Ok, so I like electronic dance music, more specifically Trance. When I started in the 1990's, the US was a bit behind in that department.
Still, with San Francisco and San Jose nearby, I've had some opportunities to see some great EDM/Trance DJs. Back in the early 2000's, they sadly played club music in the US that was nowhere close to the hits they had composed and were known for, but over the years, as Trance started becoming more popular, those DJs finally started playing their good tunes in the US too, and maybe from 2004 on, it's only been getting better. Popsicle Halloween 2004 was really the beginning of great music parties in the San Francisco Area, and thankfully things have gotten even better since then
As a matter of fact, after another 10 years (2015 and beyond) the good news is that Trance has grown quite a following in the US, and places like the SF Bay Area, and while Trance has been declared dead a few times in the last 10 years, it's still going strong here.
Trance Family SF is definitely strong in the area, we've been getting more big trance parties every year, including many top DJs that come visit us what feels like every other week now (as of 2018-2019), and through those events, I made many friends in Trance Family SF. Thanks to you all.
Over those years, I got the chance to meet a few of my favourite DJs, including Armin more than once, and my last hobby has been to work on lights for my shirt and pants (version 3) and (version 4)
And if you are curious about my LED outfit, you can read more about it on my led peacock engineer medium post and if you'd like to read all my festivals or dreamstate, or clubbing posts, please click on the links higher on the page to get taken to those categories.
Nature One, Germany's Burning Man Like Huge Camping Party with A Bonus 2 Day Festival At a Former Nuclear Ballistic Missile Base
Yes, the title is a mouthful, but Nature One is a lot all at once, so I had to capture that :)
Welcome to Pydna Former Ballistic Missile Base!
Pydna had Nuclear-equipped MGM-1 Matador, MGM-13 Mace, MIM-14 Nike Hercules and BGM-109G Ground Launched Cruise Missiles.
Nature One Part 1: Huge Campsite Burning Man-like Bring Your Own Party
The reason I mention Burning Man here and below, is because many parts of the Nature One huge Campsite reminded me of burning man. The amount of things people brought to build multiple thousand sound camps and fun little camps definitely brought back that feel for me.
Joining an existing campsite (in my case F12) on thursday, didn't really work well. There was no indication I could find on the map on which road to take to enter each side of the festival and campground. After starting from the wrong side, and being sent around, the other side sent us to a long not much moving line to the wrong campsite (F12 was full by then, and everyone was in line for another location). The main thing that was not ideal is that there was no one to direct traffic and help people get to the correct site.
camp ticket checking was efficient
people didn't really know what to do
As we got closer, one of the security guards told me we would not be allowed to drive towards F12 where it was located, because F12 was full, that was non negotiable and we had to drive back out. I didn't really take no for an answer and eventually they let us through. From there, we made it to United Nature One pretty quickly.
This is were I have to express my sincere gratitude to United Nature for being so kind as to invite us in their camp (which has been going to Nature One for almost 20 years in a row). Niko, aka DJ of Silence, was super nice and helped us out with a tent onsite, which really helped.
I did bring a few offerings which are legal currency at burning man ;)
My original plan was to stay at a hotel 30mn away (not counting driving in and out, no idea how long the daily lines were), but they rightfully convinced me to come a day early and camp, as the campsite was really a significant part of the party, and that sure was true.
United Nature had a very nice setup:
very useful camp kitchen during the storms especially
hiding from more rain :)
I did bring enough chargers to setup a couple of charging stations for everyone
private toilets
real generator to power the stage and the entire camp
and it was a big crew indeed
also well setup for food
big team :)
The United Nature one stage was actually really impressive:
the camp was filled with DJs, including some who played trance. Yeah!
smoke bubble machine
smoke machine
LEDs and lasers
lasers in the rain
but yeah, it was lots of rain at times
it was a real nice setup even if it got quite muddy later at night
What was unexpected is all the camps and parties at the campsite, that some people never even went to the festival. After setting up, went for a walk to see some of the other camps, of which there were many. Walking the entire campsite end to end would probably take 1h, although the central parts had all the sound camps and end to end was about 30mn:
as I mentioned, the area is big
lots of smaller camps, almost burning man-like. Bier Garten!
