In December 2019 when we were all still innocent and oblivious to the pandemic that was just around the corner, I had the idea to bring London based crew Rupture over to Amsterdam to perform in the legendary Melkweg venue.

For those who don’t know Rupture, Rupture started out some 13 years ago as a small night ran by Mantra & Double-O which has since built up a dedicated following around the world which since then grew out to be one of the most consistent drum and bass labels out there. They also host shows on both Jungletrain and Rinse.fm.

The Rupture sound reaches back to the roots of jungle, from 93-94 golden era jungle sounds and to headz sounds, but also current day sounds like half-time, slow-fast and future jungle.
Rupture parties are known for the extremely friendly and open atmosphere, the saying is “step on a toe, make a friend”. The Rupture label has seen releases from artists like Theory, Sully, Digital, Dead Man’s Chest, The Untouchables a.o.

For Amsterdam Rupture this was nothing but a late Christmas present, packing nothing but fire, the line up was absolute quality and a rare sight for Dutch events to see so many underground drum and bass names on a single line up. Aside from Mantra and Double-O, Loxy, Sully, Coco Bryce and myself performed.

Behind the scenes

The night itself was an absolute banger and fortunately there's an aftermovie which I've included in this post. Aside from being responsible for bringing everyone over and rolling out both the physical and online promotion, I was also in charge of making the visuals which would be shown on two large screens in the room.

To this end I've sat behind my computer for hours on end to make these visuals in Cinema 4d, with the help of Octane render engine and After Effects.  The concept behind the visuals was simple; I wanted to re-create the rave aesthetics from legendary raves like Dreamscape & Fantazia. Seeing as Rupture's sounds are generally considered to be "for the heads", what better way then to actually animating heads melting.

Video credits: live footage by Takeshi Fujimura , editing by Josje Bijl 2020