Review: The Village Spiritual Synaesthesia

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As soon as the line-up times were released for The Village Spiritual Synaesthesia party, I started to mentally prepare myself for all the Village Gees about to take place in the ‘Land of Wondering Dreams.’  With comments such as ‘oh shit’ on the event wall amping me up, I could just tell that my psy-trance anniversary was going to be nothing less than special.

The week leading up to the Village was insanely long but when Friday came, I was packed and ready to party. After the usual bundu bashing to get into the venue, we grabbed our things and found a good camping spot. This is where I must say, that I absolutely love the warm hearted people who attend the Village! One lovely lad helped me set up my tent, another pegged the tent in for me and the last carried my heavy bag from the car park to my tent. Brilliant start to the weekend!

Walking through the stalls, I could hear a combination of chill-out music and heavy bass coming from the dance floor. On the path to the dance floor, my mouth dropped as I walked through the chill tent. It had beautiful decorations (that spun) hanging in the tent, ample places to sit or lie down and some chilled out tunes which varied over the weekend. After walking through the chill tent, Psydstep’s heavy beats became clearer as I moved closer to the dance floor. I excitedly walked up the little shaded path to the dance floor and smiled as I entered a different realm.

The first thing you had to do on that floor was look up. A combination of new and old colourful stretched fabrics filled the sky; the beaming fabrics combined with UV lights confirmed that I was in ‘The Land of Wondering Dreams.’ There were a surprising number of people who came on the Friday, many of those people were now thrashing their heads and jumping around to Psydstep’s tunes.

People were slowly trickling onto the dance floor and by the time Jam Jarr was up there was quite a crowd on the dance floor. I had heard rave reviews about them and I finally had the opportunity to hear a live set for the first time.   Bakaman welcomed us back to the Village and then things just got out of hand! The duo absolutely killed it! The crowd went absolutely insane to Waykin’s crazy lyrics and the mega bass provided by Soundproof.

The night moved on slowly and bass mixed with different EDM genres seemed to be the theme. At 3am I made my way to the dance floor again to catch part of the last set for the night. After passing a weird video being played in the chill tent, I arrived to find a lot of people still dancing! I didn’t know who Snitch was but I was pleasantly surprised when I saw Xatrik in the booth, throwing down some sick electro minimal beats! The beats were phat and funky, so much so that I caught sight of the security guards on the side of the dance floor jamming hard!  When the visuals had been turned off and his set was over, the crowd begged him for one more song! He played one more killer track before packing it in for the night.  Most of us made our ways to our tents as we had a long 31 hours of music ahead of us.

After Saturday morning’s progressive psy beats, around about 1pm the sun and the music finally started to heat up.  Mark’s full-on daytime beats drove all the stompers off the charts! At some point a sweet girl passed me her ‘stomp staff’ and there I was stomping the hay with both my feet and this epic stomp staff. Bruce was next up and he continued where Mark left off. I really don’t know how Bruce just does it every single time he plays. He brings the most melodic, driving, twisting and turning yet hard psy-trance to every party. He gets so into his sets and at certain points he gets these intense wild eyes and lifts his hands up/down in time to his crazy beats. It was a scorcher of a set; at one point during his set I had to stop and take a look around the dance floor to see all the grinning stompers.

The psy that afternoon was dangerously good; I was so impressed with the line up.  My friends, who had just arrived, told me that they also got their heavy bags carried by some nice guys! Seriously, big ups Village men! Walking through the chill-tent we heard some singing (chanting really) by some Hare Krishna group who funny enough also had an album for sale at the party. I laughed as I saw one of my friends had been roped into their band and he was playing alongside them with what looked like the triangle.

Next on the line up was Airtime. After the last 3 day Village last stompers were excited for his return, this explains the large amount of fans/supporters that suddenly came to the front just before his first live set. ‘Super melodic twilight music which is not too dark/daytime with some edge’ is how Airtime describes his sound. I think we can all agree that is exactly what we got! Playing tracks that he had produced, the crowd particularly enjoyed his track ‘Drool’ which can be played from his soundcloud page or below.  This set was a keeper for me and I was happy to see him receive such a large applause at the end of his set. Since he is finishing varsity this year which will give him a lot of time to perfect some new beats; we will hopefully see a lot more of him next season!

EMP was finally up and we were all excited. On Facebook he had said that he was going to play all 18 of his tracks in one hour, I thought he was kidding but he actually wasn’t. As usual EMP jammed hard during his set; egging on the stompers to stomp harder and faster with each headbang! Holding thumbs for him to upload that set!

The dance floor was packed to the brim around 11pm, scantily-clad girls with painted faces could be seen knock-kneed stomping all around the dance floor.  There was a really wild atmosphere on that floor, perhaps in anticipation of the back to back sets. When Rubix Qube started his set and I was almost immediately impressed with the quality of psy we were hearing. The cutting edge beats were dark, fast and rhythmic. The smiles quickly faded as everyone had their game faces on for this set. The Village had now turned into a pretty serious jol. Rubix Qube pretty much unleashed our ‘inner psychedelic soldiers’ that night.

The Rubix Qube set ended and Lunar appeared to form the duo Biorhythm. Round 2 was upon us. The beats had eerie twilight sounds with unpredictable playful melodies which twisted and turned as each song progressed. This combined with fast, rhythmic and powerful basslines made the set what it was. The beat was slowly rising, when the tipi above the duo began to produce a huge amount of smoke.  Suddenly all the smoke was blown forward all at once by what seemed like a huge gust of wind, the smoke covered the dance floor. At that moment the UV lights were going crazy, the sinister melody blaring through the rig and hardly anything could be seen. The combination of the psy, smoke and the hard stomping made everything seem like some Native American spiritual ritual. If you were on that dance floor you don’t have a soul anymore. Your soul is now owned by Biorhythm.  Your soul was extracted from your body during the ‘spiritual synaesthesia smoking tipi’ ritual and the only chance you have at getting it back will be next year, when the ritual is repeated.

Later that morning, I made my way back to the dance floor for Eqlipse’s set. I didn’t quite know what to expect from Eqlipse as it was her first set at the Village. The rocking djane came with loads of energy in the booth and brought MEGA GEES! I was impressed with the way she  managed to keep the floor gyrating and fist pumping to her well selected early morning twilight beats. The sun was itching to come out, the beats banging and the smiles on the dance floor were widening with every drop of the beat. I managed to catch up with Eqlipse during the day in order to find out a little about her.

By the time Deliriant’s set came around the sun was blazing and stompers were ready to stomp! His last set of the 2011/2012 season was bound to be a killer! You know the drill, awesome builds, insane drops coupled with heavy basslines and some really sweet melodies. I think after that set, we can pretty much all agree that Chronic V2 is one of the sickest tracks around!

After his set my visit to the Land of Wondering Dreams was sadly over due to various reasons. A sad time indeed, the psy anniversary was over, a good friend was leaving for London 3 days after the party and I had to say good bye to my home the ‘Land of Wondering Dreams.’ We packed up the car and lost ourselves on the drive home to Biorythym’s “Divine Geometry.”  I may not have been there for the last three sets but the psy that day was so pumping there is no doubt in my mind that the Villagers stomped their hearts out till the very end.

Words: Mbali Ngubane

Pictures: Mathilda de Villiers