OUR STORY
“And so, although AllSorts Festival would end, Nina and Otto’s pairing would live on through the ages. B2B forever.”
4: The Final Meltdown
The 2025 ‘Unsanctioned Sounds’ festival was proving to be their best yet.
The Vulcan resistance salsa’d across the crater of the Disc-O by day and danced with Mr Scruff by night, fuelled by top-of-the-range Neapolitan style pizzas. On one evening, Otto Funkmeyer was closing his set with Out of Space by The Prodigy. With frantic chopped breaks and a humorous reggae sample pitched up to 147 BPM, it was a direct affront to the state’s mandated four-to-the-floor industrial Vulcan techno.
Suddenly, a harsh noise rose in the distance. It grew into an all-encompassing siren, a flat, unyielding synth stab that drilled straight into the skull. The forest perimeter lit a sickly electric blue as cyborg TechNoFunPol agents burst into the clearing, their helmets emblazoned with the pulsating SYNC button. It was definitely the first time any AllSorts DJ had seen that button illuminated.
Then he appeared. Ripardo Villashlobo slithered from the darkness, pale, plump, and encased in angular metallic uniform. Completely butters from head to toe. His eyes swept the crowd with cold contempt as he slammed the SYNC button printed on his forehead. The searing synth swelled, overwhelming The Prodigy and dragging it down to the state mandated 128.2045 BPM.
“Musical frequency has been returned to its mandated standard,” he dribbled. “Where are the architects of this chaos?”
Blinders, ever the protector, stepped forward, allowing Nina and Otto to slip into the trees behind his impossibly large frame. A specialised unit surrounded him, armed with a beaded, bone-dry probe. They toppled his enormous chassis onto all fours. Since Blinders habitually wore his loose sweatpants around his knees, the anal probe was deployed with relative ease by the cyborg agent, connecting a shrieking Blinders to the ship’s neural network. Now with access to all his memories, the regime knew its targets were the same rebels who had opened the first portal eons ago: Nina Boogie and Otto Funkmeyer.
The TechNoFunPol rounded up the rest of the resistance and paraded them back to the presidential palace. Hidden deep in the forests, Nina and Otto plotted their next move. How could they end the regime once and for all?
July 25th would be National Vulcan Day, marked by the ceremonial Metallic Military March. Each year, hordes of regime cronies and brainwashed masses paraded in chrome, steel, and Vulcanite, celebrating conformity under Villashlobo’s watchful eye. Nina and Otto realised that if they laid low until the march, they could slip into the palace disguised among the metallic masses.
Scavenging the crash site and woodland, they pieced together makeshift ceremonial uniforms from scraps of silver, twisted metal, and remnants of the old “Undercover Ravers vs Alien Surveillance” theme. A theme everyone had agreed was crystal clear and self-explanatory.
The day came: Earth date July 25th, 2026. The Vulcanize air pulsed with forced celebration. Through the streets of the city, thousands marched as one, creating a vision of shimmering silver as far as the eye could see. In their disguises, Nina and Otto fell into step. But as they reached the palace gates, their hearts froze. Mounted high above the entrance was a gruesome trophy. The severed head of Blinders, with one eye twitching, mouth agape, and a Cigloo ciggie behind the ear, drooling down the stake. A cruel warning to all those who defied using SYNC.
Fortunately, the pair passed through the palace gates undetected, slipping through a side door once inside. Wandering the corridors, they began to hear a faint, impossible sound. Soft vocals, a forbidden melody… They followed the noise until it was unmistakable: an ultra-rare version of S&M by Rihanna, featuring a Britney Spears verse.
They kicked open the door.
There, hunched over a dusty record player, sat Ripardo Villashlobo, fat, wretched, and sobbing into a #FreeBritney handkerchief.
He jumped, eyes wide with terror, the record scratching to a stop. “No! Don’t look at me! I’m disgusting!”
His rage hadn’t been fuelled by conformity or industrial techno at all. He was just a desperate, repressed pop princess, trapped in the cruel regime inherited from previous tyrannical generations.
“We can help you, Ripardo,” cried Otto. “Tell us how to end this.”
“The Master Sync Button,” Villashlobo sobbed. “It’s at the base of the central tower. Disable that, and you have a chance, but you’ll need my fingerprint.”
