Got back from Detroit last night, was there for DEMF, and heading off to Mutek in Montreal the morning. I'll put up a bit more info when I get back next week,

but Bloc - you could definitely take a leaf from DEMF's book and extend the DJ sets at Bloc 4 (I presume its happening again next year?) to two hours each, one hour for DJ slots is very little, and it gives you not much time at all to switch between stages if you have two faves clashing. It was good to be able to catch a good long set from several artists, and get into it.

I understand you want to have lots of artists play at Bloc again but it would be so much more enjoyable with longer set times, if the result of that is less people on the bill I dont think it would be such a downer. I think I'd go back to Minehead no matter who was on the bill.

Anyway, on to Mutek. I suspect it might be a little more chilled (and possibly a bit pretentious) than the chaos of Detroit, but I could do with a chance of pace... personally looking forward to Appleblim, Deadbeat, Trus'me, Brendon Moeller, and the 7 hour Villalobos set on Sunday.

yeah its definitely true that the set times at bloc are fast and frenetic - its a consequence of having so many acts on the bill i spose...

but i do hear you about longer set times and we always try to let our headliners play out a little bit more. Would be gutting to miss out on half our acts so that everyone can have double the time tho!

on the one hand - swings - on the other - roundabouts ...

I say week-long Bloc. It's the only way to be sure.

A Week Long BLOC At Minehead Butlins would be so good.

You would need more downtempo acts to keep people sane though!

And then we could really make use of the sites facilities

Practically though, would Bloc Week be possible??

would the ravers die? would the chalets be totally trashed?

Got back from Mutek last week, just about recovered from that and Detroit now. Highlights of Mutek were exactly as mentioned above, but some of the Ghostly International artists who I had never seen or heard of before were excellent, especially The Sight Below. Thomas Fehlmann was good too on the Saturday, even though he looks like someone's old uncle, he still had the picnic rocking

Not much else to add really about what I said on the longer set times. It really would make Bloc more enjoyable, and I'm sure the spinners would enjoy the extra time on the decks. You could have live sets of an hour, then 2 hour DJ sets, then another live hour, etc. I understand you dont want to chop the lineup, but I honestly think the trade off would be worth it for greater appreciation of the artists performing, and also give the punters a chance to catch a decent bit of clashing artists.

I know also its not exactly Bloc's scene either, but it would be good to have some sort of minimal or house music stage going on at Bloc. If the bar area was playing deep house or a bit more mellow tunes I think it would just be perfect. Even something like soul or funk would be great. Every time I went into the bar (smashbloc?), usually early in the morning when things were winding down, and I wanted to too, you'd walk in there to a blistering assault on your brain and ears, hard techno or grinding electro, it was just awful to be honest (especially in a place with no light & windows, at least the sun crept in a bit in the bar at Hemsby), and sent me back to the chalet when I would have easily stayed on longer.

Maybe this is just me getting a bit older and a bit more mellowed out in my musical tastes, but after hours of techno and electro in the other rooms, it'd be good to hear something a bit less aggro in the smashbloc next time around, something with a bit of soul.

I hope this doesnt sound like bitching or griping, all three Bloc's I've been to have been great, it was well worth travelling from Canada for the last one, I'm not sorry for a second. Minehead is so nice, both the venue and the town, and I fully intend to make it along next year. I appreciate all the work that you guys put into the organisation of the festival. I mean the above points in the best possible atmosphere of constructive criticism.

Actually, I'm always putting it to people that they should put their money where their mouth is, so if you need/want someone to play an "eccentric soul" type set in the bar some morning for two hours from 5am to 7am, I am definitely on for doing that.

Jak:Bloc mid-saturday night was brilliantly housey. One of my female friends wandered off during the noise that was Aphex & Hecker, told us to come to Jak, we all whined and said it would be crap: she was right, we were wrong. Rob da Bank played some great bouncy tunes, and the people after him were pretty funky too.

right, fuck off, you're barred.

Not really...

Yeah all really good points. We always look at the forum carefully and read emails that come in so please keep your feedback coming!

