Review: Mint Festival 2018

The much loved and duly respected Mint Festival returned to Yorkshire this September, but in newly found territory, this time situated at RAF Church Fenton, the former grounds of a royal air force base. In recent years it’s not been uncommon for the organisers to chop and change venue locations, even heading to Lincoln’s showground for one year. The usual concerns for the festival have been the grounds maxing out capacity, and while this has been a common theme, this year it seems the organisers managed to get this spot on, meaning festival goers could well and truly focus on having a good time with the music on offer. Despite the festival grounds being situated a fair distance away from Leeds city centre, shuttle buses were at an affordable cost and did a stellar job of providing appropriate transportation.

With drinks in hand and an unimaginable excitement, we head into the festival grounds to sample each of the unique stages. One thing Mint do remarkably well is artist selection. We were immediately thrust into the sounds of one of their most revered bookings, Mr Derrick Carter. The American selector had some funky tones and flavours to warm up the gathering crowds, transporting us through every era of electronic music and mixing it into feel-good disco rhythms. We found him at the Woodstock stage by the way, so it was unsurprising to find other upbeat house talents giving it their all on this stage like Peggy Gou and Jasper James – later in the day we were determined to catch Kerri Chandler and Jeremy Underground going b2b in what was going to be one of the performances of the day by far.
Area 51 was by far the most techno-based stage of them all and had the whole spectrum of the genre covered, from the melodious and adventurous sounds of Dixon through to the deep and industrious cuts of Adam Beyer and Ida Engberg in a ferocious b2b display. Like on many other occasions, it’s always great to see Joseph Capriati and Adam Beyer performing on the same stage, even when they are not playing together, the energy that the two garner from the crowd is truly something remarkable.

Elsewhere was the Arcadia After Burn stage; the winning visual experience of the whole festival; a towering structure, with tentacles and fire combusting from its head – this was pure fantasy. The sci-fi experience was soundtracked by the likes of veteran DJ EZ and Tom Zanetti during the hours of daylight and by night we were presented with riveting house from duo Gorgon City and Disciples who were on fine form, dishing out some vibrant party numbers.
The Bunker stage provided exactly what you would expect, a deep and small space, with a hefty sound system and an overall intimate experience. Couple this with some internationally recognised names like Eats Everything and Patrick Topping and you can imagine how packed out this place got, and for a very good reason of course! In conclusion, Mint Festival has had its troubles over the years with overcrowding among other things, but this year it finally felt like the organisers had done a really good job on containing this aspect that had been a deal breaker previously. The music is always on point and this year was no different. Roll on next years party!