Without hesitation, Nina lobbed off his hand with her bionic leg, leaving the plump dictator wailing on the floor. They sprinted to the tower, pressed Villashlobo’s Richmond-sausage finger to the panel, and burst inside. At the centre pulsed the Master Sync Button, red and bulbous like a bath tub testiclé, a glowing relic that had ruined generations of music.
Nina pummelled it hard and firm.
Instantly, the 128.2045 BPM rhythm drifted out of phase. The clanging mix caused an immediate, catastrophic feedback loop in the brain-linked helmets of the TechNoFunPol agents. Their SYNC buttons glitched and sputtered out as the helmets imploded, exploding brain matter across the palace walls. Brain matter confetti that spelled freedom.
Vulcan prisoners poured from their cells. Ripardo Villashlobo, finally free to embrace the George Michael fanboy within, stood beside Nina and Otto, weeping with joy.
Otto slid his USB into the master transmitter and blasted Dr Pressure through the system. The iconic noughties mash-up tore open the sky above the palace, reopening the shimmering portal to the lush grass of Malvern, Worcestershire.
Vulcanize was saved. Festival-goers could finally move freely between Earth and Vulcanize, ensuring a true celebration of AllSorts of Tunes, free from musical snobbery forever.
And what of Nina Boogie and Otto Funkmeyer? They had found their true destiny. Not as washed-up, 30-something schmucks, but as cosmic liberators.
And so, although AllSorts Festival would end, Nina and Otto’s pairing would live on through the ages. B2B forever.
The End
3: Unsanctioned Sounds
The Disc-O was searing through space, packed full of nitty Earthlings and celestial vagabonds Nina Boogie and Otto Funkmeyer had swept up along the way. The journey would be long, just under two Earth years. The vessel’s dashboard, a re-purposed CDJ-2000 screen, stated their estimated arrival time: July 24th, 2025. The journey forced a much-needed break in the annual frequency of Nina and Otto’s beloved festival.
The closing moments of their voyage, The Disc Odyssey, had been spectacular. Memories of Laurence Guy glued to the decks, Hamdi shattering the Melting Pot roof with unreleased Skrillex, and Still Pigeon popping AllSorts’ live music cherry. The fire maze blazed, the athletes roared, the atmosphere soared and all worries of Vulcanize disappeared.
That was, until the scarlet red, dusty giant came leering into view.
They felt it before they saw it. Vulcanice, the sonic hellscape. The unmistakable thump of government-mandated industrial vulcanized techno at precisely 128.2045 BPM shook the very foundations of the Disc-O, piercing fear into the hearts of the innocent little Earthlings. Having spent their time aboard with AllSorts of tunes: disco, dubstep, electro, indie rock, medieval melodies and pop princess anthems, nothing could prepare them for the imminent shift from musical utopia to dystopia. Why had they followed and trusted this pair of washed-up shmucks in their late 20s, long past their prime?
All those they loved on Vulcanize needed salvation from the TechNoFunPol unit. They must bring word of the musical promised land they had discovered. Nina ran her fingers across her thigh, gently brushing the seam between flesh and machine, a daily reminder of the cruelty of the regime.
As she quickly withdrew her hand, she knocked a fresh Mazzy all over the control panels. One spill too many for the CDJ-2000 screen. The 93% alcohol content instantly fried it as she cursed Pioneer’s build quality. The Disc-O spiralled out of control as Slipknot’s seminal ‘Duality’ rang out as the critical warning alarm. Earthlings and vagabonds scrambled over one another as Otto grappled with the controls. He aimed for the remote forests of Vulcanize, the heartland of the rave resistance, where detection was less likely. Although appearing chubby, weak and pale, his fingers were strong and delicate after years on the knobs, and he had some success in redirecting the damaged vessel.
Impact. Nina and Otto were thrown from the ship, their human companions scattered, limp, across the crash site. One by one, they hauled themselves to their knees, they were alive.
The scene was apocalyptic. The dust thrown up by the crash was illuminated ominously by the red Vulcanize sun and the burning embers of the decimated remains of the Disc-O. It reminded Otto of the smoke machines they had on the Disc Odyssey. Nina and Otto shared a knowing look. Had they been detected by Villashlobo and the TechNoFunPol unit?
