Dekmantel 2015 – A Pre-Flection

Think of a lineup. Make it better. Double it. Add Jeff Mills. Times that by 4. Make it a bit better again. Times that by 7. Make it a big better. That’s roughly how good Dekmantel’s lineup was last year. And this year it’s about 4 times better that than. Yeah, it’s that good.

There isn’t an award for ‘best European festival that isn’t on a boat but is probably better than those with the boats anyway’, but if there was, it’s likely a lot of people would be nominating Dekmantel. It’s only been about for three years but it’s clearly found its niche in really, really good bookings, so we thought we’d try our best to help navigate those bookings by listening to loads and loads of mixes from those playing this years event, then trying our best to plan the weekend. Here goes.

Friday

Main stage on Friday, for us, is all about Villalobos and Zip. There’s a high chance the defining set of the weekend could take place before the sun has even set on the first day, but seeing how unpredictable they can be – and as they’re followed by Model 500, Klock and Dettmann, who bloody knows.

If their set appears to go off on a weird tangent (which, to be honest, is kind of the point), then Carlos Souffront will be playing his brand of moody, acid-tinged house on the Selectors stage.

If ‘going off on a tangent’ is actually what you’re looking for, however, Madlib will be on his own weird tangent at around the same time on the Lab stage – expect a freeflowing set of odd sounds, soul, jazz, some Indian ragas and, possibly, a shouty MC. 

Bonafide legend Roy Ayers follows, in a clash that sees him go against Klock and Dettmann. We’ll do our best to make it to both, catching the start of Roy and then Running Away (gettit?) for 2 hours of heads-down techno.

Saturday

Saturday is opened by Magic Mountain High – the collaboration between Move D and Juju & Jordash – with live, improvised, psychedelic sounds taking over the main stage.

The fast-footed will be able to dash over to the Selectors stage to catch the sligggghtly more upbeat Volcov, before the first real clash of the day appears – Palms Trax vs Young Marco vs Hunee. Marco’s on again tomorrow, and Hunee’s up again later so we’ll stick with Palms Trax here – he might be about 14 years old but boy, that kid's got taste.

As Palms Trax finishes up, it’s over to the Selectors stage for Floating Points B2B Hunee B2B Antal.  This mammoth set clashes with basically everyone – Four Tet, Jeff Mills, DVS1, Rodhad, The second coming of our Lord, Mr Ties and Tom Trago, but we’ll be trying our best to stay glued to this spot because it’s a team-up from heaven. Hunee and Antal are more than used to playing together (just listen to this mix and tell me it’s not genius), and we’ve caught Floating Points B2B Hunee before too, and they have chemistry too – here’s the proof.

Sunday

Minimal Wave founder Veronica Vasicka opens Sunday, but it’s likely a huge chunk of the audience will gravitate to Motor City Drum Ensemble on the Selectors stage. He’ll probably be wearing some sort of cap and playing some really-God-damn-good disco on one of those mixers with the big knobs, but as Boiler Room have Fatima Yamaha at the same time (whose reissue of 'What’s A Girl To Do’ is likely to get rinsed the whole weekend), it’s going to be a stressful start to the day.

We’ll stop arguing just as Young Marco starts – one of our favourite DJs in the world right now, who’s likely to charm the crowd with his mad, rhythmic, African influenced sounds. Perfect for a sunny Sunday. 

Not perfect for Sunday, however, is Helena Hauff’s dark, industrial sounding electro but after catching her at this year’s Bloc, we’ll be all over it.

The wonderful Steffi follows, before Carl Craig takes over main stage with a live set. Siriusmodeselektor close out the festival on main stage, but we’ll find ourselves in front of Tama Sumo, on the Boiler Room stage, for what’s likely to be an emotional farewell. By Christ that’s a busy weekend.