The Glade Festival 2005

Scanning the line-up for this, The Glade's second coming, it was clear that most of it may as well have been in Mandarin, so few were the names recognised. Save Sasha, even those at the top of the heap, Squarepusher and DJ APX (Aphex Twin) stand restlessly outside the gates of popular culture, poking fun at it, twisting its conventions and messing with our heads. These musician's musicians, and DJ's DJs, as one might call them make up the majority of the line-up and therein lies the rub of what makes the Glade so unique and special. It may be that it's lifted from one corner of the biggest gathering in Europe, Glastonbury, but The Glade's tastes are distinctly leftfield, progressive and edgy. Picasso said that good taste is the enemy of creativity. It's subjective of course, but taste is an all-important factor in the fragmented minefield of 21st century electronic music, for my money, the Glade's picks hit the mark. Beat after pounding beat, pulse after speeding pulse, the eight different stages play out a mix of psy-trance, techno, house, drum 'n' bass, ambient and breakbeat that, combined with the weather, put everyone in an incredible party mood.

Maybe the various independent organisations and stages that come together under the banner of the Glade work to some arcane code that allows them to pick acts, décor and asides that meld seamlessly into one artistic statement. Who knows, it could as equally be blind luck. Either way, the designed spaces of the festival are, for the most part, beautiful and unified. Of all the genres you could isolate, the one that has the most influence here is psy-trance. The Origin stage, complete with resident dancers resplendent in day-glo paints and fairy wings, is the only truly outdoor arena.  As a result of the weather, its position in the middle of the site and its infectious tunes, Origin forms a focal point for the entire festival and like a happy black hole, pulls in everyone who isn't absolutely determined to be somewhere else.

Friday starts the festival strong, Dr Alex Paterson, System 7 and The Bays all get things moving, so I'm told, but thanks to London traffic, I'll never really know. The first real jumping around I see, comes from the mighty, mighty Dreadzone. Limbering up backstage, psyching and pacing, lead man Greg goes out to a cheer as big as the bass sound that accompanies him. More than anything else, Dreadzone are a groovers band, you listen, you dance, you lose yourself; they deliver, as usual in big dub-shaped spades.

Across the site, in the far corner, is the Glade's purpose built sanctuary - The ID Spiral Chill field. A waking dream of fabric stalactites, gossamer threads, sculpted mushrooms and amoeba tables, this is the place to go ahhhh, and sit down with that ubiquitous festival juice, Chai. As we enter the field, a man draws my gaze away from the geodesic dome up ahead. Cross-legged on the fringes of the light, sat by a stout looking pair of 4ft magic mushrooms, sits Dan. At first, I think that he's drawing and being nosy, I do that looking over the shoulder thing. He's not drawing at all, he's calculating, he's doing mathematics. I shouldn't be so surprised I realise, after chatting to him for a while about the importance of number theory. "Mathematics is all around you" he states proudly. He's right, the geodesic dome ahead, the fractals on the screen behind me and the music that is emanating from all seven corners of the field, all built from numbers and number theory. 'Yeah, I knew that', I mutter wandering up to sit at one of the tealight-lit tables to think about the nature of existence and how I really should get round to reading The Da Vinci Code, but then so many people have told me not to bother. I relax at last, watching a spinning golden Buddah pulsate in and out of what looks like a huge broad bean, perfect.

Saturday is a scorcher, I mean really, it's hot, dusty and to top it all the grapevine tells us that the water is off all over the site, giving the organisers one major hangover. We never substantiate the claim, but by the time we get to the main arena, it's clearly sorted because we walk right into a waterfight. First sonic barrage of the day comes from the ever-evolving pairing of Merv & Joie, better known in the cosmos, as Eat Static. As they played last year (and the policy seems strict here), they cannot play this. Instead, they play similar tunes and call themselves Dendron. I've not heard the Dendron record, but being a long-time Static fan, I'd say that live they are more breakbeaty, but still with the same bleeps, bloops and alien squeals. They are followed by one of the few women performing here, DJ, producer and singer Andrea Parker. Andrea's warm set, a surprise considering her murky past, is more than enough to hold the Dendron crowd where they stand. It seems an opportune moment to expand on the gender split here, consensus from the organisers is that the crowd is 60-40, men to women. Onstage, it's an altogether different story. It may be different in other countries, but for a scene as progressive and vibrant as ours, it seems disappointing that there are not more women involved at the creation level. I count three women performers out of a line-up of literally hundreds; I hope there are more hiding behind such names as Oddur, Quadra, Kana, Solaquest and Mahiane, but something tells me not.

The main stage on Saturday plays host to a succession of visionaries. Speedy J and Two Lone Swordsmen may figure among them, but for me, the back to back pairing of friends and labelmates, Squarepusher and Aphex Twin (Djing as DJ AFX) has something of the once-in-a-lifetime about it. Tom Jenkinson, the man behind the bank of instruments and bass guitar that is a live Squarepusher gig, gives an incredible performance. His integrated music, created in the midst of what is already a fairly fractured scene, seems perfect for the Glade tonight. It's hot, the dust hangs in the big top, the crowd are making a lot of noise, but they are no match for him, he screams at them to 'come on'. They respond, then he launches a solid hour-and-a-half of sonic bricks at them. Splinters of virtuoso bass, fragments of fast, seemingly uncontrolled beats, clicks and squelches and some unbelievably dark bass batter the mesmerised crowd. Of course, they utterly adore him for it. It's an incredible set; his pastiches are nothing less than deconstructionalist genius, his performance, hyper. He leaves the crowd with a favourite and though they are clearly battle weary, he leaves the stage to an uproar. I shake his hand 10 minutes later. "Man you must be one of the best bass players on the planet' I mumble lamely, 'that was incredible'. "It's not for me to judge', he says humbly, 'but thanks mate'.