There Will Be (No) Miracles Here- Sziget Day One

Arriving on the Island at noon has the perks of absolutely no queue at the entrance- there is already a rather sizable queue at the Luminarium though, which we've had to pass on for the past years for exactly the aforementioned reason. So little time, so much to do, we quickly trudge by the French camping and witness what might or might not be a wake up group yoga practice and then arrive at the Lightstage which intriguingly enough has three shows in the early afternoon, then a big siesta followed by a DJ set around midnight. The act we are there to see are Tomma Alistar and they have a pretty neat crowd given the time slot, helped along by the cozy surroundings, freshly resplendent midday sun, proximity of Italian food and last but not least the fact that they are pretty good themselves, delivering the perfect chill out music for those assembled to rest out the toils of the previous night (Rihanna's dirt brown hoodie now a distant horror from a past you'd rather forget) and gear up for the day to come. 

The day to come is however slow to start, so we have plenty of time for a little voyage of discovery into corners of the island situated outside of the usual Bermuda triangle of Main Stage- A38 Stage- World Music Stage. First up is the NGO island, where we are happy to see the rabbi still dispenses useful advice for ten forints, then we touch down at the Magic Mirrors venue, which is pretty packed for an afternoon film showing, while in the Colosseum people are still dancing like it's 3 AM- which is most natural since to some Sziget is one whopping week long 3 AM. Those who feel ready for something more challenging are absorbed in the kind of Art Zone activities that require the talent, ability and skill which we utterly lack, so we're on to the Sziget beach, which is the place to lounge if you're a baby sloth disguised as a Szitizen. Sadly this year the Danube's level is too high for an actual beach to be set up, but there are still plenty of people loitering around Cöxpon's bean bags. 

Back in A38 there are a lot of French people to welcome Jain- the festival's organizers do strive each year to bring several acts from the countries providing the largest numbers of foreign visitors, but we're happy to say Jain's world music infused Gallic pop is enjoyable regardless of nationality. She also gets bonus points for being a captivating presence although alone on stage with a synthesizer, where she must however feel a bit lonely since she closes the show by taking a ride over the crowd in a giant bubble.

Next up in front of the main stage, the only time of the festival when waving a giant flag of whatever in front of your stupefied neighbours definitely won't get you labelled as a dickhead, because we're having the now traditional 7 PM fiesta. This year's flags come in some brand new fashionable colours (I am totally in for the mint green one) and then we're all set for Bastille. Though that might be an overstatement, since the last time they graced the island we were not at all enamoured by them and have not spent any considerable length of time since trying to like them. Bastille, however, seem to like playing Sziget and as the gig progresses we come to the slightly shocking conclusion that their charm campaign worked and they might just have grown on us. I am therefore typing this to the sounds of Things We Lost in the Fire, one of those things apparently being a dislike for Bastille. However, given that I am misanthropic enough to need a nice healthy dose of hatred and disdain, I will now be looking for a new act to utterly dislike, and David Guetta is just way too easy as a target. The challenge is on. (Because this bit of the review is totally subjective, be informed that Bastille are from England. play a sort of indie and their second album is due to be released this autumn.)

The headline slot of the island is shared by regulars across the Bermuda triangle: Manu Chao is due on the Main Stage, the World Music Stage re-welcomes Goran Bregovic while Editors are on in A38. Schedule clashes are always an occasion for some exasperated Sziget eye rolling, so another item can be ticked off this year as well, and some of us, namely the writer of this piece, now in the run up to some gushing about Editors, make the decision to go for A38. Editors have of course played Barba Negra last December, and I can think of several nice slots in the city where the could play next December, and many Decembers after. The set is not much changed, nor the delivery, and most of the things I wrote in last year's review apply to this concert as well- out of all the bands I love (not all that many) Editors are probably the only one whose shows never disappointed me. I can even say that I only really jumped on their bandwagon after seeing them live and they are among the elect few who still make me push and shove to the front row mouthing the lyrics I've heard oh so many times. Also, I will here mention Tom Smith's hands. Just for the record. 

Also for the record, those of us who are not me and boldly decided to stay at the main stage claimed in unison that Manu Chao was great, although without being very articulate about it or further elaborating. However, given the fact that none of them would necessarily be Manu's core audience, I can safely assume that he put on a great show- of which ability I myself had been convinced all along, but hard Sziget choices are hard and I can only hope for a friendlier schedule next time he returns. 

We closed the day with UNKLE, who performed the feat of being to the liking of pretty much everyone in our group in spite of a rather divergent array of musical tastes. My track record with them is somewhat similar to that of Editors in that I started listening to them much more intensely after seeing them live- on Sziget, of course, in an earlier iteration of the A38 tent, which was white and square, and reminded me of those used back in the day for traditional village weddings. Today's A38 is a brilliant red eye candy, but never mind the tent, UNKLE can still pack some elemental punches into their track- if the other day I was talking about electronic music with a heart, well this one is electronic music with guts. 

I Was The Sziget Guinea Pig- So You Don't Have to Be

Since I am working super scientifically here, I will start alphabetically, with the suspiciously named Afrojack. I’ll also be honest- he was dead and buried as soon as I saw that most of his Youtube output is shared with Martin Garrix. I did give another song a go, also a collab, with someone named Fais, the video of which starts ominously with a vibrating mobile, so you automatically reach for yours, just in case, drop the headphones for a few seconds and those prove to be the best seconds of the song. The genre should be electro, but it’s boring and forgettable. Next please.

