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Snearkerz Festival: Reviewed Reported by Tara / Submitted 14-10-09 14:52 With so much more to see and do in Holland, HarderFaster was invited out to Eindhoven to see what was on offer. One phone call later and correspondent Tara was on her way, well sort of! Aside from music, one of my other great passions in life is travelling. So when the opportunity arose to cover Eindhoven’s Sneakerz Festival, there was no way I was turning it down. Despite a disastrous week of missed deadlines, moving house, a botched job interview and a couple of missed trains and planes, soon I was on an Easyjet flight to the Netherlands’ City of Lights. Arriving at Amsterdam’s Schipol Airport, it’s an easy stroll to the trains, where I buy a ticket and, after some advice from a kind local who warns me off the one I was going to get on that would have involved a few changes, jump on the next direct train to Eindhoven. Walking through the town I’m surprised to see big groups of school children still out and about: it turns out it’s actually Eindhoven’s Liberation Day and one of the biggest parties of the year for the whole city. The streets are full off people and the atmosphere is happy and vibrant. At dinner over a beautiful Caesar Salad and glass of wine I learn that Eindhoven is one of the oldest cities in the Netherlands, dating back to 1232, but after the city centre was almost destroyed by the war there are now a number of beautiful new architectural areas, making it one of the world’s foremost design centres. The name De Lichstad — City of Lights — comes from the fact that the first Philips lightbulb factory was built here in 1891 and there are light galleries and installations all over the place. Today we’re lucky enough to have timed our visit for the Lichtjesroute (Lights Route) being on display, a 25-kilometre illuminated route to commemorate Eindhoven’s Liberation Day where lightbulbs are used to depict liberations scenes until the second Sunday of October. Walking though the city with Carien Kirkels from vvv.Eindhoven and through part of the Lichtjesroute and down a past a strip of bars and clubs that are overspilling with happy jovial people, we meet up with the others at Luz (www.luz-restaurant-bar.nl) where they’ve had a very nice meal. Sneakerz Competition winner Carlo Gambino from Leeds and his girlfriend Melissa have joined them for dinner, but they sensibly head off to catch up on some rest before tomorrow’s big day, where Carlo is going to open the Sneakerz Music stage at the festival, while the rest of us head into the city. Everyone is clearly exhausted after such an early start and an action-filled day that included a cycle tour around Eindhoven and trip to a local Skate Park (www.area51skatepark.nl) so there’s no takers to go back there to the psy trance party, but the others agree it would be a prime location for it. Despite an offer from Carien to get me there in a cab I also put on my sensible hat and head back to the hotel. After a good night’s sleep and a hearty buffet Dutch breakfast of muesli, yoghurt, fruit, cheese and bread, it’s time to catch a cab to the festival. While a tad overcast, it’s a warm day and we’re all in good spirits. Driving a small distance out of the city we pass a forest before reaching the wicked festival location on the banks of a lake. The festival had just started to kick off as we enter and as always, I’m blown away by the professionalism and impeccable organisation of the Dutch. Having worked at a few big events in the UK, I think it’s safe to say things are a bit more haphazard. Here though is a sea of calm as people walk around smiling and greeting their friends. Sneakerz Festival was first started by Dutch DJ/producers ErickE and Fedde le Grand to help up-and-coming DJs play in front of larger crowds and promote their music. The Sneakerz concept promotes this further: there are billboards and pictures of different trainers all over the site and with such a variety of stages covering most subgenres of house music, from progressive to electro, deep and fidget as well as hip hop, techno and tunes from the 80’s and 90’s, there really is something for everyone. I’m a little nervous however, for as much as I love some good prog and deep house I don’t always see it as party music and can only agree with a comment Peter Ward made in an interview a few years ago when he said that funky house sounds like something that should come out of a Japanese slot machine. How will all this house music work on a live stage? I’m keen to find out. Carlo Gambino starts the Sneakerz Music tent with some nice uplifting progressive as we cash in our first drink tokens of the day, which have kindly been provided for us by our generous hosts. The sun is coming through the clouds and people are coming through the gates, grabbing a drink at the queue-free bar and relaxing under the palm trees and on the beach. Unfortunately for Carlo this means there’s only a few of us dancing to his set inside the Sneakerz Muzik tent and from the booth he can’t see those dancing out in the sun, but he keeps smiling and playing some great tunes nonetheless. Chatting to him afterwards, the tracks he felt went down best were Chris Wood’s My My and his own Got High, which is yet unsigned: take note label owners, this guy’s got some great stuff going on! I’d have been happy grooving away to Carlos’s set but with eight other stages to cover it’s definitely time to go exploring. On the main Sneakerz live stage a small crowd is starting to gather as Carl Tricks warms up for festival