Somos Albuquerque, a phrase that not only reflects the culture of the city but signifies the profound unity of its people, a deep-seated tradition of coming together. As an all-ages event, it seemed like the entire city came out to celebrate. From face paint and rhinestone tattoos to Hawaiian shirts and leis, the people certainly turned out dressed for the occasion. 

It has been two years since the last Somos event and after such a tumultuous hiatus, the city was ready for a night of music, dance, and release. Nestled behind the Anderson Abruzzo Albuquerque International Balloon Museum, a crowd gathers before a stage in anticipation. Two hot-air balloons stationed on the fringe, brightening the grassy festival grounds with each sporadic blast. Hannah Wants, one of the openers, plays to a swelling mass of limbs and pool floaties. Deep tropical house emanates through the pavilion – wishing for cooler days. It’s a warm May afternoon and the growing crowd purrs with excitement.

Tokimonsta’s set came with much anticipation. More attendees trickle in as her set kicks off and sends the crowd into a frenzy. Her new track, “loved by U,” was electric, catalyzing a dynamic response from the concertgoers. As the sun began to set over an unforgettable performance, Toki expressed her love for the state and its people. Stepping down into the pit, posing for pictures with attendees, and chatting with her beloved fans, the intimacy was unparalleled to most. With much reluctance, the crowd bid farewell to “our queen,” chanted by many goers as the last song came to a conclusion. 

Big Gigantic was pivotal. The bass was thunderous, and the saxophone was angelic yet assertive. Transparent beachballs float atop the throng, flying into the air with each swift sipe of an arm. “Good times roll“, thrusts the listeners into mania. The glitchy aesthetic of Griz seamlessly sprinkled throughout, the verve was palpable. As their set neared an end, they took a moment to thank the patrons, reminding us how important it is to stay united.

Dreamglow marked the end of an epic ten-day celebration of Art, expression, and the city of Albuquerque. SOMOS Albuquerque served as a crucial opportunity to celebrate not only the city, but those who make it what we know and love today. Truly a night made of memories, till next year.

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Colorado-based electro/hip-hop fusion duo Big Gigantic – made up of saxophonist/producer Dominic Lalli and drummer Jeremy Salk – dropped their seventh studio album, Free Your Mind, this February. A collection of heart-thumping EDM, hip-hop and reggae beats, the 13-track album is laced with the duo’s signature funky basslines, sexy saxophone riffs, and sweet, soulful vocals. With a balanced mix of uptempo club bangers, hard-hitting beats and smooth jazz grooves, Free Your Mind is an electronic hybrid of musical genres that imaginatively blends styles to create a truly inventive sound.

Kicking off the record is the atmospheric and instrumental “Daybreak,” signifying the electronica dawning of their new album that bleeds into the funky jazz beats of “Let the Speakers Blow,” a hip-hop track bursting with energy and infused with the Lalli’s infamous sax riffs.

More hip-hop/funk tracks on the album include “Higher” featuring The Funk Haters. Starting with a solid funk guitar riff the track switches gears and turns into a bouncy raver tune, with heavy computerized beats that build the tension until it explodes into a cool disco groove with a blaring horns section. “Supergigantic,” a gritty rap track featuring Nigerian-Canadian rapper and singer TOBi, brings the swagger to the party. A more traditional hip-hop track with sleek rhymes, the pulsating beat is elevated by a smooth sax break that is pure ecstasy. Closing out the funk tracks is “Baad,” featuring Pell and Louis Futon. Starting off slow, the song kicks up the drums to an uptempo breakbeat and sprinkles it with more jazzy sax licks.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=phcvubBTQfA&list=PLVBt2St_ZHB4xZGJt5hwAzzWKlSEa3Z_z

“Burning Love” is a fun pop song with pretty R&B vocals that dance over an electrified calypso beat, and “Friends,” with sultry vocals by Ashe, is a hypnotic R&B love story with a vintage feel.  The laid back pop song “You’re the One”, featuring EDM vocalist Nevve, about a girl longing for someone to notice her, makes you feel like relaxing in front of a campfire on a beach, and “Where I Wanna Be” will lift you up with its booming vocals, infectious sax riffs and heavily produced beats – a true dance number that will pack any dance floor!

