Celebrating its 10th anniversary, the Awakenings festival in Halfweg, Netherlands (about 1 hour outside of Amsterdam), featured over 70 artists hailing from 11 different countries this year. With names on the lineup like Richie Hawtin, Chris Liebing, Speedy J, Jeff Mills, Adam Beyer, Loco Dice, Luciano, Laurent Garnier, Dave Clark and the Belleville Three, the lineup is enough to make any Techno enthusiast salivate. Although Detroit is still the birthplace of Techno, it seems as if the promoters behind Awakenings are making a very strong case as to why Europe, not Detroit, is now the real hotbed of Techno music.
Monumental Productions, known for sparing no expense when it comes to the production setup of their festivals, create elaborate stages decked with flame throwers, fireworks, full color laser shows and stage props that look like they come out of a block buster Hollywood movie. Creating a post apocalyptic techno land, equipped with fortress-like stages, entertainers wearing spray painted hockey masks and body armor, ridding dune buggies and ATV's. The entire scene was reminiscent of a set piece out of a Mad Max movie.
The combination of the stellar lineup and outstanding production created an extremely high level of anticipation when it came to attending this festival. The journey from NYC to Halfweg, Netherlands, was a Hajj to the Mecca of Techno.
Out of the 30+ electronic music festivals that I have attended, Awakenings surely falls among the top 5. The people, the venue with its various fantastical stages, outstanding performances by almost all the artists and a mind blowing festival finale, combine to produce an electronic music festival experience that is sure to rank as the best techno based festival of the year.
Out of the three festivals, (Awakenings, Love Family Park and Exit Festival) that I attended on my 2010 Euro-tour, the crowd at Awakenings was probably the most internationally and demographically diverse. While the majority of attendees fall in the typical bracket of 20’s to 30’s, the overall age was skewed slightly toward the older side as I saw very few partiers that fell in the teen to 20’s range.
It was also surprising but fun to see a couple of kids,(12 or so years old) attend the festival. Naturally under the guided care of parents whom made sure to have their young wear ear plugs and sunglasses while keeping them hydrated with lemonade. Normally I would not condone bringing kids to a music festival, but the environment at Awakenings is such that it allows for children to enjoy themselves under the care of their parents.
Unlike other festivals, I saw very few people that appeared outwardly and overly inebriated in some form or another. The crowd at this festival by enlarge were techno music enthusiast first and foremost and this was evident by the maturity at which these party goers handled themselves.
Over the course of the festival I met a DJ and his wife in their later 50's that were standing right in front of Dave Clarke's stage enjoying the pounding bass. Both took time to ask me where I was from and marveled that I had made a trip all the way from New York to the Netherlands to attend this festival. I met people from Italy, Russia, Canada and Australia which impressed upon me how much of an international awareness this festival has.
Whether you are 10 or 50 or fall anywhere in between, whether you are Dutch or hail from any country around the world, Awakenings offers a safe and exciting festival experience which makes it comfortable and welcoming for people of all ages and backgrounds.
The Awakenings Festival takes place in a recreational field of an area called “Halfweg”, about an hour outside of Amsterdam. The Festival is setup over 6 stages, 2 large open air main stages, 2 big top tents and 2 smaller tent stages. The recreational area of Halfweg is comprised of several fields separated by trees and also contains a large pond. This creates a perfect area for the various stages to coexist by allowing plenty of space in between the stages so that he sound from one stage doesn’t bleed into another. The pond, with its fake sandy white beach, allows for festival goers to sun bathe or relax to take the strain off their weary feet. It is also easy to spend your entire day at the festival and not get bored with your surroundings, as you are always able to take a 5 minute walk to another stage and feel like you are at a completely new area.
The most memorable aspect of this festival with respect to their stage setup is that rather than settling to create the standard raised platform stage with lighting trusses suspended above, the two open air stages resemble disco themed fortress walls. The faces of which are armed with, speakers stacks, subwoofers, disco balls, spot lights, strobe lights, intelligent lighting, flame throwers, lots of lasers and fireworks. Other festival promoters, please take note, this is how it should get done!
V Stage
W Stage
X Stage
Y Stage
DJs and Set Times
residentadvisor.net/dj/marceldettmann
residentadvisor.net/dj/benklock
I had been looking forward to hearing these two wizards of the Berghain dance floor for quite some time now. These two DJs have attained a legendary status in the world of modern techno and tech house, utilizing Berghain as a launch pad to blast out the sound of Ostgut Ton (Label of Berghain) around the world.
