Last Saturday we visited the sold-out Dream Village in Oosterhout organized by EYE4Dance. The Festival consisted this year of 9 areas and a total of over 120 acts! Actually there were 2 main-stages: a House main hosted by SLAM (former SLAM FM) and a Hardstyle main hosted by Scantraxx Records. We were pretty excited because of the line-up & the nice anthem ‘Our Dreams’ made by Bass Modulators. Check out our experience below!
When arriving at the Festival-terrain it was unfortunately raining which meant that the organization needed to make sure the terrain was safe for all visitors. We decided to stay near tents for a while because the rain kept pouring. At the Members of Hardstyle tent that was hosted by Frequencerz we checked out Mandy having a lot of fun behind the decks. This was actually the first time we saw her live and she didn’t disappoint at all.
When we made a tour over the Festival-terrain and all the tents we heard a lot of great music but unfortunately for the DJ’s hardly anyone was checking them out till about 1 o’clock (besides the artists playing in tents).
Pep & Rash
When Pep & Rash started playing at the main House stage the sun finally broke through. The stage design was made in a Japanese theme which looked quite nice. As usual their set contained a nice groove and was filled with some great deep-house tracks.
Discotrip area
The Discotrip area, the Freestyle area hosted by Ruthless, was located in a tent and had a pretty colorful stage design. Considering the nice atmosphere & the music: oldschool tracks combined with more recent kicks, that was being played we weren’t surprised this tent was already getting packed. Loads of artists played B2B at that moment because of the fact the first ones got their set cut short because of the weather conditions.
Hardstyle Mainstage hosted by Scantraxx Records
As we expected this stage was the biggest and had the best design of all. It looked like some castle from a fairytale with a dragon around it although we some say the dragon wasn’t designed in a way that it turned out amazing. When we decided to check out this stage Atmozfears was playing so we decided to stay for a while to watch his set. With ‘Reawakening’, ‘Release’, ‘Year of Summer’ and ‘accelerate’ it was an awesome, melodic set.
D-Block & S-Te-Fan
This duo definitely needs no introduction! They blew the crowd away with ‘Higher’, ‘Beat as one’ and threw in some amazing oldschool Hardstyle tracks. ‘Music Made addict’ and ‘The Human Soul’ gave us definitely some goosebumps and reminded of that golden period in Hardstyle music.
Frequencerz
We definitely didn’t want to miss seeing the Frequencerz live on stage! They played with so much energy which was taken over quickly by the crowd. The support of MC Da Syndrome & MC Dash also helped making it even more entertaining. The tent was absolutely packed (which actually was the case during basically the whole day) and the Frequencerz absolutely killed it with ‘Gangsta’, ‘Green stuff’, vocals like ‘face down ass up’ and the known edit of Hans Teeuwen’s ‘Snelkookpan’.
Tony Junior
Yes after the hard Raw Hardstyle set of Frequencerz we decided to relax a bit with some deep-house played by Tony Junior. We were actually surprised because Tony Junior also has some ‘harder’ EDM tracks. As expected he kept it quite relaxed considering Shermanology was up next. His set contained many popular tracks which are regularly on the radio.
Shermanology
With the big developments & changes Andy & Dorothy are undergoing on the road to Amsterdam Dance Event we were definitely looking forward to this set. ‘Sweet Surrender’ which will be on the Phylosophy EP (coming September 18th) sounded really good live. The set featured some really funky basslines and great singing as is common for this duo. A special moment was hearing ‘Blessed’ sang live, a track that basically the whole crowd knew.
Bass Modulators
Finally it was time to check out the anthem-creators on the Hardstyle mainstage: Bass Modulators! We loved the anthem ‘Our dreams’ so expected a lot of this set. Fortunately those expectations came true because Bass Modulators delivered a very solid euphoric set and even played the amazing ‘Scrap Attack’ and ‘Megasound’ which still are great to hear in a liveset.
Throwback Area
With 9 areas at a Festival it’s quite hard to see the best acts in every area but at the Throwback area hosted by Zany we hit the jackpot! Only 5 minutes after we entered it was time for the Donkey Rollers! Even though it was a relatively small area the vibe was really good & we knew that it will remain a special act. ‘Strike again’ is from 2004 but still has the ability to absolutely hype a crowd.
Degos & Re-Done
As we were unfortunately unable to stay the whole day due to the NS the decision where to close was easily made: at the Members of Hardstyle tent! Degos & Re-Done were taking over the decks of Titan who as usual had played a very nice and energetic set. Their set was characterized by nice build-ups to rough kicks. We enjoyed the old Crypsis tracks they played near the end of the set. Probably the best moment was when they played ‘Sing for moment’ and faded out the track at the right time so people could all sing along.
Conclusion
There are many positive things to say about the Festival like the diversity of styles, most of the stages and many DJ sets. Despite that we would recommend the organization to prepare a bit better their actions when they are dealing with bad weather conditions. It was announced that next year the festival will consist of 2 days! So we’re definitely curious what they will come up with next year. If you live close to Oosterhout it’s definitely recommendable to check it out!
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Reporter: Alexander Bouten