- By midnight on Saturday, the queue for Warehouse Elementenstraat snaked right around the block. The fifth edition of Unpolished—"Reaktor's most hard-lined techno concept"—had sold out within two hours and the lineup was too good to risk missing anyone. Stranger began his main room slot with Polygon Window's "Quoth," a galloping precursor to one of the grooviest sets of the night. Every now and then, the energy would spike via hardcore anthems like Carl Cox's "Let The Bass Kick."
By 1 AM it was already deafeningly loud. "It's only gonna get louder," someone shouted in my direction. (And harder and faster.) A few hours later, the volume had rocketed. My cheeks wobbled as I stood in front of the stacks. Even with earplugs, it was too much. Randomer and Perc followed Stranger, playing back-to-back for the first time. Randomer sneaked in a few breaks early on, but the set got fairly militant after that. Did these two really need to play together? They're very different artists, and their performance lacked the alchemy of some of Perc's other partnerships.
The sound was less abusive in the second room. Blush Response worked some acid noodles into his live set, which is always a winner in Holland. Head Front Panel, AKA John Heckle, did an even better job of courting the dance floor, dialling energy levels right up to 11. Benny Rodrigues, AKA ROD, also played in the small room. He's an excellent DJ and an animated performer, someone who looks like they're having the best time, every time, which is infectious.
Thomas P Heckmann is another joy to watch. There were lots of hands in the air during his set—most of the time his own. At one point, girls were thrown up onto shoulders and a euphoric party atmosphere took over. But the rave didn't hit boiling point until 7 AM, when The Horrorist leapt up onto the tabletop, nimbly avoiding everyone's gear with his clomping bovver boots, and delivered the majority of his live set from there—except when he dived into the crowd during "Metal Man." Grins were plastered across everyone's faces.
Things were grimmer in the main room, where Ansome, Ossian and a lot of screaming bile paved the way for AnD. There was also a third room with unannounced DJs, all of whom had earned their slot by sending mixes to Reaktor. Unsurprisingly, the pace was set at a cool 180 BPM for most of the night. Back in the main room, Bleaching Agent's gabber set was the most hotly anticipated. I was concerned at first that it might have been a gimmick. We're in Holland, why not book a proper gabber DJ? But his set was incredible. He dug deep and went proper nerdy, dropping rare gems like this one.
In that final hour, between 8 and 9 AM, the atmosphere in the main room underwent a transformation. Limbs flicked about wildly in hakken dance moves. Even though I was on my own, I was surrounded by gabber friends for life. The vibe reminded me why I moved to Holland in the first place. Unpolished nailed it by covering the full spectrum of hard techno music, from the deliberately silly to the deadly serious, from the vintage to the current. It was a smart program that brought together all sorts of wonderful weirdos—I'm only sorry we have to wait another year for the next one.