Featured image by Nathan Doran
Last weekend marked an extremely successful debut of Australia’s hottest new summer music festival. Festival X launched the very first edition of the event, featuring 4 shows in 4 days in Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne; as well as Auckland, New Zealand! I had the pleasure of attending the Sydney edition and was absolutely blown away by this event.
The festival featured four stages, all showcasing a variety of local and international talent ranging from a number of different genres. My go to was of course, the Oxygen Stage; featuring an absolutely stacked trance lineup from start to finish. After kicking off with a b2b performance by locals Simon Lovell and Bobby Neon, the stage was already reaching capacity for international acts Ben Gold and Omnia, who performed under their alias FUTURECODE. Next up was Dutch DJ Ruben de Ronde, before Aussie favourites, the Sunset Bros performed for a full house.
Keeping the party going strong was Italian DJ and musician Giuseppe Ottaviani; with his unique ‘Live 2.0’ show concept. Just when you thought this stage couldn’t get any better, the lasers came out in full force for German duo Cosmic Gate; as they performed their timeless classics from ‘Fall Into You’ to ‘Exploration of Space’. World renowned psytrance act Vini Vici brought out the harder and faster beats before the legend himself, MaRLo closed out the Oxygen Stage with a bang!
Over at the Main Arena, the Pixel Stage welcomed a huge bill of talent ranging from international Hip Hop Stars to world-renowned DJs. Large crowds gathered around the main stage for the high energetic performances of Generik, Trippie Redd and headliner Lil Pump; before electronic superstars, Steve Aoki and MK took to the stage.
Finally, the acts everyone had been waiting for. Calvin Harris brought all of his energy down under for a spectacular set filled with timeless classics that had the entire stadium singing along. Closing out the event was none other than the undeniable king of trance Armin van Buuren. Playing everything from iconic anthems to brand new music from his latest album ‘Balance’, this was easily one of the highlight performances of the entire event. Kicking it up a notch, Armin van Buuren even closed out with some hardstyle in sync with the firework end show.
Wandering throughout the grounds, I regularly stumbled upon a number of new artists at the Flux and Helix stages. The Flux Stage featured a range of the hottest local talent including Sophiegrophy, Godlands, Anna Lunoe and Alison Wonderland; who continuously threw down the filthiest beats that had the entire crowd head banging all night long. Over at the Helix Stage, locals including Wildfox and Kaz James drew in a dedicated crowd of techno lovers before international favourites Nic Fanciulli, Paul Kalkbrenner, Kolsch and Camelphat closed out the stage.
Overall, the first edition of Festival X in Sydney exceeded all of my expectations. The layout of the event was easy to navigate with an abundance of food, drinks, facilities and more available throughout the grounds. The stages were only a short walk from each other, which made it quick and easy to get around without missing any of the action. The overall atmosphere of the crowd was spectacular, drawing in a wide variety of attendees with varying musical tastes. Finally, the production severely exceeded my expectations, with everything from fireworks to jaw dropping laser shows and eye catching visuals all adding to the incredible musical performances.
All in all, I am amazed at how well this festival was delivered in its first year and cannot wait to be back again next year!
Festival X will return bigger and better than ever with more cities in 2020.
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