By: David Harrison

The Prodigy (photo by thephotolabrat.com)

For those of you who have never been to Miami, it’s time for a quick geography lesson: Picture miles and miles of grass hills surrounded on four sides by towering skyscrapers, convention centers, the American Airlines Arena (church of the patron saint of Miami, Dwayne Wade), and the Atlantic Ocean. Bicentennial Park, as it is called, transforms once a year for two days into the Ultra Music festival — the culminating concert and party for the Winter Music Conference.

Artists from all corners of the globe unite in Miami for a weekend of what has traditionally been a celebration of electro music, but now, in its eleventh year, a much wider array of genres were present.

As far as the headliners of the festival went — The Black Eyed Peas for Friday and The Prodigy for Saturday — it was a time for reuniting. Ultra marked Fergie’s first performance with the rest of the crew — Will.i.am., Taboo, and Apl.de.lap. — in a number of months, and the group was supporting their upcoming release, The E.N.D.

Shiny Toy Guns (photo by thephotolabrat.com)

If that weren’t enough, The Prodigy, headlining on Saturday, reunited for their first show, featuring all the original members, in approximately a decade. Hits from the ’90s, like “Firestarter” and “Smack My Bitch Up” echoed with the same energy as if they had just dropped on iTunes. Speaking of which, their new album,Invaders Must Die, was just released in the US in March, and is the first Prodigy album to feature all three original members in over a decade.

However, the similarities between the headliners were the most indicative of the entire vibe of the festival. Both Black Eyed Peas and Prodigy are not DJs. Yes, they do have turntables and sampling machines in their bands, but their performances are completely, 100% live. The old-fashioned idea of a DJ setting up a pair of turntables, pressing “play,” and then walking away is long gone. Musical production has come so far in the past few years that nearly everything is possible in a live performance.

This is the deviation from Ultras of the past. Yes, your more traditional DJs, like Tiesto and Paul Van Dyk, spun amazing sets late into the night on Friday and Saturday respectively, but even they whipped out MIDI keyboards, drum machines, and DJ David Guetta even featured a live vocal performance from Destiny’s Child’s Kelly Rowland. The one thing proven most by this year’s Ultra is that the role of a DJ has evolved far beyond two turntables and a microphone.

Santogold (photo by thephotolabrat.com)

However, the best part of UMF, as with any festival of its stature, is the discovery of all sorts of new artists who push the boundaries of today’s popular music and watching them grow out of their respective local scenes. DJ Jon Dadon, for example, out of San Diego, employed the use of an electronic percussion system to compliment his unusual turntable-less, computer-and-mixer-based setup (if that makes sense), and had crowds dancing to his unique jams at one of the smaller stages. The Australians also came out in full force, with artists such as The Presets — who sampled their own voices on a set of drum pads — and Cut Copy — who, between four musicians, had around twenty or thirty different instruments on stage. Another up-and-coming favorite from across the pond was Infected Mushroom, the crazy Israelis whose driving rhythm section got the crowd moving even in the midday heat. But of course, the one consistency between all the aforementioned artists was their use of actual instruments rather than turntables. The one thing I have learned from this year’s festival is that the future of music is absolutely headed in that direction — live music is definitely overpowering sampled music.

But nothing’s perfect. Yes, I know — what could possibly be wrong with two days, nine stages, and over a hundred artists? The same problem that every festival of this magnitude faces. You will inevitably miss something. So moving onto hearsay, Deadmau5 and Moby were additional highlights, and even the Ultra management couldn’t keep up, as Kaskade’s performance mysteriously disappeared off the lineup. Of course, there is little reason to feel disappointed. There’s always next year’s Ultra.