Born from a meme and driven by a flamboyant aesthetic, Shadow Wizard Money Gang has carved out a unique place for itself in pop culture. Their viral slogan “we love casting spells” is accompanied by retro visuals and hooded silhouettes adorned with chains and rings, halfway between video game characters and mystical figures. But the collective’s appeal goes beyond internet humor: it’s a mix of music, fashion, and attitude that embodies a generational sensibility. For them, their identity is as much about media presence and style as it is about sound.
On Saturday, the magic took shape at Palomosa. DJ Psycho kicked things off, surrounded by his mysterious companions in the DJ booth. The room quickly descended into a world of hardcore hyperpop, somewhere between electronic experimentation and metallic bursts. Everything was designed with maximalism in mind: saturated visuals, unexpected drops, intense rhythms.
In the crowd, every detail became an extension of this collective spell: glitter under the neon lights, colorful hoods, futuristic glasses, and chains that sparkled to the rhythm of the strobe lights. The beats pounded the bodies, making the floor vibrate, and each drop triggered a wave of screams and movements. And when the set shifted to Tizzo, a rap figure from Saint-Michel, Montreal’s aesthetic intertwined with a surreal universe and a local nod, which brought the crowd up a notch.
As the evening progressed, the boundary between stage and audience seemed to fade away: everyone was united in the same intensity, like members of a single gang. Shadow Wizard Money Gang didn’t just give a concert at Palomosa: it invited a community to feast in excess, where music, fashion, and attitude merged into a total experience.
Palomosa | Cult Member, a hypnotic journey into the heart of house music
by Marc-Antoine Bernier
At 6:30 p.m., the Jardin stage was taken over by the mesmerizing beats of Cult Member. In the soft light of early evening, his set transported the audience on an urban and ethereal journey, carried by expansive house music with vaporwave roots, featuring lo-fi textures and sounds inspired by the internet imagination.
Liam Hayden, alias Cult Member, n’est pas un DJ comme les autres. Figure discrète mais influente de la scène outsider house canadienne, il s’est fait connaître par son album culte Ethernet, avant de se réinventer dans des territoires plus techno et trance. Samedi soir à Palomosa, il a donné un aperçu de ce parcours singulier, ouvrant son set avec une réinterprétation planante de U Weren’t Here I Really Missed You.
His deeply atmospheric mix vibrated with lo-fi textures and futuristic echoes, like a patchwork of melancholy and urban pulsation. While some passages recalled the misty atmospheres of Ethernet, others shifted towards the frontal effectiveness of Club Tools Vol. 1, where heavy bass and fast rhythms galvanized the crowd. As the sun slowly set, the music grew in intensity, transforming the Garden into a hypnotic dance floor.
Not very expressive behind his machines, Hayden occasionally flashed a discreet smile in response to the cheers. But everything about his set invited introspection: his ambient layers and melodic lines seemed to come from a late-night jam session in the privacy of his studio. Yet as soon as the beats picked up speed, the entire crowd synchronized to his tempo, breathing and moving in unison.
Between solitary reverie and collective communion, Cult Member offered a suspended moment, both cold and incandescent, which perfectly summed up the alchemy of his sound universe.
Palomosa | Cecile Believe kicks off Saturday under clear skies
by Marc-Antoine Bernier
The rain had just stopped when Cecile Believe took to the stage at Parc-Jean-Drapeau’s Fizz stage. The first artist to perform on Saturday afternoon, she transformed the lingering humidity into a moment of pop and electro communion.
At 4:15 p.m., as the clouds were just beginning to clear, Cecile Believe kicked off the Fizz stage lineup at the Palomosa festival. Known to the general public for her work with SOPHIE on Oil Of Every Pearl’s Uninsides, the Montreal artist gave a performance that showcased the full range of her voice, capable of navigating between power and fragility, with flashes of vulnerability that touched the heart.
The first few songs, including a recent collaboration with Daniel Avery and Andy Bell (Ride, Oasis), plunged the audience into an ethereal atmosphere, supported by dream pop layers and haunting vocals. The crowd was quickly swept away: on Ponytail, fans sang along in unison, their faces lit up with emotion.
