This past ‘Trancegiving,’ we celebrated with Insomniac Events, as they took us through the ultimate feels trip with their second annual Dreamstate festival in Southern California. Their dedicated trance-only festival is the largest in North America, and brought together thousands of fans on Friday, November 26th, and Saturday, November 26th. Over 60 top artists from around the globe brought their best melodic and heart-pounding sets, performed across four different stages. Every sound of the genre was on display: Psytrance, uplifting, tech trance, and more. Dreamstate surely delivered something for everyone.
Upon entering the festival, we were immediately met with positivity, happy faces, and all around good vibes. Initially not knowing what to expect, we took a deep breath and headed directly to the main stage. Wowed by the incredible production that was the Dream Stage, we can certainly say that Insomniac pulled out all the stops for this show, and their amazing visuals carried throughout the venue. Simply put, the setup at the NOS Events Center was nothing short of perfect. Those first saddened by artist time conflicts were made happy once more knowing that it was not but a brisk walk to each stage. Plus, continual updates made on the Dreamstate app helped us keep close tabs on any changes. Needless to say, we had some serious ‘trancing’ to do!
It didn’t take us long to get into groove of attending an all trance festival. With so much variety among each of the artists, there wasn’t a single set that didn’t stand out as wholly unique. We can also safely say that there wasn’t a single set that was bad. In fact, every set that we saw was nothing short of perfection. “Is that even possible,” you might ask? Oh yes, everything is possible at Dreamstate. What was even more amazing is that upwards of 40+ fellow Seattle Trance Family members attended this year’s edition of the festival, in addition to hundreds of Trance Family members from all over the country, including Los Angeles, San Francisco, Phoenix, Portland, Sacramento, Colorado, Boston, and Oklahoma. Way to represent!
Seattle Trance Family Representing at Dreamstate 2016
Trance Families Unite at Dreamstate 2016 | Courtesy of Insomniac
While Day 1 surprised us with amazing sets from The Thrillseekers, PureNRG, Mark Sherry, Infected Mushroom, RAM, Jorn Van Deyhoven and more, Day 2 somehow managed to top even that lineup. Waking up on the second day, we first thought perhaps we had been transported back to the Northwest overnight…rain, wind, and clouds! No spotty weather was going to stop us trance lovers from anything though, as we zipped up our winter jackets and threw on our rain-slicks with pride. To avoid getting poured on, we hopped on over to the indoor Vision stage once we arrived, to groove to the heart-pounding sounds of Kristina Sky. Hands in the air, we danced for an hour straight, clear into Sneijder’s set where we were met with filthy beats and fast paced tracks like Veracocha – Carte Blanche, that had us burning off that day’s lunch in no time.
The small but mighty Timeless stage at Dreamstate called our names early in the evening for Richard Durnand’s In Search of Sunrise two hour set. There wasn’t a single person there that wasn’t clearly in trance-heaven. Richard certainly pulled out all the stops playing classics, like Imogen Heap’s Hide And Seek along with his own production of Running On Empty. Time and time again, we were simply in awe of each artist’s sets.
The night went on with uplifting sets from John O’ Callaghan, Paul Oakenfold’s Full on Fluoro, Paul Van Dyk and Ferry Corsten’s Gouryella, which closed out the festival with a bang. We asked some of our fellow trance family members what their most memorable or favorite sets were of the weekend. Top artists included The Thrillseekers, Gouryella, Richard Durand, John O’ Callaghan, Captain Hook, ATB, Mark Sherry, Neelix, and Neptune Project. Quite the list of amazing artists indeed. Needless to say, we went on the feels-trip of a lifetime that made us forever fans of this unbelievable two day massive.
For a taste of the weekend’s fun, we threw together some of the best sets of the weekend below, courtesy of the handful of artists who uploaded them to their respective SoundClouds. Enjoy!
https://soundcloud.com/richard-durand/isos-classics-dreamstate-part-2?in=christopher-lilly/sets/dreamstate-socal-2016
https://soundcloud.com/sevan-khoy-harootonian/neelix-dreamstate-socal-2016?in=christopher-lilly/sets/dreamstate-socal-2016
https://soundcloud.com/marksherry/mark-sherry-live-dreamstate-2016?in=christopher-lilly/sets/dreamstate-socal-2016
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