“St. Lucia” is a suave reggae song with slick lyrics by American rapper, singer, songwriter, and producer Felly, and the title track “Free Your Mind” is a beautiful soulful tune with powerful vocals by Jennifer Hartswick that transforms into a hardcore EDM track.

A fun dance album that incorporates multiple styles, voices and rhythms to create something truly unique, Big Gigantic’s Free Your Mind will change the way you hear musical genres as they break all the rules to create another hit record that will keep you dancing from start to finish.

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Joaqopelli, a Native American Basque Gypsy, started Thursday off with a traditional flute performance at the Living Room stage, a beach stage with a casual feel beside the Salmo River.  The song called “Down spirits from the heaven to feel the power of the creator”.   The set was perfect for the 11:11am start, and set the tone for the Living Room stage for the rest of the festival.

The highlight of any music festival is discovering something new.  This year it was Big Gigantic.  The American Duo started in 2008, and combine live performance with “Djing”.  Funk, Dubstep, House, HipHop, Electro Soul, and Jazz all mixed with live drums, saxophone and keys.  The genres were all over the place, but each transitioned seamlessly to the next.  Some technical issues led to a late start, and the stage presence a little stiff at first, but that all became irrelevant as they got into the first song.  The dynamic between the two fits with the improv style that makes the live set so fluid with the audience.

Adam Shakih holds a special place in electronic music for me. He was the first DJ I saw almost a decade ago.  This year he played right after the opening ceremonies in the Grove.  A calming, lawn gnome covered venue in the woods.  The set was very relaxed and complimented the sunshine peeking through the trees.

DJ Anger is the embodiment of the mindset of the westcoast DJ.  The self taught, hip-hop influenced DJ plays a huge range, reggae, bass heavy, funk, breaks and more.  He calls Victoria home, and his influence is embedded in the Vancouver Island music scene.  Anger was the first DJ I photographed almost a decade ago, and has moved into producing, as well as helping aspiring DJs in the community.  He is involved in festivals, events, local sets, producing and DJing all over the place.  He is on one of the hardest working people I have come across.  Anger has helped build and shape the Victoria music scene, and it shows.

Dua & Generic also hail from my hometown of Victoria.  Generic has several DJ comp titles, a resident DJ, he teams up with DUA for big events like Shambles.  His sets are filled with glitch hop, drum and bass, dubstep, broken beats, while scratching and mixing his own tracks in.  This is an artist that is new to me, but after this performance I look forward to more.

Shambhala is more than music, it is a weird concoction of every genre of everything.  Morning yoga everyday, a unicorn parade, tourist guide tours, spirit hood gathering, potlucks, muay thai, tantric yoga, the rocket ship (you are placed between 6 gongs and they send you to outer space), aerial silk, and fashion.

Each year local vendors put on a fashion show, highlighting things for sale, as well as varied, unique creations by artists.  Previous years had outfits made from garbage, cleaning supplies like rubber gloves, and pieces that were not traditional clothing pieces (like rubber chickens).  This year saw a lot of sparkle and shine, with some avian influence.

A voice for independent music and an explosion onto the music scene over the past few years, Griz played a phenomenal set that got the crowd roaring.  I am biased, my two favorite performances this year had live saxophones in them.  Self-described Future Funk is ridiculously appropriate, combining electro-soul, funk and live saxophone is refreshing for those who miss the sax laden songs of the 80s, which apparently I do.  Griz is young, and extremely talented, but I do not think he has peeked yet.  He has come really far, really quickly, touring with big names, and even headlining on his own, but I predict the next couple years there will be major growth into a far more developed and multi-talented artist.  Big Gigantic was the highlight for me, but Griz is someone to watch.