The highlight came with “Blink Twice”, the title track from his latest EP Tender The Spark, released in 2024. Between midtempo basslines and nocturnal beats, the track electrified the crowd, who moved fervently to the music. Later, “Bitch Bites Dog”, taken from Plucking A Cherry From The Void, brought back a visceral intensity, before the conclusion came with “Show Me What”, produced by A. G. Cook, leaving the audience feeling light and transported.
In a minimalist setting bathed in red, Cecile Believe needed nothing more than her voice and her generous stage presence to captivate the audience. Her performance was a reminder of why she already occupies a unique place in today’s electronic pop scene, even if she has yet to be discovered by a wider audience.
Palomosa | After party at SAT, closing with Fcuckers DJ set under the dome
by Léa Dieghi
On Friday evening, the Satosphere vibrated to the beats of Fcuckers, who delivered a two-hour DJ set after performing as a band at Jean-Drapeau Park. House music unfolded in a myriad of sonic colors. Between abstract projections by SAT VJs and the duo’s unpredictable soundscapes, the Palomosa afterparty offered us an experience worthy of a major New York club.
From the very first minutes, with four hands activated on the C’DJs, the tone was set: tonight would be house music, danceable and joyful. Accompanied by projections that morphed from purple clouds to abstract textures, the DJ set glided from the sweatiest house to more tech house bursts, almost reaching the frenzy of drum ‘n’ bass.
The entire room seemed to mold itself to their movements: sweaty bodies, rhythms that literally stuck to our skin, breathing that quickened with each break. At times, the humidity became almost too tangible, especially when a spectator/dancer accidentally brushed against my body and his sweat landed on my arm: an uncomfortable detail, but one that revealed the intensity of a space where personal boundaries disappear.
« Le son à la SAT, c’est autre chose », glissait dans le creux de mon oreille mon ami, pas mal conquis par la performance. Effectivement, une des grandes qualités du Dôme, avec les bons artistes, c’est de nous offrir une spatialité unique avec des basses enveloppantes, des aigus limpides, et un environnement visuel qui amplifie chaque sonorités.
Remixing house music classics for two hours, such as Basement Jaxx, Fatima Yamaha (“What’s a girl to do”), and ending with Orbital’s famous track “Halcyon and on and on”, the end had a bittersweet taste: a feeling torn between appreciation for the DJ set they gave us and disappointment that it only lasted two hours. We would have kept going all night, until dawn broke.
Between their four hands, they seem to have transformed house music into living matter: like a moist, purple wave that continues to vibrate long after the last note has faded away. It was FCUCKERS DJing, and it was a night filled with dancing, smiles, and beautiful memories.
“Early Life Crisis” flashed on the screen. A manic mixture of disorder and awe gripped the crowd. Already, dozens of people were practically running out of the show. The die hard cult following, being guided by a “pit crew,” had already formed a circle pit. At this point, barely a minute into the set, it was Nettspend’s night.
He ran out onto an elevated platform fueled with rage and euphoria as the crowd lost their minds. The pit closed, Nettspend yelled into the microphone, the great wait was over.
“I just threw up.”
No one heard, all hell had broken loose over the distorted Cloud rap. After a moment he recovered and his erratic stage presence grew larger than life as the night went on. His movements were unpredictable as if he was in daze and life was flashing in front of his eyes. One moment he was calmly bending the air with his hand, the next he was running across the stage yelling. The physical performance preceded all musicality and no one cared, it wasn’t about following the song anymore but rather about nourishing an aura.
At just 18, his personality is enough to command the crowd’s attention. As a fashion forward internet celebrity, Nettspend brought together an interesting crowd. Some had come for the same reasons they would go to a Travis Scott concert, the cathartic expression of violence, while others in the back seemed to appreciate the larger than life persona which he has created for himself, similar to Yung Lean’s magnetic charisma.The songs went by extremely quickly, like a heavy storm cloud that leaves the skies blue afterwards. While his music had harsh tones similar to Carti’s Red album, there was still a sense of euphoria in the almost humorous excess of sound. When the crowd dispersed, everyone was smiling. It was an energizing set.
30 minutes before the show even started, people packed themselves to the front, and in the back of my mind was the question of how such a notorious figure could live up to the hype. Suddenly everything went dark and out came M.I.A., effortlessly bold, with a stern look in her eyes as if she was about to shake up a revolution. My question was answered.
Smoke machines exploded to the beat of “Boyz” and she started rapping in her classic tone, a slight grin across her face. Her performance was as if you’d taken her right out of her music videos from 2005. She danced with swagger, a shameless sensuality and a confrontational presence that made us realize just how much she meant what she was saying.
