Certainly we received no clue from the event name. If it would have been sponsored by Trojan condoms perhaps I would have gotten some early hint about the event. The fact that it wasn’t called a MUSIC festival also threw us off ….as did the word IDENTITY. I will discuss all three words (condoms, music and identity) in this review.

Eric Prydz’s publicist was the one to contact HMR asking us to cover.   Cathi and I stepped up to the plate as we like to explore  unfamiliar  music/bands/acts/artists.  The festival schedule called them ‘artists’…..I don’t know that I would call them artists.  The World’s Most Popular Disc Jockeys would be more in tune with what we experienced ( not that being a DJ is a bad thing at all).

The event started at 2pm and lasted until 11pm, curfew hour at the venue. There were three stages set up for the festival goers to choose from. Some H-Town based performers were included in the line up.  Besides the ‘artists’ gear on stage, which included no guitars, drums, or other assorted music instruments, there were wall to wall LED Screens.  And these were obviously a key element to this brand of entertainment.

Here is a brief summary of the sights and sounds we experienced…I think.  Upon entering the complex,  we encountered several thousand young 18-30 year old men and women, boys and girls dressed for a ‘beach party’ with way more skin showing than clothing. Certainly we saw on display a lot of individual IDENTITY’s!  Most of the guys were showing off their age…i.e. flat bellies and proud of them.

A few of them chose tee shirts to make their statements, such as:
-‘Don’t Worry, Live Happy’
-‘Let’s Get Wasted’
-Sex, Drugs and Dub Step’…What’s a Dub Step you ask? From Wiki:
Dubstep (/ˈdʌbstɛp/) is a genre of electronic dance music that originated in South London, England. The music website Allmusic has described its overall sound as “tightly coiled productions with overwhelming bass lines and reverberant drum patterns, clipped samples, and occasional vocals”.

-Can’t Stop, Won’t Stop’

-Wake Up Drunk, Go to Bed F…ed Up’

The women were a little more diverse in their attire, and I use the term loosely. Most were showing off their very fit bodies, and some were just showing off their bodies – in whatever shape or size.  Many wore bikinis and tutus. (Not sure what the tutus were all about however I am curious.  If you know, enlighten me) with neon colored fake fur booties.

The aforementioned other than the bikinis would not be my first choice for women’s apparel.  However, it was working like a charm for many of these ladies as the guys were following them around like puppy dogs in serious heat.  Here is where the Trojan condoms fit in, figuratively of course. When you put that much flesh in front of a twenty- something guy who has had a little alcohol, add an ‘overload’ of significant cleavage, and a major repetitive dose of provocative females being displayed all over these LED screens, plus this DEEP LOUD PULSATING BEAT SHAKING HIS VERY SOUL OVER AND OVER, then funnel all of these scantily clad bodies into close quarters jumping up and down and ‘dancing’…well, I think you get the picture!   (And, in case you don’t, check out my images in the Photo Gallery.  I think you will pick up on the kind of energy that was being generated!)

Oh, did I mention that this festival is really all about dancing almost naked to sounds (go back and re-read the definition of the word DUB) that perhaps some would call MUSIC?  Hell, I loved to dance for many, many years growing up and I’m just pissed they didn’t have events like this when I was that age. Or maybe they did and I just missed them??   There is no doubt I would have been right in the middle of it and for sure my lovely wife would have been right beside me. (If the true be known she wanted to get right in the middle of it on this night, no question about it. She just let her age talk her heart and soul out of it.)

These young folks were having a nearly continuous blast and getting a terrific work out trying to keep up with the ‘sights and sounds’ that pounded away in the hot night air. There was so much jump, jump, jump that to not be in shape would have been ill advised …most in attendance, male and female, definitely got that memo!

Before closing this review, I guess I should spend a minute on Eric Prydz since he is what brought us to the festival in the first place. I guess you’d call this Swedish DJ the main stage headliner for the event as he was last to go on and ‘performed’ the longest length of time.  His sounds/visuals were all as good as any of the others we heard, maybe better than most. Certainly they were just as loud, just as visual, perhaps even more so, and drew a big crowd.  If that wasn’t very descriptive, I’m sorry.  I really don’t know how to describe this eventt any better.

All of the 21 men and women ARTISTS/DJ’S we experienced did what they do very loudly with terrific graphics that either they or others created, it’s impossible  for me know without a lot of research and frankly  it doesn’t matter enough to me . And we really never got a glimpse of who was behind the turn table and head phones. More often than not they were in the shadows, merely silhouettes against the LED screens that intermittently raised their hands, jestering to the crowd to ‘get your ass in gear and jump jump jump!’.

I heard the message and think I could personally use more of that in my life …or are those days over for this reporter/photographer?  Guess time will tell…

Until next time I hope you keep it between the navigational beacons.