DUBAI: Saudi Arabia’s electronic music festival Freaks of Nature is returning to Riyadh this weekend from Oct. 5 to 6.
The two-day event, organized by Saudi creative agency Disrupt, will feature international artists including Belgian DJ and record producer Lost Frequencies, techno house legends Agents of Time, Grammy-nominated electronic music artist Nic Fanciulli and Danish DJ Morten.
The CEO of the event Yazeed Al-Hashim, chief disruption officer at Disrupt Group, described the festival to Arab News as a “crazy and quirky friend that always makes you have a great time. Imagine these qualities and personas as a full experience.”
Al-Hashim said: “Freaks of Nature is not only a music festival. We think about it as an immersive experience where everyone comes to hear great music, feel really special and have a wholesome experience that transcends through visuals, special effects and dancers. We want to create a new entertainment concept that is not only seen in Saudi but also internationally.”
A number of Saudi and regional talents will also take part in the festival including DJ Mubarak, Aziz.wav, KALI-B, Hamza Hawsawi, and Timba JD.
Al-Hashim initially launched the festival to give artists and DJs, like himself, a platform to share their music with a crowd.
“Freaks of Nature originated from giving local artists an opportunity to play on big stages with full, amazing production. So, we’re happy we have some of the most established local artists such as Dish Dash, for example,” Al-Hashim said.
“We also have artists that are playing for the first time in front of a public crowd in this event. So, we created this environment where we can select artists based on passion and love for music. Then we do everything, all the marketing and branding, for all the artists. So even the opening artists get their own flags, their artworks, and they get their whole set recorded.”
The CEO said that this helps boost the artists’ presence and gives them content to share online.
Freaks of Nature will also take place in Amsterdam on Oct. 22.
“The Riyadh event is our flagship event. That is our core business. Our participation in Europe is for us to showcase the brand to the international music community,” Al-Hashim explained.
“Amsterdam Dance Event is the biggest music conference and festival in the world, where the whole city turns into a music festival and everyone from the music industry travels to Amsterdam and that where they do their business for a year.
“So for us, it was really essential to show the international music community the Saudi entertainment scene as well as Saudi local artists.”
Al-Hashim said that six local artists will present back-to-back sets at the Amsterdam festival. The artists will get paired up with their international idols and play the sets with them, he added.
