Hardstyle fans from more than 115 countries attended the second Defqon.1 @ Home festival. A fulminant experience over full 4 days showing more than 100 artists. From special performances, new tracks and special show elements – Hardstyle fans got served well. Didn’t they? To find out, we will now present you the full review day by day with a conclusion on the final 4th day and a resume. This is the Saturday – Day 3
Rene
We have already experienced the first 2 days – but ever since the Saturday has always been the highlight of Defqon.1 weekend. With the anthem show, the Power Hour and other specials – all Weekend warriors are looking forward to this day.
OPENING
Already at 11:20 AM we watched the Magenta Stage with DJ Thera vs. Gecko. Both members of the Theracords Crew. The set included surprisingly some nice trance tracks combined with Hardstyle classics. Tracks like ‘Geck-O – Acid Impressions’, ‘DJ Thera – Till the Dawn’ or the Headhunterz edit of ‘Gecko-It’s What We are’ delivered a nice start.
The classics continued with the early Hardcore legend Rob Gee at the Gold Stage. This guy who shaped the early hardcore and gabber scene in a tremendous way delivered surprisingly a set with a high number of unreleased and untitled tacks – but overall a funny set. Especially tracks like ‘Rob Gee – Gabber your ass off’ or the legendary track ‘3 Steps Ahead – Drop it’ made clear, what this guy stands for. Fun and early Hardcore.
With the following artist Hellfish, Vince and Zany Q-dance served a nice mixture of fresh Hardcore to early Hardstyle sounds. All of our attending friends with their various preferred styles had their special moment.
SYMBOLS WITH FRONTLINER
First Highlight of the day was Mr. Symbols – Frontliner. The UV Stage was a construction of steel containers. He directly kicked off the session with his ‘Start a Rio’ followed by his collab ‘D-Block & S-Te Fan & Frontliner – World of Dreams’. In total a trip down memory lane – cause Frontliner’s music stands still for classic Hardstyle moments.
For all Raw Heads the moment had come for Radical Redemptions performance. Actually during the COVID pandemic In fact, he recently appeared more with funny content than with new music – Farmer Joe. But since the announcement of the extension of the Minus is More Music label, by 3 new sub lables, everybody knew that he is now back. And together with MC Nolz he directly set the Red Stage on fire. ‘Radical Redemption & Atilax – Man of the Hour’, ‘Radical Redemption & Nolz – Countdown’ directly lifted the set up to a higher-level right from the beginning. MC Nolz once again proved to be one of the best raw hardstyle MCs. Every kick, drop or screech was underlined perfectly. Highlight here was the legendary ‘Brutal 6.0’ and part ‘Brutal 9.0’ – the famous track series.
ADRENALINE WITH ADRENALIZE
Time for classic Eurphoric and Hardstyle sounds with Adrenalize and Bass Modulators. Here the real Hardstyle fans with an addiction for the Euphoric and more sunny kicks, got served with a 50 minutes dose. Classic tracks like ‘Bass Modulators – Dragonblood’ or ‘Down the Rabbit Hole’ or even ‘Live and Let Die’ combined with ‘Adrenalize – For you’ or ‘B-Front & Adrenalize – Above Heaven’ created a nice session.
POWER HOUR
“See the Worst Movie ever made” this was the slogan Q-dance advertised this upcoming edition of Power Hour. What what? Haha yes, the week before Defqon.1 this slogan was nearly everywhere on the socials.
Our team grabbed the special party box for the power hour – delivered by Q-dance and made themselves ready for a wild ride. The screen went black and we saw Mr MC Villain together with Deep’S Marcel van der Zwan. who were entering a huge cinema. From the upper range two Muppet Versions of both yelled at them, that his movie is going to be soo bad.
And yes, what can we say about the Power Hour. A wild ride like a mixture of the last ‘New Kids Movie’ and the last Defqon.1 Aftermovie. Clips from Festivals, over Guys in Lederhosen, beer and partly disturbing weird pictures underlined with a full dose of Reverse Bass delivered a full 60 minutes hell of a ride. Funny where appearances of several Hardstyle Artists disguised as garbage cleaners or Mozart. At the latest now our living room looked like a battlefield. Awesome. On the whole, Q-dance has proven that they don’t take themselves too seriously either and delivered a live parody on all stereotypes.
