Toronto has been the place to be for outdoor music festivals for the last few months. Everything from boat cruises to Electric Island to Digital Dreams to Veld, has given Toronto music lovers plenty of opportunity to go out and enjoy the very short summer while surrounded by music.
The highlight I had been waiting for was the Corona SunSets festival on August 16th, because it was definitely hyped up all over social media and music heavy-weight Moby would be headlining! Unfortunately, the day came with ominous cloud cover and the eerie promise of rain and so a change to my “dance until the sun sets” outfit had to be made.
That being said, the thunderstorms never truly materialized and when we arrived to Hanlan’s Point, there were still brave music lovers clothed in sweaters and jackets. I had a vision in my head of girls in bathing suit tops and shorts dancing to EDM near the stage, but alas. Here’s hoping that Corona will pick Toronto again (out of just 5 cities!) to visit so that the beach party could actually be just that.
But onto the music! At around 3 p.m. the crowds were minimal; the music quality was good but there was very little dancing in the crowd as people stayed near the occasional heat generator. Jeff Button played a great and energy-filled full of progressive deep house even though it must have been a tough time trying to pull energy out of the freezing audience.
However, as the evening came on at around 6 p.m., the energy picked right up. It seems as through everyone who was waiting at home to see if it would rain or not had decided that the rain would probably stay away so jumped onto the ferry to make the most of the festival. The great thing was that due to the acts being split onto two stages: the Griffin Stage and the Crown Stage, there was plenty of room to dance and really feel the music.
No Regular Play and Thievery Corporation were highlights of the Griffin Stage, totally making you forget that you were even cold outside. Thievery Corporation actually brought along a full live band while Lee Foss brought Anabel England for some live vocals during his house set.
Unfortunately, myself and many other festival goers found that Moby’s DJ set just “didn’t feel like it belonged”. It could be due to the stark comparison between his set and the acts that followed him, but it sounded (dare I say it) mainstream and a little outdated. It was a huge difference between Moby’s closing sound and Lee Foss’s disco vocal house and I think Foss won this one out.
In closing, I will say that this event was skillfully organized and had a lot of great talent and staging behind it – it just really needed a more sun-filled day to be worth of being called SunSets. Not sure if there was even any sun to set at the end of the day. At least there were fireworks! Here’s hoping that the organizers make another go at this festival, and that the weather and the sunshine fully cooperates this time.
LINKS:
Corona SunSets
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Rachel Walton – EDM TOR
