Ferropolis In July

I used to think the point of a festival was discovering new things. You’d go for three headliners you knew and leave with five new favorite bands. Now you go for the people you already listen to, and any surprises are just bonus. The Melt Festival lineup is heavy on the names I already have on playlists - The Xx, Nina Kraviz, Tyler the Creator, Odesza, Jon Hopkins. It’s not a complaint. It’s just honest.

What makes Melt interesting is that it doesn’t separate these names by genre. You get Florence + The Machine and Ellen Allien in the same weekend. Ben Klock and Rin on the same afternoon. Little Dragon, The Internet, Cigarettes After Sex - electronic, hip-hop, indie, experimental all mixed into one thing. That’s actually how people listen to music now, not sorted by category but by moment. Most festivals pick a lane and staff it well. Melt just assumes you’re complicated enough to care about all of it.

The festival happens in Ferropolis, an old power plant in eastern Germany. That European thing where an industrial site gets converted into a venue and suddenly carries some cultural weight. Maybe that’s pretentious to even notice, but it works - the place has a specific character that you feel when you’re there. The festival leans into it rather than against it.

July 13-15. I don’t have a strong prediction about whether this year will be better or worse than past ones. The lineup is good enough that it doesn’t really matter. You either want to be there or you don’t.