Line-up Club Pukkelpop 2024

Wees geprezen, gij uitverkorenen, gedoemden en gelukzoekers want hij is terug, den verloren zoon Bob Uit Zuid die in het zweet zijns aanschijns een heilige tweede plaat heeft geschapen en dat alleen maar omdat hij voor anderen leeft. Ja, ook voor jou.Hij, Bob Uit Zuid, doet het allemaal voor ons, zijn discipelen die hij niet vervloekt en zes keer zestien jaar door een brandend braambos laat kruipen maar die hij juist liefdevol omarmt in een veelkleurige krans van licht: zijn nieuwe plaat en zijn overweldigende optredens.Heilig is zijn nieuwe plaat, gemaakt met Sam en Sem, zijn trouwe dienaars in het Goede. Louter barmhartigheid met een smerig Duivels randje. Het heeft Bob Uit Zuid behaagt om zijn Heilige boodschap te komen verkondigen op de plekken waar de liefde al gewonnen heeft: de poppodia, de popfestivals en desnoods op plekken waar Heilige liefde al sluimert en slechts nog maar hoeft te worden aangeraakt door bezeten hiphop met een gitarist, een bassist en een MPC.Geef u over en durf u onder te dompelen in zijn woorden. Bob Uit Zuid heeft zijn tweede plaat geschapen. Een heilig moment. En zo heet hij ook. Heilig.

Aili, het Belgisch-Japans electro-pop duo van Aili Maruyama en Orson Wouters, ontstond na een toevallige ontmoeting in 2019. Hun diverse persoonlijkheden en spontane aanpak van muziek resulteerden in de succesvolle ‘Dansu’ EP in 2021. De titeltrack domineerde de Radio 1 VOX-lijst en leverde hen een nominatie op voor Studio Brussel De Nieuwe Lichting.Het duo verstevigde hun positie in België met lovende recensies van Rolling Stone en opmerkelijke videoclips. Optredens op invloedrijke radiostations en extatische live shows in heel Europa volgden. In 2022 werden ze uitgenodigd voor het Inspire Tokyo Festival, waarna ze een speciale Japanse editie van de EP uitbrachten.

De Antwerpse band Meltheads is geen onbekende meer in het Belgische muzieklandschap. Met ‘Decent Sex’ - hun “vunzig en verslavend topdebuut” (De Morgen) - zetten ze zich nu ook internationaal op de kaart.Wie deze energiebom al live aan het werk zag, weet wat hen te wachten staat. Zo blokletterde HUMO na hun releaseshow in Trix: "Meltheads geeft je vleugels, maar pas op, het is verslavend."Waar de top ligt, weten we niet, maar dat het de komende jaren top wórdt met dit Antwerpse postpunk/psych viertal, dat staat als een paal boven water. Zorg dat jij kunt zeggen dat je op de eerste rij stond om die muzikale kopstoot in ontvangst te nemen!

Hindu Radio DJ’s staat voor een fijne mix van rock 'n roll (denk Arctic Monkeys en Kasabian), indie pop (denk Lykke Li en Little Dragon), soul (denk Martha Reeves & The Vandellas en Mayor Hawthorne), hip hop (denk The Streets en Mos Def), alternative dance (denk Katy B and The Prodigy) and old school classics (denk Mary J Blige and MIA). Ook een snuifje Elvis, Beach Boys, misschien Frank Sinatra en Dizzee Rascal mag niet ontbreken... Past het plaatje? Dan draaien ze het!

Lander & Adriaan is a Belgian duo with drummer Lander Gyselinck (Stuff.,Beraadgeslagen,LABtrio) and Adriaan Van de Velde (Pomrad, Mauro Pawlowski, J. Bernardt).Their common fondness for slick digital synths and 90s underground dance music genres brought them together to submerge in symbiotic jams during the very first lockdown in 2020.After a bunch of very successful under-the-radar concerts, they recorded an album in the summer of 2021 that was released in the spring of 2022.Their gently disturbed mashup of 90s dance music genres like Chicago juke, Detroit techno, UK-Funky, Classic rave with corny jazz fusion and mundane jazz improv brings you to a pleasantly disturbed realm of unguilty pleasures, sheer weirdness and pure excitement. ‘Post Nudism Rave’ they call it. Others call it ‘free rave’, ’confusi-trance’ and ’sophisti-rave’. A shiny 3D pixie fantasyland juxtaposed with a gritty dark smokey underworld of slimy aliens and smelly trolls.You'll be experiencing the quantum thrills of interplanetary ambient drones, sweet drumming frenzy, pulpy saccharine melodies, mushy basslines, all gently weaved into raw sweat-drippy dance music. Get (half) nude and dance!

