Fear.FM Harder

[Report] Last World Festival 2011 (BE)

With the increasing amount of sold-out dance festivals, the number of new festivals is booming too. Among these newcomers are more and more Belgian productions, often by Dutch organizations. Apart from Harmony Of Hardcore, Par-T Events put their money on Belgium as well with not just one, but two festivals, namely: Daydream Festival and Last World. Both proved themselves in their first year and made a follow-up inevitable.

This year, Last World focused on the harder styles even more and managed to extend their opening hours. Among the windmills at Lommel’s Kristalpark, the event wasn’t signposted all that well. People without a GPS must have had serious problems finding the exact location. Plenty of parking space to the left and for only €5. On the other side of the road were the tents and entrance to our “final destination of the harder styles”.

After purchasing tokens in the meanwhile well known “5-10-15 etc”-fashion, our first stop was the early hardcore tent, aka Vulcano Valley. Bountyhunter was playing jump and Hardstyle, which didn’t quite agree with us so we checked out the small outdoor Green Garden where drum ‘n bass was being played… for about a minute, when Dubstep took over and the next DJ thought it wise to start playing electro stuff. This killed our buzz quite drastically, so after walking around the grounds shaking hands and such, we went to the hardcore area for the performance of Danger Hardcore Team.

The Belgian cult group played tracks like “Hardcore Feelings”, “Crucified Noise” and “Hardcore Summer” for an enthusiastic crowd, eager to get their hands on one of the flags or lanyards given away for free. We were at first a bit surprised by the fact that they were supposed to perform for one hour straight, but found out that the live-act lasted for about half an hour (as is the custom) and the remaining half hour would consist of a DJ set by DJ Bass who played a set lacking in originality with for example “Nobody Said It Was Easy” or “Payback (Yes I Am Remix)”.

Next up were System:Overload, two quite unknown guys playing two amazing Nosferatu tracks, namely “Sick Of It All” and “Lack Of Existence”. The crowd really partied their asses off and it was fun to witness this from the first row. Afterwards, we just had to return to the Vulcano Valley for DJ Freeze’s set. This guy from the south of the Netherlands surprised us before with a great set on Up Yours – The Chatterer’s B-day Bash and yet again delivered the goods. With tracks like “Placid K – Ride The Party”, “Tellurian – Booster Activated”, “Hardcore Summer”, “Verrotted”, “Chemical Overdrive” and his closing record “Mellow Moenie Mauwe” (chanted along by the thankful crowd), no one even came close to his record choice.

Although we must admit Darkraver was a good runner-up, thanks to “Doomzday”, “The Future Is Ours”, “Like A Shot”, “We’re Gonna Blow Your Mind”, “Emotions Over Anger” and “X-Factor - The Underground”. Steve went nuts behind the turntables when catching a glimpse of the pretty girls in the crowd, coming to see him play. Obviously, this did him a world of good, judging from his record choice. Props to Steve for playing an impressive and eclectic set and combining it all wonderfully.

Since we hadn’t visited the Bonzaï area yet, now was as good a time as any. This area was located next to the early hardcore tent and decorations had been kept to a minimum. Because of the good weather, the fact that it was an open-air area only added to the fun. Although the wind did seem to get the better of Yves Deruyter. Upon arrival, it immediately became clear that the timetable was not quite up-to-date. Where was Franky Kloeck? Anyway, DJ Francois played a few terrific tunes like “DJ Arabesque – Serendipity”, “Cosmic Gate - Mental Atmosphere” and the well-known “Pump Up The Jam”.

After listening to Yves Deruyter’s site for a while, we couldn’t resist the call of DJ Ruffneck, who turned the early hardcore area upside down with classic stompers such as “Void Sector”, “The Fall Of Babylon” and “Evolution Theory”. Lots of young fans had gathered in front of the stage, going completely berserk and paying tribute to their hero. Since tokens were only available in quantities of at least 5, we refused to buy new ones at 23.00 and decided to spend our last two on a hamburger and checked out the Goldmine, which was basically a large sea container with two dJ’s covering the entire day and playing everything from Spice Girls to oldschool.

After that, we signed off to the tunes of D-Passion in the hardcore area (where the sound was about 10 times louder than before) and witnessed the fireworks from the car as the last hour was upon us and there was no other option but to listen to DJ Rob & MC Joe on the Mainstage. And of course we were keen for an after party, after all the night was still young. After The Qontinent, Last World seems to be another potentially big festival with increasing quality. We’re curious as to what next year’s edition will have in store for us.