REVIEW | SUNSHINE, SOUND SYSTEMS AND BLISS: A DAY AT CROSS THE TRACKS

By Mas Law • On Reviews

Photo Cred­it: Luke Dyson

Everything was set for an abso­lutely breath­tak­ing fest­iv­al: the sun, the atmo­sphere, and my energy levels. I headed to Brix­ton and, as soon as you came out of the sta­tion, you could feel that lem­ming-type energy of every­one walk­ing towards Brock­well Park. Upon entry, you could feel the good vibes ooz­ing. The sun had people in little clusters on the grass soak­ing in the free fest­iv­al vibes, while oth­ers con­tin­ued on that grand walk towards the high bar­ri­cades that sur­roun­ded the festival.

After a long walk around, I finally got to the press/VIP entrance. This was a sweet bless­ing, as get­ting in was swift and smooth sail­ing all the way. Armed with a pint and a big smile, I star­ted to ascend into the main part of the festival.

The main stage had the funk legends WAR play­ing their hit “Cisco Kid”. The crowd was build­ing nicely and the energy from the band was feed­ing feel-good nos­tal­gia. Def­in­itely a good way to kick off my Cross The Tracks exper­i­ence. With oth­er hits like “Galaxy” and the one from the Mar­mite adverts, “Low Rider”, the levels were set right for me to start float­ing around the fest­iv­al to see what oth­er gems I could discover.

They had lots of small install­a­tions. Like when I went past the Reprezent tent and they were fully in jungle mode. A small dark space that was deal­ing with swel­ter­ing heat, which was­n’t quite my cup of tea for that level of sun­shine. Then I wanted to check out Bossman’s, shaped like a corner shop, but there was always this excess­ive queue out­side, look­ing like it was on a one-in, one-out mode. In that heat, you wouldn’t catch me dead queuing up.

So, we headed back to the main stage where Fabio & Grooverider were pre­par­ing to take the stage with the Out­look Orches­tra. My Bris­tol roots were tingling for some good old jungle and I was not dis­ap­poin­ted in the slight­est. From ’92 to cur­rent-day drum and bass, we were taken through a won­der­ful jour­ney. With Kele Le Roc and Jenna G singing the soundtrack of our yes­teryears, I was fully in awe.

The raver in me was get­ting a full dose of dopam­ine. Gun fin­gers were on blast as I sur­roun­ded myself with appre­ci­at­ive ravers. It felt like the good old days, being mas­ter­fully con­duc­ted and played out live by the bril­liant orches­tra. Def­in­itely a high­light of my after­noon. One nation under a groove!!!

Once they had fin­ished, I wandered around to see what was next to ful­fil my fest­iv­al palette. The crowd that had formed at the Ter­min­al Stage was humong­ous and the music soun­ded like Soca. I got closer to real­ise it was Obongjayar.

What a performer.

With his tight white pants and his hench physique, he took the crowd through a jour­ney of genres with his ener­get­ic pres­ence. When tracks like “Adore You” came on in a stripped-back acous­tic ver­sion, the whole crowd sang along. It almost felt like his Cham­pagne Super­nova moment.

He con­tin­ued after that with what felt like Nigeri­an heavy met­al. The blend of what felt like Afrobeats meet­ing heavy met­al had me in awe of his per­form­ance. What I was wit­ness­ing here was a Nigeri­an artist whose songs seemed to relate to all nation­al­it­ies and races. As fest­iv­al per­formers go, he was def­in­itely a joy to watch.

Feel­ing filled with music­al euphor­ia, I drif­ted around the fest­iv­al in search of food. There was def­in­itely no short­age of choice. This had me walk­ing all around look­ing for the right thing to sat­is­fy my hunger.

As I was on my search, a funky house groove lured me into this tent, The Caboose, where this South Afric­an song­stress was hyp­not­ising me. I had seen this woman before at Peck­ham Levels. In the heat of the sun and the groove of what was being played, I was drawn in.

Nandi was her name and now I was part of the 2Fox Ele­ments. With a host of amaz­ing sing­ers, they got me dan­cing with a real sense of free­dom. Son­ic­ally, this was what I needed.

I do believe fest­ivals belong to the DJs when done right and this was a per­fect example of that. With the ever-tal­en­ted Renell Shaw on bass, I was at my euphor­ic peak in this moment.

I ate my food, I danced, and thought I bet­ter catch some hip hop as I am writ­ing for IAMHIPHOPMAGAZINE.

So I took myself to the D‑Railed tent.

North Weezy’s very own Knucks was on stage and the tent was going off. The energy of the youth was fully being rep­res­en­ted. Watch­ing songs like “Alpha House” drop and every­one around me singing it word for word was a sight to behold.

I was fully skank­ing, the gun fin­gers were back.

Espe­cially when he dropped hits like “Leon”, I was the one singing word for word. I’ve been watch­ing Knucks do his ting since Break­fast at Tiffany’s, so to see him head­line this tent was a won­der­ful sight to behold.

To see how the youts were shelling the bars like they wrote them was com­fort­ing to see. I love see­ing rap­pers who can actu­ally rap and have skills get the levels they deserve.

A bril­liant head­line act to bring a close to the D‑Railed tent. A full tent con­sid­er­ing he was on at the same time as the ever-won­der­ful KOKOROKO and the legendary Chan­nel One.

Last but not least, the sea of people in the fest­iv­al all ascen­ded towards the main stage to see the legend that is Little Simz.

She star­ted in this beau­ti­ful white Adi­das top with these amaz­ingly designed green cargo pants with extra bits attached. She abso­lutely looked like a super­star. Some people are blessed with the “it” factor and she was the sheer embod­i­ment of that.

In a scene so dom­in­ated by sex selling and words being pro­jec­ted for the sake of it, Little Simz is a per­fect role mod­el of an artist, someone who writes from a place of mean­ing rather than simply chas­ing what sells

As closers go, this was a breath­tak­ing per­form­ance blessed with such good music. The lady she had on bass had such a com­mand­ing pres­ence; it was like look­ing at anoth­er superstar.

With so much in the cata­logue, people sang with her track after track. Songs like “Young” gave you that real sense of feel-good val­ues with­in the fest­iv­al. The range shown was fabulous.

As she backed off the Adi­das jack­et and showed what had become a pop­u­lar sight through­out the fest­iv­al, her Arsen­al top, she took a DJ stance and shelled down the place with some of her more elec­tro tracks.

As we jour­neyed from her past to her present, she showed she’s a cut above many. By the time she got to tracks like “Point and Kill” and “Woman”, you had been taken through a beau­ti­ful adven­ture of Little Simz and her music.

The show closed and I was def­in­itely in a state of bliss!!!

I try to use prom­in­ent words to describe what I saw and how I felt.

In a nutshell:

Little Simz was remarkable.
The fest­iv­al was remarkable.
The weath­er was remarkable.
The day and the exper­i­ence as a whole? Remarkable.

Def­in­itely got what I came for and more.

Thank you, Cross The Tracks.

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Mas Law

Artist/Producer hail­ing from NW Lon­don. Enig­mat­ic storyteller and End of the Weak Eng­land Organiser.

About Mas Law

Artist/Producer hailing from NW London. Enigmatic storyteller and End of the Weak England Organiser.