Squarepusher, Floating Points join Sónar Hong Kong Festival 2018 line-up
UK breakbeat innovator Squarepusher and symphonic electronic composer Floating Points join an already strong line-up for the March event, while a talk from Hong Kong-developed robot Sophia will open the Sónar+D programme
New headline acts including breakbeat innovator Squarepusher and jazzy symphonic electronic composer Floating Points have been added to the line-up for this year’s edition of electronic music festival Sónar Hong Kong.
They join previously announced performers including veteran genre-straddling, jazz-flecked DJ Laurent Garnier, crowd-pleasing US house DJ The Black Madonna, and unclassifiable UK post-dubstep artsy experimentalists Mount Kimbie.
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The second edition of Sónar Hong Kong takes place across three indoor and two outdoor stages at Hong Kong Science Park near Tai Po on March 17.
Other new names announced in the second and final tranche of Sónar performers include UK grime MC Ms Banks and Malaysian off-kilter techno producer Tzusing, bringing the total number of performers to 41. Eleven of them are appearing in Hong Kong for the first time.
The grandaddy of electronic music festivals and the one by which others tend to measure themselves, Sónar was launched in 1994 in Barcelona and has since spread to more than 50 cities around the world. The Hong Kong edition is organised by local partners Magnetic Asia, the people behind Clockenflap.
Typically for Sónar, the Hong Kong line-up is an eclectic one that veers between radio-friendly and accessible to wildly challenging. “We really want to get across that the spectrum of electronic music is so wide and has a lot more dimensions and nuances than what a lot of people hear,” says Justin Sweeting, music director at Magnetic Asia.