24 year-old Artemas, full name Artemas Diamandis, has only been releasing music since late 2020 but is fast developing a distinctive alternative pop sound through his relatable songwriting and captivating melodies. The self-taught multi-instrumentalist and unashamed pop music fan is a student of the YouTube generation of songwriters/producers. Hailing from Oxfordshire, but now based in London, Artemas made the most of being restricted to his bedroom through the pandemic, spending most waking hours during that time honing his studio craft.Since May 2023, Artemas has been independently releasing a song every 3-5 weeks, building directly with his audience and focusing on cultivating an online community around his music. His recent release ‘Cross My Heart’ quickly gained 500k streams in 24 hours with over 20k TikTok creations within its first week of release. The latest earworm single ‘if u think I’m pretty’ went viral online and entered both the Billboard chart and OCC Singles chart. Artemas’s music has now been streamed well over 100 million times.His early releases have seen him gain support from the likes of BBC Radio 1, Apple Music and Spotify. He was also recently the sole support for Rex Orange County at his huge headline show in London’s Gunnersbury Park, as well as other live performances at Radio 1’s Big Weekend, Reading & Leeds Festival, Latitude Festival and more. Artemas’ eagerly anticipated mixtape ‘Pretty’ was released in February 2024 alongside 2 London shows which sold out in under 20 minutes. This is followed by a broader international tour just ahead of the Summer.

For Thee Sacred Souls, the first time is often the charm. The band’s first club dates led to a record deal with the revered Daptone label; their first singles racked up more than ten million streams in a year and garnered attention from Billboard, Rolling Stone, and KCRW; and their first fans included the likes of Gary Clark Jr., The Black Pumas, Princess Nokia, and Timbaland.

Romy Madley Croft is a musician, songwriter and DJ. First coming to prominence as a teenager as one third of the influential London group The xx, Romy has followed in footsteps of her xx bandmates Oliver Sim and Jamie Smith (aka Jamie xx) to carve out a hugely exciting solo career.  In 2020, she released her debut solo single "Lifetime" to widespread acclaim, followed by a collaboration with HAAi and Fred again.. ("Lights Out") and her 2022 breakout single "Strong" which became Romy's biggest solo single to date. 2023 will see the release of her highly anticipated debut album "Midair", featuring production with Fred again.. and Stuart Price. Her next single "Enjoy Your Life" is another prime example of Romy's "emotional music to dance to" and features the sampled vocals of the legendary Beverly Glenn-Copeland. A now-legendary pop writer, Romy has co-written each of The xx’s three acclaimed albums, Dua Lipa’s Grammy-winning hit single “Electricity” with Mark Ronson and Diplo’s Silk City), plus songs for King Princess and Halsey, among others. 

DJ St. Paul gelooft niet in genres. Een overtuiging die hem de geboren host maakt van zijn eigen stage op het Best Kept Secret Festival. Maar ook Lowlands, TivoliVredenburg en Club Smederij behoren tot zijn vaste adressen. Een persoonlijk hoogtepunt voor hem blijven zijn optredens als official support act van Tame Impala. En natuurlijk zijn terugkeer naar Pukkelpop. Samen met VJ Liza Renee. Let it happen! 

“None of this works if I do it alone…” Creating harmony within music is often not simply the result of a technique or knack. For the acts that deliver it with devastating, affecting power, harmony is a way of being, a kind of thinking and an understanding that unites and strengthens a number of different artistic visions behind one goal.Harmonies certainly seem to be a keystone of the five-piece KAWALA. While that is most clearly demonstrated by the vocal union between singer Jim Higson and guitarist-singer Daniel McCarthy that sits at the heart of the group, harmony on many different levels is what has allowed KAWALA to resonate with people.