There was not one dull moment. Playing her early classics, she had the whole crowd singing her lyrics in superstar fashion. From her albums Arular and Kala to the edgier “Born Free” song, sampled from a Suicide’s Ghost Rider. She chronologically covered her entire early discography,
*even playing an alternate version of Galang from the Piracy Funds Terrorismtape. It refreshed the crowd and proved the timeliness of her work as she passionately delivered songs from an album dated 20 years ago.
Between this, the dancers, the smoke and the all-out silver attire, it was “pop” at its best and existed apart from everything we had just seen. While the previous acts like The Hellp and MGNA Crrrtareferenced 2000s American pop music in hyperpop fashion, M.I.A. was the real deal. It felt like going back to the source, and solidified the idea that her career had, in fact, been a cataclysm leading us all to this point.
As an outspoken Sri Lankan-born refugee, her identity intrinsically challenged stereotypes and conventions amid post 9-11 United States. She was an underdog, a rebel, and an inspiration to the youth like me for a change in the culture. This is why her intervention, nearing the end of the show, still reverberates strongly and sparked heated conversations, though not in the way we would have expected.
While most other artists held complete silence about global issues, the controversies surrounding M.I.A. are too blatant to ignore, and the crowd pressed her regarding the genocide happening in Palestine. If anyone was going to address this ongoing crisis, it was her.
As the music stopped briefly, she jumped into the conversation and told the DJ to pause: “I was cancelled fivetimes” she replied. We were on the edge of our seats.
“Last year they cancelled me for supporting Trump.” What?
This began a somewhat confusing debate with the crowd, and after chants saying “Fuck Donald Trump,” she retracted her statement, saying she never supported any politicians.
Perplexed, we listened and she performed the next song wearing a Keffiyehin solidarity with the Palestinian cause.
In the end, her message was positive, explaining that envisioning a liberated future was the first step to achieving it. But in the ensuing conversations after the show, there was still a general confusion about her position and engaging in her vague rhetoric about serious issues just caused further suspicion and debate, which might just be her objective. Who knows.
But the real question is, what happened to M.I.A.?
Throughout the show, she herself alluded to this change. “I’m not the same M.I.A. you knew” and “It’s harder for a bad bitch to be good than a good bitch to be bad.”
She mentioned how talking about some things was “dangerous,” alluding to a form of censorship which she has extensively dealt with in the past, having been accused of supporting terrorists when talking about the Tamilpeople’s struggle in Sri Lanka. Because of this and other controversies, her social accounts were being blocked, for years her albums were not being released, and she was refused access to the US to see her child, the reason for which she claims was calling for a cease-fire in 2024.
Publicité panam
Palomosa | Double Dose of MCR-T
by Julius Cesaratto
The Ultras, as MCR-T affectionately calls his fans, came prepared for a double dose of debauchery: a prime festival slot at Parc Jean-Drapeau followed by late-night afters at the Société des Arts Technologiques. Packed in shoulder to shoulder around the 360-degree Jardin stage, just a stone’s throw from Calder’s iconic Place de l’Homme statue, dressed in their finest candy-kid rave outfits, Y2K and indie-sleaze looks, the crowd of youngsters was eager for the sesh to start. Behind the CDJs, it was a full-blown Live From Earth family gathering, with fellow members of the collective in attendance to support.
West Berlin born and bred, MCR-T has built his reputation as a rapping, singing, producing, and DJing powerhouse. This unorthodox approach to techno has made him stand out, as he has become fairly known to sing and rap live during his sets. From start to finish, he served non-stop club bangers, with his signature ghetto tech sound – cartoonish samples, cheeky vocals, and a club-ready bounce that had the floor in upheaval. Anthems like My Boo, My Bae, My Baddie and fan-favorite singalongs like My Barn, My Rules had the crowd singing along to every word, while his flip of iconic dance tune Better Off Alone sent the dancefloor into a frenzy. Acting as his own hype man, he worked the mic with charisma, hyping and bantering between shots of liquor, whom he shared with LFE family & ultras alike. At one point, he hopped up onto the speakers to sing along to Up and Down, driving the crowd wild. Billows of smoke poured out from the booth, making him disappear right before breaking into live vocal renditions of his breakout tracks Careless Whisper and off his most recent album Not The Same. He then wrapped up his outdoor set by literally leaping straight into the gabber madness of his collaborative single Buurman uit Berlin, jumping into a mosh pit he himself instigated.
