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home » festivals » Freeze Festival » Freeze Festival 2010
Mark Ronson and The Business International perform an inspired set to the music & winter sports fansFreeze Festival 2010 reviewWednesday 3rd November 2010 The second day of the winter sports festival kicked off to a slow but steady start as Battersea saw punters trickling in to the man-made site next to Battersea Power Station.
Having grown up in South London and being accustomed to the derelict power station back dropping the sky as you pass on the train, I really appreciated the way that they had transformed the area into a festival site. The snow covered Big Air Jump, which was the focal point of the event, was in the midst of the day's heats with talented skiers taking to the slopes and launching themselves down the slope and over the ramp with great skill. To winter sport veterans, this may have been a mundane sight, but for those of us who are not as experienced it was a really interesting and thrilling experience to view. The rest of the site housed a huge retail village, which sold everything the winter extreme sports fanatic could ever desire, from woolly hats all the way to snowboards and skis. To fit in with the theme, there was also a Jagermeister ice bar, amongst the several other bars onsite, as well as plenty of places to purchase food from, and several other small stalls and DJ areas, as well as the O'Neill experience cinema area, showing documentaries and short films associated with alpine sports. I caught as much as I could of Reggae crooner, Natty, in the packed Relentless Energy tent. I could not actually make it inside as it was quite small and the event staff was not allowing people entry when there appeared to still be quite a lot of space inside. From what I could gauge from the exterior, Natty gave a passionate performance smoothly serenading the tent with his chilled out lyrics that had the whole crowd bopping along excitedly. Adorned in an extremely colourful top and with a wide grin throughout, he spoke very little during his set as his backing band filled the space with jamming reggae beats, and Natty provided the soulful vocals whilst waving his arms in the air and bouncing onstage.
She has a great voice which switches from melodic to husky in a few notes; her music is definitely rock-based with her strong voice keeping the tunes cool and funky. She is very quirky with the whole vintage fashion thing, and as she sang she had a painter painting along to her lyrics behind her. The tent filled up as she played on, and I'd definitely like to see more of her in the future. Next up I tried to get in to the Relentless tent to see DJ Yoda. Unfortunately the same problem as before arose and we could not gain entry, so we could only vaguely hear the legendary DJ's mix of eclectic hip hop beats, and see arms flailing about in the packed tent. It gave us a chance to check out the final ski practices of the day and watch the skiers performing tricks mid air on the steep slope.
By this time the festival had really filled up and there was such a vibrant vibe with most people wearing full ski outfits as well as donning day-glo paint and comical beanies with horns. A few punters had got into the Halloween spirit and wore costumes or had their face splattered with face paint. Mark Ronson & The Business Intl took to the main stage as the final act; Ronson and his peers had also got into the Halloween spirit with eerily white faces and zombie-style make-up. Ronson's new whitish blonde locks stood straight up into the air, prompting him to comment at one point "I look like a dead Jedward!" The Business played out a lot of their tunes, such as 'Bang Bang' and the eclectic 'The Bike Song' during their set, as well as one of Ronson's original, hip hop classics 'Ooh Wee', much to the crowds delight. Ronson was on top form and I don't know what was in his hair dye but he was bouncing about the stage and waving his arms in the air with immense passion. The Business also treated us to some tunes from previous albums with Alex Greenwald providing the lead vocals for most of them, such as 'Valerie'. Greenwald has worked with Ronson for the last 4 years in different guises on his albums, and the onstage chemistry was electric. Ronson declared "This is my hometown so let's do something special. I started DJing in small clubs –let's turn this tent into a fucking club!" He then played a set of mixed hip hop and club tracks that raised the roof in the tent.  review by Fiona Madden photos by Richie Soans 
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