For the second day in a row Movement had multitudes of fans shuffling their feet to electronic music all day long. At the start of day two we noticed that the lines to get in and in front of the Titos and Redbull bars were much shorter than the day before. This was most likely due to the fact that many of the festival goers were probably dancing all the way until five or six o’clock in the morning at one of the many after parties taking place around Detroit for the festival. Some of these parties were official Paxahua sanctioned after parties, but most of them were just parties thrown in celebration that, for this Memorial Day weekend anyway, Detroit was the epicenter of techno music.
We started our day out with another trip around the festival to collect free swag from each of the vendor booths. Then figured it was time for us to take it easy and relax in the grass, enjoying the sounds of the beeps and the boops floating into our ears through the cool breeze coming off the Detroit River – all the while catching glimpses of some of the decently indecent festival attire strewn throughout the crowds at each of the stages.
Once we were reinvigorated via the power of Vodka Redbulls, we bounced back and forth between stages in order to catch Will Clarke and Lady Starlight who were performing simultaneously on nearby stages. Clarke’s laidback performance which allowed his music to do the talking was in stark opposition to the crowd pumping energy of Lady Starlight, who dazzled her audience with mounds of energy.
Later that night my friends and I got lost in a cosmic, techno-inducced, mind-tunnel while watching my new favorite act at the festival, Anna. Her idiomatic sound might be brand new to me, but Anna has been turning tables and honing in her craft since she was 14-years-old in São Paulo, Brazil. 10/10 would recommend.
Snapping back to reality, I made my way back to The Waterfront Stage where I followed a crowd of people with wristbands that granted them much better access than mine did, made myself as invisible as possible, and somehow found myself dancing on the side of the stage next to 2manydjs . The pair of older gentleman proved that with age comes wisdom, including the wisdom of how to make a crowd lose their shit. Their set was packed to the brim with disco and 80s club bangers mashed together with nonstop techno beats. It was the most fun I have had dancing in a long time.
I wanted to stick around for the entirety of 2manydjs, but I was forced to leave my stage-side grooving space and venture into the hordes of people so that I could catch Carl Craig and LCD Soundsystem’s front man James Murphy’s DJ Set happening directly at the same time. Since my days living in New York and attending as many house parties as possible, I have been head-over-heels in love with James Murphy as a DJ. It would be a crying shame to miss him spin at such an iconic music festival – but miss him I did due to the bajillion other fans that had made their way to his stage much quicker than me, filling up any prime spots of the amphitheater he was performing to.
I was bummed but not defeated, because seeing James and Carl DJ was going to mean that I would be missing the world-famed Adam Beyer and/or the godfather of techno, Juan Atkins who were also playing the same headlining set time on individual stages. I opted for Atkins who performed atop a tower of psychedelic visuals being projected on screens both in front and behind him. His set was a master-class in understated stage presence. He reminded me of a preacher on a pulpit playing to techno-enthusiasts entranced by his music and the colorful lights dancing in the crowd (we have come a long way from the days of green and red glow sticks).
The final night of Movement is right ahead of us and the lineup is the one I have been anticipating the most. Dom Dolla, Ducksauce, Flying Lotus, and Griz are all set to perform in overlapping set times. You’ll have to excuse me while I begin stretching and carbo-loading in anticipation for the marathon I am about to run to try and see as much as I can.
Written by:
KALVIN LAZARTEPhotography by:
JIMMY GOLDFINGERS