After the forced cancellation of the Festival last year due to extreme weather conditions we’ve all had to wait for over a year to experience this Festival. CRAFT Festival is according to the organization Lose Your Mind ‘The most complete harder styles Festival’ which seems correct looking at the massive line-up. We had to make so many difficult choices because of the fact that many great acts were playing at the same time. Fortunately, we’re able to remember a f*cking thing so read our party report below!
After quite a long queue we went straight to the Tijdmachine stage which looked amazing! An old-school industrial feel for an outdoor stage was a great fit for the classic Hardstyle concept. Josh and Wesz were dropping old-school bombs like their original ‘Like Thiz’ so we decided to stick around. Obviously as well because the first of many live-acts we wanted to check out; AVIO LIVE was up next. If you’re unaware, AVIO LIVE consists of Alphaverb and Intractable One. They have been around in the scene for quite some time & definitely were able to please the crowd with tracks such as ‘WTF’. WTF would also be a good way to describe the look on our faces when seeing that the tokens weren’t as you would expect but were Pokémon tokens! A pretty genius marketing move in response to the Pokémon Go trend.
Since the Access stage was rather close to the Tijdmachine we went there to have a look. The area was already pretty packed because Adrenalize and Wasted Penguinz were throwing down a lovely euphoric set. The stage-design compared to the Tijdmachine was rather disappointing however music-wise the area was great.
The Future area, which is of course the talent-area of the Festival was pretty small but that created an intimate atmosphere. We’ve walked past this area a couple of times and from what we heard talent was clearly present in the sets. We caught the set of Crisis Era which was pretty impressive.
The Penoze area is besides the Tijdmachine area the biggest area of the whole Festival. The stage-design had been teased on snapchat already: a mountain on cocaine, pills, 2 guns, a DJ booth and a led-screen. If you wouldn’t know what Penoze means it must look pretty weird but it certainly fits with the gangster concept which is Penoze. To our surprise The Pitcher and Requiem dropped Power Of The Mind, one of the older Qlimax-anthems by Headhunterz which has become a classic over the year. We’ve seen quite a lot of festivals with food-trucks but we had never seen the Spanish tapas from La Cubanita at a Festival. Needless to say we tried it and it was tasty!
We just couldn’t resist to have a look at miss Deetox’s set at the Reckless area and that turned out to be a great decision. The area was filled with dedicated fans who were able to sing the lyrics of all the tracks. The moment when she played the popular track ‘Alone’ ft. Delete that led to an amazing atmosphere.
The fact that CRAFT Festival covers all spectrums of the harder styles shows at the Ouwe Jongens Krentenbrood area. Over there we enjoyed our second live-act of the day: DHHD LIVE! DHHD is Trilok and Chiren who you are more likely to know from the track DHHD – The Anthem (2003). It was the first time ever we managed to catch their set and we enjoyed the early sounds.
Before returning to Penoze for Phuture Noize LIVE we went back to the Tijdmachine for DJ Coone. Coone will be hosting the main area of the indoor version of Tijdmachine on the 17th September at Klokgebouw, Eindhoven. He has got so many massive early tracks like ‘Million Miles’ which made the crowd go wild.
Phuture Noize according to us is still an underrated talent. His live-set was absolutely sublime but it seemed like he was a little nervous and more focusing on doing a great mix than focusing on the interaction with the audience. It’s a learning process though and we’re sure that he’ll be improving day by day. The amount of drive and atmosphere during ‘Paranoid’ and ‘Shallow Waters’ was very cool to experience.
It has been quiet around Code Black for some time but his set at the Access area during CRAFT Festival was easy one of the best sets of the day. He’s been in the studio a lot and from what we’ve heard he’s got great tunes on the shelves. ‘You Got The Love’ with which he finished his euphoric set is one of those tunes and we were absolutely blown away by it.
If there’s anything you have to experience if you have the chance it’s an early hardstyle set of Noisecontrollers. The man has got over ten years of experience and has such an elaborate discography that you just have to love his productions. We were taken back into time with ‘Communicate’, ‘Crump’, Killer Clown tunes, ‘Malboro Man’ and much more.
Frequencerz LIVE was going to be our fourth live-act of the day already. As expected the set-list included ‘Wolfpack’ and this years Q-Base anthem which both do extremely well. B-Front actually opened his set with Mysterias (just like during his own XQlusive event) and the crowd-reaction was ecstatic. Blackness also obviously was a part of B-Front’s set and as usual some B-Freqz music.
To be honest we had totally lost track of time by now, since time flies when you’re having fun. It was time to see Gunz For Hire LIVE for the very first time for us. We’ve never ever seen anything like their 1-hour showcase. It was a live-act 2.0 with a movie, a plot & a very well thought out set-list. It has given us goose-bumbs several times for example when they dropped ‘May God Be With You All’. It’s certain that we’ll try to catch them live more!
Conclusion
CRAFT Festival has been totally worth the wait. It covers various spectrums within the harder styles which makes it attractive for many people to go. Considering the stage-designs the access-area disappointed us but that was made right by the great sets in that area. In my opinion the Tijdmachine area was my favorite area of the day, which makes sense because of the high-class line-up there. Next to that Phuture Noize LIVE and Gunz For Hire LIVE have been amazing. We recommend you to check it out & feel the atmosphere for yourself next year.
© Festivalling.com
Reporter: Alexander Bouten