If the Jardin stage set was a candy-colored carnival, SAT’s main room plunged us into something entirely different — dark, sweaty, and relentless. With support from fellow Live From Earth With support from fellow Live From Earth artists MRD and TDJ, MCR-T went back-to-back with MRD, cranking up the BPM into hard trance and industrial basslines, at times punctuated by jungle interludes. MRD jumped on the mic for live vocals, dropping cheeky mashups like Meet Her at the Love Parade blended with Fergie’s My Humps. TDJ added her touch to the performance with angelic vocals. Between the pounding kicks and playful curveball selections (We Like to Party by Vengaboys & MCR-T rapping over Scatman), the night became a playful blend of nostalgia, improvised collaboration & plain old fun.
By the time the sweat-drenched crowd spilled out of the venue, there was no doubt: MCR-T was the man of the night. Backed by MRD and TDJ, he turned the booth into a family affair, channeling Berlin’s rave energy into a younger Montreal crowd that gave it right back — a set equal parts cheeky, chaotic, and euphoric.
Why devote a Saturday night in Montreal to Arca, the highlight of the Palomosa festival? Because Alejandra Ghersi Rodriguez had never been to Montreal before, and because this transgender artist is, in my opinion, the most significant game changer in electronic music on such a large scale. Since her emergence in 2012, when she joined Björk’s extended family and began her transition to non-binary, we’ve been swooning.
What we did on Saturday!
Kicking off with a resounding TABARNAK!, a swear word learned on the spot, Saturday’s performance was not a succinct summary of Arca’s work, but rather a major warrior use of her ammunition. That said, there were plenty of idiosyncratic sequences on offer to delight and contemplate the music of this gifted artist, served up by an exemplary sound system that highlighted the excellence of his mixes, imagined here and now.
Highly percussive, with a relentless succession of breakbeats and Afro-Latin polyrhythms including a burst of Brazilian samba, this 60-minute set was also interspersed with carefully selected pop references, vocal harangues, chanted words, and outright rap, also those climaxes punctuated by violent explosions, bursts of noise that normally have nothing to do with the accepted codes of pop culture.
Unlike most artists of similar renown, Arca does not construct his music around song-like forms (intro, chorus, bridge, chorus); melodic elements are scattered here and there, either as one element among others, without dominating the composition.
Although more accessible in front of an audience than in the studio, Arca does not subscribe to the codes of the dance floor either, excluding those covers topped with a return to big beat. Arca is more of a hybrid creature in every respect, making people dance a little but demanding attentive listening, which is not easy for the generation that has come to meet her. We are talking here about a true conceptual feat, nothing less.
The solo albums by the Venezuelan artist (who moved to Europe at the start of her career) have left a lasting impression, far beyond the circles of insiders who attend niche festivals such as Mutek and Akousma and who normally pushes back the mainstream press in its mainstream conservatism.
In fact, truly innovative creators who are capable of captivating mass audiences, who are normally fond of more conventional music and very difficult to win over, are very rare.
Electronic music is no exception to redundancy and predictability, but fortunately, there are times when someone like Arca emerges to captivate a wide audience while shaking things up. And, above all, elevating them with his innovative creativity.
There’s something to be said for music that makes you feel hot. When the right combination of saucy bass, club floor drums, and breathy vocals comes together, you can almost shut your eyes and pretend you’ve been admitted to Berghain or have found your way into New York’s most exclusive speakeasy.
Such is the case for NYC electronic band Fcukers, who, despite having meteoric success that can only be the result of intense musical nepotism, also deserve every packed dancefloor they play. The band, fronted by vocalist Shannon Wise and now playing as a four-piece with live drums, bass, and scratch-record backing, opened their Palomosa set with the modern classic “Homie Don’t Shake,” which elicited a raucous cheer from the steadily growing sunset crowd.
While I was initially set on being near the front for this show, my friends and I were soon sent to the back thanks to a truly horrible stage mix. But once we were a little closer to the board and could hear something other than eardrum-crushing kick drum, it was a joy, as always, to watch this sleazy, slinky group strut across the stage. Though their catalogue hasn’t changed much since I discovered them at Osheaga last year, it was hard not to dance anyway to tracks like “Bon Bon,” “Tommy,” and the newly released “Play Me.” Frankly, each of these songs is a vapid, drug-addled ode to nothing, but the raw energy and undeniable cool factor of Fcukers means they’ll continue to be one of my first choices when I secure the aux at a party.
