As I counted the days prior to the festival, I slowly became more and more anxious, mostly out of excitement. One of the most anticipated outdoor events took place this past week-end, and we hit it with full force, for there can only be one Origin, and what an Origin it was.
The masses - By Chabunk
First and foremost, let me be honest about something. I , personally, am not a fan of the bigger trance parties. I often find that they attract an odd crowd, can be too packed and usually raise quite high expectations that are not always met, due to the prior hype. It is for those reasons that I was bit skeptic about Origin at first, yet I can assure you one thing:
I was proven otherwise.
Due to other arrangements, we could only make our way to Origin early Sunday morning. The drive alone got us overly excited for the party, with Rubix Cube blowing the speakers and the yellow ball slowly rising above the mountains. A far drive, but nevertheless we’ve finally arrived at the gate, had our laughs with the security, and proceeded to park in the middle of nowhere.
Seriously – Middle.of.nowhere.
I would say this was one of the few, if not the only flaws the festival had. The parking situation sent our car to be in such a great of a distance from the actual festival that we didn’t see nor hear any of the action, and has led us to a good 20 minute walk before we stumbled upon intoxicated creatures. Yet, for a party with such a high attendance, this was somewhat acceptable to us, and by no means downed our spirits (although, literally speaking, we did down our spirits).
The Parking and scenery - By Rachel Doyle
Walking through the camping area was a somewhat surreal experience ; in these dry lands we’ve been driving through, Origin positioned itself in what felt like a rainforest of sorts. Tall, wet trees producing copious amount of shade, with some insane sun rays breaching through for the ultimate glow effect. Tranquil rivers flowing all around countered by the overwhelming stench that the MDMA kids shat out in the cubicles.
By Rachel Doyle
Yet, with so much of the festival already missed, I didn’t come here to play zen master, nor deal with kids on drugs.
With haste, we made our way to the dancefloor, a magnificent set-up, loud music and thousands of people joined as one in their journey to the true Origin. For the love of trance, this was one hell of an entrance.
Although my expectation of the extreme number of people was in-fact valid, we easily found our spot on the front-right of the dancefloor, and were immersed in a little reunion of sorts. Friends from all over the country have travelled down to the Cape to experience all that Origin 2011, and we were once again rejoiced with the music.
Yet I was confused by the music, for rumour has it, the line up was delayed? That’s to say that sets were pushed forward, and some have even changed times drastically. So whilst now, at 8:00, I thought i’ve missed half of Avalon’s set (one that I really wanted to wholly experience), I was but warming up for his masterpiece at 9:00!
And my god, it was some masterpiece. Avalon had an energy that is seldom seen by other DJs, and that energy transformed into some of the best of psy waves. Next up was Flipflop, which too played a brilliant set yet at some point decided to push the volume a tad too high. Hold your horses, I am never one to complain about loud music, for I too prefer to be surrounded by it, but it had gotten to a stage of distortion that damaged the quality of his set.
Flipflop - By Chabunk
What happened next was the best thing that could have gone down. It seemed that the delay in the line-up times had resulted in some fucking surprise.
Headroom.
Still, to date, one of my favourite acts in the trance party scene, with an insanely distinct and a constantly unique style that never fails to send all into a stomp like no other. How bleak was I when I found out i’d miss his set, having him play originally on Saturday night, yet my worries soon fell away. An absolutely brilliant set that seemed to have lasted longer than 2 hours and was, without a doubt, my personal pick of the party.
Shane Gobi, and all those that followed through to the afternoon, kept the masses moving just well enough. I took some time off to check the Groovy Beats tent for Ivan and Pierre’s set ; mellow and great all the same.
All in all, Origin exceeded expectations and created some fine memories that will last a lifetime. Kudos to the organisers for managing to handle the vast number of people, for their awesome decor and dancefloor set up (plenty of shade), for an amazing forest experience ( 
), and for one helluva party!
Check out this little cool video our friend, Cian, did with his GoPro camera!
Tags: avalon, DJ Avalon, flipflop, forest, headroom, mdma, Origin, Origin 2011, Origin Festival 2011, outdoor, parking, protoculture, review, Rubix Cube, Shane Gobi, Trance, trance party
