Copped..

Jumpstyle

I'm really feelin' these Europeans going crazy over jumpstyle. Imagine some super-intense happy hardcore with a bunch of suckers in weird clothes doing some kind of highland fling/martial arts/cripwalk crossbreed. When theyre all doing it in sync it looks insane, we caught a huge group of kids going at it in Alexanderplatz, Berlin. I don't know if you can see in the second picture, but the guy in the matrix shades and cyberdog UFO pants with the neon green skull? He was their leader. The Lord of the Dance if you will. When he turned up they all went nuts and hugged him, and his girlfriend was hot. He never got up and danced though, shame.

These videos will give you a better idea of what it's all about.

Melt! Festival 2009

Earlier this year, when all the festival tickets started to burst the internet floodgates, I had to make an important decision. Did I want to opt for the matching lads-on-tour polo shirts, extortionate ticket prices, and comparatively weak line-up of Benicassim? Or did I want to get my snob on and find something a little less "bait" but inherently more enjoyable?

Naturally, I went with the more pretentious option and settled on Melt! festival, which, although supposedly just outside Berlin, is in fact about 2 hours away on the train. However, the journey is completely worth it because the arena is bonkers. Whoever thought of putting stages, tents and some food stalls in a disused industrial site is a genius. The snappily named "Ferropolis" - or "Iron City" - is an old German ironworks, and is covered in enormous cranes and rusty old machinery which are all illuminated at night. Epic.

Also, you really can't go wrong with an £80 ticket, especially when it includes Röyksopp, Aphex Twin, Rex the Dog, Skream & Benga, Simian Mobile Disco, Boy8Bit, Phoenix, Erol Alkan & Boys Noize, Diplo, MSTRKRFT, Patrick Wolf, Brodinski, Tiga, Passion Pit... I won't even go on, there were just so many impressive names.

Anyway, again, I lost a lot of photos on the ruined film, so here is some of what I managed to salvage from the other rolls.

German Japery

Made a return to Berlin for a couple of days either side of Melt festival the other week. Possibly my favourite city in mainland Europe, you just can't fault it. I took a bunch of pictures of graffiti and this awesome punk squat on the last day, then found out my film hadn't hooked on properly which was a major bummer y'all. However, I did manage to successfully snap a few others which didn't come out too bad.