“Choo-choo”! The Full Flex Express Tour train is on it’s way across Canada, and it’s first stop was Toronto on Friday the thirteenth. Despite the date, this turned out to be one of the luckiest days for thousands of people who got to attend! If you didn’t get a chance to go though, no worries because we’ll tell you what you need to know and give you some amazing links!

The Line-Up:

4pm – TOKiMONSTA
4:45pm – KOAN Sound
5:15pm – Hundred Waters
5:50pm – Grimes
6:35pm – Diplo
7:55pm – Pretty Lights
9:10pm – Skrillex

Kicking off the day was TOKiMONSTA hailing from LA. She’s well known for her remixes (like most electronic artists and DJs). One of our favourite remixes that she did was definitely “Scissors” originally by Eight And A Half. Although she was first and sometimes that can be incredibly nerve-wracking, she definitely did great! Her sound is a little slower and more melodic, which was good because it didn’t start off the tour too intense and it created a great pace to follow.

Up next was KOAN Sound, two dudes from the UK. Very much like the previous act, their music is a little more chill and was nice buildup in pace for the coming artists. Like a lot of Drum & Bass coming out of the UK, they definitely were heavy on the bass and carry more of a deep rhythm, rather than more focus on melody or lyrics. “Meanwhile, In The Future” is a great track of theirs. Hundred Waters was the next to hit the stage. This set was trippy and melodic and trancy and dancey and so much wonderful rolled into one. Just visit their website [here] and you’ll know instantly what I mean. It picked up the pace of the day a little bit, and by this set we started seeing a lot more people arrive to the venue at Toronto’s Fort York.

Can we pause to talk about this venue for a second, because it was great! After you walk in you are surrounded by an ice-cream truck, a Smoke’s Poutinerie truck (one of my favourite places in the city), water tents, drinking tents, the VIP section and much more. This was an extremely well planned out venue, and for an outdoor concert, that is incredibly important! There was a large backfield where people openly danced most of the day, and a section in front of the stage that we never saw empty. The crowd was a sea of neon colours, bold patterns and a lot of Ray Ban style sunglasses, but no matter what the fashion, it didn’t really matter because everyone was so focused and excited for the music!

So next up for music was Grimes, another female artist which was great to see in this tour (and in a usually male dominated genre). She sings on her own tracks and has a very harmonic, light voice that works well with her up beat electronic instrumentals. One of our favourites by her is “Oblivion”. We were a little disappointed at the show only because there seemed to be a lot of technical difficulties during her performance specifically. At least once every other song she would need to ask for something to be adjusted, added or switched. Not really her fault, just distracting for us.

Next up was Diplo, on of the (I’d say) 3 main acts of the nigh. A friend of mine said “I’ve seen Diplo 3 times, and Skrillex 4 times but this was definitely the best for both!” Not sure why he saw them each that many times, but I’m going to take his word for it! The set for Diplo was amazing and this was the set that got people on their feet and off to a crazy dancing start. Since Diplo uses a lot of hip hop influence, this was much easier for a lot of people to dance to than some of the other previous artists. Definitely check out “Barely Standing” below, which is one of our favourites.

Pretty Lights, oh the wonderful Pretty Lights. This set was amazing and this is when everyone really started coming together. Half of the reason is probably because Skrillex was up next and they wanted a good spot, but it was also because Pretty Lights is awesome and is blowing up on the electronic circuit right now. After having a song in an international commercial (“I Know The Truth”) it was bound to happen. Check out that song below. This guy sort of encompassed everyone else’s style of music into his own, which made for a perfect segway into the headlining act. A little hip hop, a little electro and lots of Dubstep. We were hoping for a fantastic light show from Pretty Lights, and don’t get me wrong, it was great just not fantastic, only because it was still fairly bright out while the sun was setting. Obviously no one could control that though, so I’ll let it slide. Despite that- great set!

Finally after much anticipation the man of the night was set to perform. For once I was really happy that an artist came on later than scheduled, because this gave the sun time to go down and let us enjoy the ultimate experience of it all. After the intermission (which was basically an entire Bob Marley CD), the literal countdown for Skrillex himself. In unison from the crowd “Five-four-three-two-one” and the drop we had all been waiting for. Starting off with “Right In” this got everyone from the start chanting along and jumping up and down with high energy. The best thing about a show like this is that it was all one long mix of songs, so there’s no disruption to that amazing feeling that the music gives you. “Kyoto” was not too far after, and this being one of his grimiest, hardest, dirtiest, full of bass songs, this got the crowd jumping everywhere and some people were even moshing at this point because they were so into it! This was also around the point where the SPACESHIP, yes the spaceship, that Skrillex was in rose on the stage so that everyone could get a good look at the man of the night. This was incredible to see, but what was more impressive was the light show with lasers spanning out behind the crowd, smoke cannons in unison with the music and occasionally the perfect blast of fireworks at the drop. Words can’t really describe how perfect the visuals were with every song. At one point there was even a Skrillex Nyan Cat on the screen behind him! The perfect example of this light show was during “Bangarang” which was beyond anything I would have expected. Luckily with after that song though it was time to cool down and catch out breath with “With You, Friends” and “Summit”. Although the crowd never stopped moving, it was nice breathing time, especially since the air had cooled down too! The entire set was sort of unreal and it felt like a community coming together- everyone knows what you’re there for and everyone just gets it. People were extremely courteous of each other, and it was just a feel good place to be in (despite the dirt and sweat we were all covered in). The night ended with evidentially his most popular songs, “Cinema” mixed into “Scary Monsters and Nice Sprites”. This ended the night on a very high note, and left everyone satisfied and probably a little over-whelmed by how amazing the night really was. If you ever get the chance to see Skrillex, do it! Even if you aren’t the biggest dubstep fan, just the overall experience of the lights and community is out of this world!

After searching the internet, I was able to find a decent video of Skrillex’s set. There are longer ones and more of specific songs, but this one was a decent length and you could actually see stuff going on, so it’s attached below. To relive the day or experience it if you weren’t there, definitely check out some of these in order (trust me, it will be worth it!) Also for a behind the scene look at any shows we attend, find us on Instagram at BestFanBlog!