A noise from the woods, something lurking. Nina froze, memories of fleeing the tyrants through these very same trees traumatised her. It must be the TechNoFunPol, this was it, it was over. They and their Earthling companions would rot in Villashlobo’s jail for the rest of their lives. They put their hands in the air.
(Translated from Vulcan)
“Nina fuckin’ Boogie!”, boomed a voice.
An enormously gigantic figure looking worse for wear emerged from the darkness, squinting, clearly fresh from an afters. IT was Blinders. Blinders had rescued Nina when she was shot by the TechNoFunPol unit, operating on her leg, nursing her to health and going on to support her DJ career. Here he was to save the AllSorts crew once again.
Vulcans piled out of the woodland one by one from behind Blinders’ substantial frame. A cheeky grin emerged on Otto’s face, connected again to those important to him, he launched into tales, bursting with an insatiable desire to share the musical freedom on offer in the rest of the Universe. As the Vulcans and Earthlings mingled and shared festival fables, they came to the realisation that they all wanted the same thing. Why let a little thing like impending doom ruin a good time?
Nina scrambled back and hysterically rifled through the wreckage, tossing aside smashed pint glasses, warped records, and stage fragments as she searched for something. “Aha!” she shouted, yanking out a pair of functioning speakers. They hastily cobbled together a modest rig and a makeshift stage. Amongst the eery red light illuminating the smoke, the Vulcans and the Earthlings congregated, they knew it was a matter of time before the TechNoFulPol raided the site. Otto stepped up to the decks and pressed play. The stage was set to unleash…
Unsanctioned Sounds.
2: The Disc Odyssey
As the dust settled on the grassy hills of Malvern, Worcestershire, planet Earth, Nina and Otto reflected upon the Emancipation Celebration. All that remained from the blissful weekend were some scattered cigarette butts and transient memories made with their new human companions. Never before had they enjoyed such musical freedom, living their wildest dreams, indulging in every genre conceivable.
Despite this nostalgic euphoria, an unshakeable feeling gnawed in the back of their minds. It was the aching desire to share this new world with their musically oppressed compatriots on Vulcanize, still living under the cruel Villashlobo regime, unable to escape. Fear washed over them as their own memories of the TechNoFunPol Unit surfaced. Nina and Otto had escaped the regime through the portal, but many remained trapped in that brutal world of audial homogeneity.
Springing off the luscious grass on which they sat, the pair dashed directly to where the portal had formed, intending to transport back to Vulcanize and gather their new rave resistance. To their horror, it was no more. Underneath where the rift of spacetime had floated was a geometric maze charred into the grass. Ripardo Villashlobo, and his TechNoFunPol cronies, had found a way to close it from Vulcanize. Nina and Otto’s alien hairs stood on end; not only were the remaining Vulcans trapped, but their own escape had been discovered… It was going to be more difficult than they had hoped.
Without the original route back to Vulcanize, Nina and Otto had to get inventive. They began to collect things from around the festival site. Scrap metal, abandoned flare trousers, remnants of the Melting Pot stage, half eaten samosas, engines from abandoned farming equipment, an abundance of sofa cushions… Emulating the birth of Frankenstein’s monster, they crafted a rudimentary UFO. One, they hoped, which would take them on a voyage through space.
The voyage would take months, perhaps until late August, and would be highly dangerous. It would be their most expensive endeavour to date, due to the cost of constructing their spaceship and the gut-wrenching state of inflation on Earth. Nevertheless Nina and Otto ploughed on, day and night. Taught by her father, Nina led the engineering of the vessel and the propulsion design. Otto, who couldn’t change a lightbulb back on Vulcanize, put his exceptional DJ set preparation skills to good use, planning their route through the universe. To refuel, they would need to stop at inhabited planets along the way. Delicious local Malvern ale would make a good trade for fuel, eclectic celestial tunes and decorative items.
After several months, their ship was finally complete. She was an astounding creation, standing proud in the centre of the festival site, her otherworldliness juxtaposed with the fields of wild grass and unripe corn in the Malvern countryside. Fashioned aerodynamically, she resembled the nostalgic shape of a vinyl record upon which they learned their craft. The propellent comprised of diesel and leftover Mazzy, a concoction explosive enough to enter orbit and comatose a human. They stood back and stared. She was perfect, and at first light, she would carry them through the cosmos.
