17.06.2014 - 09:44
Barcelona (ACN). – Sonar, Barcelona´s three-day electronic and advanced music festival, came to end on Saturday night with the attendance of 109,000 people, the second best in the festival’s 21 year history. However, it is a 10% less than 2013 record figures. 53% of those attending the 2014 edition were foreigners. Sónar by Night, which is the festival’s evening programme, has claimed the ability to make the masses dance. On Saturday, it reached its peak with a program marked by disco anthems from Nile Rodgers of Chic to performances by Rudimental and DJ Snake. Massive Attack were among the best performers of the night, in their second concert after the opening day. Multiple simultaneous stages with performances from some of the biggest names in electronic music gave national and international festival-goers a lot to choose from. Sónar was founded in Barcelona in 1994 as the “Festival of Advanced Music and Multimedia Art”, by music journalist Ricard Robles and the artists Enric Palau and Sergio Caballero. Since then, Sonar has reached various cities all over the world, and featured concerts by Björk, the Beastie Boys, the Pet Shop Boys and The Chemical Brothers, among many others. Year after year it has been consolidated as Europe’s main festival for electronic music lovers, and occupying a top position at world level. The 20th anniversary of Sónar in 2013 has so far been the most popular edition of the festival, with over 120,000 people in attendance. Last year, the festival’s day programme moved from the city centre to Fira de Barcelona’s Montjuïc venues, while it had already moved the evening shows to Fira de Barcelona’s Gran Via venues, in L’Hospitalet, three years ago. This planning was repeated for the 2014 edition.
After performing at the opening session, the British band Massive Attack have been widely regarded as one of the most memorable acts of the festival, with their exploration of visual political propaganda and the influence of technology. The bigger stage at Sonar by Night also hosted spectacular concerts by Rudimental and I Am Legion, two of the most powerful British bands that can be currently seen on stage. First, however, the American DJ Mathew Dear made an appearance, later followed by Parisian DJ Snake, who has collaborated in Lady Gaga’s latest album, ‘Artpop’.
The current legacy of Nile Rodgers
Madonna’s ‘Like a Virgin,’ the famous ‘Let’s Dance’ by David Bowie, Duran Duran’s 1986 hit ´Notorious’ and more recently, ‘Get Lucky’ by Daft Punk all have one thing in common: they are united behind the magic of Nile Rodgers and the guitar he calls his ‘hitmaker.’ His creative success in the production of these works and many others has become a benchmark in the landscape of dance and pop music.
Rodgers also stood as one of the headliners of the 2006 edition of Barcelona Sónar, along with Goldfrapp, Ryuichi Sakamoto and Tiga, among others. He did not perform all of his earliest work, but it was a memorable performance with many Chic hits played. With ‘Good Times’, the inspirational ‘Rappers Delight’ by Sugarhill Band and ‘Another One Bites the Dust’ by Queen, ‘Everybody Dance’ and ‘Le Freak’, many of the attendees were using muscles they hadn’t used in years.
This repertoire was fitting to open the concert, with the excellent band and two vocalists that have propelled Nile Rodgers in almost every corner of the world, using the effervescence present in their most successful albums of the last ten years. The number that opened the concert was premonitory: ‘Everybody Dance’.