Ill Gates & KJ Sawka are the backbone of bass. KJ Swaka is a member of both Pendulum and Destroid, also providing beats to a ridiculous amount of DJs, while Ill Gates makes production tools used by countless artists.  Ill Gates has collaborated with Bassnectar, Datsik, and more, and this shows in the body-vibrating Bass that exploded from their set.  Halfway through the set I stopped, and tried to separate myself from the music, and all I could feel was my internal organs buzzing.

Authenticity is the sound she strives for. Ill-esha pulls out turntables, vocal loopers, keytars, and more in her set to create a sound all her own.  Her initial foray into music was drum and bass, then into glitch-hop, but she strives to break out of being pinned down to any specific genre.

Scott Jackson was an unscheduled, high-energy suprise.  Either technical issues, or delay created a gap in performers and Jackson stepped up.  Jackson’s skills in beatboxing come from illness, being bed ridden he developed his skill.   “How many of you like Michael Jackson?” he yelled to the crowd before jumping into a medley of songs, followed by a ten minute solo, freestyle beatbox.  This is not an art I am intimately acquainted with, but the range in pitch, sound, a term I have no words for was astounding.  The speed in which he switched between singing and percussion sounds, and jumping from song to song was something I had only seen in YouTube videos, which has minimal impact compared to seeing it in real life.

I was born and raised in Victoria BC, and, in a tongue-in-cheek way, we have a love-hate relationship with Calgary.  This is where I set my holier-than-thou, hippy, west coast, surfer, tree-hugging, granola munching, yoga doing, fishing, snowboarding hat, and legitimately compliment Calgary on its ability to produce musicians. Subvert, from Calgary, has been on the scene almost 20 years, a founding member and lead designer of PK sound, as well as the Village stage director is all about “bass that works”.  Synths, bassline, strings, in glitch and drum and bass create a deep, dark, sexy sound that resonates from the toes to the head.

Fractal Forest.  In the age of technology, Shambhala wants a piece of it to remain mysterious and untouched by the ravages of Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, and WhatsApp.  As a result, photography is banned in the Forest, thought that did not stop wide-eyed, enthusiastic dancers from sneaking a cell phone pic. Skratch Bastid worked the crowd with ease, but was followed by an unfortunately disappointing set by DJ Jazzy Jeff.  It came off as pop laden, top 40, and when the crowd did not react, he did not change.  I was at his performance in Vancouver last year for Quip, and he read the crowd and brought it to a riotous clamour, playing it like a skilled fiddler. Mix Master Mike faired better, but had lost a lot of the crowd from the previous performance. Neon Steve and Vinyl Ritchie had energetic crowds, while the The Funk Hunters drew a huge, effervescent, excited crowd.

Zed’s Dead.  My very first Shambhala, almost a decade ago, put me in a car with a stranger on the 12-hour (we took two days) drive from Victoria to Salmo.  That ride introduced me to Karl, who had a love for electronic music more than anyone I knew.  We became close friends, and after Shambhala, I would receive a phone call whenever Zed’s Dead was in town.  “What are you doing tonight? It doesn’t matter, Zed’s Dead is here, we’re going”. Karl introduced me to them, among many others. He passed away a few years ago, and I have a special place in my heart, and my calendar whenever I see that they are performing.  I really enjoyed this set, but I will be the first to admit I am entirely biased. I saw Zed’s Dead for Karl, and I have no regrets.

Pretty Lights was surprisingly aggressive, and a little too loud. I enjoyed the set but was expecting a little more laid back from their previous performances, as well as being one of the last headliners on Sunday night.

