To quote the venerable Paul Flynn, i-D’s ultimate aficionado on gay nightlife, Block9 is “the best gay club in the UK”. According to Resident Advisor it’s “categorically one of the best clubs in the world”. To the uninitiated, Block9 is Glastonbury Festival’s late dancing area. Like Shangri-La, but very gay. The jewel in its crown is NYC Downlow, a disco inside a three-story building made to resemble a New York bathhouse-cum-meatpacking warehouse circa 1982 and an “homage to mirrorball nightlife in all its Dionysian excess”.
And this year it’s back bigger than ever, comprising of two adjacent fields — Block9 East and Block9 West — and a huge line-up across its different stages. In Downlow, there’ll be Tony Humphries, Mr Fingers (live), The Black Madonna b2b Garrett David, Erick Morillo, Sweely and Midland. Out back you’ll find The Meat Rack, featuring the “ultimate sleazy homo-centric line-up” including Luke Solomon and Rob Mello, Smokin Jo and Wes Baggaley alongside Deptford Northern Soul Club and Berlin’s Discosodoma. And Jonny Woo’s drag troupe, Maude Adas and All Those Children, will be commemorating 50 years since Stonewall.
Meanwhile at IICON (the area’s new sculptural artwork and stage with a six-point ambisonic sound system and state-of-the-art video mapping, duh) expect Okzharp and Manthe Ribane, Moor Mother, Larry Heard live ft. Fatima and Paul Cut, Laurel Halo, Kode9 and The Zenker Brothers. Not clear on the specifics of what this really is? According to the team behind it, IICON is “a pseudo-religious monument to the terrifying new realities emerging in our digital, post-truth age”. Register here to find out about the IICON tour.
And across the way at Genosys — a stage exploring the birth of analogue electronic music and its lasting legacy — there’s performances from Anthony Parasole, Josh Wink, HAAi, Honcho, Hannah Holland, Randomer and Leeon.
Boom.
