camp down to the beach, only the red lights illuminating the mob attempting to secure justice. I was behind my camera for the whole thing, so I lost track of quite what was said next. All I do know, is that Cotton was called up to throw a gallon of milk and Fauci was banished back to whatever hellish dimension he came from. Have you seen him much in the news lately? I think it worked.
Following the not a cult ritual, the (Former) SlurpGang boys tried to record but found themselves fighting God’s drunkest Miami Vice looking Jewish soldier. Last I heard of that particular attempt was that some of the lads from my camp were chasing Jay along the beach at 3am playing Bar Mitzvah music. I’m not quite sure what to do with that, I’m just reporting what went down.
Sunday morning, people were spent and back to relaxing. Well, for our camp, we decided to indulge in some Shrooms for the morning. I only took enough to get chatty and feel a bit wavy, but some of our group went on a trip and a half, or ‘Forty years in the desert’ as An Appeal to Liberty would describe his Sunday. Regardless, we were feeling grand and particularly sociable, which was perfect as we had Agora Brewing’s Mead to look forward to!
For those who are unfamiliar, which included myself last year, Mead is a fermented honey based alcoholic drink sometimes made with the addition of spices, fruits, grains and hops and is most comparable to wine in how it sips, thought it is in a separate category of alcohol altogether. Once again, Agora did a great job with the crowd as he passed around his various offerings, described their palette and cultivated a warm atmosphere of sophistication, even amongst those of us tripping balls. Bringing smaller groups up for tasting sessions as opposed to having everyone at once like last year was the most standout improvement and turned it from what was a great crowd spectacle into something more personable. I was distracted from savoring the Mead quite as much as I should this time around, absolutely enjoying it but more so standing by to watch my lady and the rest of the first time Chillderburg campers try it for the first time.
Sunday is the day with no real agenda, and it’s magnificent for it! Following the Mead tasting, we mixed with more campers. It can’t be appreciated enough the value of hanging with like-minded people in a social setting. Not some stuffy party meeting like the LP shitshow that was happening at the same time in Reno, arguing about how radical you should be in the face of a relentless money laundering, war machine empire, but a place where you can get a glimpse at what a future based on voluntary association could look like in reality. Rather than getting caught up in the distractions of the ever evolving catastrophe that is our government, Chillderburg was a rare dose of sanity where instead of one-upping each other with outrage, debate and speeches, individuals instead connect, trade, cross-pollinate and forge real connections.
Best of all to bond over, was the food on offer. From a peak at Cook Shanty’s 2022 menu, it didn’t look like we would be seeing Fat Konkin’s this year, thankfully that was not the case! For many first time campers, the Fat Konkin Burger was perhaps part of the curious mythos that drew them to the event in the first place. For the uninitiated, here is the recipe from the horse’s mouth:
(How does this not have more likes??)
The unexpected Konkins were excitedly received by all those with FOMO from last year, and those who had tagged along with friends without too much context, hesitantly put theirs together at the behest of veteran Chillderburg goers.
The rest of the event was a little bit of a blur for me as the night progressed if I must admit, a grand, hilarious, oddly educational blur, all the same. Firstly, my little idea of a cool Anarchist gun guy and co. area, Little Amsterdam, really exceeded my hopes! So many like minded people cropped up, gathered chairs and coolers and touched base on so many good topics and points of interest. Truly, that feeling of finding your tribe. Naturally, this continued without incident for a reasonably impressive amount of time before we allegedly broke out the gun show.
After everyone got a little excited and showed off kit and gats, we calmed things down and returned to chilling and grilling until the early hours. It was at this time that I finally figured out my plan for recording an in-person podcast. I was trying to figure out of the many gathered voices, advocates, podcasters and in general, characters I should ask to come and record a round table discussion about the event with. As the event went on, I’d struggled to decide who to bother, but that final night following the impromptu gun show, it became obvious. The newcomers had to be the voices I talk to, the people I’d dragged all the way to the hill country of Texas be it by invite or with my accounts of the previous year. I wanted to see what they made of the hardcore individualist vibe, the Woodstock tones, the community born of a few joke tweets and the general mood of our pop-up township.
The ‘studio’ for our recording came about due to the wind, we folded the seats down in the back of the vehicle we came in and set up with some first time campers and a small audience joining in from the open trunk. Goonicidal Tendencies and An Appeal to Liberty were amongst those joining in. It was an absolute blast and total chaos as you can hear for yourself here:
We set out the next morning for a 14.5 hour drive home, but this year, we made a life saving pit stop that we missed the previous year. Before the drive for Chilly 3, I took a dip in the lake as a half-assed attempt to not stink like the era of peace and love too much but actually, there’s a handy little shower right by the exit to the camp. Let this be my little pro gamer tip for those who read the whole article. It’s absolutely worth seeking out, it’s outside but with a restroom right next to it if you need to change out of a swimsuit or whatever. If you’re driving a few states or flying, those around you will greatly appreciate you taking a moment on the way out. So unless you’re trying to keep TSA from groping you, give this a look if Chillderburg Go (5) is at MuleShoe Bend once again.
If you enjoyed your time at the event or are looking to come next year, you can support Chillderburg at Chillderburg.com and sign up for email updates!
Bring that excitement and sense of community home with you, and let’s continue growing this great event year after year! It’s a privilege meeting so many people that get you and what’s important in life and a necessary pilgrimage for individualists of all stripes!
I really should set up an NZ equivalent.
Great description of Chilly! Hopefully the world hasn't ended before Chilly GO! happens and I can come over from 1984 land, this has made me even more hyped for next year!