Freedom Festival.............18-21 August.............. Portugal



In a summer festival, like you know, is impossible to see, listen and feel everything at the same time, so I decided to do this review like a personal diary, talking about what I saw, what I listened and what I felt.

I arrived to Elvas Tuesday at 6PM and from there (20kms away from Freedom) I started to see green arrows showing the way to the festival...when I arrived to Barragem do Caia there was 2 big police controls and a big movement at the doors (nothing abnormal till here).

When I came inside, the weather was hot (7PM) but with a wonderful wind disguising it...the place was wonderful, all surrounded by water, the only bad thing is that the entire floor was full of rocks and pricker bushes, walking without shoes seems to be an adventure.
The chillout zone was very well decorated, full of beautiful paintings that with the UV lights on have a great psychedelic character...the dancefloor was with good deco too but as such a big stage that seems more adequate for a rock concert than for a trance party.
There wasn’t no lights at camping zone and just a few at the site...there wasn’t too enough Wc’s for this kind of festival but they were washed every afternoon and we didn’t have to pay for use it like in almost other European festivals...also there was a shower zone with good conditions and a big number of individual showers.
Similar to Boom Festival, there was a bank where we could change our money for Freedom’s :)




Michele Adamson started the dancefloor very bad in my opinion, I really like her voice but 1h30m of singing fullon is not for everyone...otherwise I think that the organization could choose something more tribal or more progressive for the opening! At this point I could see that the disposition of the speakers is not the best because they are very elevated from the floor and the dancefloor is done at some kind of a hole...however, the sound can be listened with clearness and power.




In the chill area the sound was changed for a movie called “Barak”, the environment was nice and everyone seems relaxed and happy.

When I returned to the mainfloor, there was 2 or 3 times more people than at 1h before...the master at work was Bushman, showing some Spun new tracks of artists like Void, Gms, Wrecked Machines,...after his set I went to sleep, thinking that we were going to have a wonderful weekend :)




Friday I woke up at 11am, the sky was a bit dark but the temperature stills hot.
The dancefloor was going very well, there was people dancing from all over the world at the live act of Talamasca, always with his great energy but using some tracks that he always play in the last 2/3 years...
In the chill area there was a nice and fresh atmosphere but – incredible – the Dj is playing at 3 hours without phones!

Juvenile was spreading energy to the mainfloor crowd and after him Dj Poli was my favorite of the first day, telling us a wonderful story with his Dj set...after him the music stopped and people went to chillout or to the fresh and clean water of Caia :)




At sunset Michele Adamson in chill area (in my opinion much better that in the day before at mainfloor) gave peace and good music to the audience...at 1am there was a lot of more people on the mainfloor (weekend started) and the music was by Dj Gange with a nice and well constructed set but morning oriented, not the best choice for that hour...after him came Dj Migas with more dark music and the party continued...

At Saturday I woke up at 10am and I could feel that summer festival feeling on the air :) The mainfloor was full of dust in the air , the firemen could help us wetting the soil, because this many people went off...the chill area was full of people, Ott was playing his dub tunes...at that time I went for the first time to the water and I stayed there almost all afternoon...back again to chill, I never saw a chill area with so much vibe and people, it was the Shpongle live pa, all people dancing with the sunset on the backyards :)

D_Vision opened the last day of the mainfloor with some good music but I felt a bit tired and decided to go sleep.

At the last day I woke up at 7am and the mainfloor is completely full with 1200 Mics playing, after came GMS and after one of the best lives of the festival for me – Astrix, always with that killer bass lines and melodies to dream in space :) After came Raja Ram Dj set with 2 hours of party music and after at a bad hour for his sound came Hallucinogen that made such a “stop” in the sound that almost 1/4 of the people went away...some hours later came Quadra with a great power but with the only bad thing that all the tracks were very similar.




At this time I went to ate something and when I came back Xp Voodoo was playing a lot of good music but without any technique in the mixes...at 23h the music stopped but after 20 minutes of words and whistles by the public came more 5 or 6 tracks.




At 00:00 the mainfloor was closed and everyone went to chill area for the after hours...it could be a beautiful after Freedom if Dj Nirmal wouldn’t take out everybody of the stage (almost beaten in the djs that were playing) and played 3 hours of bad music without any technique on the mixes, I’m sure that if the organization was there the festival would end in a better away!

I’m waiting for the next Freedom festival, in my opinion 7/10 :)