Ada Oda, een nieuwkomer in de Brusselse scène, levert binaire en up-tempo rock die post-punk van de jaren tachtig combineert met de grote melodische vluchten van de Italiaanse variëteit. Het project, dat in 2020 tijdens de eerste lockdown werd opgestart door César Laloux (The Tellers, BRNS, Italian Boyfriend), kreeg al snel gezelschap van Victoria Barracato, die opvalt door haar heldere vocals en Siciliaanse afkomst. Door opzettelijk eenvoudige muziek te maken pakt César het thema van de liefde met lichtheid op. Op het podium en in de studio wordt het duo omringd door Clément Marion op bas (David Numwami, Judith Kiddo), en Alex De Bueger (Alaska Gold Rush, Gros Coeur) en Aurélien Gainetdinoff (San Malo, Yolande Bashing) op gitaar. 

Baby Queen has seen some shit. Since she moved to London from South Africa aged 18, the musician (real name Bella Latham) has lived in boats on Regents Canal, gotten messy at raucous house parties, and spent a lot of time looking out into the city with a sense of sharp-edged cynicism. For much of her teenage years and early twenties, she used all of this to write alternative pop songs that transformed her into her genre’s reigning star; a fiery totem for a generation falling out of love with social media, the pressures of adhering to an “ideal” body image, and adult responsibilities. But now, Baby Queen finds herself growing up too, learning how to grapple with the realities of leaving angst and adolescence behind. She’s not quite ready to fully let go, though: “I want to be a reprobate again,” she says.As the musician enters a new era, having spent the best part of the 2020s taking over London’s anarchic pop scene, she’s leaning into that feral mood to make new art. At the same time, she’s discovering the more grounded and introspective side of herself too, leading to the creation of some of the most pure, excellent and affecting music of her life so far. Blending her pop hook tendencies with the punkish aggression she’s made her own, her new single “Dream Girl” is the perfect, compromise-free meeting of these two sides of herself. An achingly honest song, it chronicles a kind of unrequited love she felt for a woman who was in a relationship with a man. She wrote it a few years ago – lovelorn and pining for someone out of reach – on the same trip that inspired The Yearbook single “Dover Beach”. But back then, she didn’t feel ready to release it. “I actually had, like, heart palpitations over it,” Baby Queen says. For one, such an open expression of sapphic love felt dangerous; but it was also an unabashed pop song, antithetical to the sound she was trying to put forth. Now though, she’s learned that leaning into either of these sides of herself doesn't have to be a personal betrayal. “When I first started making music, I was like, ‘No one can know that I'm bisexual. I have to keep it a secret’.” She shrugs. “I just don’t give a fuck anymore.”It’s a personal progression that ties in perfectly with a moment that marked a new movement in Baby Queen’s career. In the early summer of 2022 – just before she joined pop behemoth Olivia Rodrigo on her UK tour – a Netflix show named Heartstopper had an unexpected break-out moment. A queer TV series based on the blossoming relationship between two high school boys in England, it became a global hit. To date, it’s racked up over 53 million watch hours; two more seasons are on the way, the next one dropping in August. But Baby Queen was there when it was a modest prospect for the streaming giant. “I remember being invited into their offices to watch the first three episodes, and they were like, ‘Oh, do you want to make a song for this?’.” She wrote the wistful and romantic track “Colours of You” for the soundtrack, while her own tracks, “Want Me”, “Dover Beach” and “Buzzkill”, were synced for it. “At the time it was so cool, but you have no idea about the size or the weight of what you're signing up to.” No one did really, but it made stars of its cast, and Baby Queen’s fanbase widened, with a new gaggle of queer fans entering her oeuvre. “So many kids said ‘Colours of You’ made them come out to their parents,” she says. “I would never have imagined that for myself. The music means so much to them, you know? They really feel like it's their stories.”There is this deep, introspective burrowing that Baby Queen is doing in pop songs that traditionally don’t warrant it. Big, mind-bendingly good choruses and hooks; euphoric production – the word of an artist in full command of her sound. If the inspirations have shifted somewhat, her output has always remained staunchly Baby Queen. You hear a song and instantly know who made it. It all filters back to a childhood spent seeking refuge in the songs of Taylor Swift. Growing up in Durban, South Africa, Taylor’s music was a refuge from the conservative community around Baby Queen. She began playing guitar and piano, enlightening herself to a life in which she could not only listen to music but make it, and the subsequent lo-fi demos she recorded were sent to local radio stations. She was so dogged and relentless that, when she asked to move to London and stay with her aunt and uncle, her parents accepted. She joined rock bands and made herself a mainstay presence in all the right music circles when she arrived, dropping demos at the doors of major labels and working in Rough Trade. Eventually, she landed a creative collaborator who believed in her message, Ed King. (They still work on everything together today.) They made the songs that would put Baby Queen on the map – she was signed to Polydor in 2020. Songs like “Internet Religion” and “Buzzkill” were her career’s “introductory essay” she called it; part of the Medicine EP that acted as a tonic for the torrid state of the world we are all forced to live in. But by shaking off all that bullshit, she found beneath it a person willing to speak more openly about how she felt. The Yearbook mixtape, released in 2021, did just that: her version of an American coming-of-age movie in sonic form. But time passes, and from it, new ideas bloom. In the process of making the music she’s creating right now, she’s learned things. “I had to grow up to write this all out,” Baby Queen says. Now, she’s ready for you to hear it. 