NOISECONTROLLERS & KELTEK PURE HARDSTYLE
The legend and the next generation of Hardstyle Power on stage now. For the next 30 minutes a powerful Hardstyle set with new and classics took over from the Power Hour. ‘Keltek – Echo’ directly kicked off the set followed by ‘Noisecontrollers collab with Sephys ft. Diandra Faye -Youngblood’ a really powerful start after the Power Hour Madness. A special moment was, when Keltek played the Defqon.1 2019s Anthem – One Tribe.
RAWHARDSTYE POWER AND MORE
After this warmup, the BPMs increased. First Sephyx started at the UV Stage, followed by Unresolved with Cryex at the Indigo. Typical for Unresolved were powerful raw hardstyle kicks bordering the frontiers of Raw Hardstyle. They both kicked the session off with their collab ‘Everynite’ and Unresolved’s famous ‘The Void’. A full wild ride. Dither took over with Hardcore beats on the Black stage. And he didn’t came to do things by halves. From ‘Deadly Guns & Dither – Sick in the Head’, ‘N-Vitral & Dither – Crush Them and ‘Cryogenic – Basskick Paradise’ the full set felt like a total destruction. Okay, since he created the anthem of the last Thunderdome – we knew that this will become hard.
A short break was now thanks to TNT. A 30 minutes ride from early Hardstyle sounds with a lot of Reverse bass. The stream returned to the Black Stage for ‘Dog Fight Records’ power with Anime and Mad Dog. Honestly here were experienced the latest sounds from the label. The classic MOH Hardcore seems to step back, for more straight and faster hardcore. We heard tracks like ‘Mad Dog – Mean Streets’ and ‘Anime – Playing Terror’ – ending up in ‘Mad Dog – Reset’ and ‘Anime – Fine Night’.
RAW HARDSTYLE ON THE HOME STRETCH
For the rest of the night, the Raw Hardstyle’s elite made themselves ready. MYST on the Blue Stage presented his ‘Trinity’. This Album got released on May 7th. 2021 and really comprised some impressive bombs. Especially ‘MYST – Driven by Pain’, ‘MYST – The Path we take’ or ‘MYST – Overloader’ were tracks that made our crew freak out.
From the more melodic raw hardstyle to the war machine. Back to the Blue stage please – time for Warface, on of our most awaited act for tonight. With tracks like ‘Warface – Fiyah’ or ‘Warface & D-Sturb – Extortionist’ our speakers were screaming for a rest. Wo didn’t sing along when he played ‘Obay No More’? But what was the second last track? A collab with Dither and Deadly Guns and Warface? We need the trackname please 😉
The Legend is here – Headhunterz. 12 tracks within the following 30 minutes. Already at the very beginning, we noticed a track with ‘Headhunterz & Sephyx ft. Carola’ where we also a still missing. But wait, this was not the only new track – the very last rack ‘Headhunterz ft. Karliene’ made us thirsty for more. Besides the new ones, Mr. Headhunterz luckily served also classics like the Defqon.1 2009 Anthem ‘Scrap Attack’.
WATCH OUT THE WOLVES
Then the music went out and everything went pale black. Time for Frequencerz – and a new show. A nice intro with a female wizard introduced the appearance – The Wolves are back! All lights and pyros were on point. A wild ride through the Frequencerz hits like ‘Brave the Storm’ or ‘Victory Forever’ with a bunch of new and unknown tracks and a nice lightshow delivered a powerful set.
CLOSING CEREMONY
The closing ceremony started with a drone flight over red flares and a total of all stages – illuminated by red flares. Pyros lead over to the Blue Stage. Headlights formed a cross, with the stage in the center. The following 2 minutes were a showcase of short clips of the last two days.
The fireworks started again fulminant according to the music “We are the Warriors” and it once again it felt more like an opera.
There is only one way to end Defqon.1, and that is with The Closing Ritual. Relive the grand finale of Defqon.1 at Home now with our ode to all the Weekend Warriors. Thank you for being part of Defqon.1 at Home 2021 and we can’t wait to see you again next year at the holy grounds for four days of madness!
CONCLUSION
This it was – the third day of Defqon.1 2021. It’s every year the same, the time flies. Once again we witnessed a top-notch light and laser show and a really interesting Power Hour. It feels like, that Q-dance has set the bar even higher than expected. Everything seems to be planned and exactly executed. For most of us, we continued our Saturday with a nice Aftershow party and we were already looking forward to the Sunday.