A resounding success, one can only presume that the hundreds of people there and the organisers themselves had all their expectations surpassed. The venue, Sheffield's 'Corporation' is a perfect scale to get a balance between stage-viewing, bar-lurking, market-trawling, dancefloor shape-throwing and smoking-terrace mingling. The mood was party-like, which I would put down to 2 things: the scale of venue and a particularly fan-friendly line-up of musicians who seemed to comfortably party-up with the punters instead of isolating themselves backstage. And the line-up was nothing short of inspired....it could only have been put together by a crew who know their music and have their finger on the pulse of what bands are actually popular in the industrial/ebm/electronic 'scene'...much as I hate the word! Covenant, And One, Suicide Commando, Faderhead, XP8, dished up their dancefloor anthems and music to lift the roof. SAM, Caustic, C/A/T, Modulate, Gothsicles, Eisenfunk, [X]-RX, Deviant UK, Uberbyte all proved themselves to be at the cutting edge of what SAM aptly describe as synthetic adrenaline music. Inter-band collaborations were frequent and added completely to the party mood.


Musical highlights from the weekend (in no particular order): The Gothsicle's colossal festival intro, joined onstage by Nachtmahr's Thomas Rainer and Uberbyte's Richard Pyne to perform “The First Band Ever to Play Resistanz Festival (We're No.1)”...written specially for the show and an inspired and glorious spin on getting the opening slot on day one; XP8's resurrection and face-punching rendition of 'Twisted' with guest vocal's from Stuart Whoo; Faderhead's shout-outs to the Irish crew in the house....obviously still reveling in the afterglow of their recent Dublin show; Deviant UK and (are you sitting down?) Uberbyte's collaboration on the Scooter classic, “One(always hardcore)”....astoundingly good; Caustic's Matt Fanale hilarious berrating of all members of Modulate as they launched into the stomper that is 'Skullf*ck'; Caustic's cover of Cubanate's Oxyacetalene which took no prisoners; SAM's set-closer 'Bull F*cking Shit'....a bit of a musical 'Blue Steel' to throw at the bands to follow; Covenant's 'Call the Ships to Port' closer went down a storm too....


The list goes on....as did the after-show djing and general madness. If the venue hadn't closed up at a reasonable hour each night, the crowd would have stayed partying until stupid-o'clock and with good cause. Whilst there were the usual and unavoidable sporadic technical difficulties with sound and lighting, it's hard to find fault with Resistanz Festival's inaugural run.....they've given themselves very high standards for next year. I'm very sure the Irish will be back for more. You can count me in anyway. Cheers Leighton and the Resistanz crew for a most enjoyable endurance weekend!