Upon entering their arena, I was not disappointed by what I heard. On the stage, Marcel Dettmann was moving his hands as if marching in place, eyes intent on his laptop and the energy and excitement clearly evident on his face. His counterpart, Ben Klock, seemed to be enjoying himself delivering massive doses of Berghain born techno across the dance floor.
While this form of hard techno, synthesized on the dark cavernous dance floors of Berghain seems slightly out of place in a bright lit up festival big top tent, the crowd never the less seemed to be enjoying the fast pounding bass and unrelenting snares and drums.
I had heard of Reboot from a techno connoisseur friend of mine, but had never seen him perform in person, especially performing a "Live set". So I was very interested to see what this DJ would bring to the table and with only another 15 minutes left to his set, I rushed over to the W Open Air stage.
As I made my way to the front center of the stage, the sounds were definitely jamming and the crowd seemed fairly receptive although also a little sun weary. Reboot lived up to my expectations, but didn't necessarily surpass them. Delivering a nice blend of minimal techno and tech house, Reboot succeeded in packing his large W open air stage.
My stop at Steve Rachmad's stage to listen to his set was purely coincidental, I was walking by the big top tent he was playing in on my way to get some food when I couldn't stop but take note of the techno he was playing. It had a nice hard edge to it that was welcoming after hearing a slightly more minimal and down tempo set from Reboot.
The scene inside his stage was very energetic, the crowd seemed extremely lively and the occasional build-down in each track was punctuated by cat calls from an eager audience. The two LED curtains on this stage framed the DJ nicely and provided great visual back drop for the artist on stage.
Overall I really enjoyed the portion of Steve Rachmad's performance that I listened to. He played a range of tracks that incorporated ambient sounds with hard bass and a quick tempo. Although I had never seen Steve Rachmad before, I will definitely keep an eye out for him in the future.
Steve Rachmad had just gotten off the decks to make way for "The Surgeon" Live. So I decided to give this stage another 15 minutes of my time to check out what kind of operation the Surgeon would be delivering to us. Slowly and methodically, the Surgeon started to slice out beats; they started out slow, very ambient in nature, not quite in harmony. He was testing the crowd a bit, building the anticipation. In the video below, you will notice this as the first 2:30 are very ambient in nature, but it is at about 2:40 that he kicks in a deep dark bass line...and you know then that the Surgeon is ready to operate. Take a look below at the Surgeon Live for yourself.
www.residentadvisor.net/dj/luciano
It was now about 5:30pm, the great Chilean/Swiss tech house master, Luciano was about to get on the W open air stage and the promises of some amazing Latin and Tribal drums incorporated with a tech house back beat called out to me. Luciano's beats infused with Latin drums was definitely resonating with the crowd. I could feel from the crowd interaction, even at the outer edges of the masses that Luciano was connecting with them.
The sounds of a funky sample yelling out "Ooh baby" repeatedly blasted at me as I got closer to the stage. Luciano was pacing back and forth on the DJ booth, like a caged fox, waiting for the moment to release the trapped beats.
Still waiting for the right moment, Luciano shifted to another track with Arabian sounding flute sample and some off tone sounds, as if to shock the crowd back into a state of alertness.
With Reboot at his side, smiling and interacting with the crowd through Luciano's beats, I could sense from the two DJ's that another killer track was on its way. Kicking things up a notch with some snare sample beats, Luciano was ready to devour the crowd with Loco Dice's track, "Definition". Slowly layering the track in, I could tell the crowd behind me was feeling it simply by the smiles on Reboots and Luciano's faces.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laurent_Garnier
Next up on the agenda was Laurent Garnier, playing a special live set for this festival. To my complete surprise, in a festival known as the Temple of Techno…somehow, the deep dark sounds of Dup Step were crawling out of Laurent's stage as I approached it. I rushed into the tent curious to see how the in world a Dubstep DJ had snuck into the lineup. The tent felt dark and heavy, the crowd, slowly undulating to the heavy bass lines seemed oblivious to me as I pushed myself to the front. Laurent and a member of his band, manning a drum machine were carefully building a Dubstep beat, bringing it to a boiling point…and then whipping the Dub Step beat into the familiar sounds of 170bpm Drum N Bass.
This reminded me of Electric Zoo in 2009, when Desyn Masiello surprised the crowd by moving from down tempo house into a kicking Drum N Bass set. I could tell the crowd was enjoying this little trip down electronic music memory lane as well. Drum N Bass has become sparse amongst electronic music festivals in the west, these little interludes almost feel like a slow but inevitable salute good bye to a genre of music that has become trapped by its own definition. As they say, save the best for last, and Laurent appeared to be no stranger to that concept. Bringing on stage three additional musicians, a Pianist, a Trumpet player and a Saxophone player, Laurent definitely piqued my curiosity a notch higher.