Shambhala is a triathlon for music lovers.  A hugely varied artist list, and music running from noon-11am in some cases, it takes a dedicated and energetic person to fully appreciate the festival as a whole. Bonobo played his set late Sunday night, and I was barely standing by the time I arrived.  Hailing from Brighton, UK, Simon Green has been doing this for over 10 years and it shows.  I moved around the crowd as much as I could, and the most common phrase overheard was “I love this song” throughout the entire set.  It was a bit more relaxed than previous sets, but fit in with the late night last day crowd.  The set ranged his entire discography, and despite the fatigue of almost 4 straight days of dancing, the crowd refused to let this amazing performance be wasted.

Welcome home is a mantra that fits with Shambhala so well that it is almost comical.  There was not a single person I encountered who did not share the family, community, sharing vibe that the festival puts forward.  Walking from the campsite to the stages, you encounter hundreds of people shouting “Happy Shambhala” “Shappy Hambala” “Welcome home” or just an outrageous, coarsing roar that starts on one side of the farm and ends on the other.  Flags, balloons, costumes, stilts, juggling, instruments and any other skill you can think of is prevalent.  This is truly one of the few places where, no matter who you are, what you do, how you dress, you will be accepted and acknowledged.

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But What The Festival isn’t just another fest. It’s acres of land, featuring 8 stages, some huge and some intimate. One’s in front of a pair of huge wading pools so hundreds of people can splash, dance and hurl inflatable toys into the air. Another, accessible only by trekking through the Illuminated Forest art exhibit pathway, is shaped like a massive Chinese dragon with a pagoda structure on its back so the DJ stands 10 meters above the dance floor (which is grass), surrounded by trees on all sides.

Other, more intimate, stages are nestled into smaller areas, like the Shinto A Go Go just off the main drag. The Shinto area has a small torii entrance with traditional noren to walk through and features multiple miniature open-air tea houses brewing matcha and herbal blends; Luz Elena Mendoza of Y La Bamba fame played a set there Friday night and sounded fantastic. Just down the forest path is the LOL Stage, where decidedly un-techno acts like the LoveBomb Go-Go Marching Band or The Saloon Ensemble might play a half-gypsy, half-flamenco version of Phil Collins’ “In The Air Tonight”. It could happen. And after midnight, when the two main stages shut down, the Silent Disco starts up midfield, underneath the massive disco ball. There are few sights as surreal as seeing 200 people swaying in total silence, their wireless headsets glowing blue or red depending on which one of the two DJs they’ve chosen.

As you’d expect the two big stages are where the bigger acts play to crowds of thousands. Visiting the major stages is a breeze, you can pick one and dance nonstop for hours or ping-pong back and forth between the Effin’ Stage and the Main Stage.  Friday night’s duelling stages began to heat up at 8 when StéLouse was on the Effin’ Stage opposite duo Sabota on the Main Stage. Members of Camp Waldo – one of the more visible camp tribes, definitely a thing at WTF – must have been delighted by half of Sabota wearing nautical horizontal stripes and a red woollen beanie, but none could be reached for comment.

Friday night’s Effin’ Stage lineup peaked with twins Kendrick and Sherwin Nicholls’ Two Fresh. StéLouse handed them a good groove and they ran with it, their vocal-heavy, hip-hop-infused, dance music sounding different enough from what had come before to be novel. It helps that both Nicholls are born performers who use every inch of the stage and fire up the crowd, but credit where due: those were some amazing beats. The only quibble with their music might be their frequent use of “bitch” and “ho”, tired tropes that are deeply ingrained into the fabric of old-school hip-hop. But yeah, that’s a quibble. Two Fresh was a top-10 set of the weekend, easy.

When Daktyl played Portland last year, supporting Slow Magic, he was solid, but somehow unremarkable. Perhaps being on tour empowered him? Less than a year later at the WTF Splash Stage his set was unexpectedly bold, featuring an unusual number of tempo changes, as if he was daring the crowd to keep up with him. It worked. He walked a rhythm tightrope, keeping the party going while flirting with less and less traditional beats, giving himself multiple opportunities to drop (and re-drop) the bass. He read the roaring crowd perfectly and delivered one of the most musically memorable sets of the festival, in the sun, at 5 p.m. – no small feat. He had a solid lead-in by Ambassadeurs and made the most of it, upping the ante on the crowd minute by minute.

