Living in Finland, on the north-east edge of the EU, I have the chance to travel to my eastern neighbour Russia easily and I have been doing so since 2010 playing gigs there in various places. Acidcorefest.Moscowedition was held between 23rd and 24th of September and it was my second gig in Moscow. Acidcorefest has its roots in Russia’s culture capital St. Petersburg and the concept was now visiting in the country’s business capital.

Contrary to what the name suggests, these fests have very little to do with the acidcore subgenre itself. The fests are more like a celebration of the diverse underground hardcore techno styles and breakcore and speedcore representing both local talents as well as interesting international artists. The mainstream hardcore scene hasn’t been completely excluded from the equation either, but what became clear to me from the very beginning was that this party was not going to limit itself in terms of speed and intensity.

The party venue was Aglomerat Club, a building that used to be a cinema in the Soviet times and had been recently refurbished into a techno club. The interior was like an abandoned warehouse, so the event definitely had the feel of a proper underground rave. I initially thought that the event would be split between 2 nights, but it was actually a 15 hour party from 9PM till 1PM! 46 artists and dj’s were on the lineup for 2 dancefloors: Acid Blood, which was the main stage, and Acid Jam, the “chillout”.

Since my first visits in the country I have noticed that Russians like their core music fast and this night was no exception as people went totally mad from the chaotic distorted breaks and bassdrums starting to run around the dancefloor. Mashup style hardcore and breakcore seemed to be especially popular, but many dj’s also played more darker tones of crossbreed, dnb as well as more minimal, but very effective oldschool sounding hardcore. So I said that the Acid Jam dancefloor was the chillout, and it kind of was when jungle and hardtek dj’s were playing, but many times I would enter there and intense as fuck breakcore and hardcore comparable to the main stage was blasted there as well.

Definite crowd favorites of the evening were the hardcore/breakcore artists Klitorix from Spain and M1dlet from Lithuania, whom I especially remember of his speedcore releases in the past. Local favorites were especially the Action Agenda duo and the metal, core and dnb fusing Sa†an, who has received wider international fame in recent years for his music and shows. A more bizarre local speciality and exception of the night was XS Project, a duo producing pumping house and hard bass – styles popular among squatting Slavs in tracksuits. For me personally, the most interesting set of the night was by Quinta Essentia who delivered straightforward, relentless and at times quite hypnotic hardcore beats. After her Extremest, a touring artist from Scotland, played some mashupcore madness of varying tempos. There were still survivors left when it was my turn to play my shamancore music as Teknoaidi before 8 in the morning. The shamancore shaking rituals went down very well and the crowd demanded me to play some extra.

It was a pleasure meeting many old and new people, fellow international artists from Europe and I was also surprised to meet Jüps from as far away as Seattle who was travelling and visiting parties in Europe and Russia. It was unfortunate that the party could have had more visitors.. Gotta give the organizers lots of respect for taking the risk to put this party together! In a time where the powers that be are creating apparent divisions between people, music is a great way to step out of the geopolitical games and bond us together.