- Bigger than those held in previous years, the fifth edition of Goa's Sunburn Festival hosted around 100 acts spanning three days. This year saw Sunburn grow to gigantic proportions, almost doubling its physical size while adding three more stages (which meant a total of seven altogether). And though there was a fair share of glitches, the juggernaut didn't seem to displease to the masses that attended.
Sunburn 2011 boasted two label stages: Defected In The House and Toolroom Records. The two "areas," Ground A and Ground B, were a good walk apart from each other, not taking the security check queues into account. While initially taxing on our stamina to walk across the grounds, we appreciated the ample space post-sundown when the crowd was at its peak. (The final day's turnout was estimated to be around 90,000 people.) That's when the extra space really came in handy and prevented any mishaps, even while people were bouncing around from stage-to-stage towards the end of the festival.
Day 1
Despite the many additional arrangements this year, we nonetheless found ourselves waiting for well about two hours to enter on the first day. Upon admittance, we did catch a stunning opening set from Anil Chawla and Dale Anderson, who dished out fabulous tech house vibes in the afternoon sun. Later on, Praveen Achary, an upcoming local producer and DJ, played his first Sunburn slot at the Cubezoid stage with a sublime deep progressive set to a small crowd.
Meanwhile, at the Defected In The House stage, local Goa artist Anish Sood was spinning. Afterwards, ATFC took over. The set was a bit of a disappointment for us, being a bit all over the place genre-wise with some token Defected tunes thrown in here and there. One of the first day's main draw cards, Nic Fanciulli, took off into a deep, tech set that was quality from the onset. More than a few Sunburn DJs were seen taking in his performance. The Joris Voorn rework of Mark Fanciulli's "The Tide" was one of the many highlights. Back at Ground A, Jerome Isma-Ae was playing a bouncy set to a crowd of about 20,000. Comprised of big room electro sounds, his music kept most of those in attendance hooked until his performance's end. The addition of stage dancers and fireworks, while a bit tacky, kept everyone on their feet.
Elsewhere, FreQ Nasty started his slot with a bang, and laid on a power-packed set with a hefty amount of punters in attendance. In all, the veteran managed to do what he's best at—making people dance while introducing a whole legion of people to unfamiliar sounds.
Day 2
We woke up on the second day with that familiar Sunburn't feeling: aching ankles and calves. We reached the festival grounds at around 3:30 PM to catch DJ Nawed, who played a nice blend of house interlaced with some summer vibes. By the time Style of Eye appeared, the crowd had gathered in decent numbers. He then proceeded to play a set riddled with histrionics and insane energy.
Further along in the evening, Norman Doray laid down his style of French house, which unfortunately didn't offer much excitement at all as it ended up being pretty familiar and predictable. Back at the illa stage, Pearl finished a stellar set to a large crowd before handing the decks over to Above & Beyond. The crowd suddenly seemed to swell by the thousands as soon as the act appeared (it might have seemed as if the entire festival had assembled for their set). They played a lot of their own tunes, including the commercial hits "Sun & Moon," "Good to Me" and "A Thing Called Love." Two hours by the duo (all three members weren't there) were enough to tire any mad stark trance lover at the venue—if they could find a spot to dance or move about.
Day 3
The last and final day of Sunburn 2011 started at an early 10 AM, and featured a fully-fledged psy-trance lineup from morning till mid-afternoon. In the evening, Markus Schulz took to the decks, playing a mixture of electro house and progressive trance. The crowd, though having thinned out by the time he reached his peak, lapped him up.
Unsurprisingly, it was Axwell that drew the largest crowd of the entire festival. The minute he started his set, 50,000 people went from being tired and lazy to dancing like 10-year-olds who'd just seen an ice cream truck. On the other side of the Sunburn grounds, Infected Mushroom played their rock-tinged psychedelic trance (mixed with dubstep) for 90 minutes. At the Arro Experimental stage, Indian drum & bass and breaks veteran Vachan Chinnappa was on the decks, throwing down old school jungle cuts to a dedicated dance floor.
Back at Cubezoid, as soon as Axwell concluded, the MC and director of the festival, Nikhil Chinapa, came on stage and announced that Sunburn 2011 had come to an end. The party wasn't entirely over, though, as the event's final Afterburn was still to come. Sunburn openers Anil Chawla and Dale Anderson headlined this one, which was a fitting end to the festival's largest iteration yet.