- In his review of last year's edition, Jordan Rothlein observed that Melt! was "a big festival unencumbered by the baggage that bogs down similar events." I couldn't help coming back to that idea over the course of my weekend at the German festival. Something about Melt! just felt comfortable, an event with all the pros of a huge festival—insane production values, killer headliners and amazing energy—as well as a strangely intimate and welcoming feeling in spite of its size. I even spied security guards dancing every once in a while.
Melt! happens at Ferropolis, an open-air museum south of Berlin. Decked out with giant cranes and other mining and construction monstrosities, it was like a post-apocalyptic playground for the German techno massive. The structures made a fascinating backdrop, especially with projection-mapped visuals and some impressive pyrotechnics. Walking through Ferropolis, there was always something to see and music to be heard. A storage container held a karaoke booth, while a few yards down, another one was home to DJs playing classics from the '70s, '80s and '90s to a constantly full tent flanked by gleeful ravers on swings (a 6 AM session with Aerosmith's "Don't Wanna Miss A Thing" was particularly vibey). Then there was the Truck Stop, which blasted everything from techno to drum & bass, seemingly oblivious to the booming Big Wheel Stage behind it.
Even with all the sensory bombardment, Melt! pitched the actual stages far enough apart that sound bleed was rarely an issue. There was the mainstream-leaning Main Stage, a huge pit that featured acts like Haim and SBTRKT, while the permanently dark Gemini Stage offered refuge from the sunrise and hosted a hip cross-section of dance music styles, including a stunning back-to-back from Erol Alkan and Daniel Avery and a giddy mishmash from Baauer. The sweltering Intro Tent hosted bands like Future Islands and Darkside, while Modeselektor's lakeside Melt! Selektor stage represented the festival's more adventurous end—Akkord, French Fries versus L-Vis 1990—and gave overheated ravers a chance to cool off in the gorgeous Gremminer See.
The Big Wheel stage is where I spent most of my weekend. Though the programming here was more Ibiza-centric than last year, there were highlights every night from both ends of the spectrum, from hands-in-the-air house to heads-down techno. Innervisions led proceedings on Friday. Âme delivered a typically epic set, and Recondite laid down a heady groundwork for Dixon, who ran with the darker vibe until he busted out Moderat's "Bad Kingdom" just in time for sunrise. Kölsch played an ecstatic live set on Saturday night that had one of the best crowd reactions of the weekend (especially on "Goldfisch" and "All That Matters"). Jeff Mills took over for the following three hours, alternating between blistering techno and funky percussive workouts. With DVS1 on next, it was about as solid a lineup as you could hope for.
The programming was strong enough that there was pretty much always something I wanted to see, but the music wasn't without its disappointments. Robyn & Röyksopp's turn on the main stage felt disjointed—the Swedish singer was in fine form, but she relied too heavily on distracting pre-recorded backing vocals. Fuck Buttons' live set was cancelled at the last minute and replaced with a DJ set from member Andrew Hung, whose taste in slightly cheesy techno clashed with what came before (Jeri-Jeri) and after (Sherwood & Pinch). Still, these were minor disappointments in the scheme of things. After all, Melt! is the kind of festival where a four-hour back-to-back set by Tiga and Seth Troxler doesn't feel like the biggest event of the night (and the two were clearly having fun, trading off on party anthems like Tiga's new "Bugatti" and Donna Summer's "I Feel Love").
All of that happens inside the festival, and then there's still the Sleepless Floor, a notorious all-day-all-night sand pit outside the festival grounds that requires no wristband for entry. Running from Saturday morning through Monday afternoon, this one had a decadent, anything-goes feel—more like a Berlin afterhour than a festival stage. Guy Gerber played there at 8 AM on Monday morning, and when I stopped in later that evening to see stellar turns from Portable and nd_baumecker, I felt like I had stumbled on a different event entirely. It was hard to tear myself away from it.
I was glad I did, though, because Sunday's headlining one-two punch from Moderat and Portishead was a beautiful way to cap off the festival. Moderat played to an adoring crowd who sang along to almost every song, and by the time Portishead came on, there was a collective euphoria from those who stuck around until the end, through all the heat exhaustion and hours upon hours of raving. By the time Portishead finished their set—the highlight of the weekend—I went to check out the rest of John Talabot's festival closer on the Big Wheel stage, and felt a tinge of melancholy about the whole thing. I easily could have done with another day.
Photo credits: Geert Schäfer (Melt! sign), Robert Winter (Sleepless Floor, Big Wheel), Stephen Flad (Moderat, Melt! Selektor Stage, )