also lots of drinking going on ;)
Snow in July ;)
it does stretch out quite a bit :)
lots of games were centered around drinking somehow ;)
K@noc, was the only camp I found outside of Nature United, to have a nice selection of trance DJs. Much thanks to both :)
woohoo, a whole day of trance, but it was indeed rare
Many camps looked similar to what you'd see at burning man, but without the corrosive playa dust:
The one thing is despite the many many camps, most of them, played techno, techno, and also techno :)
The camps did keep going at night of course, some literally went 24/7, especially some next to where I slept :)
The campsites had toilets and water of course, and other things like:
for pay showers
vending machines
drink options if you didn't bring your own
water delivery for camps
the campsite had food vendors that thankfully accepted real money (although you could bring all the food you wanted to your site)
one great thing they had were 3 cell towers from the 3 major providers in Germany. Cell coverage was excellent despite an estimated 50K people
ample medical help, and they seemed busy :)
this was a pre-set camp for people coming by bus
lockers
While Parookaville was busy preventing use of gas and solar generators (which basically means solar panels and batteries), even preventing batteries that were the size of what I use for my outfit (and are allowed on planes), Nature One allowed all of these and even had a full bigger battery rental setup:
89E is not bad for power power stations and replacements all 4 days
Part of the time was spent hiding from the rain, which thankfully did not hit during Nature One festival hours themselves:
Since the whole place did become a muddy mess, they did cover some areas with hay to make it more bearable:
Since it did rain a fair amount on Thursday and Friday, so I was able to hide in camp, and used the time to fix broken bits of my outfit :)
did fix my LED shoe, but it was so muddy, I never actually used it
Somehow rain did not stop people from shooting personal fireworks from the camp :)
some were quite good
While it's clear that some people never left the campsite, but for those who went to Nature One, you could get your festival wristbands, as well as load up some of the fake but required festival money on said wristbands (more on that later)
you could top up from machines, or on your phone
adding money was easy, of course getting back the leftovers, a lot lot less. Shocker! :(
Campsite videos:
Instagram Videos in Campsites:
The people
Some folks had cool outfits, more than parookaville but less than the average insomniac US festival, or even Chateau Perché I had just gone to:
the only half totem I found
and this cute little one :)
Dreamstate balloons :)
Nature One Part 2: The Actual Festival
With all the fun happening at the campsite, it wouldn't be difficult to forget there is an actual festival (running from 20:00 to 06:00, or 18:00 to 08:00 if you go for extended hours):
let's go from here
to here :)
There was a fairly long walk from the campsite to the festival (or twice as long or more depending on how far you were camped):
it's unfortunate that they didn't find a way to open the festival on the side closer to the campsite
eventually made it
Right here, I need to state that just like campsites, 80-90% of the music was some kind of techno, hardcore, hardstyle, or acid. I realize that there are lots of kinds of techno, but given that I'm not a huge fan of techno, some of the nuances were lost on me ;)
Thankfully there was one psytrance stage, and a bunker that played some trance mostly on saturday:
Hi Talla 2XLC
And Alex Morph
Also got to meet Ed Lynam who closed saturday night
The festival had lots of food options, putting aside the fact that they didn't accept real money:
unfortunately way too many people still smoke in Germany and those lovely people were there pushing cigarettes as hard as they could ;(
extra needs were taken care of :)
Mainstage actually played various kinds of music that were other than techno:
The highlight cool factor-wise was of course all the former bunkers with huge concrete blast doors, where nuclear ballistic missiles were stored and could be taken out and fired within minutes in case of need:
how cool is this?
Also each bunker hill had stages on top:
Sunset was late, a bit past 21:30, but Nature One went all night:
definitely took work getting up and down
All in all, many stages to get around:
Thanks Talla for the trance
Day 2 had fireworks, but those were sadly a huge waste of time, barely managed to stay on a steep hill and wait patiently for fireworks that were shot behind the hill, so I was barely able to see them. Sad :-
So after wasting all this time for a fireworks show that was mostly not visible, went to see the rest of Alex Mprph who played great trance:
Soon after that is when Paul Van Dyk played mainstage. A nice mix of trance and some techno to make the Germans happy :)
Hi Mom :)
PvD's set where I'm visible a few times :)
And after PvD, finished in the Heaven's Gate bunker for more trance (well, a mix of trance and techno):
Videos Summary:
Instagram Videos Summary:
How did this compare with other German Festivals, i.e. Parookaville?
