masterful Calvin Harris draw Creamfields' weekend to a thunderous close

With licensing laws meaning the stages having to finish earlier on a Sunday night, the main stages open at midday.

 

Dimitri Vangelis & Wyman have the unenviable task of opening the Horizon stage, they played a stunning set full of Brazilian influenced samba beats and a heady mix of funky house, a lush way to relax back in the early afternoon sun. As usual I picked an artist I had never heard of before to spend a bit of time listening to, this year I plucked out Camelphat.

 

Playing in the Towers arena between 3 and 5 I took in over an hour of the deep tech house set, a hugely entertaining afternoon full of funky moves being thrown out, I'll definitely be catching them again, after going to the epic Cream Classics event run in Liverpool cathedral curated by K-Klass. I made the short walk to catch their set in the very intimate Studio Cocktail Bar, and as always they proved just why they have been a staple in the Cream diet for so many years. I never managed to make it inside the stage for this set but luckily the weather was kind so I joined in the dancing masses cutting shapes outside for an hour. 

 

Duke Dumont was taking to the stage on the Arc and I'm glad I watched that performance. I think with Avicii stepping down he will be one of the acts fancying his chances of stepping into the spot, with a few more hits under his belt I think he could be more than capable of managing it. I put his set in the top 3 of the weekend personally, with the mix of a hit laden set and awesome visuals utilising every inch of the mega screens, Dumont has hit a point in his career where he could really propel onto the next level!

 

With the mad witching hour of the Sunday church service approaching I went for a good walk around the rich array of food stalls, every year the outside stages have to power down for an hour as the church in Daresbury hold their Sunday service, and the food stalls notoriously get stupidly busy during this time, so I raced to beat the masses.

 

After settling on some king prawn stir fry and yet again recharging the drinks We went to watch a previous headliner take to the stage playing a sub headline spot, Hardwell is often voted top of many a poll for the worlds top DJ and it is easy to see why from this set, there aren't many that do it as well as the 28 year old Dutchman. With quite a unique sound, in a genre in which it's easy to fade into masses, it's always easy to pick out an Hardwell track, which I think is the biggest compliment I can pay to him. Within the blink of an eye the weekend was drawing to a close, it was time to pick a headliner, having seen Tiesto recently and as impressive a show as he always delivers I picked Calvin Harris, I had not seen a show of his for a few years, and I must admit the biggest deciding factor was that he was playing on the Arc Stage. 

 

This choice was more than vindicated, with a set shoehorned full of hit after hit, and a light show that could draw attention from outer space, Harris put on the kind of show that proves he is the master of his art at the moment. He drew one of the biggest crowds of the weekend, and held them captive at the ransom of his catchy mastery of creating diamond standard pop songs! Finishing with a barrage of his hits featuring vocals by pop royalty such as Florence, Rihanna and Ellie Goulding, Harris drew the weekend to a thunderous close. 

With next year being Creamfields 20th birthday I was surprised that there were so many huge changes this year, and I'm sure they must have some pretty massive tricks up their sleeves for the anniversary ,I for one can't wait to see how they top this year.