Impakt Festival, Saturday March 31 2007 - Germany

Apr 1, 08:47 by Stefan Koopmanschap

Impakt festival is a dutch festival presentating a lot of multimedia art. Art installations, films, music, lots of IDM and combinations of those. This weekend was the 18th edition of this festival. Let’s have a look at the third evening of music.

After the disappointment of the first night, I had hopes that this night would perhaps be a bit better. The program for the evening was, for me, not telling. The first two acts, Jacob Kirkegaard and Tuk & Kurt D’haeseleer were not known to me. However, the headliner, Plaid, was definitely something I knew and was really looking forward to.

It turned out this evening was definitely making up for the first night. First up was Jacob Kirkegaard, who brought minimal ambient music with a touch of noise. Very beautiful, eerie, and at times a bit disturbing. Especially combined with the, also minimal, visuals in the background, which fitted the music perfectly; details that were slowly but gradually changing, eerie at times. Beautiful! A good opener.

After Kirkegaards performance the seats were removed from the room, indicating the rest of the evening would be more rhythmic. First up was Tuk & Kurt D’haeseleer. The first responsible for music, the second for visuals. Tuk brought an interesting combination of downtempo, cut’n’paste rock electronica, at times frantic, at times laidback. A very interesting way of bringing music. Visuals were again wonderful and fitting.

Last up (as far as the live performances go) was Plaid. This was the show that I was so much looking forward to, and as such I had high expectations. Plaid were able to even exceed these high expectations. An energetic show, and the enthusiasm of the audience definitely made the experience even better. Beautiful visuals by the Eyescream VJ team made the experience even more intense. What a great show!

This evening definitely brought back my trust in the Impakt organization to put up a good show. I am already looking forward to what next year might bring. The only thing the organization will need to learn is, if an artist doesn’t perform live, to mention this upfront.