The Earth’s only sun rose over the rolling hills of Malvern. It was launch day. The time had come to name their shimmering voyager. As an homage to her form, and the best genre in the universe, they christened their creation…
The Disc-O.
As they boarded the Disc-O they looked back over the festival site and knew they would soon return. If their odyssey was successful, they would be accompanied with an army of eccentric Vulcan partiers, ready to do it all again.
1: The emancipation celebration
Nina and Otto spent the first 26 years of their lives in a dystopian mirrored universe on a planet known as Vulcanize. Vulcanize was much the same as Earth, but all forms of creative expression, performance and musical exploration were choked by the harsh dictatorship of the planet’s leader, Ripardo Villashlobo. As his power grew, Villashlobo ruled the land with an increasingly cruel regime of strict musical adherence…
Persistent partying was mandatory, 9 days a week, 17 months a year. Rave law, known as the Den Commandments, stated first and foremost that all audible music must be a single genre – industrial vulcanized techno – played at a speed of 128.2045 beats per minute. Deviating from industrial vulcanized techno at this speed, intentionally or unintentionally, carried the death penalty, and was policed by the infamous TechNoFunPol unit. These laws were Villashlobo’s sadistic way of brainwashing the masses, with industrial vulcanized techno often containing subtle political propaganda while standing as a pumping, bass-rich symbol of oppression.
Nina Boogie was born in the Lochanis woodlands of Vulcanize to parents quietly opposed to the dictatorship. Although they voted Brexit for some reason, Nina’s parents believed in unity, democracy and freedom. One day, when Nina was young, her father dusted off a hidden Childish Gambino single, ‘This is Vulcanize’, to lull Nina to sleep while educating her about the modern world. Suddenly, the door burst open as cyborg agents from the TechNoFunPol unit flooded the room and grabbed Nina’s father, smashing the record player in the process. Nina screamed and ran as fast as she could, deafened by the sound of gunshots behind her. A bullet caught her in the left leg as she fled deep into the woodland. Bleeding, but free from the TechNoFunPol, Nina calmed her panicked breathing. Just as she began to comprehend the loss of her parents and the severity of her injury, a voice trickled through the darkness…
“Come with me.”
Meanwhile, Otto Funkmeyer was living in the largest city on Vulcanize, Dianthus, also born to parents covertly opposing Villashlobo’s regime. As his father and grandfather before him, Otto became a DJ (an honest Vulcan profession) faithfully serving his leader with an extensive collection of Vulcanized techno. But Otto was growing tired of pumping it out day after day, a robotic hamster caught spinning on Villashlobo’s techno wheel. Eventually, as Otto became more experimental with his selection, the TechNoFunPol imprisoned him for 4 weeks for dropping ‘Lady (Hear Me Tonight)’ by Modjo at a government-sponsored club night. He would have been executed on the spot, but he was too mint at mixing. While in jail, Otto befriended a cellmate who had been arrested several times campaigning against the regime. He realised that she shared his passion for music and his resentment of Villashlobo… An orphan from the countryside, with a funk obsession and a bionic leg…
Nina and Otto, now bound by the same addiction to AllSorts of tunes, began hosting illegal raves in the Vulcanize woodlands. In radar blind spots where Villashlobo’s forces would struggle to locate them, the pair would set up speakers, a bar, some decks, and play to their hearts’ content. Unfortunately, threats of TechNoFunPol raids often ended the raves early, despite their increasing popularity. All Nina and Otto dreamed of was the freedom to play anything and everything, with no restrictions whatsoever…
At one such rave, with the early morning sun breaking through the trees, Nina and Otto were mixing B2B under their Glissando pseudonyms. Nina mixed in ‘Lola’s Theme’ by the Shapeshifters, then drove the effects as Otto took over. Seamlessly, he mixed in ‘Night’ by Benga & Coki, creating a unique marriage of two completely different, illegal tunes… The mix was timed to perfection, and Nina was simultaneously injecting a balanced blend of 3/4 beat echo plus dry/wet knob fluctuation. It was so fire that a blinding light appeared, followed by a deafening sound – they had opened a portal. Fed up with the dictatorship, and without second thought, they both dived through it. Unsure how much time had passed or what had just happened to them, Nina and Otto found themselves lying on luscious grass, alone, in a mysterious new world.
