Don’t Let Daddy Know, the worldwide concept that hailed from Ibiza years ago, aka DLDK is a very familiar name within the EDM scene of the Netherlands. The organization behind it, E&A Events, known for other concepts like Kingsland, TikTak and Sexy By Nature, went all out again with 2 days of party time at the Ziggodome in Amsterdam. We visited the event last Saturday, check out our thoughts below!
DLDK announced beforehand that they would be welcoming about 25.000 visitors from over 50 countries divided over the course of 2 days, which says a lot about the popularity of the event. We noticed instantly upon arrival at the Ziggodome that the foreign flags were out in full force. It’s just always great to see how music has the power to unite thousands of people regardless of their nationality. The icon/logo of DLDK has always been a triangle and for this year’s edition the organization decided to incorporate it into their stage-design with a lot of LED.
When we arrived and put our stuff into a locker, we heard Todd Helder playing the last track of his warm-up set and we realized that Third Party were up next. Third Party is a duo from the UK, which produces and plays mostly progressive house music. They played a bunch of awesome progressive Swedish House Mafia tracks and played some exclusives of their album ‘Together’ which will be out very soon on their own label Release Records. We were actually blown away by the quality of their set and to think that the night had only just begun!
Sem Vox, Amsterdam-based DLDK resident, got the party started for real. He created the anthem ‘Let’s Go’, which is euphoric, big room-ish and got everybody excited for the rest of his set. We got to mention the quality support he got (and the other DJs too), from MC Gee. MC Gee knows exactly when it’s the right time to hype up the crowd and when he should keep quiet.
Stream the anthem here:
While walking through the crowd when after getting a drink and some food, we noticed loads of people with Hexagonian merchandise. Obviously, because label-boss Don Diablo was on the line-up tonight. Don is one of our favorite acts because of his unique future-house sound and overall enthusiastic way of performing behind the decks. The way he built up his set to a climax with ‘This Is What We Started’ that caused the whole Ziggodome to clap with him was pretty magical.
Nicky Romero has been laying a bit low release-wise, so we didn’t really know what to expect from his set. The fact that massive beach-balls were thrown into the crowd during his set did help to get the crowd pumped. Nicky surprised with massive tunes like ‘Pjanoo’ by Eric Prydz and the timeless ‘NickTim’, a collab with the deceased superstar Avicii.
Quintino instantly went full-throttle dropping that infectious big-room energy when he took over the decks from Nicky Romero. He dropped new Hardwell music, Calabria and went a bit harder than he usually does with some LNY TNZ-like tunes in order to get the crowd ready for the closing by DJ Coone.
Don’t Let Daddy Know has had Wildstylez & Headhunterz as hardstyle closing act, but it was Coone’s first time playing for the DLDK crowd. He had definitely prepared a melodic set which fitted perfectly, and it included a brand-new track from Brennan Heart’s album ‘True Colors’: Brennan Heart & Coone ft. Max P – Fight For Something. Look out for that tune, because we’re sure it’s going to blow up!
We’d like to say thanks to Don’t Let Daddy Know & E&A Events for having us, we had a blast & loved partying in between 50 nationalities! See you again soon!
© Festivalling.com
Reporter: Alexander Bouten