founder and promoter ErickE. Carl plays the kind of uplifting progressive house I’d expect to hear in Ibiza and with tunes like Music Is The Answer being dropped with the lake in the background you could easily think you were on the White Isle. But with beers at just 3 tokens each, this is certainly the mainland. Soon ErickE is on and he hardly stops smiling or dancing during his set. And given that he’s partly responsible for the fantastic party unfolding in front of him, it’s hardly surprising that he’s in an extremely good mood, for a large crowd of smiling sneakers-wearing fans has now formed and are getting well into the festival sounds. We head back to the Sneakerz Music stage to see Kiss FM DJ Simon Dale, who’s got a big group of happy festival-goers dancing outside the tent in the sun. After enjoying last year’s press trip so much Dale said that he wanted to return this year and DJ so Clubbing Holland managed to set it up for him (don’t worry — I’m not getting any ideas!) Dale appears to be enjoying it just as much this year. His favourite tune of his set was M’Black’s Heartbreaker, but from what I saw everything he played went down well. Each stage has a massive sound system and wandering around the site, I’m surprised that there isn’t more of a sound clash between them. But each area has been strategically placed to avoid any problems. It’s time for some lunch and after perusing the cheap and plentiful offerings I manage to find a vege option: spring rolls. The food area is right next to the 80’s & 90’s stage and Sander Hucke is pumping out timeless classics like Funky Cold Madina and Rhythm’s Gonna Get You while people chomp on their burgers, pizzas and rookworst. It’s started to get really busy and very hot, but there was plenty of shade around the site and in the tents and a cool breeze blowing off the lake. We set off back to the main stage to catch Funkerman’s set, where he took a few classics like Fatboy Slim’s Praise You and Everything But the Girl’s Miss You and putting his own Sneakerz spin on them. The crowd go absolutely crazy and he looks like he’s loving it. Chatting to Erica from HOllanCLubbing.com about the current dance scene in Holland, she tells me trance is all but over for the time being, for house and electro are huge. “This is the music scene,” she says, and with a few thousand happy smiling Dutch going mad to it in front of us I’m certainly not going to argue. We’re both curious to see how this is going to change the forthcoming DJmag Top 100 Poll which has been dominated by the European trance lords for longer than I care to remember: but with Tiësto since deciding to quit trance altogether, PvD already having gone on a bit of a pop trip and Ferry’s style always being more of a mash up, maybe it’s just time for something new. Funkerman drops a mix of Fleetwood Mac’s Looking Out for Love and I have to remind myself that cheese is one of the land’s greatest exports, for he still has the crowd eating it out of the palm of his hands. Funkerman is enjoying it so much he almost has to be pulled off for headliner Lucien Foort to take over. I haven’t seen Foort since I won passes to see him play The Gallery many years ago so am interested to hear how his sound has progressed since those heady Turnmills days. Starting out with an electro house version of Lenny Kravitz’s Are You Gonna Go My Way, he proceeds to play anthem after anthem to the now packed main arena who’re going absolutely mad for it. He’s continually involved with the crowd, smiling and singing along to tracks like One More Time. With the heat cranked up we take refuge in the Jagermeister chill out area behind the main stage, where downstairs you can relax and watch a movie or upstairs VIPs and press can lounge in bean bags and watch the action on the main stage. The bean bags are a great find and with the tranquil lake to the left, the main stage action to the front and the fun park with skiers getting pulled along the lake to our right it really is a beautiful spot. But we’re not just here to sit in the sun sipping drinks, with interviews booked almost back to back for the next couple of hours. First off it’s Funkerman, who’s a bit embarrassed to tell us that he has to run away to the 25th wedding anniversary of his parents’ friends. “Sometimes I do normal things,” he laughs. As he was one of the pioneers behind Flamingo Records with Raf and Fedde Le Grande I’m keen to learn more about him: watch this space! Meanwhile Lucien has the main arena going ballistic to Underworld’s Born Slippy, surely one of the greatest festival tunes around?! All too soon Lucien has finished and having heard that he also has to take off quickly, we go to meet him next to the lake for a chat, trying to avoid the camera crew who’re following him all day as The Cube Guys take over the main stage. Congratulating him on a fantastic set, he tells us how he’s got to rush away as he has not only another set but three in total to get to that night! No wonder the crowd love him so much, and given that he’s spending the day travelling the around to his gigs in a limousine full of competition winners — which he has conveniently ensured are single and female he tell us with a wink — the guy is obviously a local superstar. We have a brief but interesting chat about the changes in the dance music scene and how much harder it is for producers to make money in this day and age, while Erica reminds him how much fun they had at the Parade a couple of weeks earlier where Lucien’s float was one of the best of the bunch. He assures us he’ll be back in London to play