Slowly but surely, ever since I discovered a love for electronic dance music, I’ve travelled the globe searching for musical experiences to enhance my knowledge and interest in the scene. Spain’s underground music and art driven festival Sonar was one that hadn’t made the list …until now. In 2010, the year I turn 30 years old (yikes!), it was decided: I would go. And I would embrace every little part of it.

The Sonar Experience – to be frank, I had no freaking idea of what I was going to before I arrived. I mean, there’s music festivals, and then there’s Sonar. I was filled with nervous anticipation of what was about to unfold for the next three days. Well, music, art, and culture – that’s what I was in for.

Broken into ‘By Day’ and ‘By Night’, Sonar 2010, as I was to discover, is a spectacular display of music, arts, sounds, industry know-how and film, all with a Spanish flavour. Each year, it fills its line-up with artists from all over the world yet with a focus on local Spanish talent. This year’s showcased many Spanish artists/DJs alongside artists from 24 countries including the UK, Italy, Japan, USA, Canada, Portugal, France, Venezuela, Austria, Switzerland and Australia.

The music on offer was so diverse it was hard to comprehend, ranging from dubstep, hip hop, ambient, house, techno, experimental…and some I don’t even know how to categorise! Extremely well organised and laid-out, I was impressed by how the event was run and how easy it was to do, well, anything. Throw in beautiful weather for the whole event, except for a splash of rain on the last day of Sonar By Day, and all in all, it was a fantastic time.

The event is held in several locations, namely within the confines of the Museum of Contemporary Art in the Barcelona city centre for Sonar By Day (think modern vs. traditional architecture), and an impressive huge warehouse-style venue on the outskirts of Barcelona for Sonar By Night. This seemed to work extremely well, with tickets available for a multitude of combinations, including only By Day, only By Night, combo of both or single day visits.

In addition to all the madness of the festival, numerous clubs in Barcelona hold specific Sonar parties with international DJs who don’t appear at Sonar. For the industry, there are quite a few private parties as well, held across the city at exclusive hotels, villas and the intimate venues. To be honest, it can be quite overwhelming in choice for the first-time visitor to Sonar, as you really can’t be everywhere (or find the energy to do so!).

Sonar By Day was a fantastic opportunity to relax, absorb and open your mind to new sounds and arts, and possibly meet new people along the way. I saw so many artists here: Vidal Romero & Manu Gonzalez, Professor Green, Pete Tong, Lartytta, Robot Koch, Jimi Tenor & Kabu Kabu, Moodymann and more in passing. As I said, there was a lot on, sometimes it was a little difficult to keep track of who was who!

Some standouts were Tufan Demr with his glitchy, glittering grooves and Australia’s own Sui Zhen with her solo guitar performance. New Young Pony Club were big winners, along with David M, Professor Green, Moodymann and of course, Pete Tong. I was introduced to the sounds of bRUNA by my Spanish friends and his sound was dark, deep and menancing.

Sonar isn’t only about the music – multimedia and visual arts are of high importance as well. There was an exhibition on show on robotics, featuring robotic dogs, a robotic chair that fell apart by itself and came back together again, and some other amazing things, made by artists from all over the world. Definitely well worth the look with beer in hand. Did I mention how cheap the beer is?

There was also a trade show on the latest equipment for DJs/producers, and an area to watch some of this equipment being used by one of the visiting DJs/producers with cameras to see it in action. Many people were quite interested in this and made themselves comfortable as they watched on with much enthusiasm.

The highlight of the whole festival for me was the first night of Sonar By Night. Hot Chip and Plastikman were amazing. There wasn’t a spare space in the area. It was absolutely jam-packed, an unbelievable sight. Hot Chip worked their live magic, playing all their tracks while the crowd eagerly sang along. Plastikman needs no explanation – it’s Richie Hawtin, nothing else to say really! That same night, Magda played driving, furious German techno, while 2manyDJs were mashing it up in their signature style. Air were great to see live, while I squeezed a snippet of LCD Soundsystem and it was going off as well.

The second night of Sonar By Night wasn’t as much of a drawcard as the previous night. It never got jam-packed and there wasn’t the same vibe as the night before. The night before was alive. Due to exhaustion, I only stayed a few hours, but during that time I saw blasts from the past, Roxy Music, which was a lot of fun. The rest of the artists I saw I couldn’t get into, particularly Dizzee Rascal, though many there were pumped to see him.

On one of my side adventures, I was able to attend an awesome beachside party at an exclusive hotel where I could see some great talent including Munich’s Gregor Tresher and live sets from Jihael Mackson and Einmusik. Tresher played a really cool techno sound, one I’d love to hear more of.

One thing I just love about going to music festivals in Europe is how cheap the drinks are and how great the food options. At Sonar, forget the doner kebab and dim sims we get here in Melbourne. No, the Spanish serve up beautiful baguettes, sushi, proper hot dogs, crepes and fries and yummy European mayo. Wash it all down with a glass of Sangria and I’m one happy festival-goer!

All in all, Sonar was definitely like no other festival I have been to before. It was brilliant fun, eye-opening, intriguing, interesting and one of the best experiences ever. Now that I understand how it all works, I would love to go again and enjoy more of what was on offer.