Getting in and out of Parookaville was bad, even if you biked, there was a required shuttle with huge lines
I never went to the Parookaville campsite, but I know it's nowhere close to N1 in terms of fun and party. They have a long list of not allowed stuff, including generators and even solar generators that are as safe as can be. They even restrict USB battery packs to what can fit in your pocket (mine barely do, but I have very big pockets)
Parookaville festival was 3 days vs 2 for N1 but of course N1 wins by far on all the campsite parties
Both festivals require unnecessary fake money with cumbersome refund procedures
N1 did not require privacy invasive personalization and denying entry on perfectly valid 500E tickets like parookaville did
Parookaville had so many silly rules like disallowing camelbacks or any water container except their 0.5l pouches that failed and leaked, but they did provide free water inside while N1 did not.
Parookaville had fewer stages but they were of better quality
N1 wins by 1000x due to the coolness factor of the venue :)
N1 wins by plenty on the burning man-like campsite atmosphere and all the parties, that was unique and very enjoyable
So there you go, hope this helps and clearly for me N1 was a winner.
Thoughts/Conclusions
Oh yeah, I almost forgot, it was August in Germany, but it was quite cold. Thankfully it didn't rain during the actual Nature One Festival Hours:
So, what were my thoughts? I'll start with what wasn't ideal:
Weather was poor, everyone was prepared for rain and mud, but doesn't mean those were fun. I didn't even bother using my LED shoes in all that mud, and my LED pants are covered with mud I'll have to carefully clean at home. Thankfully that was the last festival of that trip. Yeah, call me sheltered and afraid of rain, that's fine :)
The required fake money BS. Sure, it's not parookaville joke plastic money, but it's still a completely unnecessary system that I am convinced is geared against the festival goer more than help. "Cashless" they call it? It's too bad that I don't have cashless plastic cards in my wallet already or a phone that can pay to tap for almost 10 years. This really has to go, but it won't unless enough festival goers complain loudly.
Unsurprisingly, just like virtually every festival that does this, getting your unused money back is somehow manual and designed so that enough people don't bother and lose their leftover money. As I write this, no one can get their money back, they have to wait long enough that some amount will forget. Sigh....
On the upside, security at the festival entrance was pretty lax, so it was easy to bring your own food and drinks but that was definitely against their rules. I'm totally fine with having to buy food and drinks onsite, but allow pay by card and phone.
I unfortunately have to add that they did not make drinkable water available inside unless you bought some. Ironically there were huge containers of water to wash your hands next to the toilets, but it was marked as non potable. Of course, now you have people drinking it anyway and taking their chances. That's probably the most disappointing thing on a festival that got so many things right. Come on, this is not Lumi, you are better than that Nature One...
no drinkwater it says, and since they didn't provide another source, people drunk that
They had a pretty useful app, but it was all in german. It's Germany, so it's not like I should complain, but mentioning that thankfully Google Pixel can translate graphical apps by scanning them and translating their output. That helped a lot.
Sadly one of the messages I translated was the one who said to go climb the hills to better see the fireworks, not saying that the fireworks would be half not viewable if you were on the left hills and not at the top of them. I guess I know for next time now, but it sucks to have mostly missed the fireworks after patiently waiting 40mn for them :(
but back to positives, the festival was super permissive on what they allowed. In the campsite you could bring anything you wanted, even fireworks in the campsite, hence the burning man feel I mentioned
festival entrance was also quick and painless, no huge lines and security was pragmatic and looking for real threats. Good for them.
it's obviously not a trance focussed festival, I guess Germany is mostly about techno nowadays, but if you knew where to look, there were other kinds of music, although that was a lot of walking to go find them, almost as much as EDC Vegas :)
More generally there were around 15 stages at the festival (even if 1/3rd of them were small in bunker holes), plus probably over 30 in the campsites, so even if a lot of is was techno, you cannot complain that you can't find music you like, although you have lots of places to check out :)
I said it before, but I'll say it again, cell phones worked remarkably well. That was impressive.
N1 forwent a fair amount of unnecessary stuff that Parookaville felt the need to do, liked forced personalization of tickets required for entry, while N1 was just happy to just scan your barcode and you were in. Nice, thank you.
While most things were in German, most relevant staff spoke English well enough to help. I was actually surprised to find out that many German speakers spoke fairly limited English. I didn't expect them to speak English like the Dutch do, but being French myself and the French are not known to be great English speakers, turns out the Germans aren't much better than us :)
The crowds were all super nice and happy to have extra lights and cheers brought to the event :) but it's true that only a small percentage wore cool outfits, although this is typical for European festivals. Still, I'd say people had more outfits than average for Europe, so that was nice.