The track "The Man with the Red Face" came on and served as a back drop for what would become a Jazzy, funk band, going through a jam session. One by one, the Saxophone player, Trumpet player and Pianist/Synthesizer player went through a solo session, layering on top of the bass and drum beat of "The Man with the Red Face". Finally, all 5 musicians synced up together and brought the crowd to a roaring cheer as they closed out Laurent's set.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Detroit_techno
Expectations were high and I was dying to see the "Belleville Three" perform. Known as the founders of Detroit Techno, these three high school friends (Belleville high school), are held as legends in the techno arena. Derrick May was playing solo when I first approached the stage. I had seen him a month before at DEMF (Detroit Electronic Music Conference) a couple of times and he continued to impress me this time around.
The other two of the three Belleville's joined in a round robin format, each playing a few tracks. While it was a treat to see these three pioneers helm the stage, the performance of Juan Atkins and Kevin Saunderson were somewhat less than inspired. Although it registered as an "Okay" set for me, I was expecting much more from Juan and Kevin.
Dave Clarke has been a pioneer of the Techno movement for many years. Two years ago when I first investigated the Awakenings Festival in Holland, the first clip that got my attention was of Dave Clarke playing out on the main stage and a visual bombardment of lasers hitting the crowd. Therefore, although I had never seen Dave play before, catching his set held a special importance to me as he was partially responsible for raising my awareness of this festival.
As I made my way over to his stage, I could hear the unrelenting sounds of kick drums and snares pile out of the packed big top tent. It sounded like a war of sounds was being fought within and at first I couldn't make out whether I liked it or not. Upon snaking my way into the tent and to the front of the stage, the full force of the sub woofers started to wash over me. His set was certainly not for the faint of heart.
Over the course of the 30 minutes that I listened to Dave, he never faltered and continued his onslaught of hard driving Techno with deep bass lines. The video that I captured doesn't do the music justice as the missing sub-harmonics take away from the overall effect, however the clips will convey to you the unrelenting drums and snares that Dave uses in his set along with the mesmerizing visuals.
It was now 9:30pm and Richie Hawtin was already playing on the open air stage. With an extreme display of "force of will", I pulled myself away from Dave Clarke's stage, much to the chagrin of my friend whom was really getting into Dave's set. Untangling myself from the intricate and hard beats of Dave's set and the packed tent, I eagerly made my way over to the "W" open air stage. Already the field was pretty packed and I decided to first go up close to Richie's stage to get a few pictures and listen to him play. As expected, the start of his set was a little on the mellow side, but I knew that soon the heat would turn up...literally.
I made my way to the mid-back side of the field to get a better view of the full presence of the "W" open air stage. The scene reminded me as if I was looking at the front wall of some mythical Techno Castle. The stage looked intimidating, almost menacing with its 4 huge buttress-like pillars. Before me was Richie Hawtin, blasting out a barrage of beats and melodies, the spot lights and flashes of strobe lights bombarding the crowd…truly an impressive scene.
With 30 minutes left until the close of the festival and Richie playing ambient sounding tech house, Mr. Hawtin eased into a build-down, slowly a myriad shards of light shot out of the stage from 4 points, creating 4 funnels of lasers so low that one need only raise their hands to touch this faux vortex of light beams. (As seen at about 2:42 in the first video below)
A sudden series of explosions caught my attention and I could see that on the Y open air stage fireworks were being fired off as the lasers from the W stage continued their mesmerizing dance of light.
The crowd climaxed in excitement as a combination of Lasers, fireworks and flame throwers were unleashed simultaneously, creating a visual overload on the senses the likes of which I have never seen. The crowd responded in turn, releasing their energy in response to Richie Hawtin's beats by raising their hands and shouting out in excitement…
To me this is the moment that defines the Awakenings Festival… Take a look at the video below marvel at the visual overload of the Awakenings Finale!
With over 70 different "A" list artists over 6 stages, the Awakenings Festival will not disappoint you if you love techno or tech house. I would highly recommend you attend Awakenings if you find yourself in the Netherlands in late June or make a special trip to it if you are a true Techno enthusiast. Outside of the Detroit Electronic Music Festival in America, this is the ultimate Techno experience for music lovers. An extremely impressive lineup, top notch production value, great crowd and one hell of a festival finale will await any one that makes this pilgrimage.