South-Yorkshire indie heroes The Reytons are hitting 2024 with the momentum of a runaway freight train filled with red flares, northern charm and working-class grit. After claiming a number one album last year with 'What's Rock And Roll?' and selling out a HUGE headline show at Sheffield Arena, The Reytons are back to do it all again with third album 'Ballad Of A Bystander' and a 20,000 ticket Rotherham hometown gig respectively. Expect raucous sing-a-long indie hits and a crowd with all the energy of a last minute World Cup winner.

Four years on from the release of their unexpectedly self-assured debut album, NYC based Nation of Language have attracted a rapidly growing international audience via their danceable and impassioned take on new wave, post-punk & shoegaze genres. Following the critical acclaim of their first LP Introduction, Presence, its 2021 follow-up A Way Forward pushed them to a wider audience—landing them their late-night TV debut on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert and a string of sold out tours—and their 2023 record Strange Disciple has continued this momentum, landing Rough Trade’s coveted #1 album of the year spot. Now a mainstay atop lists of the best live acts of recent years, the band continue to charge synth-first into their latest chapter as a major festival draw at recent iterations of Austin City Limits Festival, Desert Daze, Pitchfork Festival, Primavera Sound, Corona Capital, Outside Lands, Bonnaroo and many others.

Al meer dan 20 jaar dwaalt kempenzoon Eppo Janssen professioneel door muzikale velden als radiomaker (Janssen&Janssen op Willy en Duyster op Studio Brussel), muzikant, dj, (Pukkelpop) progammator, …Die veelzijdigheid hoor je terug in zijn dj-sets. Eppo gaat swingend, fantasierijk en uitdagend door de muziekgeschiedenis: van indierock en pop over r&b en hiphop tot de laatste toffe dance platen. Enfin, Eppo Janssen rijmt niet toevallig op keihard dansen.Speelde eerder op: Best Kept Secret Festival, Pukkelpop, Lokerse Feesten, Hindu Nights, Dour, Graspop, ...

