Last summer, together with DJs Gvozd, Zemine, Art and Easer, I attended the WetLuck dnb festival, which takes place every summer in the Altai Mountains.
Morning of the first day. When I woke up after the flight and the long journey by bus, accompanied by some serious drinking, it personally seemed to me—as someone from central Russia/the Northwest—that we had landed on another planet. The scenery was absolutely fantastic, a total mind-blower.
To be honest, the first thing I thought about after checking into the camp was continuing my sleep. But no such luck. After settling in—roughly speaking, throwing down my things—I headed even higher up the slope to the tent city to check on and help set up a tent for my friends from Omsk. By the way, there were an ocean of tents there. I did not personally count them, but the scale was impressive.
By the way, I have never encountered such hospitality anywhere else. People invited one another to the table, shared everything they had, met and talked to each other. I have never seen such “interconnectedness” anywhere west of the Urals. Even Kazantip, which one might think is a gathering place for absolutely every party crowd in Russia, does not, in my view, provide the same “sense of solidarity” as this place.
After the camp had been set up, we decided to go exploring. This showed that a couple of kilometres downstream there was the magnificent village of Aya, where they make pretty decent shashlik, while drivers on the road would casually give you a lift anywhere out of the goodness of their hearts. Also, Aya has an absolutely insane single-lane suspension bridge for cars. The sight was completely unreal. Kurt Gluck (Submerged), who came with us, simply could not take his hands off his camera and was filming something the whole time.
We returned to the camp only around noon. The music was already playing at full volume. People were gradually making their way to the dancefloor and the bar. The bar, incidentally, was fairly minimalist. I do not know whether that was good or bad, but at least I did not see any long queues there—they worked quickly—and there was some sort of selection of drinks and snacks.
In general, I want to say straight away that I liked the entire lineup, and some of the names were genuine discoveries for me. I will not list everyone separately, because in that case I would simply have to copy the entire lineup here. I think the Russian scene loses a great deal because of its fragmentation. I do not want to go into detail, but there are many problems, starting with the rather limited awareness of what is happening in the European part of Russia beyond the Urals, and vice versa. Even plane tickets, which increase an event’s budget practically tenfold when an artist from the opposite side of the Ural range is invited, are enough to make promoters—and people who have been to both places at least once—feel gloomy. Because I can say with confidence that many people in St Petersburg have only a very vague idea of how many strong artists there are in Novosibirsk, Omsk, Tomsk and other cities. We still lack unity.
The day was drawing to a close. The real celebration was beginning. A feast for the whole world. Euphoria overwhelmed everyone present. No one remained indifferent. Language barriers were rapidly collapsing and close friendships were forming. I think my phone book, for example, nearly doubled in size. We partied until morning. I was especially glad to meet MC Sinista, a professional at his craft, as they say—he could raise the dead, and make them dance. Sven, by the way, received this year’s Best German MC award according to future-music.net, one of the most authoritative German websites devoted to drum and bass music.
So, the first night’s extravaganza was indescribable. It could not help but affect the following morning. My room’s window looked directly onto the dancefloor, so when my head began vibrating along with the pillow from the sound of a heavy bassline at noon, I had to get up whether I wanted to or not. But a shower under the open sky with icy water brought me round very quickly. After hurriedly eating some plov, I was urgently summoned to a press conference held in the organisers’ cabin. In my view, a press conference at events like this is a very important and responsible matter. And I was very surprised by the amount of press that had gathered for the event. Although this was the WetLuck organisers’ first press conference ever, everything went smoothly and professionally. Of course, our fellow journalists ruined it all again. Nobody knows how to write about drum and bass yet! Nobody does. And nobody knows how to ask questions either. And I am the worst among these unfortunate correspondents. Nevertheless, many interesting topics were raised and many important questions were answered. They are all somewhere in this text.
Incidentally, this was the longest press conference devoted to a drum and bass event that I had ever attended. It lasted more than an hour and a half. When it ended, some people went to get ready for the evening’s dancing, some went swimming in the mountain lake, and I sat with friends in the tent city. The second day was given over to guests from St Petersburg. I especially want to mention DJ Art’s DJ set, during which he played “kung-fu breaks” (see the photo of Artyom wearing a Vietnamese straw hat). Unfortunately, it started raining, which cooled everyone’s ardour a little. A little, I stress. Just a tiny bit.
That night, thanks to the excellent mountain air, the small amount of alcohol and a gigantic dose of energy drink (4 x 0.33-litre cans), I stayed on the dancefloor until the end. I was indescribably pleased about it (if it were not for the energy drink—do not repeat my mistakes). Kurt (Submerged) played the most hellish drum and bass music I could possibly have expected. All the weight of Ohm Resistance descended on the dancefloor during his DJ set. People danced furiously. For me, as a fan of tech and neuro sounds, Nels and MAD were the most anticipated. They pleased me beyond measure. Thanks, guys. Their DJ set kept me on the dancefloor right to the end.
Before the third day, I managed to sleep for only a couple of hours—energy drinks. We had an extensive programme planned for that day. After a hurried breakfast, DJ Zemine invited us on a hike.
It is worth noting here that the surrounding area offers an absolutely huuuuuuuuuuge number of opportunities for travel and extreme activities. The first item on the programme was the neighbouring mountain. If I remember correctly, it is called Camel. Its height was apparently just 800 metres. Well, that only sounds easy—800 metres, as if that were not much. And it is not even the highest one in the area. But! I recommend that everyone manage at least this climb. Forget that you have a lift, forget that the road is straight and trodden down, and try doing it. It is worth the effort, especially since the view from the top is simply fantastic.
During the ascent, a hang-glider pilots’ launch site was spotted below.So, these guys did not get to the top ofMount Camelat all. The sensations were indescribable. Immediatelyupon returning to the camp, we were loaded into a minibus and sent up the river to go rafting. From the frying pan into the fire, as they say. It was my first time rafting too. I highly recommend it to anyone who has not tried it yet. After a three-hour trip, you become fused to the paddle and the boat, permanently. You could not pry them apart. Especially since a mountain river, even in August, is not the Black Sea—the water is fairly cool. We also wanted to reach the hang-gliders, but realised that once was enough.
I would not want this brief report of mine to seem excessively enthusiastic to anyone. I am conveying my most sincere impressions. Going over all
