IN its biggest year to date, Future Music Festival prevailed over a deplorable new venue to confirm itself as Perth’s largest and best dance party.
Over 29,000 punters – up an extraordinary 11,000 from last year’s event at Wellington Square – made their way to Ascot Racecourse last Sunday to send off (a very hot) summer in style.
The layout of Ascot – making its debut as a festival host – was simply ridiculous for an event of this size with the two main stages located so far apart, that it took the best part of 30 minutes to navigate between them, let alone find a good spot to watch the action.
This created an absolutely jam-packed area adjacent to the main Future Music stage and The Likes of You tent, where the upbeat crowd seemingly ignored the negatives to enjoy one of the most consistent festival line-ups of the year thus far.
Bristol’s Way Out West kicked off a stellar back-to-back selection of some of the world’s best DJs on The Likes of You stage with a strong, albeit slightly low key, mix of progressive house, trance and breaks.
Colombian-American DJ Erick Morillo provided the huge main stage crowd with the perfect two-hour late afternoon remedy of strong house music before the first headliners – Scotland’s Franz Ferdinand – took to the stage.
Playing to a setting sun, the indie rock band demonstrated their position on the dance-rock bill by playing tracks off their genre crossing party album Tonight: Franz Ferdinand, along with radio staples Take Me Out and Do You Want To.
France’s David Guetta showed celebrity DJs how not to rest on your laurels with 90-minutes of world-class house, integrating tracks off his massively successful solo album, One Love, including club anthems When Love Takes Over and, of course, Sexy Bitch.
For the hardcore dance fans, Sven Väth played the highlight of the day on The Likes of You stage with an epic two-hour set.
The German electronic legend was his usual madman self as he built a truly anthemic two hours of dance music.
British progressive house legend John Digweed followed Väth with his own terrific set which matched his status, however the crowd had already begun to gravitate towards the main stage in anticipation of The Prodigy, who didn’t disappoint with a cracking set that incorporated all of their massive hits.
While The Prodigy confirmed their headlining status, German electrohouse duo Booka Shade closed The Likes of You stage with a surreal hour of incredible electronic music.
These two powerhouse electronic acts demonstrated the strength and evolution of the Future Music Festival, which was sadly let down by a sub-par venue and transport situation.
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