The last slivers of daylight swirl across the field for Stage One. The heat has passed, the evening falls and everything lands in its place. Caroline Polachek was there, her voice was there, her songs and appearance were there, and that feels like a collective sigh of relief. Now suddenly there is half an hour to prepare for the most unwavering certainty of the three Best Kept Secret headliners: The Chemical Brothers. How many times have we seen them: at Pinkpop in the nineties, countless times at Lowlands, and recently we already got a taste of this show via the Coachella live stream.
Ed Simons and Tom Rowlands broke through in the mid-nineties from acid house stronghold Manchester with the albums Exit Planet Dust in Dig Your Own Hole. In addition to Underworld and The Prodigy, they were the dance acts that were embraced by the large rock audience. The great thing is that in the three decades that followed they continued to make valuable additions to their oeuvre. And tonight in live setting it turns out how different the roads are that the brothers took in later years.
Tonight’s set is divided into two clearly separated parts: the first hour and a final half hour. In that first hour, the duo takes the time and space to go deep, to build up an intense trip over and over again. Early in the set it succeeds with ‘Feels Like I’m Dreaming’, with spinning synths spiraling downwards. Occasionally Tom Rowlands whips up the intensity, while Ed Simons steps out from behind the table to accompany the more trippy parts with big hand gestures. Behind the tables full of hardware we see crystal clear visuals in red and blue, a Dario Argento-worthy fever dream.
2023-06-09 22:00:00
#BKS23 #Chemical #Brothers #deep #twisted
