With Gottwood entering its 10th year we sent our resident dirty raver and lover of all things wobbly, Matt, through the wind and rain to check out what its decimary year had to offer.
Located on the north-westerly coast of Anglesey, miles from any form of civilisation, Gottwood Festival sets upon the Carreglwyd Estate estate for the next few days, a relatively small site that packs a punch in terms of diversity, spectacle and beauty.
The line-up this year is something to behold and is a testament to the festival’s increased popularity and place as one of the leading electronic festivals around the world, people come here expecting a certain level of quality and it doesn’t half deliver it.
Upon setting up camp the sun was shining with the sea in full view of our camp, not a bad sight to wake up to for the following days to come. The first night mainly consisted of stumbling around stage to stage getting our bearings before settling at DJ Tennis. Highlight of the night: DJ Tennis dropping the Hardfloor remix of Yeke Yeke, absolutely ludicrous.
Me enjoying the Curves’ delights
Friday
Waking up bleary eyed after an eventfully heavy night our thoughts only went to one thought, food. The guys at Other Side Fried sorted me out with a southern fried chicken burger with garlic mayonnaise and Parmesan. Job’s a good’un.
Friday in general was pretty rainy, as we skittered between the stages armed with waterproof jackets and less than appropriate footwear.
Missing out on Artwork’s dubstep throwback set due to The Barn being absolutely rammed was a slightly disappointing turn of events but our spirits were soon lifted later in the evening by sets from DJ Boring at the walled garden and Hesseltime at the Treehouse.
Saturday
First stop: Palms Trax.
With a beer in hand and the sun blaring down with the rain finally gone, Palms Trax was set to be a belter. The tent at the curve quickly reached capacity till people were spilling out, as banger after banger filled the tent the set was topped off with a relentless barrage of old school jams such as Skip Mahoney’s ‘Janice (Don’t Be So Blind To Love)’ the crowd was buzzing, the sun was shining, absolutely bloody lovely.
Moving into the Trigon, sets from Raw Silk, Krywald & Farrer and Andrew Weatherall kept the night pumping and saw us happily into the early hours.
Sunday
The final day is always one to remember and as we chilled out in the sun for most of the day things quickly moved to the evening with the annual Move D disco set to kick it all off. The Trigon was absolutely moving by the time we got there and matters were only helped by sing alongs to The Beatles’ ‘Come Together’ and a remix of Fleetwood Mac’s ‘Dreams’ intertwined with countless funky anthems.
Moving on from Move D at the Trident we hurried our way over to the Lawn in anticipation of Crazy P hitting the stage and finishing up the line of acts that have graced the Lawn stage over the weekend.
Sunday was capped off with an incredible display.
After seeing crazy p live numerous times I knew what was to come was going to be an hour of funky sonic delights, the anticipation was building due to them slightly being late on but by the time they came on the crowd was at fever pitch. Classics such as ‘Heartbreaker’ and ‘Echo’ kept people moving as the sun started to set over the lake.
With their set coming to a close, the fireworks go off, marking the 10th anniversary of the festival in style. Ahhh, that was nice.
Over to watch Digby take control of the Curve before an outstanding closing set from Margaret Dygas, three hours of belter after belter, finishing with Michael Jackson’s ‘Don’t Stop Till You Get Enough’ What more do you want eh?
Till next time Gottwood.
