A CAMPING FLIGHT TO LOWLANDS PARADISE 1996
This was the fourth time i visited the Lowlands festival. I really like
the festival because of the atmosphere and the diversity of styles.
*Friday
The first act we saw this year was Nicolette. A couple of years ago she
played a terrible set at Metropolis, but now it was a bit more
professional fortunatly. A nice warm-up for what would follow.
After Nicolette we went to see 808 State. We missed about 2/3 of their
set and at entering the tent they started a remix of their classic
"Pacific State". It was nice to hear again, although the original was
much better. I wished we immediately left again because the rest was
dreadful. How they can ruin a track like "Cubik" is beyond me.
Directionless sonic emptyness.
Time for something else: Stereolab. I'm not very familiair with their
music, but i'm glad we went to see them. Long noisy drones and beautiful
melodic songs mixed with some cheeziness. A very nice surprise!
Because of some 'security problems' we had to miss a large part of Sonic
Youth. What we saw of their gig was OK but very noisy (we saw the last
part :)
Time for friday's big finale: Bjork! She was backed by a very small band
this time: two keyboard-players we also know as Plaid, a (very good)
drummer and an accordeon player. It was brilliant! The set was very well
built and a lot of tracks had a new arrangement. Especially the new
version of Big Time Sensuality with jungle rhythms was interesting. She
also played a new song although someone later told me it was actually an
LFO track. A fantastic end of the first day!
*saturday
We first spent some time in VPRO's multimedia tent which theme was D.I.Y.
People were for instance able to check out the Roland MC-303 and make
tracks with it. As a kind of demonstration The Connection Machine created
some tracks which were performed live. Unfortunatly the sound was quite
bad and a lot of people didn't even know that something was going on. The
tracks were very nice though and deserve to be heard on a broader scale.
On the stage of the Bravo tent instead of System 7 for example. I really
didn't like them. Boring thumpy trance without any original idea in
sight, especially rhythmically. The crowd seemed to love it though.
Perhaps they should have been called Windows 3.1 ;)
Ken Ishii was something completely different! Incredible sounds and some
experimentation, but still very funky. This man is a wizard on the mixing
desk, constantly full of surprises. I think he will play a very important
part in the future of techno.
Speedy J, or perhaps i should say Public Energy, was the next act we saw.
It started very good with raw distorted beats. Then the 4 on the floor
thumps started again. The first one was quite good but the rest was a bit
more standard trancy material (good breaks though). At one point i
thought he would do some electro, but that was just an intro. Still, the
set was very well built and the crowd went bananas. The last track was
more experimental again and quite nice.
*sunday
One of the highlights of the festival was right at the start of the last
day: Lamb. A description like Portishead goes jungle does them no
justice. With their mixture of jazz, jungle and folk they create
something completely unique. The freaky rhythms were topped with a
beautiful voice. This was one of those gigs i will remember for a very
long time.
The first 3 tracks of The Aloof were so entertaining we went to another
area of the festival to hear some ska classics and see Laurel Aitken
perform. Irresistible party music which put a smile on everyone's face.
Then it was time to see the much talked about Eboman. The energy of this
gig was enormous although sometimes the enthusiasm of the Ebopeople was
so big it all got a bit chaotic and over the top. The video was
incredible and a very important part of the gig. When you see for a
example a machine gun you also hear it as a part of the music. Very
entertaining.
The last band we saw were the Propellorheads, a DJ/musician duo. I never
heard of them before, but they were quite nice. Nothing too shocking, but
solid funky beats to get that last bit of sweat out of your body. I
especially liked the bits where one Propellorhead was behind the drums
and the other behind the digital hammond.
I didn't see/hear that much of the DJs because i sometimes wanted to give
my ears some much needed rest. Of what i heard of them some were a little
bit disappointing (Lady Aida & DJ Angelo) and some very good (Roni Size,
Alex Reece & DJ Robob). I think the main reason why i didn't really enjoy
Aida & Angelo's sets was that the crowd demanded trancy stuff with not
too much experiments. Or perhaps i'm getting old and boring :)
Anyway, the music is just one part of the Lowlands festival. Altough i
may not have enjoyed all the acts and wished for a little more
progressive techno programming from the organisers, i had a fantastic
time. The atmosphere was great again (perhaps even better as last year)
and the festival was organised very well. Next year i'll be there again!
Also check the website of the festival, especially if you're interested
in Java:
http://www.vpro.nl/lowlands/
Mazzel!
Hans
____ _ _ ___ ___ __ ____ Hans Veneman
(_ _)( \/ )___ / _ \/ _ \ ___ /__\ ( _ \ hansv@tip.nl
)( \ /(___)\_ /\_ /(___)/(__)\ )(_) ) tv99ad@xs4all.nl
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