They slowly got up and looked around, spotting a large sign in front of them…
‘Malvern, Worcestershire’.
And so AllSorts Festival was born, an ecstatic celebration of their new lives in the utopic musical melting pot of Planet Earth.
“And so, although AllSorts Festival would end, Nina and Otto’s pairing would live on through the ages. B2B forever.”
4: The Final Meltdown
The 2025 ‘Unsanctioned Sounds’ festival was proving to be their best yet.
The Vulcan resistance salsa’d across the crater of the Disc-O by day and danced with Mr Scruff by night, fuelled by top-of-the-range Neapolitan style pizzas. On one evening, Otto Funkmeyer was closing his set with Out of Space by The Prodigy. With frantic chopped breaks and a humorous reggae sample pitched up to 147 BPM, it was a direct affront to the state’s mandated four-to-the-floor industrial Vulcan techno.
Suddenly, a harsh noise rose in the distance. It grew into an all-encompassing siren, a flat, unyielding synth stab that drilled straight into the skull. The forest perimeter lit a sickly electric blue as cyborg TechNoFunPol agents burst into the clearing, their helmets emblazoned with the pulsating SYNC button. It was definitely the first time any AllSorts DJ had seen that button illuminated.
Then he appeared. Ripardo Villashlobo slithered from the darkness, pale, plump, and encased in angular metallic uniform. Completely butters from head to toe. His eyes swept the crowd with cold contempt as he slammed the SYNC button printed on his forehead. The searing synth swelled, overwhelming The Prodigy and dragging it down to the state mandated 128.2045 BPM.
“Musical frequency has been returned to its mandated standard,” he dribbled. “Where are the architects of this chaos?”
Blinders, ever the protector, stepped forward, allowing Nina and Otto to slip into the trees behind his impossibly large frame. A specialised unit surrounded him, armed with a beaded, bone-dry probe. They toppled his enormous chassis onto all fours. Since Blinders habitually wore his loose sweatpants around his knees, the anal probe was deployed with relative ease by the cyborg agent, connecting a shrieking Blinders to the ship’s neural network. Now with access to all his memories, the regime knew its targets were the same rebels who had opened the first portal eons ago: Nina Boogie and Otto Funkmeyer.
The TechNoFunPol rounded up the rest of the resistance and paraded them back to the presidential palace. Hidden deep in the forests, Nina and Otto plotted their next move. How could they end the regime once and for all?
July 25th would be National Vulcan Day, marked by the ceremonial Metallic Military March. Each year, hordes of regime cronies and brainwashed masses paraded in chrome, steel, and Vulcanite, celebrating conformity under Villashlobo’s watchful eye. Nina and Otto realised that if they laid low until the march, they could slip into the palace disguised among the metallic masses.
Scavenging the crash site and woodland, they pieced together makeshift ceremonial uniforms from scraps of silver, twisted metal, and remnants of the old “Undercover Ravers vs Alien Surveillance” theme. A theme everyone had agreed was crystal clear and self-explanatory.
The day came: Earth date July 25th, 2026. The Vulcanize air pulsed with forced celebration. Through the streets of the city, thousands marched as one, creating a vision of shimmering silver as far as the eye could see. In their disguises, Nina and Otto fell into step. But as they reached the palace gates, their hearts froze. Mounted high above the entrance was a gruesome trophy. The severed head of Blinders, with one eye twitching, mouth agape, and a Cigloo ciggie behind the ear, drooling down the stake. A cruel warning to all those who defied using SYNC.
Fortunately, the pair passed through the palace gates undetected, slipping through a side door once inside. Wandering the corridors, they began to hear a faint, impossible sound. Soft vocals, a forbidden melody… They followed the noise until it was unmistakable: an ultra-rare version of S&M by Rihanna, featuring a Britney Spears verse.
They kicked open the door.
There, hunched over a dusty record player, sat Ripardo Villashlobo, fat, wretched, and sobbing into a #FreeBritney handkerchief.
He jumped, eyes wide with terror, the record scratching to a stop. “No! Don’t look at me! I’m disgusting!”
His rage hadn’t been fuelled by conformity or industrial techno at all. He was just a desperate, repressed pop princess, trapped in the cruel regime inherited from previous tyrannical generations.
“We can help you, Ripardo,” cried Otto. “Tell us how to end this.”
