Music Festivals

[Olov]

Thought I would write a TR of my visit to a music festival I attended last weekend and was thinking there might be other who enjoys concerts as well so maybe we can have this topic to discuss such events.

 

Hadn't planned to visit any festival this summer but a friend was in the area last weekend and we checked what was being played in the capital city of Sweden, Stockholm (home of Gröna Lund). Sweden isn't really known for big festivals based on electronic dance music and there's a good reason for it. There ain't none of it, well at least until now. Now we had two major events to choose from on the same day at almost the same location. Is Stockholm big enough to be able to hold two such events at the same time?

The festivals to choose from was Summerburst and Dans Dakar. The first had David Guetta, Eric Prydz, Avicii, Calvin Harris (cancelled/delayed flight), Dada Life, John Dahlbäck, Adrian Lux, in short a big house music event held at the olympic stadium.

The second event featured Trentemöller, Crystal Castles, Tiga, Boys Noize, Maskinen, Diskjokke, etc. etc. Not as much mainstream house but good stuff non the less.

We chosed the Dans Dakar which appealed to our taste of music more.

 

The day was beautiful with a clear blue sky and temps of 25+ degrees, perfect. Took the train to Stockholm, strolled around the city a bit and grabbed some food before taking the tunnelbana (underground metro) to the Stockholm University where the stages were set. We got to the area and walked across the big fields of grass outside the festival area and people where sitting everywhere relaxing and listening to music played inside the festival area. Finished up the bottle of cider I was drinking before entering the area and it was time to enjoy some nice music for 12 hours ahead.

The main stage hadn't opened yet so we checked the area (not so big but very nice and compfy) and stages. The festival consisted of one main stage, one smaller stage and one inflatable tent stage.

 

So the first main act was opening the main stage, one of my personal favorites Andreas Tilliander. A guy who likes to play with synths, drum machines, effects and filters. He has a pretty dubby techno sound so will be a nice start of the day. If anyone is interested in gears his live equipment consisted of two Octatracks, Machinedrum, Monomachine, MPC1000, TR-707 + some FX boxes.

He started out with some slow tempo, dubby, raggee style techno (if there's such style ) and made all the subwoofers in front of the stage work for it. Crowd was sitting around on the lawn and basking in the sun. The set continued with some more techy stuff and couldn't sit still anymore so was digging to the music in a dancing mode. And just when it was getting tempo up to a good level and the mood was top notch, the set ended. Felt a little too short but the guy delivered what I wanted to hear so I wasn't too sad. Had experienced him earlier in a moore clubby environment and it was banging. Check this guy out if you get a chance.

 

Next up was a group from LA called We Are The World playing in the tent. Haven't followed this group closely but had seen some of their stuff on youtube and to say the least, they're wack!

They had just been booked one, two days earlier since another artist had cancelled (Planningtorock) so it was a sparse backdrop with just the instruments and costumes. They usually from my understanding do a lot of artsy stuff on stages and are very entertaining to watch live.

But their energy and dance choreography made up for anything that was lacking. Although the set was again too short they were very entertaining to watch and I'll make sure to check them out again if they come around another time.

 

After We Are The World we decide to see the group Maskinen (The Machine) which is a swedish group who rap swedish on electro and rhythmic sounds. Was pretty good stuff and it was starting to get crowded so not usually what I listen to but pretty fun to watch.

(Not my vid. Their biggest hit in sweden, Everyone who doesn't dance are rapist... yeah uhm ok I guess I have to move my butt then )

 

Now we decide to just chill out, drink some cider/beer and enjoy the mood and music from the small stage.

 

And checked out the tent some more where some great track was being played.

 

Next mainact was coming up, Crystal Castles although they were diva late, starting half an hour after schedule. Haven't heard much of the canadian group before and the songs I had were remixed by other artists. Anyway they were pretty noisy and mix of punk and electro. Thought the vocals was a bit on the low side in sound level but music was good, not great though. Just need to mix up the kicks as it was the same straight 4/4 kicks all the time from what I heard.

 

Now it was getting dark (as dark as it can get up here in the north) and it was the time for the man I was here for. Danish Trentemöller and his live band. The group played flawlessly and they were playing great together. The set consisted a great mix from the styles of minimal techno from Trentemöllers Last Resort album to his surf rock tracks (Into The Great Wide Yonder album). He was shifting tempo, building up and releasing a lot of built up energy. This is something you have to experience live. The last 10-20 minutes nearly killed me because of the high energy tracks and just being flat out awesome. See this guy!

Intro (The Mash And The Fury)

 

(Not my vid, Sycamore Feeling)

 

Not my vid (Silver Surfer, Ghost Rider Go!!)

 

Miss You

 

After Trentemöller we went to see the Diskjokke to cool down. A guy from Norway I like following, will try see more of his live act next time I get a chance to see him.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=anAPJjaQ_Wg

 

It was now middle of the night and up next on main stage was Tiga and Boy Noize to finnish it up in style. Tiga with his typical turbo twisty weirdness techno.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0XEY2ctSs80

Green Velvet - Flash

 

And Boys Noize as the last act, energetic rocky electro & techno with good mixing skills.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mAa4ysLj070

Intro

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0WHb_tnrGbw

Full on

 

So it was now soon after 3am and the bastards cut him off from playing his greatest encore tracks, the festival was now officially over.

Friend and me travels on the metro across the town to the after party afraid of not getting in because of long queue. But on the train we heard some bad news. When we got to the warehouse (underground baby!) it was just walk on and just about 20 people inside. Police had payed a visit earlier and confiscated all the alcohol. Bummer. It was a nice way to kill all the party mood so we didn't stay there for very long. Friend and me decided to quit the party night.

Now a looooong wait for the train home.

 

After a few days, body still akes but my memories from the evening/night are still great. It was a great to see a various of bands and artists. Hope to see more electronic festivals of this kind in Sweden.

 

Thank you if you made it this far now.... The End.

[coasterguy4]

Nice TR, I love the look of Boys Noize current set up.