Music was loud but not overly loud, which was nice
I mentioned it above, but I'll say it again, the venue itself was amazing and definitely unique. It has a cool and slightly eerie factor that I haven't experience anywhere else
I was worried about huge lines driving in and out (like parookaville saying it could be up to 6h wait getting in the campsite), but despite the lack of proper routing issues getting in, it took less than 1h to make it to camp, and about 45mn to drive out dealing with all the roads they had closed and the big detours to get back to Koblenz. Not bad, considering.
It is also fairly cheap. Honestly just raise the price a little, provide drinkable water and stop the fake money and profits from keeping the leftovers that people end up abandoning. The festival is really good and worth extra ticket money.
Definitely they are doing plenty of things right, because 30 years! The communities that have made Nature One their home, is an impressive sight.
And it's probably the only music festival I know of that you can go to, not even go to the festival, and have a great time at all the campsite clubs, multiple dozens of them.
Here, I need to make sure to express deep gratitude to United Nature One for the invitation to their great camp, it made the whole experience much more enjoyable and complete.
Well, that was a first for me, literally my first festival in France and even really my first music event in France, ever (and yes, I was born there and lived almost half my life there, but France has no idea what Trance means, and I never really heard of a festival that sounded exciting for me, until this one. I'll be honest that I wouldn't have flown all the way from California for it, but it fit nicely between Timescape, UK, and Nature One, Germany, so there was little excuse not to go.
And yes, it meant I already had my heavy LED outfit and batteries, so I dragged them there. People loved it :)
You could take a local RER or uber to a nearby town, and from there, you could pre-reserve shuttles to get you directly to the festival and be dropped off a litlte bit closer to the entrance. Turns out driving there took you to a far away parking lot from which you had to drag your luggage a long long way, so I was happy I had a shuttle slot (they sold out)
nice little castle
sadly once I arrived it was raining and muddy, totally not fun for regular wheeled luggage
it was probably only 1km, but with the weight I was carrying and dragging small wheels in the mud, that was hell
the line to get in and search were actually quite pretty fast
the search was very reasonable and also efficient, but the light rain was no fun
Because of my gear (weight and recharging needs, including solar panels I brought just in case), I'm not a huge fan of camping (never mind bringing all my camping gear from the US and back in plane luggage, which could cost $200 of extra luggage fees each way), but in this case I was thankfully able to sign up early and get a tipi setup onsite, which definitely helped.
another longish walk with luggage to get to the pre-set tipis
very nice inside
plenty of space, indeed
my poor luggage wasn't happy :)
Overall the entire area was well setup;
cute map :)
bathrooms were basic but decent
One thing I need to note that it's not really setup for people who don't speak french, which is also why I had never really heard of this festival outside of france. It is by design I assume :)
they had cool workshops (although very long line to sign up), but french was required
the one issue with workshops was the long inefficient line to sign up (potentially 2h+)
drinks were reasonably priced, with recycling for the cups. Of course you could pay with credit card/phone
toilets were compost style and clean enough. Free water was plentiful
they were also setup for sorted trash, definitely eco conscious
For power, I was able to find some free plugs inside the festival here and there (none in camping unfortunately), and some company had a service to charge your phones:
The decors were truly wonderful
alice in wonderland-like corners in the woods
projection mapping on the castle
Food options were good, although just like drinks, you could just bring your own anywhere from the camping site to the festival site. The only thing security cared about, was no glass:
My surprise, though, was how decked out people were at night with lights, that was almost burning man level costumes and lighting:
a bit boom-like
The 8 or so dancefloors were scattered around the venue, and actually sometimes hard to find in the dark and the middle of the woods ;)
The days were pretty warm, but there were chill out spaces
went to rest here the last day as the sleep nights were short :)
Every night had a theme, but night 3 was "red", so I improvised ;)
There were all kinds of music. 0 trance indeed, but DnB, Psytrance, Dark Psy, downtempo, 80's french music, and more:
psy on vinyl
even better: f2f psy on vinyl ;)
I arrived thursday, and after 3 nights of fun (and mostly quiet days to recover), it was sunday morning and time to go back. I barely made it to my 14:00 shuttle to the nearest town from where there was a train, or uber as needed:
the shuttles were well organized and on time
got dropped off at a quiet nearby town on a sunday afternoon and headed back to Paris
Conclusion
This is obviously not an internationally focussed festival, and that's likely the point. It's for french people by french people, centered around french culture. It does not mean you couldn't attend if you only speak english, especially if you're happy to skip the workshops, but you'll jump into the deep pool a little bit :)
Do I recommend it? Hell yes! It was definitely another kind of unique:
I loved the people's party mood, costumes and lights.