Van het Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts (LIPA) is het maar een kleine stap naar een platencontract, en een die Louis De Roo (26) met de vingers in de neus zet. Nu kan hij onder zijn nom de plume Isaac Roux in alle rust werken aan nieuwe songs, een debuutplaat en de gegarandeerde doorbraak naar het grote publiek.Als het LIPA niet meteen een belletje doet rinkelen, weet dan dat dit de befaamde ‘muziekacademie van Paul McCartney’ is. De Roo werd er in 2015 als één van de 100 gelukkigen toegelaten om er vier jaar te studeren, en kon er zelfs met Sir Paul zelf aan nummers schaven. Zijn kennis van het Engels maakt ook sprongen – naar eigen zeggen een van de belangrijkste redenen om naar Engeland te trekken: met een loepzuivere tongval legt hij zijn ziel en gevoelens in zijn songs, verpakt in gitaren die op het juiste moment groots worden. Denk: Bon Iver, Ben Howard, Perfume Genius en My Morning Jacket of, dichter bij huis, Novastar.‘White Rose’ is zo’n song, hemelse indie folk die naar het einde toe breed uitwaaiert, met een vol geluid, maar niet gelikt, net edgy genoeg, en de warme gloed in de karakteristieke stem van De Roo. Het is met White Rose dat Isaac Roux begin dit jaar zegeviert in ‘De Nieuwe Lichting’ van StuBru, en zo in de voetsporen treedt van onder meer labelgenoten The Haunted Youth en Mooneye. Alle radiozenders gaan meteen overstag, tot in Nederland toe, en Spotify aarzelt niet om support te verlenen. Live komt de combinatie van warme indie folk en alternatieve rock zo mogelijk nog beter tot zijn recht en doet Isaac Roux elke keer monden openvallen. Geen wonder dat hij al in het voorprogramma stond van The Haunted Youth, Mooneye, The Bony King Of Nowhere en Portland.Een normaal mens zou dan gaan zweven, maar niet Louis De Roo. Met zijn goedgevulde rugzak en stevig op zijn benen heeft hij alles in huis om de belofte helemaal waar te maken, zonder stappen over te slaan. Daar kan alleen maar meer moois van komen, en in de verte, ergens in 2024, gloort al een spraakmakend debuutalbum.

Sampa The Great is poised to be her highest self. In just a few short years, the Zambian artist (born Sampa Tembo) has established herself as one of global rap’s most compelling and outspoken voices, reaching new levels of recognition and acclaim with the release of 2022’s defining album As Above, So Below.The 29-year-old recorded her sophomore album over the course of two weeks while back home in Zambia during the pandemic. As Above represents Sampa's outside self, while So Below translates the Sampa within, uniting to reveal the highest version of herself— honest, without a mask or role to play. To bring the album to life, she worked with a network of friends, family and Zambian creatives: Mag44 serves as the project’s executive producer and co-producers are Sampa Tembo (her first producer credit), Sam Nyambe, Sammy Masta and Solomon Plate. It’s a homecoming back to her roots as well as a mark of her growing beyond her borders. She is expansive — she transcends genres and expectations — as both an artist and as a woman.The fusion of urgency and poignancy that can be heard on Sampa’s most recent material can be traced all the way back to the start of her career; beginning with The Great Mixtape in 2015, developing beautifully across the Heroes Act 2 project in 2017 and culminating this period with the breakthrough Birds and the Bee9 mixtape in the same year. Netting Sampa the first of two Australian Music Prize wins (making her the only artist to achieve the feat), Birds and the Bee9 established her arrival within the music industry as a game changer for innovative hip hop being produced out of Australia.Releasing her debut album The Return in 2019, Sampa The Great stepped further into the spotlight. The album proved to be a transformational moment for Sampa – in Australia, it earned her four ARIA Awards, her second Australian Music Prize, and the J Award for Double J Australian Artist of the Year, amongst other accolades. Internationally, Sampa was recognised as a BET Amplified Artist of the Month, while also growing in profile through performances on esteemed festivals and platforms including (and not limited to) AFROPUNK, The Roots Picnic, Later…With Jools Holland, NPR’s Tiny Desk…At Home and more.At the end of The Return’s album cycle, Sampa returned to Africa, relocating back to Zambia, where she has been based since 2020. The move informed her next chapter exponentially, forming the basis of her As Above, So Below era: a renewed love for the music she grew up on and reignited vigour to create music that added to her growing legacy.At the centre of Sampa The Great’s artistic identity, is an inherent knowledge of and confidence in herself. The vivacity experienced at a Sampa live show is a pure extension of the personality and strength of the woman behind the music; an artist unafraid to move between sonic genre and mood, Sampa’s infusion of her own brand of boldness with her art, has made her an in-demand name.Recent years have seen Sampa collaborate with the likes of The Avalanches, Baker Boy, Emmanuel Jagari Chanda (WITCH), Denzel Curry and Angelique Kidjo; has appeared on the posthumous ‘Stumbling Down’ with the late Tony Allen in 2020 and lent her voice to younger sister Mwanjé’s forthcoming debut project.The release of As Above, So Below in September 2022 came as a crowning achievement of what was a monumental year of performances for Sampa and her Zambian band, who she was able to thrive with on festival stages including Glastonbury, Coachella, Newport Jazz Festival; before returning to Australia to premiere As Above, So Below at iconic venues like the Sydney Opera House and The Forum, the latter of which saw Sampa host two special performances in the heart of Naarm (Melbourne), the city that had been so integral in the formative era of her career.A global artistic visionary in the truest sense of the term, Sampa The Great has brought the essence of her culture together with a powerful and forward thinking blend of sonic influences; creating a contemporary sound that has illuminated one of music’s most unique and exciting creative journeys.

