Defqon.1 Festival

Defqon.1 Weekend Festival

The official logo of Defqon.1 Weekend Festival
Genre Electronic music, hard dance, hardstyle, hardcore techno, hard house and hard trance
Dates the Netherlands (since 14 June 2003)
Australia (since 19 September 2009)
Chile (since 12 December 2015)
Location(s) the Netherlands (since 14 June 2003)
Australia (since 19 September 2009)
Chile (since 12 December 2015)
Years active 2003-present(NL)
2009-present(AU)
2015-present(CL)
Founded by Q-dance
Attendance 55,000+
Capacity outdoors
Website
Defqon.1 Weekend Festival
Defqon.1 Festival Australia
Defqon.1 Festival Chile

Defqon.1 Weekend Festival is an annual music festival held in the Netherlands, Australia, and Chile. It was founded in 2003 by festival organizer Q-dance. The festival plays mostly hardstyle and related genres such as hardcore techno, hard house and hard trance.

The primary stage at Defqon.1, the RED Stage, is the largest stage. (photo from 2014)

Events

Many prominent hardstyle artists perform there annually. Acts perform across up to seven stages in Australia and 14 stages in the Netherlands. In 2015, Q-dance debuted a new stage to Defqon.1 Festival Australia, the Green stage. Unlike its parent festival in Netherlands, this was the first time that a Psychedelic trance stage was introduced to the Festival. It features well established psychedelic trance artists such as Ranji, Coming Soon!!! and Skazi. Defqon.1 Festival not only invites well-established artists to come and perform, it also invites various up and coming artists to perform on a smaller scale stage namely the Up & Coming stage in the Netherlands and the Talent stage in Australia. Q-dance acknowledges the effort and talents of many young artists and grants them an opportunity to showcase their talent for the world to see but more importantly, hear.

The festival was previously held in mid-June on Almeerderstrand in Almere. Since 2011 it is hosted on the event site next to Walibi Holland in Biddinghuizen. Since 2009 the event has also been hosted in Sydney in mid-September, at the Sydney International Regatta Centre. Until 2011 (2014 for the Australian edition) the festival ran for 12 hours, from 11:00 am to 11:00 pm, and ended with a firework display. Since 2012 the festival is extended to three days. Since 2015, the Australian edition was extended to two days. Each edition also has an anthem, an official song that is played in conjunction with the festival. The festival also streams its videos live on Beatport for people all around the world to tune into.

On the Dutch event the audience has grown to 55,000 with tickets sometimes selling out in less than an hour. In 2013, the Sydney event attracted 18,000 attendees.[1] The same event saw the death of a male, around 20 drug overdoses[1] and more than 80 arrested on drugs charges.[2]

In 2015, MC Villain was in charge of announcing the arrival of Defqon.1 to South American soil, more specifically to Chile.[3] At the 2015 Sydney event, one man was found unconscious in his tent and later died in hospital. [4] Another 9 people were taken to hospital and 46 drug-related arrests were made.[5]

Festival history

Year Location Anthem & Theme Number of visitors* Number of performers Date
2003 Almere 30 Minutes (DHHD) 48 14 June
2004 Almere Demolition (Tuneboy) 79 19 June
2005 Almere Emergency Call (The Prophet) 85 18 June
2006 Almere The Colour of the Harder Styles (Showtek) 103 17 June
2007 Almere Get Wasted (Brennan Heart) 124 16 June
2008 Almere Biological Insanity (Luna & Deepack) 119 14 June
2009 Almere Scrap Attack (Headhunterz) 104 13 June
International Regatta Centre, Sydney Maximum Force (Zany) 52 19 September
2010 Almere No Time To Waste (Wildstylez) 115 12 June
International Regatta Centre, Sydney Save Your Scrap for Victory (Headhunterz) 72 18 September
2011 Walibi Park, Biddinghuizen Unite (Noisecontrollers) 127 25 June
International Regatta Centre, Sydney Psychedelic Wasteland (Toneshifterz) 72 17 September
2012 Evenemententerrein, Biddinghuizen World of Madness (Headhunterz, Wildstylez & Noisecontrollers) 55,000[6] 21–23 June
International Regatta Centre, Sydney True Rebel Freedom (Wildstylez) 15 September
2013 Evenemententerrein, Biddinghuizen Weekend Warriors (Frontliner) 55,000[7] 312 21–23 June
International Regatta Centre, Sydney Scrap The System (Brennan Heart) 18,000[1] 14 September
2014 Evenemententerrein, Biddinghuizen Survival of the Fittest (Coone) 55,000[8] 207 27–29 June
International Regatta Centre, Sydney Unleash the Beast (Code Black) 20 September
2015 Evenemententerrein, Biddinghuizen No Guts, No Glory (Ran-D) 80,000 250+ 19–21 June
International Regatta Centre, Sydney No Guts, No Glory (Frontliner, Dillytek & 360) 26,000 97 18–19 September
Santiago, Chile Unleash The Beast (Wildstylez) 20,000 33 12 December

*In the whole event

See also

References

  1. 1 2 3 Emma Partridge (15 September 2013). "Man dies at Defqon.1 music festival". The Sydney Morning Herald (Fairfax Media). Retrieved 15 September 2013.
  2. ↑ Amy Dale, Nathan Klein, Alicia Wood and Simon Black (16 September 2013). "Dance party drug death victim James Munro pictured before the fatal Defqon. 1 festival". The Daily Telegraph (News Corp). Retrieved 4 May 2015.
  3. ↑ "Defqon.1 Festival Chile, Santiago". Q-dance. 20 June 2015. Retrieved 23 June 2015.
  4. ↑ Lucy Cormack (20 September 2015). "Man dies at Defqon.1 music festival". The Sydeny Morning Herald (Fairfax Media). Retrieved 21 September 2015.
  5. ↑ Taylor Auerbach (21 September 2015). "Defqon. 1: Nigel Pauljevic, 26, dies at popular Sydney music festival". The Daily Telegraph (News Limited). Retrieved 21 September 2015.
  6. ↑ "Dronten akkoord met festival Defqon (Dutch)". http://www.dronten.nl/. Retrieved 7 July 2014. External link in |website= (help)
  7. ↑ "Defqon.1 met regen van start (Dutch)". http://www.omroepflevoland.nl/. Retrieved 7 July 2014. External link in |website= (help)
  8. ↑ "Defqon.1 Holland — Tickets sold out". http://www.q-dance.com/. Retrieved 7 July 2014. External link in |website= (help)

External links

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Coordinates: 52°26′23″N 5°46′06″E / 52.43972°N 5.76833°E / 52.43972; 5.76833

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