Here's the first bit of our coverage of the fifth Bloc Weekend at Butlins Minehead last month...

Friday

As a complete Bloc Virgin I was keen to get down to Butlins Minehead and have a jolly good go at catching as many of the acts as possible, the line-up being pretty damn serious, a mixture of long standing giants of Electronic Music and trailblazing new artists all out to smash the pants off this little holiday camp.  Bloc was split into several arenas, primarily there is the Centre:Bloc, Tec: Bloc, Red: Bloc, Jack:Bloc and the visually spectacular and technologically mind-boggling Ableton RFID Dome. 

Each area had a particular curator organising exactly what heaviness happened and where, so it was first off to the Tec:Bloc organised by Bristols' Subloaded, a night originally set up via Dubstep Goliath Pinch and it was indeed him I caught first demonstrating exactly what they're all about, no secret this is basically weighty pounding Sub Bass and drums over the equally impressive Funktion One system. 

Mala then took over the reigns to keep the rhythms on the Dubstep vibe, proving his renowned mixing abilities to whip up a chest-crushing beast of a set and this only being at 9.30 in the pm!  Missing some of this to catch Ikonika over in the Red:Bloc missioning through a set impeded by a power cut she held it down supremely, dropping a veritable medley of tunes from across the genres and tempos to great effect.  

After a small break back at the chalet for some badly needed sustenance and a cheeky White Russian it was a return to the Tec:Bloc to witness Untold's masterful construction of a cracking set, taking in his own unique brand of messed up house, electro  and 2 step beats.  Reports of Ramadanman absolutely killing it over in Red were tempting but I felt compelled to check Shackleton out back in the Tec:Bloc to practically taste the grimey, atmospheric percussive dealings over the ridiculous system backed up by some quality images from the flashing screens behind.

 Anyone who's caught his recent Fabric 55 mix will have been familiar with the set that was played and yet this being an original live reconstruction in line with the performances he's put on in the past and really is great to witness in a club atmosphere, plenty of heads on the dancefloor taking it in enthusiastically, some proper zoned out on some deep meditative type shizzle, it really can be that involving.  To summarise Friday then: Dope:Bloc!

Saturday was all about an early evening Red:Bloc visit to catch the Mary Anne Hobbs' curated demonstration of where cutting edge bass music is at right now with L-Vis 1990 playing what appeared to be a semi-live set, fiddling with an array of curious Technology up on the stage and waking out some hefty tunes, the recent Pearson sound's 'Deep inside' edit particularly standing out for me but many other quality tracks dropped obviously as well as that.  

Addison Groove continued the onslaught of pumped up tunage, taking things in a fairly jukey direction, his first track, a mad remix of a classic soul tune 'Jimmy Mack' showed exactly where he was headed with his set and plenty of peeps were in the mood to get down to the jacked up electric funk that followed.

Having missed the headliners on the Friday I wasn't going to be repeating this on the Saturday and a plan of such cunning had to be devised in order to make sure we'd be down the front for Aphex.  To be fair, all the cunningness was really consisted of getting into that main arena several hours before and the bonus of that was we caught the nutty performance of Dopplereffekt.  This guy's antics consisted of wearing a mask and standing side on to the audience, his hands flickering at mad speeds over some bizarre contraptions while the images from behind and on the screens to the left of the stage emitted random old science reels and the like.  

Four Tet was up next, performing a live ableton set and starting out with the immense ultra-beautiful 'Angel Echoes and launching into plenty of funking 4/4 and laying down the perfect build up to where Aphex was going to take us for the main spectacle.   Understandably, the crowd was a maximum capacity for Richard D James and more than willing to lap up the kaleidoscopic range of tunes he then took us through. 

Building from a more abstract laid back intro, killer tunes dropped to the best effect included the totemic 'Work them' from Ramadanman, Jam city's 'Ecstasy Refix', killer Techno beast 'Twenty Nine' from Mark Broom and then stormed into some mad tempos for some jungle-related mashup.  Some may see the insane levels reached tempo-wise as too much but you can see the logic with which the set was made up, the images also mirroring this self-destructive theme of basically pushing things into near oblivion.  Pretty damn intense.

To climb down from such heady heights it was quite a good idea then after this musical depravity to seek refuge in the heady rhythms slapped out in the Jak:Bloc and the Resident Advisor curated acts that went through way into the early morning light.  A highlight here was checking Legowelt for a well aimed set containing much chicago house and the like, just what you want at that time and executed with admirable precision.

Sunday then, was a much calmer affair, plenty of time for anyone who hadn't yet tried the wonders that Butlins has to offer and no, I'm not being entirely sarcastic here, you would have to be a stone cold humourless cat not to enjoy sitting in an oversized deck chair or attempting the crazy golf while under the influence, rendering a somewhat irritating game entirely impossible or perhaps that's just my own little problem. 

Either way, after a brief visit to the fancy dress competition to witness some admirable costumes but also suffer intentionally awful music, it was quickly onto check in at the Centre:Bloc for the rest of the night.  Matthew Dear paved the way in entertaining fashion for the epic set Laurent Garnier (and friends) then bestowed upon us.  This was the way to see Bloc out, a gentle drift out on a sea of House music.  Live versions of the 'The man with the Red Face' and other classics was there for the chins in the crowd but overall it was a dope way to see the party out, culminating in a veritable feast of lasers and glitter.  

With so much to choose from here I can testify this is a festival well worth getting to next year, the choice of acts meant if you missed someone sick the chances are it's because you were at something else equally dope and I'm just throwing in the highlights I caught.  Plenty of peeps will have had completely differing experiences but generally will have some a variety of electronic music rarely found elsewhere and rivalling huge contemporary festivals such as Sonar. At 5 years old Bloc. Is gathering pace at a frightening speed, their brand of deep, but not exclusive dance music is a very welcome constant in todays scene.

Anyone interested in the tunes mentioned here I'm just dropping a few links for good measure:

Mark Broom – Twenty Nine (Black mix)

Ramadanman – Work Them

Addison Groove – Footcrab part 3/Footcrab Stomp 

Hardive – Deep inside (Pearson Sound remix)

Jacques Greene – (Baby I don't know) What you want

Four Tet – Angel echoes