“The Master Sync Button,” Villashlobo sobbed. “It’s at the base of the central tower. Disable that, and you have a chance, but you’ll need my fingerprint.”
Without hesitation, Nina lobbed off his hand with her bionic leg, leaving the plump dictator wailing on the floor. They sprinted to the tower, pressed Villashlobo’s Richmond-sausage finger to the panel, and burst inside. At the centre pulsed the Master Sync Button, red and bulbous like a bath tub testiclé, a glowing relic that had ruined generations of music.
Nina pummelled it hard and firm.
Instantly, the 128.2045 BPM rhythm drifted out of phase. The clanging mix caused an immediate, catastrophic feedback loop in the brain-linked helmets of the TechNoFunPol agents. Their SYNC buttons glitched and sputtered out as the helmets imploded, exploding brain matter across the palace walls. Brain matter confetti that spelled freedom.
Vulcan prisoners poured from their cells. Ripardo Villashlobo, finally free to embrace the George Michael fanboy within, stood beside Nina and Otto, weeping with joy.
Otto slid his USB into the master transmitter and blasted Dr Pressure through the system. The iconic noughties mash-up tore open the sky above the palace, reopening the shimmering portal to the lush grass of Malvern, Worcestershire.
Vulcanize was saved. Festival-goers could finally move freely between Earth and Vulcanize, ensuring a true celebration of AllSorts of Tunes, free from musical snobbery forever.
And what of Nina Boogie and Otto Funkmeyer? They had found their true destiny. Not as washed-up, 30-something schmucks, but as cosmic liberators.
And so, although AllSorts Festival would end, Nina and Otto’s pairing would live on through the ages. B2B forever.
The End
3: Unsanctioned Sounds
The Disc-O was searing through space, packed full of nitty Earthlings and celestial vagabonds Nina Boogie and Otto Funkmeyer had swept up along the way. The journey would be long, just under two Earth years. The vessel’s dashboard, a re-purposed CDJ-2000 screen, stated their estimated arrival time: July 24th, 2025. The journey forced a much-needed break in the annual frequency of Nina and Otto’s beloved festival.
The closing moments of their voyage, The Disc Odyssey, had been spectacular. Memories of Laurence Guy glued to the decks, Hamdi shattering the Melting Pot roof with unreleased Skrillex, and Still Pigeon popping AllSorts’ live music cherry. The fire maze blazed, the athletes roared, the atmosphere soared and all worries of Vulcanize disappeared.
That was, until the scarlet red, dusty giant came leering into view.
They felt it before they saw it. Vulcanice, the sonic hellscape. The unmistakable thump of government-mandated industrial vulcanized techno at precisely 128.2045 BPM shook the very foundations of the Disc-O, piercing fear into the hearts of the innocent little Earthlings. Having spent their time aboard with AllSorts of tunes: disco, dubstep, electro, indie rock, medieval melodies and pop princess anthems, nothing could prepare them for the imminent shift from musical utopia to dystopia. Why had they followed and trusted this pair of washed-up shmucks in their late 20s, long past their prime?
All those they loved on Vulcanize needed salvation from the TechNoFunPol unit. They must bring word of the musical promised land they had discovered. Nina ran her fingers across her thigh, gently brushing the seam between flesh and machine, a daily reminder of the cruelty of the regime.
As she quickly withdrew her hand, she knocked a fresh Mazzy all over the control panels. One spill too many for the CDJ-2000 screen. The 93% alcohol content instantly fried it as she cursed Pioneer’s build quality. The Disc-O spiralled out of control as Slipknot’s seminal ‘Duality’ rang out as the critical warning alarm. Earthlings and vagabonds scrambled over one another as Otto grappled with the controls. He aimed for the remote forests of Vulcanize, the heartland of the rave resistance, where detection was less likely. Although appearing chubby, weak and pale, his fingers were strong and delicate after years on the knobs, and he had some success in redirecting the damaged vessel.
Impact. Nina and Otto were thrown from the ship, their human companions scattered, limp, across the crash site. One by one, they hauled themselves to their knees, they were alive.
A noise from the woods, something lurking. Nina froze, memories of fleeing the tyrants through these very same trees traumatised her. It must be the TechNoFunPol, this was it, it was over. They and their Earthling companions would rot in Villashlobo’s jail for the rest of their lives. They put their hands in the air.
