Origin Festival @ BelvoirAmptitheatre, Perth 31/12/10

Wed 5th Jan, 2011 in Gig Reviews

The biggest DNB festival in Australia returned to its Original home at the Belvoir Amphitheatre for Origin 2010-11. A sold out crowd arrived early to check out masters of all that is dark; Evol Intent who arrived on stage late and busted out dubstep to many a darker fans disappointment.

He fondled his way through Big EI tunes Dead On Arrival and lighter favourite Middle Of The Night, but some of the evolness was lost during Pendulum’s Witchcraft and the pure cheese of Dr P’s Sweet Shop – This track should be banned from all festivals from here on in.

In the Amphitheatre ministage 16 Bit were killing for a modest and up-for-it crowd of early birds. Fast and frantic beats kept all bouncing as one, smashing out big tune Cobra as the sun slowly melted into the night sky.

The legend that is High Contrast graced the decks to minimal hype and got straight down to business, dropping Lincoln Barrett bombs all over Belvoir. Kiss Kiss Bang Bang and London Elekricity’s Just One Second had the lovers of liquid gurning for more, even Dirtyphonics’ remix of local boy Shock One’s anthem Polygon got a proper rinse out. Love Sick was a major highlight of the night, however a fresh mix of If We Ever didn’t really deliver and the withdrawal of Return of Forever from his set list were the only real sour points of the sweetest set of the night.

Ex-local lovely Kito kept the faithful happy with a dublicious set, staying away from the commercial cheese released on sad ears by some of the head liners, LFO kept the people surging and was one of the finer moments on the top/darker stage.

Nero nudged High Contrast aside, literally, and gagged the crowd with an epic electro false start, before common sense prevailed and nasty dub bizness rained down in a sea of light. Nero nailed it, rolling out his own show dubstep showpiece Innocence and the “oh my god” epicness of Skrillex’s Scary Monsters and Nice Sprites.

Quite spectacular to see is a jam packed amphitheatre jump to every clinical beat as one solid unit of joy showered in white light. Is there anything better than drum and bass and thousands of your closest mates? I think not.

Major draw card, Chase And Status kicked on with the anthems they’ve burned into the subconscious of every drum and bass fan’s head. Is It Worth It brought the pace down before the horrendous Smash TV turned the front section into a minor moshpit. Duppy Man had the purists moving, while Hurt You and Take Me Away_ had the crowd wailing along and dancing up a frenzy before Pieces gave the softer heads in attendance a chance to kiss and cuddle the missus, naaaaaw lovely.

The clock struck midnight and hugs all round, and due to the firework ban at Belvoir, there were none but next man up, Subfocus brought a lighting rig that could put any pyrotechnics to shame. Smashing off with Rock It before touching on Daft Punk’s Around The World and Deadmau5’ Ghosts And Stuff.

He was hardly visible behind such an elaborate rig, but no one seemed to mind, he more than made up for it with the epic selection of his own tunes being rolled out. Timewarp and the fantastic X-Ray had the late stayers going bananas.

Those who had come to get lifted got it in spades, as Hedforshire’s own Jon Gooch, a.k.a. Spor came out and smashed what was left of the DNB faithful, Aztec and ignition aired early to rapturous approval. Something about Belvoir brings out the crazies, one overeager punter was crash-tackled trying to get up close to Spor, naughty naughty. If only he had held on, Spor would have came to him, before releasing a Perth inspired remix of Pacifica on the crowd, he leaped into the crowd to be as one with his Perth minions and to signal the end of what was to be a fantastic new years and well organised and enjoyable event.

Well done to Knowledge Music on delivering again, cant wait til next year, we’re very spoiled Perth, aren’t we?