at The Gallery soon and I can only recommend you go and check him out. Next on the interview schedule is Birmingham-born MC Gee, who after starting out in the UK drum & bass scene has been in the Netherlands for years and now plays all over the world. He’s full of praise for the Dutch scene and given how well he’s doing out there it’s hardly surprising. While many HarderFaster readers are no doubt cringing at the thought of an MC over electro house I’m surprised to report that it actually works well when done properly. MC Gee MCing over the Bingo Players on the main stage was testament to this and not for the first time at Snearkerz, my perceptions of dance music are challenged and altered. Our next interview is with festival founder ErickE, who we meet on a lookout overlooking the whole festival, quite a breathtaking spot. He’s happy to explain the Sneakerz philosophy to us: “We wanted to create a platform for the new guys. We had a bunch of people around that were really qualified as DJ but had no way to get themselves noticed. So we tried to achieve that by putting on our own party!” Surely a voice of inspiration to any up-and-coming DJs and promoters out there, he goes on to describe how one of the key ways they do this is by having the well-known DJs play first and the “new fellas” on later. It’s certainly a formula that works, for looking down the festival site is now packed full of happy colourful party-goers. Some of the new comers we decide to focus on are the producers of the new Sneakerz CD, The Cube Guys and Prok and Fitch, who are closing the main stage, and Sunny James and Ryan Marciano, who’ve just played a storming set on the Flavour stage. It’s their second Sneakerz Festival and since the first one they’ve come a long way, having now played some really big events. They met through the dance scene ten years ago, so have been doing music together for a while and are now enjoying seeing the fruits of their hard works pay off. Describing their music as a mix of house, techno and minimal, they aim to play with a lot of energy and groove but the right mix of tech: a fine combo! For the rest of the year they’ve got some even big events on the horizon which they encourage UK readers to come and check out and can only recommend it: I suspect these guys are going to be huge! We let them go and enjoy the last hours of the party and go to finish our final mission on the main stage. Unfortunately only one half of the Cube Guys is around and his English isn’t brilliant, but we manage to catch up with Brighton DJs and producers Prok and Fitch, who tell me how thanks to the vibrant Dutch scene Holland is now their second home as they’re over there every month. When asked what they’d say to encourage other English to come over, the answer is: “Come and listen to some decent f*cking music! If you’re into house music, at the end of the day this is a great place to be!” Their final set on the main stage confirms this many times over: it’s a fantastic end to an incredible festival. Waiting for the cab back to the hotel we’re entertained by thousands of drunken Dutch all trying to jump on their bikes and head home, but once again I’m amazed at the laid back attitude and good humour all round. Given how much trouble you’d see on an average Saturday night in the UK, today I haven’t heard so much as a cross word, let along an argument or a fight. Everyone is just as polite and helpful as they were 12 hours earlier. My final verdict? If you like a bit of house music, you’ll love Sneakerz. It’s well worth it for the relaxed chilled-out atmosphere that goes with the name and the colourful crowd. There isn’t really anything in the UK I can compare it with: possibly SW4 at a push, but this is way more laid back, while it’s certainly less pretentious and much better value for money than Ibiza. On Sunday we all sleep in then have a final wander around Eindhoven city, and I can now confirm that the architecture is indeed worth checking out along with all the interesting shops and cafes. We have a relaxing lunch near the Central Square where there’s great range of cafes, with people sitting outside eating and drinking but it’s soon time to head back to the train station and the airport, which all goes incredibly smoothly in typical Dutch style. Without doubt, I hope to make it back to Eindhoven again to have a proper look around the galleries and town, and hopefully make a psy trance party! Share this article : : : Follow HarderFaster on For more information about Sneakerz Festival check out www.sneakerzfestival.nl Thanks to Erica Hutchings and the team at Holland Clubbing, Carien Kirkels and all at vvv.Eindhoven, easyJet, The Eden Crown Hotel and www.hotels.com and everyone who made this weekend and the Sneakerz Festival such a lot of fun. Images courtesy of Melissa Halliday, Andrew Hemphill and Erica Hutchings. Not to be reproduced without permission. Share this :: : : : Follow HarderFaster :: Other Features By Tara: Blasting towards summer festivals with Bahar Canca ahead of Psy-Sisters Spring Blast! Turning the world into a fairy tale with Ivy Orth ahead of Tribal Village’s 10th Birthday Anniversary Presents: The World Lounge Project A decade of dance music with Daniel Lesden Telling Cosmic Tales with DJ Strophoria Tom Psylicious aka EarthAlien takes 50 Spins Around the Sun: Raising Awareness Through the Power of Music The views and opinions expressed in this review are strictly those of the author only for which HarderFaster will not be held responsible or liable. Comments:

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