The concept was born in Ibiza, but at the present day it’s a worldwide phenomenon with events in the UK, Thailand and at the home-country of the founders: The Netherlands. Don’t Let Daddy Know is one of the very few events where you see people flying in from all over the world to witness the event and represent their country with their flags. This year DLDK had a weekender on the 2nd and 3rd of March and we went there last Saturday to check it out! Read all about our experience below!
Upon entering the venue and seeing the stage it was clear that the organization had lived up to their promise to create a new stage. The characteristic DLDK triangles were once again clearly incorporated, both in the led-screens as 6 huge moveable triangles at the ceiling. It wasn’t that busy yet at the beginning, but that’s no surprise since a bunch of visitors had bought a weekender so they might have been a little tired from the day before.
When we arrived, Mike Williams was almost finished with his set and the decks were taken over by Lucas & Steve. Their future-house/pop vibe is something that you hear quite often on the radio these days, so it was a very nice warm-up for the rest of the night. They’ve got a lot of hits but ‘Let’s Go’ with Curbi and Mike Williams is definitely a crowd-pleaser.
During the set of Sem Vox when he asked the crowd to put their flags into the air we came to the realization how many different countries were represented at the event. Brasil, Korea, Spain, Italy, Germany, Scotland and France to name a few. It actually created a flashback in our minds to watching the live-streams of Ultra and Tomorrowland where you can see an equally big amount of nationalities represented. According to the organization they expected people from 75 countries, which might have been a tad bit less due to cancelled flights, but probably very close to the correct number. His anthem for DLDK Amsterdam was received quite well by the crowd, personally we prefer his anthem from last year though.
A special thing which is part of the show for a couple of years now are the bracelets that are handed out at the entrance that become a part of the light-show during the night. When you stand at one of the stands in order to get a great overview it’s beautiful to see the lights lighting up matched with the beat of a track. Nicky Romero’s progressive house sound as well as the popularity of his Protocol Recordings label is on the rise, which was proven a few weeks ago when Protocol signed artist Raiden got to play during the closing of the Winter Olympics in South-Korea. With tracks like ‘Champion Sound’, ‘Like Home’ and ‘Nicktim’, Nicky Romero managed to keep the energy-levels flowing high.
Axwell ^ Ingrosso obviously need no introduction and we had very high expectations of their set. Within 5 minutes the expectations were exceeded, what an amazing show, vibe & tracks!! The duo at the very top in terms of quality dance music right now and the combinations between the show-elements and a mix of older (SHM) music and more recent tracks was definitely the highlight of the night for us!
The NERVO twins were born in Australia, but are currently living in the USA and fly all over the world to do shows. They’ve been the biggest female act in the DJ MAG top 100 for years and it’s not that often you can see them in the Netherlands, so we were curious about their set. ‘Reason’, ‘Like Home’ and one of their most recent collabs ‘Loco’ with Danny Avila were included in their set. Clearly a lot of big NERVO fans had come over, since we spotted people with NERVO merch and self-made signs. It’s a challenge to play after the headliner of the night, but NERVO didn’t have any trouble with that and not with playing a bit longer either the next act was a bit delayed.
Another Australian act, which you might know from the viral video with a dad with a trumpet and a kid slamming the oven-door, is Timmy Trumpet. He hasn’t really got a particular style of music, but pretty much plays what can hype the crowd, whether it’s big-room, psy or harder styles. His set was quite similar to the one he played at Tomorrowland last year, but that wasn’t really a big deal because he played one of the best sets at Tomorrowland 2017.
To close the night, you always gotta go a bit harder, in order to enable the crowd to get rid of the last bit of their energy. Wildstylez knows exactly how to make that happen. With remixes for W&W and Vini Vici it’s clear that he’s a versatile act. He accomplished his mission to lose the last bits of our energy, since when we left the Ziggo Dome we were very tired but satisfied.
Conclusion
DLDK is a must-attend event if you love the diverse spectrum that Electronic Dance Music has to offer. They pretty much always got a few big headliners and a proper build-up of the night. However, if you go, remember: Don’t Let Daddy Know! 😉
Reporter: Alexander Bouten
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