Sonar by Night is the rave up. Pure and simple. A gargantuan airport hanger 15 minutes out of town (btw this should only cost about 12 Euros, not 40 Euros, which they will try… there’s a free bus, but it gets hectic) with one indoor stage and two outdoors. The main pull of the Friday night is Grace Jones who, although hitting the stage an hour late makes up for it by appearing on a 20 foot high tower with almost 20 foot long legs, belting her diva voclas on hits like Nightclubbing, before straddling poles and big ass fan machines. Although (much like the Sonar By Day programming) there’s the breakthrough electro disco UK acts like Little Boots playing on the main outdoor SonarPub stage, it’s about the Mary Anne Hobbs presents… showcase.
Grace Jones
MAH smashes out some dirty dubstep to exclusive visuals by LuckyMe before Joker racks up. One of the highlights of the weekend is Joker, the young Bristol Purple Prince hammering out banger after banger of psychedelic low end wonk, from Digidesign to Snake Eater. Gaslamp Killer’s MCing is worthy of mention. Barcelooooona! That’s before doing what he does best, cutting from Still Tippin’ to Rusko to Jimi Hendrix. Big ups to Gaslamp, and of course Martyn, whose trademark dubby, techno set was another one of best of the weekend, resonating even better in the great, purple outdoors. Hustling over to SonarPub we found Buraka Som Sistema shaking down with a grip of females on stage. And again for Friday, the kuduro livewires knock out a live Sonar highlight.
Joker
The festival’s closing Saturday night features Animal Collective (unfortunately the early billing and late night Barcelona steez means we miss them), but this is made up by Rustie’s awesomely nonchalant attitude to smashing out freaked out beats and the epic Orbital comeback – surely the biggest crowd of the entire weekend. Yup, they play Satan and yup they’re as heavy as ever.
Rustie
There’s already YouTube footage of the Crystal Castles meltdown – Alice punching one of the production staff, the technical difficulties throughout the entire set… Sonar issued a press release stating: “The festival’s technical supervisors repeatedly attempted to remedy the situation, by asking the band’s sound team to solve the problem. Their efforts were in vain due to the negligent and irresponsible attitude which the band’s technicians displayed throughout the show. The festival organisers deeply regret the inconvenience caused, which turned one of the night’s most eagerly-awaited shows into a disaster.” Take from that what you will. Moderat on the other hand were pretty amazing, the throbbing electronics and visual theatrics of the Modeselektor and Apparat collaboration leaving you shaken and sweaty…
Leave A Comment!