And as a next step, we might as well sink into the murky waters of national stereotypes: I immediately felt better about Boys Noize, given that he hails from Germany, and German electro always gives me pleasant Autobahn vibes. And indeed there is a brainy machine music whiff about his work, also mostly collabs and remixes- Starchild feat Poliça being particularly enjoyable. He will definitely not become my next playlist staple, but a pass nevertheless.

I was secretly hoping Carnage are the miraculously reformed Swedish death metal act, but then again, the presence of such heavy genres belongs to a foregone era of Sziget- and indeed, Carnage is seemingly, obviously, a Guatemalan DJ. I immediately sensed a Latino disturbance in the force when, instead of the sounds of doom and gloom, as I’d hoped, I was greeted by somebody rapping like Pitbull. And Pibull has absolutely maxed out the number of people allowed to rap like Pibull who should co-exist on this planet, so the farther I am from Carnage (DJ) the better.

All things are delicately interconnected: the most popular Dillon Francis song on Youtube is a duet with DJ Snake (can’t anybody make music on their own these days?!), which sounds like a bad version of everything Diplo ever stole from MIA, and oh yes indeed, DJ Snake collaborated with Diplo on Lean On. There is also profuse twerking in the video, much high art, such fun, next please. (Youtube promptly obliged and skipped to, yup, Lean on. Which I listened to as I was making my tea.) DJ Sliink is not even on Wikipedia, which I took to be a bad omen, and he then proceeded to thump my brain into a pulp. The unworthy of mentioning category indeed.

DVBBS sound exactly like an ad for Canadian toothpaste, in which the protagonists wash their teeth frolicking around the house and then drive out into the sunset with major grins, with the wind caressing their golden locks. In an amazing development, the video for Never Leave looks exactly like that, minus the toothpaste, which is a shame.

This is a conspiracy, and my brain will burst, Dyro is Dutch and sounds exactly like Hardwell, Tiesto and/or Martin Garrix. In a meditative take on the state of things in the world, is Dutch, erm, music so internationally beloved, or are we inflicted these people because the Dutch nation, bless their hearts, loves Sziget and moves in hordes from one end of the continent to the other come August? I am almost afraid to know the answer.

At this point I was starting to lose hope of ever being a sensible human being again, since I basically knew none of the acts coming up in the alphabetical list. And then Excision dropped the base in the most vicious Skrillex-like manner, and when evil of such proportion comes from the loveliest of lands, Canada, you know all hope is indeed and truly lost.

I was therefore absolutely delighted to discover that FIDLAR are Californian skate punkers and sing about pivotal stuff such as cocaine, Chinese weed and most importantly, cheap beer.Order of the universe restored to some degree- skate punk is normally pretty low on my list of priorities, but there comes a point when it turns into the sweet sound of redemption, and this is it.

JAIN (you guys, we get it even if it’s not capitalized) is a French singer-songwriter, which is indeed another gust of fresh air in our playlist. Some African vibes are added to the basic French guitar serenade type music- she’s lived in the Congo (which, let’s be honest, is something totally exotic to add to your biography) and is partially of Malagasy descent, so we’ll say she’s entitled to ride the African bandwagon.

It seems we’ve finally totally escaped the Dutch electro hell, which is a blessing, but there’s something decidedly mind bending in Movits! delighting us with swing in Swedish. Somehow a voice deep inside me insists Swedish was thought up more for organizing the landing of a marauding ship on foreign shores or halfheartedly explaining IKEA catalogues (or perhaps halfheartedly explaining the structure of a marauding ship.) Nevertheless, in the scorching heat and with a glass of cold cider the whole endeavour might seem like the most natural thing in the world, as opposed to assembling the LACK coffee table, let’s say.

The lead singer of Oscar and the Wolf seemingly had a rather unsuccessful stint at the Belgian Eurovision Junior preselection, and the first song Youtube threw at me sounds exactly like the entry finishing 17th in the competition. He’s sure to have some starry eyed fans with ages ranging 7 to 12, so here’s to parents chaperoning their kids on Sziget having a good time at a safe distance from wherever Oscar and the Wolf are belting out their teenage angst.

Tourist is a Brit doing a rather minimalist electro, which could be borderline pleasant if I weren’t on the comedown from a wild ride of oomphs and bass dropped randomly for the heck of it. In a totally random connection, Travis Scott has a song called Tourist, but I definitely felt better about him before I found out he sometimes writes his name with a dollar sign, which is being totally groundbreaking and unique, isn’t it. He’s probably someone’s cup of tea, and that someone is  a hip hop fan, and therefore not me.

And back to hell we are- Troyboi is one of Diplo’s many cronies, and true to form, he has some slightly oriental beats going on. The most exciting thing about him seems to be the collaboration with someone or something called Flosstradamus, which made me chuckle for two seconds, those being two more seconds of emotion than what Troyboi could elicit from me.

Vinai sound Dutch but are Italian- I don’t know whether that makes them better or worse, but they helped me in identifying the axis of evil which is Spinnin’ Records, a Dutch label which has harboured at some point almost all of the vile knob fiddlers on the festival circuit. In a more objective take, that kind of makes them wonderful at what they are doing, but they’d better do it out of my earshot.

I always go more easily on Brits- they’ve produced enough guitar music right up my alley to compensate for weirder meanderings, and Wilkinson has a pretty cool video for Afterglow. I mean, it involves a CAT, what more do you want from life these days, really.

And thus we’ve reached Zedd, whom I wish had a Pulp Fiction connection, but doesn’t. He’s Russian-German though, which is some sort of scary, come to think of it, and you won’t guess it, but he produces electronic music and collaborates with basically everyone. This round of guinea pigging being done, please excuse me while I go and, well, in the state I am, I might even ponder kissing the sky, but maybe I’ll just listen to The Last Shadow Puppets instead.