We’ll start with a disclaimer, and a metaphysical observation of sorts: this year, increasingly often, I felt that a band/artist sounds like a tweaked version of someone else, or a mate remarked on the same. Therefore, we undertook some Pilsner imbued thinking on why this is the case. Arguments being brought up were the scary ‘we are getting old and have imprinted on the early styles we enjoyed as teens/young adults’. Or music is actually getting repetitive and a little crap- this is closely connected to the first argument, as I do remember my parents’ generation saying the same when I would reveal to them a new band I liked, feeling it had just reinvented the wheel. In a more nuanced take, I chose to believe that this happens because we are exposed to an unprecedented amount of music that is widely available to anyone who cares to listen, and therefore we are getting to know much more music than we did in the past. Creating music, and make it available, has become easier as well.  In the past, you had to buy physical records, or attend concerts, which were out of reach for many people. These days, the algorithm does the job for you, and scours the web for music similar to what it intuited might be your taste. Whether it’s a blessing, or a curse- they jury’s out on that.

I also want to add, lest any fans of a certain artist take offense, that my Sziget experience is that of a magpie, jumping from one interesting stage to another. Quite often, then, concerts feel more like a vibe, or an instant impression, than a well-rounded whole, and other festival goers are likely to have different interpretations of their own- and therein lies the magic of such an event’s fabulous diversity.

Tkay Maidza, August 7, Revolut Stage

In light of the above, on the first day of Sziget I marched into the Revolut tent, a bit like a child who wanders into the middle of a movie without a frame of reference, and concluded the following: Tkay Maidza, who hails from Zimbabwe by way of Australia, sounds great, somewhat like Azealia Banks did when the NME proclaimed her the next best thing since butter on toast. Things didn’t quite work out either for Azealia, or the NME, the way they would have wanted it, but here was Tkay, and she sounded fresh and alive and really kicked in the doors on this otherwise somewhat sleepy Sziget start. Someone also mentioned that she looks a bit like Rihanna, which is both a sloppy compliment, as if every pretty woman of colour has to look like Rihanna, but also, in fact, quite correct.

L’Impératrice, August 7, Revolut Stage

The French sextet (a frankly odd number, since pop bands tend to draw the line at five, except if you are Arcade Fire and you enlist all your friends and family to play) are fundamentally a one band playlist of a sultry Euro disco summer on the beaches of the Med, with tracks in English, French, Spanish and Italian. They’re a bit on the light, tropical end of the La French Touch electro- a couple of days later, a heavyweight, Kavinsky, a former Sziget performer himself, was dropping his beats at the Olympic closing ceremony. But L’Impératrice are visibly happy to be in their own, featherweight groove, releasing stuff such as ‘Vanille fraise’-incidentally vanilla-strawberry (I am immune to the charms of chocolate) happens to be my go-to ice cream flavour when all the salty-caramel- tiramisu -oregano-basil-sorbet concoctions feel close to short circuiting my taste buds. A trustworthy palate cleanser, with all the joys of summer encompassed within.

Dagny, August 8, Main Stage

Dagny sounds like the act Norway doesn’t send to the Eurovision because they know they would win, and they prefer investing their petrol wealth in businesses more lucrative than a beloved, but a little bit expensive and politically booby-trapped yearly camp fest. The decision is logical if questionable. Her music is that brand of tantalizingly catchy Scandi pop that sounds like all the Scandi pop songs you’ve heard before, and therefore you instantly love it. There’s a pleasant alignment to the Zeitgest, too, her band looking like the procurement and accounts departments of a Silicon Valley start-up who have come up with a pop group for the yearly team building exercise organised in a posh hotel. Then there’s lines like ‘Let my tears fall down underneath my ray-bans’, which is basically a succinct and quite poignant summing up of how our generation suffers behind heavy layers of angst and Instagram filters.

Nova Twins and Grandson, August 9, Revolut Stage

We’ll bundle these two acts together because independent reviewers (a fancy name to give your mates on Sziget) have called them ‘Rage Against the Machine if they were girls’ and ‘one man Rage Against the Machine’ and then, to live up to the moniker, Grandson did arrive clad in a Rage Against the Machine t-shirt, and he was angry. I generally find it hard, among my many admitted weaknesses, to listen to genres from the general direction of punk and/or metal, with everything in between, on record. I do however enjoy the vibe of such acts when they play live, as they often have a special kind of energy and a close connection to the crowd, which makes for great concert experiences, even if you’ve never heard their music before. Nor do I wish to listen to their music in the future, but I would definitely drop by to see either Nova Twins or Grandson perform again.

Aurora, August 9, Revolut Stage

I will openly admit that I only listened to Aurora’s most recent album in its full length after the Sziget concert, spurned by the experience. Namely, I felt it to be more disjointed than her first Sziget concert– which dates back all the way to 2016, and which remains an all-time favourite of mine. There was a tautness and cohesion to that earlier performance which seemed striking for someone so young- but then again, she had much less material to work with. In the meantime, she has explored different genres and ideas, and sometimes seems to have struck discordant notes, in spite of the curiosity and bravery of the endeavour. She remains a superb performer, and her fans packed the tent in numbers unprecedented for this year’s somewhat breezy edition of Sziget. As such, the fault might lie more with my expectations than with Aurora’s delivery, but I just failed to sense that same aura of magic as last time around.