Future Entertainment is probably the biggest dance music promoter in Australia and every year they throw massive festivals all around the country and bring out the big name djs and pack us all into venues around the country dancing to music. This year saw the advent of a new festival called "Future Music Festival" which is a replacement for Two Tribes. It's held in most captial cities in Australia including Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne, Perth, Adelaide and Auckland (New Zealand). This years international line up saw the likes of Carl Cox, Ferry Corsten, Sander Van Doorn, LTJ Bukem & MC Conrad, Nick Warren, Princess Superstar and many more with local talent coming from a lot of The Family Crew including DJ Syke, Tydi, Neroli.

For the first time the festival was held at the Doomben Race Course in Eagle Farm, just outside of Brisbane city. Being that it is an established venue for the races, it had plenty of on site facilities. The layout of the site was very well thought out, with food stalls being behind the main grand stand so that it blocked a lot of the sound from the festival so you could sit down and have a nice chat while grabbing some food. There was six stages in total catering to a variety of sounds from minimal tech through to trance.



The first artist that I was there for was Sander Van Doorn. When we got to the main tent he had just walked onto the stage and he started off very progressive. Over the next two hours he threw down some great tunes including the obligitory Grasshopper. Finishing on a bit of a faster note with that nice dirty Sander sound. We have some video of Sander that we'll be uploading as soon as its converted. It's the first time I had seen Sander play live and it started out different to what I expected of him, based on the all the radio shows and live recordings I've heard. Even though it was different he still showed us a great time. After Sander there wasn't really anyone on the bill I wanted to see for about an hour and a half so we decided to explore the venue, finding all the stages, the food stalls and the markets kitted out with the standard rave attire including big hats, sunglasses and t-shirts you're mum shouldn't see.

Nick Warren was next on the agenda and seeing as that we were going to be wandering around for another 6 hours or so we decided we'd sit in the grand stand above the stage Nick was on and observe it from there. I hadn't seen Nick play before so I was interested to see what he had in store for us. He started off with some very progressive house moving along through the set building up slightly. when he dropped a bootleg of Red Hot Chilli Peppers - By the Way the entire crowd began to chant along with it which really is a sight to see from above. A sea of hands slowly waving and this dull raw of the song.

Next up was LTJ Bukem and MC Conrad setup in the bar area's of the grand stand overlooking the other stages and the race course. We stood there listening to JDS while waiting for LTJ Bukem & MC Conrad. About 10 mins before they were to start, they arrived at the back of the room and walked through the crowd to the front. For the first time in the festival with some great drum and bass we were seeing the music pass 135 BPM and it was a nice change from all the house and progessive that I had experienced already that day. I haven't seen these guys in a few years and wondered what they had for us, and did they bring it. We got our groove on there for about an hour before making our way over for two hours of Ferry Corsten.

We raced over to the main tent in time to see ferry throw down his first track. The next two hours saw him play an amazing set that was everything I hoped it would be. He managed to have a compliment of the new and the old tracks mixed into 2 hours of dance music bliss. The crowd was not only singing along to so many of the tracks, there were also humming along to the sounds of the tracks also. We have a bunch of video of Ferry that we'll also be uploading to compliment this post, I'm just awaiting the video conversions to be completed.

Overall I have to say this is one of the best events I have had the pleasure of attending in Australia. It was well laid out, well catered for, the atmosphere was very friendly and laid back much like the raves around 2000 and it was a great selection of artists. I do have some feedback for you though future, and that would be on the front of turning up the volume at the stages, as you got towards the back it did become a little hard to hear, I guess its nice to not have to come home with ringing ears though. Thanks for a great day and I hope to see you all there next year.