Backstage Vibes at AVA Festival 2023

AVA Festival demonstrated why it has quickly become one of the jewels in the European electronic music calendar. What began in Belfast as a love letter to rave culture has evolved into a pilgrimage for dance music fans from across the continent. This year? The future of electronic music captured the pulse of the past, all under one Belfast sky.

From the moment the gates opened, the site crackled with energy. The gates were filled with people trying to get in, and the air hummed with a mad sense of anticipation. Yet the real standout of this year’s festival wasn’t just the stacked lineup, though that helped. It was the perfect cross-fade of hometown heroes and global game-changers. British rappers took the stage with fire and finesse, while deep tech heavyweights mesmerized bodies into motion from all corners of the dancefloor.

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AVA is gritty and glamorous, DIY and high-definition. One moment, you’re smack in the middle of a sweaty, grimy crowd echoing the shouts of a Belfast-born DJ playing hometown anthems, and the next, you’re in a sea of synths from a DJ born in Berlin, playing tunes that sound like they’ve warped through time to reach you.

Photographer Suie Ann Le was quick on the draw. From behind the scenes to the side stage to literally everywhere in between, she caught the pulse of the festival not just the artist lost in their sets, but the micro moments: A quiet glance between bandmates before they hit the stage, a fan wiping happy tears from their cheeks mid-song, a light show painting the sky just as night cracked open.

And the music was the magnet, but the people were the soul. You could feel it in the sweat-soaked tolerance in stranger hugs, the echoes of late-night laughs from the Slipways. In a time when connection can feel farther away than ever, AVA brought people together in the most human way possible: with rhythm, joy, and collective movement. As the last track faded away and the crowd gave one more holler, Belfast didn’t seem like a city at all. It was as if it were the center of the universe, at least for that one beautiful weekend.