Something a bit deeper / funkier and less inyerface for the afterparties in JakBLOC is definitely something we've discussed and could well be coming to a BLOC near you in the future.

nice one

The 1 hour slots at Bloc may be over quickly but most of the earlier act's sets are shorter at most festivals not just Bloc. How else do you pack a lineup like Bloc's into a weekend?

I feel that If the amount of acts got cut at Bloc to allow for longer sets you know that people would be shouting how they now only had half the acts playing. This happened when apparently there weren't enough techno acts for instance this year.

Also with Overkill we got some more experimental sometimes chilled sounds. There was some more dubbier dubstep on the Friday and some live Dub on the Sunday. When you have headliners such as The Future Sound of London you can't really complain that the festival was too full on all the time.

I would say that at Minehead there was a much more diverse lineup than at the previous Hemsby Blocs.

If anything places like the Jak Bloc and the Smash Bloc before it are surely where you need to get your stomp on to release the last of any energy that may be left after an evening of mentalness.

Minimal music can have it's place but I would hate to see a whole stage of it for the weekend at Bloc.

If you go to Germany or Barcelona you can get your entire fill of minimal stuff in a couple of evenings.

Obviously these are just my opinions. But please... Deep House.... No!

I would like to add my tuppence worth to this. but on a related note. Following on from the debacle between Bambaata & Carl Craig, can you ensure that if an act turns up late for whatever, that the time he/she/they miss comes out of their own set time & not the act following.

I know of so many people who were more than annoyed that Bambaataa ate into Carl's set time, espicially as he was the headline act, after all

Can I please request that if ANYONE is late, Lawrence (Agent2) fills in for them? Best DJ set of the weekend

I do agree with boompty though; giving bambaataa his full set was unfair. If he'd been cut down we might have had less MC Hammer.

Hi

I have to disagree with the minimal house morning set. If people want to chill out and watch the sun rise while hearing the occasional beat surely it would be better for them to go outside or back to their chalet and put some music on. Or would you rather the Hardcore Raver (tm) in the chalet next to you want something a bit more banging and whack his Bangface compilation up to eleven at six in the morning. Also I think a chilled out set at 5am to 7am would just turn Bloc into a Bedroom.

How about using the restaurant area in the centre of the chalets as an early morning chill out area?

Alan


RIP Hemsby

Hi

Forgot a couple of other points,

If an Act is late for there set it shouldn't cause another Act to lose time on theirs.

If anyone causes Carl Craig to lose time off his set the should be thrown to the baying Bloc masses.
And Carl Craig should play again next year.
And the year after.
And yes I did like Carl Craig.

Set times. Bloc isn't a club with one or two acts, I come to Bloc to have a dang good time and if an acts set wasn't a good as I hoped, I know that I'll find a few decent things to listen too not much later that night and possibly enjoy a genre of music I previously didn't like. With all two hour sets, if I couldn't find anything I liked I'd just get bored waiting around or go back to the chalet.


Alan

Please keep the shorter set times! There are very few acts who are good enough to sustain two hours of their own material. There are very few acts who are equally good at performing live and DJing.

Sure, for the headliners, 2 hours is great - but the thing I like about Bloc is the variety and getting barraged with new and wonderful music. Plus I have the attention span of a gnat with a testosterone injection.

Jak Bloc was wicked last year, so don't change it (well smashing some windows into the place might be a good idea, then again it might scare the Butlins staff). Heading down there at 8am in an afro and shell suit (just my usual clothes) to go mental to Jerome Hill is one of the highlights of the weekend. The queue for that arena says it all really - took me ages to get in. Luckily, Alex Benson seemed to be providing some kind of stand-up comedy routine outside, well it seemed funny after drinking white russians and cider for most of the day.

Yes I'm excited about Bloc 2010.

Nope it would not, and next year if I have anyone playing music in their chalet real loud, be it gabbaclowncore or pure ambient drone, I'm going to call security on them first and then go and sort them out myself if that doesnt work. There's loads of places to go and stay up all night if you want to - right in the middle of a load of other people trying to sleep is not one of them. Not better at all.

(You may gather that this was a minor gripe for me about last year)