“Glass Beams, the enigmatic Melbourne-based band, draws inspiration from their Indian and South Asian heritage, infusing their serpentine psychedelia with cosmic instrumentation and worldly polyrhythms. Their debut 'Mirage,' self-recorded in a home studio, is a captivating fusion of 70s-era Indian classical, disco captured through the lens of DIY electronica."I was looking for new energy & inspiration to write a bunch of new music. I recalled a childhood memory of my parents and I watching a DVD they had bought: ‘Concert For George’ (a tribute concert for George Harrison from the Beatles). George’s long time collaborator and friend Ravi Shanka put an Indian Orchestra together for that concert, and even though I hadn’t even started playing music at the time that I watched this, the experience was very formative.My father was born in India and moved here when he was 17, and after recalling this memory I decided to look up musicians from my father’s hometown and surrounding areas. I found a wealth of Indian classical, disco & freaky jazz music that formed the building blocks for this record. As soon as I had that vision of what I wanted to write and why I wanted to write it, the songs just flowed out."Recognised by industry stalwarts like Gilles Peterson, Glass Beams were named an essential emerging artist by NME 100. Their immersive live performances at Primavera Sound and Best Kept Secret have created waves internationally, where the masked trio cast a hypnotic sonic spell over their audiences.”

Crystal Fighters have always sought to open themselves up to the world. After all, they’re inherently a fusion concept – part British and part Basque; part old and part new; part pop and part traditional. But when the world changed, so did they. Separated on different continents by the pandemic, the band looked inwards, and started to realise what had been missing. Dialling into the energy of their earliest recordings, new album ‘Light+’ is their most inspired, dynamic, and addictive statement yet, the sound of a band utterly renewed.2010’s debut album ‘Star Of Love’ introduced them to the world, succeeded by excellent sophomore set ‘Cave Rave’. A decade of lights, camera, and action followed, with Crystal Fighters becoming used to lives of perpetual motion. “I’m always excited to visit different places,” says frontman Seb Pringle. “There’s always something to learn from different music and cultures around the world.”While this simple message sustains the band, it also pushed them to the brink. At the dawn of the pandemic they were close to burnout, beginning to lose sight of what motivated them. When lockdown came, it was almost blessed relief, a respite from an unwieldy schedule. Drawn to South America by his passion for music, singer Seb sought out the cumbia, champeta and bullerengue rhythms of Colombia. Without a better option as the world started to shut down, he decided to stay put, seeing out the pandemic in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta on the Caribbean coast of the country.  “It felt like living outside of normal time,” he says. “I was on a beach, with not much access to the outside world. It came as a relief, really. I was able to enjoy life, and reflect on my experiences.”Co-writer Gilbert Vierich remained in the UK, while band mate Graham Dickson saw through these world-changing events from his new home in the United States. Throughout all this the band remained connected – by phone calls, Zoom meetings, and WhatsApp groups. The world may have slowed down, but - if anything - their creativity increased. “We were writing purely for us,” the singer points out.When he was finally able to return to their base in the UK in the summer of 2021, Crystal Fighters were primed and ready to go. It was as if a fire had been lit inside them, resulting in song after song.  Around 60 tracks were demoed – more than some bands write in their entire career – before the group entered the studio. “There’s an infinite amount of new things you can do with music,” he says. “That’s what keeps me interested. It’s how you can mix old and new music, traditional sounds with cutting edge electronic music.”The idea was simple: to give fans a fresh definition of Crystal Fighters by returning to their core values. As a result, ‘Light+’ is packed with ideas – from rave workouts to tropical pop, from hints of cumbia to delicious pop melodies. “We wanted to get to the roots of who we are, and how we felt when we were first coming up,” the singer points out. “When we only wanted to make music for ourselves, and to make people dance at our shows.”Old friends Charlie Hugall and Luke Smith returned to produce the new record, with additional help in the electronic