Security was just the very basic, you were allowed to bring food and drinks anywhere even if they had some for sale
That said, there was some security inside to make sure everything went ok, but I really didn't see any work for them to do (which is good)
No "cashless wristband" bullshit, you could pay with real money (i.e. credit cards and phones), as it should be
There were 8 stages, which was plenty, but interestingly they didn't play the same kind of music each night. So first night, I really liked a state with deep dark psy, but the next day they played downtempo, oh well.
Despite the map, in the dark woods at nights with random pretty lights everywhere, it was quite easy to get lost. One night, I was unable to find a stage I wanted to get back to and that was in a corner I never found again :)
it did have a burning man feel of exploring the deep playa and looking for surprises, that was fun
while walking around in the dark, you had to avoid falling in some creeks :)
price was pretty reasonable considering (a bit over 200E for 4 days/3 nights)
transport in and out was good if you took the shuttles, no ridiculous waits like boom the last day
But I do have to state, 0.0% trance (some psytrance though). It's not that Trance died in France, it mostly never existed, and one of the reasons I fled the country :) However given how much trance I listen to, I guess it's not absolutely terrible to go to a festival with other kinds of EDM :)
Links
Rick Weekender and his crew is probably powered by triple expressos and buckets of red bull, because they're at it again. He has been putting quality mid sized events in the UK, featuring trance. Since I'm not local, I sure can't attend them all, but I already went to Anomaly Summer of Trance as well as Euphoria Festival Malta just 2 months prior and both of them were quality smaller scale events. Unsurprisingly this was another of similar quality.
It was of course different, which is both good but also requires more work since the entire setup is different. This time around it was by a farm, mostly in the woods, 30mn from Cambridge. Apparently the literally filled the perimeter with huge container-size hay that was stacked up around the perimeter. Just that was impressive. Inside, they planned for bad weather (and we had some, it is the UK afterall) and filled the entire area with wood chips to limit the amount of muddy mess, and it indeed helped. I'm just noting that it was non trivial amounts of work before any of the rest was installed: sound systems, lights, lasers, and everything was water proofed as nothing died in the rain. Well done!
seriously, how much work was this!
Most people camped, but with my gear to carry and recharge, it's not a reasonable proposition for me. Thankfully there were some hotels 10mn drive away and while I was worried about lack of ubers/bolt, this turned out not to be a problem. The most I had to wait was 15mn or so, and they were never unavailable.
So, let's start:
basic map, but to the point ;)
very nice for campers
food was sufficient but often only one option was open/available
Entrance to the woods:
The wellness tent was a nice addition, familiar to people who go to Insomniac festivals: a place to chill out, hide to regroup, and/or lay down and get help if having a bad trip or otherwise. Nice addition:
The usual troublemakers
Birthday Boy!
Mr Erection Supervisor, He's famous!
congrats on the many outfits and costumes
so much win in this shirt ;)
Our lovely DJs
Of course, the great things about these events is that you can mingle with the DJs:
Unkonscious team!
Lange!
Incedent Noise
Space brothers
my dearest Alessandra <3
Timescape Day 1, Friday
Friday started a bit later since many locals were travelling from all over the UK, and I'm sure some amount came straight after work. Thankfully the weather was good on the first day:
After a good day of fun, we retired to the silent disco tent
we were missing chocolate and marshmallows on a stick :)
Video Summary:
Timescape Day 2, Saturday
Saturday had rain, sometimes hard rain, for half a day. But the brits were prepared of course, it's not like it's the first time they see rain ;)
but it kind of rained seriously for a few hours, so I did hide there for quite a while
this is what happened when you didn't have rain protection :)
you could hide in this saloon :)
I did come back early to see my friend Lonskii of unkonscious fame
the chill out tent was also a good place to hide and very waterproof
more rain :)
rain finally stopped around when Rinaly started. Sweet!
the forest was dark enough to allow for lights and lasers way before sunset
it did get fully dark eventually
The festival was also an opportunity for me to test new hardware. I had just finished making new hats, but the cutest one with the smallest LEDs barely lasted the 3 days before the LEDs started breaking, oh well.. As for my LED panels, given how wet things were and my sweating on top of it, I found out that it caused water to condense directly on the panel electronics and mess up the display. The last 2 nights it started glitching as a result. Thankfully it was fine after it dried out and I figured out that I can just duck tape the back to protect it from moisture.