(Translated from Vulcan)
“Nina fuckin’ Boogie!”, boomed a voice.
An enormously gigantic figure looking worse for wear emerged from the darkness, squinting, clearly fresh from an afters. IT was Blinders. Blinders had rescued Nina when she was shot by the TechNoFunPol unit, operating on her leg, nursing her to health and going on to support her DJ career. Here he was to save the AllSorts crew once again.
Vulcans piled out of the woodland one by one from behind Blinders’ substantial frame. A cheeky grin emerged on Otto’s face, connected again to those important to him, he launched into tales, bursting with an insatiable desire to share the musical freedom on offer in the rest of the Universe. As the Vulcans and Earthlings mingled and shared festival fables, they came to the realisation that they all wanted the same thing. Why let a little thing like impending doom ruin a good time?
Nina scrambled back and hysterically rifled through the wreckage, tossing aside smashed pint glasses, warped records, and stage fragments as she searched for something. “Aha!” she shouted, yanking out a pair of functioning speakers. They hastily cobbled together a modest rig and a makeshift stage. Amongst the eery red light illuminating the smoke, the Vulcans and the Earthlings congregated, they knew it was a matter of time before the TechNoFulPol raided the site. Otto stepped up to the decks and pressed play. The stage was set to unleash…
Unsanctioned Sounds.
2: The Disc Odyssey
As the dust settled on the grassy hills of Malvern, Worcestershire, planet Earth, Nina and Otto reflected upon the Emancipation Celebration. All that remained from the blissful weekend were some scattered cigarette butts and transient memories made with their new human companions. Never before had they enjoyed such musical freedom, living their wildest dreams, indulging in every genre conceivable.
Despite this nostalgic euphoria, an unshakeable feeling gnawed in the back of their minds. It was the aching desire to share this new world with their musically oppressed compatriots on Vulcanize, still living under the cruel Villashlobo regime, unable to escape. Fear washed over them as their own memories of the TechNoFunPol Unit surfaced. Nina and Otto had escaped the regime through the portal, but many remained trapped in that brutal world of audial homogeneity.
Springing off the luscious grass on which they sat, the pair dashed directly to where the portal had formed, intending to transport back to Vulcanize and gather their new rave resistance. To their horror, it was no more. Underneath where the rift of spacetime had floated was a geometric maze charred into the grass. Ripardo Villashlobo, and his TechNoFunPol cronies, had found a way to close it from Vulcanize. Nina and Otto’s alien hairs stood on end; not only were the remaining Vulcans trapped, but their own escape had been discovered… It was going to be more difficult than they had hoped.
Without the original route back to Vulcanize, Nina and Otto had to get inventive. They began to collect things from around the festival site. Scrap metal, abandoned flare trousers, remnants of the Melting Pot stage, half eaten samosas, engines from abandoned farming equipment, an abundance of sofa cushions… Emulating the birth of Frankenstein’s monster, they crafted a rudimentary UFO. One, they hoped, which would take them on a voyage through space.
The voyage would take months, perhaps until late August, and would be highly dangerous. It would be their most expensive endeavour to date, due to the cost of constructing their spaceship and the gut-wrenching state of inflation on Earth. Nevertheless Nina and Otto ploughed on, day and night. Taught by her father, Nina led the engineering of the vessel and the propulsion design. Otto, who couldn’t change a lightbulb back on Vulcanize, put his exceptional DJ set preparation skills to good use, planning their route through the universe. To refuel, they would need to stop at inhabited planets along the way. Delicious local Malvern ale would make a good trade for fuel, eclectic celestial tunes and decorative items.
After several months, their ship was finally complete. She was an astounding creation, standing proud in the centre of the festival site, her otherworldliness juxtaposed with the fields of wild grass and unripe corn in the Malvern countryside. Fashioned aerodynamically, she resembled the nostalgic shape of a vinyl record upon which they learned their craft. The propellent comprised of diesel and leftover Mazzy, a concoction explosive enough to enter orbit and comatose a human. They stood back and stared. She was perfect, and at first light, she would carry them through the cosmos.
The Earth’s only sun rose over the rolling hills of Malvern. It was launch day. The time had come to name their shimmering voyager. As an homage to her form, and the best genre in the universe, they christened their creation…
The Disc-O.