The Hellp, a Los Angeles electro hyperpunk duo made up of Noah Dillon and Chandler Lucy, dressed in tight leather jackets, short-long, greasy hair and Oakley shades, looked like they were about to front a sleazy Oasis or a Julian Casablancas tribute as they pranced onto the main Fizz Stage. Although one of them manned the synth and sampler while sporting a Blink 182 T-shirt while the other leaned on the microphone stand and twisted a few nobs on his vocal effects pedal, letting out a chaotic “WOOOO.”
The Hellp’s stage presence was one of indie sleeze indifference, like they were too cool to be there, and it works for them. As they lay into some hazy hyper pop punk (kind of in the same vein as Suicide, but from Gen Z), the crowd loses their collective shit. I loved how Lucy consistently popped cigarettes into his mouth while messing with the sampler and forgetting to light it. They only played for an hour, but he must have smoked three, as the clouds of smoke dissipated under the fog machines. The one song I recognized was “Colorado,” an absolute catchy banger live with its slacker rock guitar sample, and they played it half way.
Later on in the set, they dove into a newer one, which I believe was called “Riviera” (noted by the orange backdrop and the word in Helvetica) twice. The first time apparently was off time, and Dillon wasn’t going to have that. I have a friend who loves The Hellp and plays the latest album, LL, quite frequently, and it’s good, but until seeing them live, I never really understood the main appeal. Now I can say I, too, am “feeling Colorado.”
We were transported to the wacky years of the 2010s as MGNA Crrrta, a trashy electro girl dance pop duo from New York, took the stage to open the main Fizz Stage at Palomosa. The sound person was having a bit of trouble with the mix as the vocals were extremely quiet, competing with a wall of inexplicable bass. This went on for half of the set. But both singers/ DJs, Farheen Khan and Ginger Scott, didn’t seem phased as they blasted on through as song like “I.C.F.U.H,” an acronym that appeared multiple times on the visual backdrop. Listening to the lyrics, you deciper that it stands for “I Can Fuck You Hard,” which also happens to be the name of the duos website.
This trashy and sleazy energy permeated through MGNA Crrrta’s set and the visuals, sporadic epilepsy-inducing flashes of gaudy mansions or the duo smoking weed on bridges, matched the tone. For my personal taste, many of the songs were pretty one-note, but they had a lot of energy and, for the last few songs, bubble guns. They were a fine opener to Palomoa’s main stage shenanigans.
Palomosa | Y2K, Afrobeats, and pouring rain: TALLANDSKIINNY’s trance
by Félicité Couëlle-Brunet
It’s always exciting to walk through the subway and catch a glimpse of the hurried figures heading in the same direction, the yellow line on the way to Jean-Drapeau Park. You can already feel the adrenaline rising: tonight, it’s really happening. Palomosa is that other moment in time when the city transforms into an open-air dance floor.
Thursday night, the sky was rather overcast… the rain made a comeback as a special guest. Far from dampening the crowd’s spirits, it made the experience even more vibrant. Under the pouring rain, Tallandskiinny churned out house beats, afrobeats, hip-hop, baile funk, dancehall, and more, guiding the crowd toward the stage where her universe was unleashed.
Her set was a journey. Between Y2K nostalgia and the burning grooves of Afrobeats, SKIINNY imposed her presence with contagious energy. She mixes as if she were among us, on the artificial turf dance floor, dancing without restraint.
Each track becomes a bridge to a memory, an era, a community. More than a style, her music exudes a movement, a way of life. When Rihanna resonated, then System of a Down, the effect was striking: like a leap back in time, but reinvented in the present. A shared memory, remixed with passion and audacity.
In the intimacy shared with the audience, her clear intention was evident: to make people dance, always. And that evening, the mission was accomplished. Under the pouring rain, bodies moved closer together, smiles lit up, and the space was transformed into a collective celebration, electrified by TALLANDSKIINNY’s daring selections.
Palomosa thus kicked off its first anniversary. With her behind the turntables, it felt like we were witnessing a birth, that of a movement ready to grow.
