This past weekend was the inaugural Veld Music Festival held in Toronto, which turned out to another welcomed addition to the North American electronic music circuit.

Public transportation: Getting to the Baysview Front Park venue was straightforward, catching the subway to Baysview (last stop heading north) and then taking the festival provided buses to the venue which was a quick 5 minute ride away. There were plenty of buses on cue at the end of each day to ensure a smooth exit. We didn't encounter any problems leaving the venue 15 minutes earlier each day to ensure a quick exit.

Venue: The set-up was true to the origins of word ‘veld’ which signifies wide, open grasslands. Aside from the Bacardi tent, the entire venue was out in the open with parched grass all around. The two stage lay-out (main stage in the open air and a Bacardi tent) was refreshingly simple compared to the massive festivals. Movement to and from the stages was no more than a 5 minute walk and enabled attendees to view the entire line-up if timed correctly (one stage typically started a performance at top of every hour and another at the middle of every hour).

Attendees: All in all, it was a great crowd who were carefree and brought their positive vibes. The crowd braved a scorching Saturday and were rewarded with relatively better weather on Sunday. There were a surprising amount of individuals wearing sandals and boat shoes, which isn't the most comfortable festival attire. Other than that, clothing ended up being minimal for both sexes as the heat overcame any desire to keep pre-planned outfits on. Our LED showlaces were quite the hit with attendees, however, and were pretty useful when the group was walking across the venue at night.

Artists: The simplicity of Veld (2 stages) and set times (diff. set times as mentioned above) made it possible to view nearly half of the line-up over the course of the two days. Overall, we were impressed by the wide selection of artists and performances. Performing in his native country, deadmau5 gave a visually appealing performance. The legion of dedicated fans came out in droves and were waiting at the top of the mini-hill while Angello wrapped up his show. As a testament to the heat and humidity, both deadmau5 and Cazzette opted to not wear their respective heads during the acts. Stand-out sets included performances by Bassnectar, Krewella, Mord Fustang, Nicky Romero, and Avicii. The latter ended the festival with a surprisingly awesome set - we were initially part of the attendees who were upset there was no other artist going against Avicii’s timeslot. After getting through the typical ‘Avicii’ tracks in the first half hour (and testing the patience of certain attendees), Avicii switched gears and gave an hour of hard, rage-worthy tracks, a handful of which we’re eagerly awaiting the tracklist to identify.

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