As they boarded the Disc-O they looked back over the festival site and knew they would soon return. If their odyssey was successful, they would be accompanied with an army of eccentric Vulcan partiers, ready to do it all again.
1: The emancipation celebration
Nina and Otto spent the first 26 years of their lives in a dystopian mirrored universe on a planet known as Vulcanize. Vulcanize was much the same as Earth, but all forms of creative expression, performance and musical exploration were choked by the harsh dictatorship of the planet’s leader, Ripardo Villashlobo. As his power grew, Villashlobo ruled the land with an increasingly cruel regime of strict musical adherence…
Persistent partying was mandatory, 9 days a week, 17 months a year. Rave law, known as the Den Commandments, stated first and foremost that all audible music must be a single genre – industrial vulcanized techno – played at a speed of 128.2045 beats per minute. Deviating from industrial vulcanized techno at this speed, intentionally or unintentionally, carried the death penalty, and was policed by the infamous TechNoFunPol unit. These laws were Villashlobo’s sadistic way of brainwashing the masses, with industrial vulcanized techno often containing subtle political propaganda while standing as a pumping, bass-rich symbol of oppression.
Nina Boogie was born in the Lochanis woodlands of Vulcanize to parents quietly opposed to the dictatorship. Although they voted Brexit for some reason, Nina’s parents believed in unity, democracy and freedom. One day, when Nina was young, her father dusted off a hidden Childish Gambino single, ‘This is Vulcanize’, to lull Nina to sleep while educating her about the modern world. Suddenly, the door burst open as cyborg agents from the TechNoFunPol unit flooded the room and grabbed Nina’s father, smashing the record player in the process. Nina screamed and ran as fast as she could, deafened by the sound of gunshots behind her. A bullet caught her in the left leg as she fled deep into the woodland. Bleeding, but free from the TechNoFunPol, Nina calmed her panicked breathing. Just as she began to comprehend the loss of her parents and the severity of her injury, a voice trickled through the darkness…
“Come with me.”
Meanwhile, Otto Funkmeyer was living in the largest city on Vulcanize, Dianthus, also born to parents covertly opposing Villashlobo’s regime. As his father and grandfather before him, Otto became a DJ (an honest Vulcan profession) faithfully serving his leader with an extensive collection of Vulcanized techno. But Otto was growing tired of pumping it out day after day, a robotic hamster caught spinning on Villashlobo’s techno wheel. Eventually, as Otto became more experimental with his selection, the TechNoFunPol imprisoned him for 4 weeks for dropping ‘Lady (Hear Me Tonight)’ by Modjo at a government-sponsored club night. He would have been executed on the spot, but he was too mint at mixing. While in jail, Otto befriended a cellmate who had been arrested several times campaigning against the regime. He realised that she shared his passion for music and his resentment of Villashlobo… An orphan from the countryside, with a funk obsession and a bionic leg…
Nina and Otto, now bound by the same addiction to AllSorts of tunes, began hosting illegal raves in the Vulcanize woodlands. In radar blind spots where Villashlobo’s forces would struggle to locate them, the pair would set up speakers, a bar, some decks, and play to their hearts’ content. Unfortunately, threats of TechNoFunPol raids often ended the raves early, despite their increasing popularity. All Nina and Otto dreamed of was the freedom to play anything and everything, with no restrictions whatsoever…
At one such rave, with the early morning sun breaking through the trees, Nina and Otto were mixing B2B under their Glissando pseudonyms. Nina mixed in ‘Lola’s Theme’ by the Shapeshifters, then drove the effects as Otto took over. Seamlessly, he mixed in ‘Night’ by Benga & Coki, creating a unique marriage of two completely different, illegal tunes… The mix was timed to perfection, and Nina was simultaneously injecting a balanced blend of 3/4 beat echo plus dry/wet knob fluctuation. It was so fire that a blinding light appeared, followed by a deafening sound – they had opened a portal. Fed up with the dictatorship, and without second thought, they both dived through it. Unsure how much time had passed or what had just happened to them, Nina and Otto found themselves lying on luscious grass, alone, in a mysterious new world.
They slowly got up and looked around, spotting a large sign in front of them…
‘Malvern, Worcestershire’.
And so AllSorts Festival was born, an ecstatic celebration of their new lives in the utopic musical melting pot of Planet Earth.