At a typical rock show there may be a 15 to 30 minute gap between performers to allow breakdown and setup of gear, but at most EDM events these transitions happen organically, as DJs seamlessly blend sets to keep the momentum going. It’s unspoken, but understood that if another DJ or producer is plugging in during the end of your set, it is incumbent upon you to pass it off to them as gracefully as possible. So it was shocking to see a performer pull the musical equivalent of dumping water on a campfire at the end of his set. QUARRY had a challenging time slot; 7 to 8 p.m. is between the poolside Splash Stage closing and the 8 p.m. headliners coming on, when the plurality of attendees get food, rest, and change clothes for the evening festivities. His crowd was not massive, but he had a solid few dozen people dancing when he seemed to have technical difficulties. A hard crackling stop mid-beat, some dialog, then a final track of synth washes, which seemed beatless, capped off by a dead stop, silence, then him saying “That’s it.” Uncool, and enough to dissipate the crowd.

By the time Ellie Herring started her set a moment later, a scant 8 people stood a good way back from the stage. Understand, this isn’t starting from scratch – it’s way harder. This was earning back spurned attention and having to overcome the lure of a very effective Little People set in progress just across the great lawn. You can see both stages, so it’s obvious when one scene is happening and one isn’t. Laurent Clerc a.k.a. Little People had a 15 minute head start and was banging, his trademark electronic sound effects punctuating solid beats that had attracted a large, and growing, crowd.

Some know Ellie Herring from her hooky, minimalist tracks like “Always Just OK,” but her 2015 work has been more muscular and driving – insistent without being aggressive and without the whisper-passive vocals featured on most of Kite Day. It’s a near-complete stylistic reinvention, different and good. Her WTF set picked up where her May tour with Dot left off, lots of percussive beats and short vocal samples that insinuate themselves into your earholes and demand body movement, at times sounding like next generation Jose “Chep” Nuñez or Tuta Aquino’s mid-’80s mixes.  As people poured back onto the festival grounds, heads turned and trajectories were altered as Herring soldiered on. A few minutes in she said “Hi, I’m Ellie, come dance with me.” and they did: 8 became 40 became 120 became 300 and upward, and the music soared. By the end of her hour long set she was handing Sweater Beats a hot crowd in a great mood. It was the biggest turnaround of the weekend and the talk at one of the campfires at 2 a.m. “Did you see Ellie Herring?” “Holy shit, YEAH.”

On paper, the Main Stage has a bit more firepower, lining up artists like GRiZ, Keys N Krates, Machinedrum Vapor City Live, Slow Magic, and Big Gigantic. The latter 3 artists, in particular, benefit from using analog instruments in performance. Watching someone thrash a drum kit or play sax can be a good visual break from the DJ hunched over the controls, not to mention a sonic differentiator. The Main Stage also has LED display screens built in to several vertical surfaces, allowing most of the stage to luminesce.

The first of the headliners to close the stage was GRiZ, who took the opportunity to stretch out his trademark funk; the vocal samples were there as well as slinky Chic-esque guitar snippets and occasional blasts of horns. GRiZ is one of the few artists at WTF whose sound could translate almost identically to a really tight live band, but he did it all himself. Imagine the sound of excellent tracks like “Funk Party” and “Get Down” writ large, with a thousand people stomping along in the dust. His music plays better live than most, he pushed the crowd hard, and might have singlehandedly convinced hundreds of people to consider a move to his hometown of Detroit. His work has always had an earthy, party vibe and that was ideal for the festival setting. Great, great set.

