May means Strichka. At least in Kyiv. No matter what (which means – even if the city, a few days before, had one of the deadliest strikes, caused by Russian rockets and drones, it will reassemble itself and will try to dance as usual).
Also usual recently for the festivals in Ukraine to have some last-minute withdrawals from the foreign artists. This time, we couldn’t hear Tau Car (Gee Lane stepped into her Sunday slot to play after her own Saturday one). After that, the scene was set: Closer, Lisnyy Prychal, Otel’, Mezzanine, Dvir, 3rd Floor, and Garden were set and ready.
The opening acts were quite solid. Dvir started with live performance by tofudj, one of those who are called “A DJ’s DJ” in Kyiv, our regular (and the newest resident of Closer) Lisovskyi was at Otel’, another great one of Kyiv diggers, Gapon started at 3rd Floor, while T. Fain launched Closer’s dancefloor. And this one is where I wanted to stop specifically, because not every time you’ll see the DJ, who’ll perform with his own rotary mixer, a lot of years in the making, called RADA (after his daughter), that’s the way to start the festival, right?
A lot of people (including me) were happy to see the comeback of the “Romanian” sound, along with Ion Ludwig, to Closer. And it was just as good as expected (you’re not really used to 3 hours of live performance after all), but the biggest set of the first day for me was from Igor Glushko. In the heavy world of today, we can see a lot of DJs turning to more soulful music after years of banging. What did he play? A lot of melodic Detroit-like house you probably even forgot existed, funny, bright, and not as euphorically aggressive as some disco tracks could be. You can check his last one in the set below (TRACK ID TIME!).
Gee Lane, who stepped up after Igor Glushko at Mezzanine, had a very hard task to continue that majestic vibe or to level it up to the peaktime. While at Closer Abo Records’ wizards Amir and Oleh continued the night after those 3 hours from Ion Ludwig.
The tale of Saturday should end with the closing acts of ecce lizard at Dvir, where she tore the audience apart with that heavy-hitting uptempo, and b2b of Alex Savage and Shults.Sashaa at always-packed-as-hell-after-the-first-hour Otel’ – the place, that still will wait for its best set on the next day.
The Sunday part offered us fewer locations (no Mezzanine and 3rd Floor for today), but it was compensated for with the longer presence. The day started at 10:00 in the morning by Ochii at the usual place for that type of dancing – Lisnyy Prychal, after that, Gee Lane stepped up for her second set of the weekend. Borys started at a time when there was barely any free space on the dancefloor with his unbelievable selection. After him, it was Thongvor, the biggest surprise of the previous year, with an even better live performance, which set the space up perfectly for Maxime dB.
With his, as I would say, one of the best sets from Yoyaku store recordings, the anticipation was huge. And he delivered perfectly, blending, probably, all the peaktime styles into one (without any extra banging, everything was delicate, but just as expected for the Sunday night at Lisnyy Prychal).
The Sunday at Dvir looked kinda scary, Trent, b2b of Serge Jazzmate and Bellis, plus Lena Willikens for the dessert is already looking good. But who knew that the biggest set of Sunday (for me, of course) would be played nearby.
Otel’, probably, the smallest place of the festival, is the easiest to pack. The day started with Trippsy, who closed the Depo venue at the Brave’s Saturday last year, and it was hard to find a space to dance there already. Live performances of PRZ and Lostlojic followed, and the day was closed with Monotronique and his parade of bass genres. We don’t really cover this type of music on Trommel, but he did so well that it was impossible not to mention this here. Without really proper competition in Ukraine, his only rivalry could be with himself, and it seems he delivers more and more with every big festival.
That’s it. You can read some afterwords from the artists, as usual, while Closer already started to prepare their Brave line-up (damn, that first drop of artists with Sweely and DJ Masda is looking crazy!). The only sad thing to say is that after the latest Russian strike, the piece of the location right now looks kinda like this. But Closer has time to rebuild it. Like they always do.
Maxime dB: The people of Ukraine… so full of life, warmth, and strength. They carry so much light ♡ . A good reminder that music is a space where we simply meet as humans.
Gee Lane: Coming back home with my heart this full isn’t something that happens every day… I admire your bravery so deeply. In such a delicate moment for your country, I found smiles, light, resilience, and a joy that moved me. Dancing with you reminded me how powerful we are through the music ❤️
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This article was written in Ukraine. Ukraine is in the middle of the war with Russia right now. Would be great if you could donate to the biggest Ukrainian volunteer fund here. Also, you can pick any music initiative, that is also trying to help from our list here. We’ll be stronger together.
