Live Review: Summer Dance

The sandstone buildings inside the National Art School provided a somewhat cosy, intimate yet spacious environment for a Sunday afternoon party. Aside from the lack of bathrooms (with lines to the portaloos reaching around the corner at the best of times), it was a fairly well organised event. The crowd was uber young and uber trendy, with an abundance of sloppy men in fedoras pouting, (probably) Insta-famous fashion bloggers and about a dozen photographers all taking photos of exactly the same DJ pose/homemade two-piece pajama set/couple in matching backwards caps and vintage overalls.

FBi radio host/DJ Andy Garvey took to the stage playing an upbeat, danceable set of mostly chill house tunes before there was some sort of malfunction with the speakers and the music cut out for a good half hour. There were plenty of rest areas for people to sit and relax by the grass, and a couple of beanbags spread out by the burger tent (cheeseburger and vego options too). The food was delicious, with the Happy As Larry van serving pizza with everything from Pig & Fig to Summer Prawns. Their lychee and mint shakes were also sublime. It was reassuring to see an ambulance van on site, as well as an ATM and a free water stall set up to cater for just a couple hundred partygoers.

German DJ/producer Florian Kupfer jumped on stage and played a really abstract techno set which was not really well suited to his timeslot of 5.30-7pm. It was definitely more on the ambient/experimental side and while most still stood semi-bopping along to the noise, no one was really dancing. His music would best be suited to a 3-4am set inside an underground club, following through from the main act.

The vibe and energy in the crowd was immediately more interesting when Bristol-bred DJ and producer Julio Bashmore started off his vinyl-only set with really bassy, moody house (for all of about five minutes) before switching to disco, funk and house. He played Gay Marvine's 2015 track Luvly One, before groovin' to more old school-inspired funk with Sound Stream's Starstrike. Towards the end of his set he mixed in a little more techno tunes, but it was more like he was attempting to mix disco and techno together, which didn't really work. It felt like a half-arsed job of both genres and sounded neither fully polished or really there. He did however, pull out his 2012 crowd favourite Au Seve, causing all the hipsters who had been sitting down at the back looking cool to dash like headless chicken towards the front of the stage to finally get their boogie on. Summer Dance had well and truly returned!