Report from Tilburg

a great weekend in the Netherlands for Incubate. i arrived Saturday night in time to see:Shackleton doing a more techno-y set than last i heard him, a frantic jump up rave kinda style, before closing his set with some classics like Blood On My Hands. wikkid threads as well.

played all the new South Asian and Arabic dubstep. glad i stayed the course and did what i set out to do: the more challenging and heavy material with no compromises and no apology. no one dropped to their knees and burst into tears as i had hoped, but a few people did head for the door, so it was basically a good show.

30 minutes later Cooly G on point as usual. not sure how many in the bar was hip to the now sound...

on sunday the West African legends Orchestre Poly Rhythmo de Cotonou was superb. felt kind of bad for them as the park behind the "rock'n'roll highschool" (where Sun Ra's Archestra played last year) was still pretty empty at 2 PM, and only like 4 people including myself was dancing. I'm sure these guys burn the house down when they play at home - the grooves were HOT and the melodies sweet as can be - but the largely Dutch audience just sat and stared.

later an all African set from me. started with some recent Frances Bebey remixes and Haitian VouDou Techno rounded off by SA House, and gradually slowed down from 120+ to around 100 BPM with some Ngoma favorites; ending with a mashup of Rhythm and Sound with Madagascar tribal singing.

and of course these guys sounded fucking great. no mistaking it this time, new material in the classic style: some roots, some ragga riddims. and Paul's voice is as amazing as ever. deep and varied with so much soul... and delivered many tunes in a rough and tough style not heard on the records: like some kind of introspective badman in deep spiritual reflection. had to take the photo op as it presented itself. (Marcus if you have a problem with these pictures let me know and i will take them down)

kicking myself after for missing James Blackshaw play in a small church. friends who saw it affirmed that it was sublime. also missed the headliner Hermann Nisch performance involving a dead pig, its entrails and loads of blood... but not terribly sad about it.

and a great surprise on Sunday night: last party of the festival and everyone was gathered in a crowed bar, where the man known as Rummelsnuff did a set of original, REAL German Elektro-Punk. NOT like the annoying shit trendy stupidsters in their day-glo nu-rave outfits spew all over the world these days, which has given the genre a terrible name -- this was like DAF, like Einsturzende, like old Laibach, like the best of the NDW and early industrial punk. and such a friendly and humorous dood too, full of good vibes!

thanks to all the nice people at Incubate who made this amazing event possible. so great to finally meet Vince the Prince and DJ Umb, although regrettably didn't get to spend enough time with them -- but of course there is next year!

and a little groceries from the Grass Company on the way to train station monday morning - legal weed is good weed :)