Oasis Festival 2018: Five key performances

  • The pioneering Moroccan event enjoys its biggest year yet.
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  • Oasis Festival launched in 2015 at Fellah Hotel, a luxurious, clay-coloured retreat on the outskirts of Marrakech. There were two stages, a couple thousand people and a tiny cultural programme. The lineup, which peaked with names like DJ Harvey, Gerd Janson and tINI, was solid without being spectacular. All in all, I had a good time, but it definitely felt like there was room for improvement. Fast-forward to 2018 and Oasis was back at the same venue, having spent the two years in between at another complex nearby called The Source. The whole thing, in comparison to the first edition, felt super-sized. The main stage, previously a breezy spot dominated by a large pool, was now a towering structure—the pool had been covered to extend the dance floor. National radio and TV crews were broadcasting live, while Maroc Telecom, the country's largest network provider, had installed free wi-fi. There were three stages, including a new poolside stage, plus multiple chill-out areas, a food court and, on Saturday, roughly 6,000 people from 50 countries. (The split, admirably, was 50/50 between locals and tourists.) Despite the expansion, Oasis retained and built upon many of its great original qualities. The soundsystems were crisp and overwhelming, and the layout spot on. The cultural offering felt much stronger—a personal highlight was the cute space dedicated to Musée d'Art Contemporain Africain Al Maaden (MACAAL)—as did the lineup, which stretched from Powder to Carl Cox to a dozen or so local artists, including, for the first time, female DJs. Though the vibe was still noticeably bourgeois—champagne bars don't belong at dance music festivals—and the drink prices a little hefty, this didn't impinge on the electric party atmosphere. Peel away all the Instagram opportunities and you were left with a loud, sweaty rave. Here are five key performances from across the weekend.
    rRoxymore The moon was a blurry crescent as rRoxymore, wearing a splendid patterned jumper, got her live set rolling with the punch of a button. Playing before Powder and Jane Fitz at the smallest stage, Mirage, she initiated the festival's headsiest spell of programming, launching straight into light, spacey techno with minimal sound design. The two DJs before, Cinthie and Myriam, had closed with a couple big prog tracks, so the contrast with the French artist's twitchy grooves was sharp. It took her a good 25 minutes to coax people off their sun loungers and onto the raised dance floor, though the tunes from start to finish were brilliant, full of zany sounds, trippy percussion and scratchy textures. All throughout, she stood stone-faced yet intently rocking. After mellowing the energy with a dreamier melodic cut, she ended with as rude a groove as I heard all weekend. Then, with a flick of the wrist, the drums stuttered and slowed to a standstill.
    Sasha It's increasingly rare, especially at festivals with stacked and varied bills like Oasis, to see DJs seamlessly flow into the previous act's final track. Sasha, assuming position on the main stage to the euphoric chimes of Massive Attack's "Unfinished Sympathy," seemed particularly uninterested in doing so, immediately resetting the vibe with a long, bubbling intro. The move came as little surprise—his thing has always been building a set from the ground up. (A great recent example: fabric 99.) Over the course of the next 90 minutes, Sasha increased the intensity brick by brick, subtly crafted with pinpoint layering and a succession of heavily melodic tracks. Not every tune was palatable—his sets often feel on a knife-edge of soppiness—but whenever he landed on a booming groove (Mind Against's remix of SCB's "Test Tubes") or a killer piano line (Wehbba's "Catarse"), the atmosphere stirred. As he pulled the set full circle with a slow machine-gun drum roll, a guy bobbed through the crowd wearing a pork-pie hat and a T-shirt that revealed the night's next performer. It read: "Bodzin saved my life."
    DJ Python It's thrilling when a DJ set completely obliterates your preconceptions. Because he also plays live, Brian Piñeyro very rarely plays his own music when he DJs, nor does he play much music in that same slower, more cerebral style. Early on Sunday morning at Mirage, it was strictly bangers. His manner behind the decks—chain-smoking, constant furtive glances at the crowd—belied his technical prowess. Rowdy tunes by the likes of Special Request ("Make It Real (Gerd Janson & Shan Mars Mix"), PLOY ("Ramos") and Skee Mask ("Dial 274") slipped beautifully into one another. A couple splashed about in the pool as the dance floor swelled from sparse to healthy, peaking with a hectic remix of Strike's "U Sure Do" and Womack & Womack's "Teardrops." To finish, he brought the tempo right down, opening a leisurely closing medley with "I Am In Love" by Jennifer Lara. Within seconds of leaving the booth, a wide-eyed British lad bounded over to him. "Mate, that was my set of the year." Piñeyro grinned.
    Carl Cox "Oh Yes, Oh Yes!" screamed the T-shirts worn by the staff at the long bar tucked away to the left of the main stage. This was a stunt worthy of the occasion: Carl Cox was playing Morocco for the first time in years. Naturally, I expected carnage at the main stage, but it never came, which is testament to the way the festival was programmed and laid out. Playing for three hours, Cox did as Cox does, peppering well-timed catchphrases over an onslaught of pummelling techno and tech house. Each go on the mic served as a small shot in the arm to the atmosphere, though the music always had something about it—a mammoth riff here, a stressed vocal there—helped by the clear boom of the system. "Borderline" by Filterheadz stood out, as did a housey jam with some snappy trumpets at around 5 AM. At some point in the final hour, the panel of golden bulbs behind Cox burst into formation and those four familiar words flashed in our faces: "Oh Yes, Oh Yes."
    Derrick Carter b2b The Black Madonna What you want on the Sunday night of a festival is bags of sass, a slew of house hits and Derrick Carter in a fetching black kilt. He and The Black Madonna spent much of their back-to-back grinding on each other to the endless stream of diva vocals, lush instrumentation and shuddering basslines. Classics, of course, abounded, but they were delivered with aplomb, never outstaying their welcome. The chug of Donna Summer's "I Feel Love," a tune, in my opinion, well past its sell by date, was layered underneath "I Can't Go For That (No Can Do)" by Hall & Oates to classy effect. Harry Romero's "Hot Music" and Floorplan's "Tell You No Lie" sounded spectacular. Best of all, though, was a thumping remix of the US rapper Cardi B's "Bodak Yellow," which sparked spates of chanting in the thousands-strong crowd. After a big hug, the two old friends sank to the back of the stage, leaving it to Africa's biggest DJ, Black Coffee, to soak up the golden atmosphere. Photo credits / Guy Clarke - Lead, rRoxymore, DJ Python, Derrick Carter b2b The Black Madonna Ollie Simcock - Sasha, Carl Cox
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