Machinedrum Vapor City Live’s work is less bombastic and more subtle and inspires a more mellow, groovy response. Like the crafting of a good mixtape, WTF organizers were cautious to mix things up from set to set, and Machinedrum’s near-downtempo washes of synth and voice over not-quite-but-almost drum & bass percussion was a kind of hourlong exhalation for the crowd after Hustle and Drone and Little People. Not that the set wasn’t exciting – it was, magnetic even, and an ideal crowd prep lead-in for Big Gigantic’s saxophone driven dance funk.

In scientific terms, people went ape shit for Big Gigantic. The duo – Dominic Lalli and Jeremy Salken – are veterans of Bonnaroo, Coachella, Lollapalooza, and seemingly every other festival and it shows. Their set started sick and got progressively more insane as it went. Their set also marked the first sighting of one of a pair of massive, luminescent squid puppets, 5 meters high and requiring a minimum of 3 puppeteers. More than most, WTF inspires attendees to want to glow and present their tribes with costumes, signs, and pike-mounted objects that can be seen above the crowd. The massive squids were overkill of the best kind, dancing their way back and forth through the crowd, as Big Gigantic pounded their way through one of the best-received sets of the weekend. Big Gigantic’s set offered strong visuals on the LED screens as well – was that dancing Honda ASIMO robots as well as Apollo astronauts?

As for the other squid, he was undulating his way through the huge mob STWO handed off to TOKiMONSTA. Jennifer Lee’s work can be aurally challenging at times, demanding a careful ear, much like the rest of the Brainfeeder crew. But the set she played at WTF avoided her (at times) dissonant aspects and more experimental time signatures in favor of sleek beats and clever transitions. Fair enough – TOKiMONSTA’s style seems to change up from record to record anyway, and only the most churlish fan would expect her to step on the vibe by breaking out the more avant of her garde. More importantly, TOKi was beside herself, grinning, clearly enjoying the sight of a thousand or so people throbbing up and down to her music.

More than most events of its size, What The Festival places a premium on the variety of experiences offered to the guests. In addition to the stages of various sizes and the silent disco, the Illuminated Forest offers an interactive and beautiful break from the sun and sounds. Take a right at the outdoor hookah lounge and you’ll almost immediately be struck by the otherworldly beauty of the various art installations peppered through the woods.

One retro/futuristic device had hundreds of vintage slides being pulled along several belts which passed backlighting and magnifying glasses. Aside from being visually arresting as an object of curiosity, the feeling of sitting at its base and gazing into those lenses as the images passed by was like a steam-powered View-Master. Directly across the path is a wooden sculpture facing a screen and a Microsoft Kinect: like a giant multitrack theremin, it reads your gestures in conjunction with your selections and allows you to create music by waving your hands in different directions. Further down the path is a queen-bed-sized fiber-optic garden which encouraged tactile interaction.

Turn back toward the main lawn and you’re met with several fantasy forest guardians woven from branches and twigs, each with a luminous heart at its center, as well as a sculpted metal luminous pegasus whose every surface was open for personal messages to be written in the chalk provided. Other installations were less experimental, but just as welcome, such as the huge cushions inside a neon clamshell labeled “We Need New Friends”, the three-animal totem on which line art was projected, and a Mario Kart station. Artists were working on some installations all weekend long, often inviting input or help from attendees.

Cliché as it sounds, the best part of WTF is the people. Tribes representing themselves with costumes, wigs, and standards on 3-meter lengths of PVC; dancers and hoopchicks lighting up the night with luminous hula hoops, whips, and fur collars; yoga practitioners striking precarious poses at the edge of the Splash Stage pool; goths and punks and B-boys and heshers and vape geeks all gearing up and cruising the grounds to see who’s who and what’s what. (That guy with the dreds who flips a stick between two other sticks showed up too, but he goes to every festival – he hasn’t changed his poncho in years.) In most cities they avoid one another, but at WTF they all somehow mesh and become the friendliest crowd imaginable. Maybe the common denominator is loving Big Gigantic.

More photos can be found here.

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