Veerle's blog

Boy did the time fly this weekend (especially if you’re sleeping most of the time). The need for some shut-eye was due to Tiësto in Concert last Saturday at the Ethias Arena in Hasselt.  I’ve been looking forward to this concert for quite some time and expectations were high due to last year’s concert in Arnhem. That gig and its vibe was pretty hard to beat. After driving for 1,5 hour we arrived at the Ethias Arena around 10pm.

The first surprise for me was that security was not that tight as in Arnhem last year. Last year they made it very clear that cameras weren’t allowed and there was no way you could smuggle it in since they performed a serious body search. It was tight as airport security. The pictures used here are from the show in Arnhem since there are no photos online yet from Hasselt on the site of ID&T. No big deal since those shows are almost the same.

As soon as I was in I noticed that the Ethias arena is (looked) smaller then the Gelredome. The setup looked regular but those sound and light guys know how to hide all the good stuff. When walking in you have no clue that you’re about to enjoy one of the biggest light shows in Belgium. Around 11.15pm, the countdown started: 10,9,8,7,6,5,4,3,2,1 and there he was: Tiësto!! His warming up set was decorated with 3D-visuals made by Frank Verstraete, that’s the guy behind the famous club Zillion. You had to put on one of those glasses to fully enjoy it. The first 45 min Tiësto was only visible on that big screen. At midnight the music stopped and MC Stretch started to announce DJ Tiësto, when he finally appeared on stage coming out of the floor together with his equipment. Awesome fireworks and very well programmed light effects completed the opening ceremony.

After playing for about an hour it was time for the first live act. On my right there was a sphere that lit up and opened like a flower and a mysterious man appeared. This man was giving orders to his companions to prepare things for a magic trick. It was a bit of a surprise that Tiësto himself was part of the act. Those people locked Tiësto up in a box with handcuffs. The box was lifted approximately 10 metres high and he had to escape in 1 min. Then one of the cables broke and eventually it was just like Tiësto was falling out of the box, but hey, it was magic after-all and suddenly Tiësto was back at his DJ booth. Nice trick and very convincing. From that moment the first chapter of the magical trip started, starting with “Modern Magic”. The show consisted out of 3 chapters. Chapter two was “Eastern Magic” and chapter three “Magic Circus”. More and bigger shoots of the event Part I, Part II, Part III.

One of the next live acts involved a man behind a piano, it was singer/songwriter Matt Hales, from Aqualung. His first track, “Easier to lie” was kind of a break to get some rest. He also did a track called “You Are” which was pretty nice. It was in that set that Tiësto rocked the house once he played “Love Comes Again” an absolute highlight since everybody was singing along. You can get goose bumps if twenty thousand people get the vibe.

Another big surprise was the Children of Orpheus Choir from Bulgaria that was lined up behind the DJ booth. Something you don’t expect at a dance event. It turned out great once they’ve accompanied “Suburban Train” with their lovely voices. Very impressive indeed. Other impressive live acts where a violin player (Mason) that played on “Lethal Industry”, at that moment the crowed went mad. Like the S man would say “it was off the hook”. Two boys that could have been Safri Duo accompanied the song “Plastikman - Spastik” on the drums. In the “Eastern Magic” chapter there was a performance by a lady with snakes and a fire-spitter and belly dancers. In the Magic circus act there where stilt walkers and acrobats hanging in trapezes and long ribbons.

Records that heated things up were from “Push - The Anthem” a Belgian production after all, Tiësto’s new single “Just Be” and of course “Traffic” and the single “Rain down on me” together with Dinant form Kane. The thing that I enjoy the most at these ID&T events is the attention to detail in the light and laser show (14-15 lasers!!!). Those things have such a great part in creating the right atmosphere. One example was a huge dummy of a face (about 5 by 3 meters I guess) that came down from the roof where they’ve projected a “magical” face on, you saw the eyes and mouth moving, all synchronized with what was coming out of the speakers. This visual trick ended with a morph to Tiësto’s (real) face where you could see his eyes moving and his mouth smiling at the crowd, very cool usage of technology. All in all a great night out and the event proved it, Tiësto is still the world’s best DJ. One thing that I noticed is that I still enjoy a great trance track but that my taste has been shifting towards deep house largely due to the work of the S man Roger Sanchez my personal favorite. This man knows how to move a crowd. His sets are a work of art.