wee!
end of day2 around campfire
Video Summary:
Timescape Day 3, Sunday
Day 3 had more rain, and hard rain, until 15:00 or so, so I showed up a few hours after opening. Not trying to be a sugar cookie, but while people were hoking about me being electrocuted, which indeed wasn't going to happen, once my electronics get too wet, they will fail, and potentially get damanged, so given the cost in time and money to replace them, not worth it. Apologies to the DJs I missed earlier on those 2 days.
it got fairly muddy by day 3, though
Unfortunately, although it wasn't raining, by then there was thunder and lightening nearby, which caused the festival to be shutdown for 30-40mn. That was a bummer for Ferry Tayle, whose set I was very much looking forward to, but got cut by more than 2/3rd.
Eventually we got back in, and it was impressive that all the gear survived:
Rinaly came back as her evil sister who plays techno :)
By some miracle a kind soul invited me to the DJ booth meet Dave Pearce and get this great shot with Marcella Woods
kudos buddy with the POV flow toys
honestly impressive lighting and lasers for a little festival in the woods
And just like that, day 3 was over, so we spent a bit of time at the chill out tent to finish the night (with silent disco):
Video Summary:
Conclusion
Originally I was planning on going to Summer Sound Festival in Helsinki which was the same weekend, but given that they failed to post any real lineup or update their website until a few weeks before the date (too late for me), I got too pessimistic about it, and figured the 3 days of Timescape would be a better bet. I didn't get to visit Helskinki, and we did get wet, but Timescape was still loads of fun and so glad I went. Namely:
yeah, the rain and mud were not fun, but the event still had incredible vibes
after many of huge festivals that have lost the friends and family feel, it's really nice and refreshing to have nice smaller festivals where you get to experience that
which includes mingling with the DJs
it was a different location, but ultimately had a similar feel to ASOL and Euphoria Weekender, which is not surprising since all events were by Rick Weekender, who clearly has a track record of doing an excellent job
Is it worth travelling across the world for? Well, it depends how much vacation time you have, how far you live and how much money you have :) If you must pick, I would recommend Euphoria Malta first, but this honestly was a very good second if you happen not to live too far (in my case I do, but it was the first one of 3 festivals in a row :)
Just like Euphoria and ASOL, it featured some great Trance DJs that do not get to play bigger festivals as often. I see it as a great thing, but if you prefer the more popular "big name" artists, then go to those bigger more expensive festivals where everything is also more distant :)
Also, I hope the UK people realize how lucky they are to have these trance events, few countries have that many. And those who actually make them happen, and are the rockstars!
Huge thanks to all the DJs who came play for us and party with us, and of course Rick Weekender and all his team for all the work!
sizing up batteries, the P5 do indded use 2x as much power for 2x more pixels
Added some switches and potentiometers to reduce voltage and current to improve runtime
they don't look great when not lit up
better now :)
lot of crap inside ;)
end result
and I can stack them to transport them
will try to carry them that way so I don't smash them and damage the strips that don't love to bend
Demo time:
Or same on youtube:
Of course, as luck would have it, on my very first flight, TSA was "interested" with my hats on their first flight:
And here is the behind the scenes you don't usually get to see. I do not often point out how unreliable LED gear can be, and how easily it can break. Sure enough, the P5 LED strip failed in 3 different places after just 3 days of use. Super disappointing. Thankfully the P10 strip seems to be holding up so far:
For those who missed it, Armin's EDC set with a super nice best of trance intro during the fireworks:
This is the 2nd time I hear Armin van Buuren doing those intro tight mixes at the start and they are absolute gold, please don't stop. And yes, doing that synced with the fireworks only made it that much better :)
And props for playing Toccata et Fugue en Ré Mineur (D minor) from Johan Sebastian Bach for all the kids who have no idea who Bach, is 🙂 (and people who know both Armin and Bach well will know that Armin played that same melody during Yearmix video in a carton intro with students learning music in a class, starting with Bach and adding beats and morphing into trance).
Things like this are why I will always have to admire Armin forever, even if at times he hurts my ears by playing hard techno right after saying on the mike "who's with me in a state of trance?" 😄
Update, for people asking "which yearmix did he play Bach, in?", I just went to look it up for you. That was 2019:
It's a really cool music class cartoon made just for that yearmix, and sure enough it mentions Mozart, Beethoven and Bach
Yes, that was 5.5 years ago, but I have a good memory when music is involved :)