arena from Ghost Culture – whose collaborative record with Falle Nioke became a mutual soundtrack for the group’s lockdown activities. A band unleashed, ‘Light+’ feels unforced, natural, and completely true to their back catalogue. Take new single ‘Manifest’ – constructed with the help of FYFE, it opens with crisp guitar chords before surging into a heady 80s inspired synth feels, blessed with light, hope, and a quiet sense of urgency. “It’s about chasing the setting sun,” says Seb. “The freedom that travel can bring; and escaping the confinement we all felt for so long in our lives. Something so many still dream of escaping.”In a way, the single points to the energy of the album as a whole – it’s about embracing freedom, and making people move. Looking to their live shows, Crystal Fighters have a way of zeroing in on a frenetic and reckless disregard for convention. “Our rule was, if you want to play fast, then play fast. In the live shows, our favourite moments can be incredibly fast, and kind of chaotic… but in the collective energy it all hangs together.” It’s also an album of deep emotion, however. Take ‘Carolina’ – a real-life love story set in Colombia, it’s a homage to a woman Seb fell for, someone who escaped the rat race, and made her way to the coast. “She was living a different life… with not a lot of money, but a lot more happiness. I wanted to tell her story, of how she claimed her freedom by letting go of what society expects of us to pursue her own dreams. Living a life you enjoy rather than living for your work.”Lyrically, the band move from grand, thought-provoking statements – ‘Multiverse’ and ‘End The Suffering’ – through to simple ‘boy-meets-girl’ pop songs. “It’s the contrast,” Seb says. “Real life has to happen as well. Each of us is looking for love, or pining over a situation in our lives. It’s honest to write about that, as well as something that’s a bit more spiritual. It speaks to who we are as a band.”‘Love x3’ started as an acoustic idea, before becoming a lush tropical onslaught, asking fans to open their hearts once more. “It’s asking for us to experience love as a collective. It’s what can sustain us, and heal us as a society,” he says. “We’re all in need of real connection. And we need music that speaks to us as individuals, as people who are fallible, and need help. Sometimes life can be a very tough place to be. Music can really help people open up.”Scorching album highlight ‘Tranquilo’, for example, takes its name from a carefree expression common across the Spanish-speaking world – put simply, it means ‘all good’. “We wanted to capture that vibe, and take it over to English-speaking cultures,” he says. “It’s a reminder of that familiar feeling of when we want to be all calm and chill, but reality gets in the way. It’s asking people to step back from the traffic of your thoughts, and observe them. Life can be hard… so you’ve got to take it easy.”Right now, Crystal Fighters are living their lives in a ‘tranquilo’ fashion. Each moment counts, and they take life for what it is. “It taught us the value of collaboration,” he says. “The time we spent apart mellowed us all out, in a certain way. We’re happier than ever, and we want to use our platform to deliver our message to the greatest number of people that we can. As the album says, more light. More positivity, more clarity. We all need more hope in our lives.”Crystal Fighters are like a burst of light in the darkness – soon the sun will be coming up, and the party can begin.

Als DJ begon Stijn Van de Voorde lang geleden op feestjes met De Afrekening en Was het nu 80, 90 of 2000. Sinds 2018 is hij één van de gangmakers van onze afterparties. Deze zomer vormt hij een dj-duo met Equal Idiot Thibault Christiaensen. Rock 'n' Roll high school door Stijn en Thibault: fun, fun, oh baby!

The Whatevers started out by combining danceable rock tunes and hip hop jams. But as the ride got faster, louder and more interesting, they didn't mind blending other styles in a sometimes unorthodox yet very creative and efficient soundsystem selection of bangers and classics. For some years The Whatevers has been a solo project of Kim Mathijs (also known as Michael Midnight or dj-projects like Ed&Kim and Flashback Force).These days it's a mix of the finest genre-crossing and energetic party anthems from over the last 5 decades, the present and the future. Whatever fits! Let's not forget the Whatever! parties, which have been going strong for 10 years now. Besides playing all the major festivals through the years (Rock Werchter, Tomorrowland, Pukkelpop, ... the list is endless). An versatile and energetic selection, technically strong and fast mixing and always a surprise = The Whatevers!