Toronto’s Downsview Park stood amongst tall amongst the giants of North America’s dance music circuit final weekend as VELD returned with a competition engineered for peak summer time depth.
Over three cloudless days, the competition welcomed tens of 1000’s to a city-sized celebration of digital dance music, the place towering LED phases, a glowing Ferris wheel,and nightly drone reveals reworked the Toronto skyline right into a gleaming extension of the sound.
For its 2025 version, VELD leaned additional into manufacturing scale. The Fundamental Stage served because the competition’s visible anchor, drawing followers for marquee performances from Alesso, deadmau5 and extra. The Bass Stage, in distinction, delivered chest-rattling sonics to a faithful headbanger crowd. And Sirkus, draped in a mixture of circus whimsy and techno grit, supplied a sanctuary for these drawn to the sounds of the underground.
Opening day set the tone early. Canadian duo Loud Luxurious took the Fundamental Stage with the arrogance of a homecoming, leaning into euphoria earlier than pulling off one of many weekend’s first standout moments by bringing out Natalie Jane for a shock debut of latest collaborative materials. Earlier within the afternoon, the surging TWINSICK duo delivered a equally buoyant, genre-spanning set that primed the early crowd with carefree appeal.
The Bass Stage belonged to heavyweights like Sullivan King, who once more proved himself as one of many few artists able to mixing steel and dubstep with guitar work that supercharged his set. It was certainly one of a number of performances over the weekend to remind audiences that digital music, at its finest, can provide rhythm and spectacle in equal measure.
Saturday introduced with it a distinct type of weight as Dom Dolla, nonetheless within the afterglow of a record-breaking Perry’s Stage efficiency at Lollapalooza two days earlier than, introduced an equally commanding presence to VELD.
Over at Sirkus, Layton Giordani, a member of the EDM.com Class of 2025, carried out a b2b set with techno legend Inexperienced Velvet. Collectively, they threaded darkish, atmospheric builds with percussive fury. Giordani’s smash digital hit “Act of God” grew to become one of many weekend’s sleeper anthems, resurfacing later in John Summit’s Sunday evening set and proving its resonance throughout phases.
That degree of interconnectedness was emblematic of VELD’s 2025’s curation, every stage telling its personal story, however with a shared pulse. On Sunday evening, the weekend reached its inevitable high-stakes closing set with Summit and Excision showing in opposing time slots.
As the ultimate acts took their respective phases, VELD supplied a layer of theatricality as a fleet of drones lit the sky above Downsview Park and The Ferris wheel glowed on the competition’s edge, giving followers a panoramic view of what the weekend had turn into. With eye-popping manufacturing and a imaginative and prescient that feels more and more immersive, the competition continues to develop as a vacation spot on the worldwide summer time calendar.
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