Dance News

Sunday 28 December brings one of the largest, most varied lineups for an electronic music festival Adelaide's seen in a long time. Summer Break at Bonython Park is boasting a really impressive lineup, featuring artists from many areas of electronic music and beats. The big one is Public Enemy live, with DJ Lord doing his own thing on the side as well. Breaks are represented by Adam Freeland, Aquasky, and Noisia playing a breakbeat set. Drum'n'bass will fare well with Sub Focus, Chase & Status and Futurebound all making appearances. Electro-house and indie dance fans are the luckiest though, with the bulk of artists coming from those styles. Midnight Juggernauts are doing a live set, and others include Utah Saints, Tydi, Van She live, TV Rock, Snob Scrilla, Vandalism, Tommy Trash, and Bag Raiders. Dubstep gets its own spot too, with genre innovators Benga and Skream heading down. Jonathan Ulysses (Space Ibiza) and Ajax are also on the lineup.

The lineup for the Future Music Festival 2009 has been announced and it's a big one... N*E*R*D are headlining, and if that isn't enough to get people down, Basement Jaxx are performing live, as are Brazillian electro-pop crew CSS. For DJs, superstar DJ Paul Oakenfold tops the bill, but also coming along are progressive trance faves Markus Schulz and Christopher Lawrence, Steve Angello and Sebastian Ingrosso will both be playing seperate house sets, Tocadisco, Joachim Garraud and Mr Oizo, the French DJ/ producer responsible for the electro classic Flat Beat. The clip features a pretty fantastic couple of puppets as well.

Although dance isn't really the focus of Big Day Out, there are a few good artists on the lineup against all the rock and indie stuff. Pendulum are playing, presumably live, since their recent album 'In Silico' features a lot more live instrumentation and a fairly strong metal influence. The Prodigy are on there too, playing in the exact same venue as they did the last time they were in Adelaide for Two Tribes in 2005. British electro duo Simian Mobile Disco will also be there, as will Sneaky Sound System and Cut Copy.

Similarly, while there's not heaps of dance on the St. Jerome's Laneway Festival line-up, there are a few really interesting electronic acts who are definitely worth checking out. Headlining is Girl Talk, who creates uptempo beats and breaks out of dozens of old loops and samples, crafting a surprisingly catchy, listenable kind of party collage. This guy is awesome. You'll get Sinead O'Connor's Nothing Compares 2 U, pitched up and looped over a skittery beat and some crunk rapper talking about getting head, then something completely different. Post-rock/ electronica group Stereolab are also on the lineup, and after almost 20 on the scene they're a group who have really carved out their own little spot but still manage to be inventive. Four Tet's coming, too. With a career spanning from post-rock to folktronica to techno to instrumental hip-hop (loosely), it'll be interesting to hear what he plays. His latest release, 'Rounds', was a more minimal techno affair, but it's not worth trying to predict something like this. One of the most interesting hip-hop producers is coming along as well, Daedelus. His album 'Exquisite Corpse' is a beautifully lush, soundscaped hip-hop record, but he gets involved in all kinds of electronic music, from electro-acoustic love songs with his wife, Laura Darlington, to avant-garde hip-hop with Radioinactive and Busdriver.

Mr Scruff is going to be playing at Rocket Bar this New Year's Eve. Anyone that caught his set at Womad a couple of years back should know the deal, but if you don't, he plays a diverse selection of really laid-back grooves, with elements of funk, house, downtempo and lots of breakbeats. Mr Scruff's playing a 6 hour (!) set, and is bringing a couple of AV artists along with him, so the whole thing should be pretty spectacular. 9pm-11pm is also all you can drink cocktails.

Jurassic 5's DJ Numark is playing on Saturday 3 January next year, at the Electric Light Hotel. Known to hook electronic toys up to his system and play part of his set on them, he's an innovative DJ who's definitely worth checking out if you like hip-hop and turntablism. Groove On New Years Day, Summer Break, and this all within a week or two of each other? It's going to be a pretty crazy New Year's.

Ben Ford-Smith (dbdancenews@gmail.com)