It is now 25 years on since that first impromptu beach event in 2001 when (surely now patron saint of Brighton); Norman cook aka Fatboy Slimplayed a free DJ set on the beach following a screening of a cricket match organised by Channel 4. Well the stage was there, so why not!
And here he is once again ‘On The Beach’ celebrating and entertaining the masses in Brighton over 4 sold out days. This outing will be my 4th of these ‘Big Beach’ experiences having been at the legendary 2nd one in 2002 (still probably one of the greatest days of my life), the 4th one in September 2008 and the 6th one in 2022; which happened to mark the 20th anniversary of the mega one.
The name ‘Big Beach Boutique’ derives from the world famous Big Beat Boutique club nights that started here in Brighton in the 90’s, often featuring the cream of Skint Records roster, oh how I’d love those to come back, small venues, funky big beats, the sweat dripping from the ceiling.
Talking of sweat…the weather today is utterly glorious, much like days 1 and 2, that thunder that had threatened a week ago, thankfully nowhere on the radar. The huge crowd, which I believe is approximately 10,000 are all in a massively happy and up for it mood, sun cream at the ready.
Fatboy Slim at ‘On The Beach’, Brighton Beach 18.7.26 (pics Mike Burnell)
And here is the moment everyone has been waiting for, Fatboy takes to the decks for his 3rd night out of 4, which in fact will be the most times he has performed on back to back nights. Whilst this is the 7th Big Beach Boutique, by the end of this event he will actually have performed on the pebbles 10 times over the years.
Whilst Fatboy Slim is globally known, playing massive festivals and putting on huge shows worldwide, he is still incredibly down to earth and very much involved in the local scene. For years he had his Big Beach Café at Hove Lagoon which only very recently passed on into new ownership. He is involved with Pepita Coffee which brings lots of local art events, he had a recent art exhibition at The Helm Gallery, he does lots of fund raising events for the Martlets charity, which has had him involved very small DJ nights at small local venues or pubs, he has had collaboration clothing with The Modfather Clothing in Church Street. This weekend in fact they have a very limited run of clothes on sale.
There are the local talks, we’ve had them at The Old Market, the Theatre Royal and there is another later this year at Horatios on the pier. Then there is the close association with Brighton & Hove Albion football club. It’s not unheard of for him to be there championing on the youth training. He even worked at the now long gone Rounder records back in his early days, so yes Brighton loves Fatboy Slim and Fatboy Slim loves Brighton and these shows are like the love letter from him to us.
So tonight! As ever Fatboy arrived on stage barefoot and wearing the same Hawaiian shirt he wore on night one, green and black with skulls and roses. Backstage beforehand he had been doing a photoshoot in four different shirts, so maybe this one just felt right (again). I wonder if he has a shirt selection process, I wish I’d asked him now. Anyhow enough of the shirts as I am sure you want to hear about the magic.
After a short 15 minute break as they set up the Fatboy’s decks, the voice of Gene Wilder singing ‘Pure Imagination’ played, the suspense and anticipation building, then “Put your hands up in the Air by The Black & White Brothers” kicked in and the crowd went wild, everyone was so up for this.
The “I’m in Brighton Bitch” sample rang out as the screens flashed up in huge letters “PUT YOUR PHONES AWAY LETS ENJOY THE MOMENT”, too right. That’s the message and this was generally the vibe of the set, keeping things more old school with plenty of nods to the Big Beach Boutique’s of the past. Tonight really was one for crowd love and interaction as another huge cheer went up as the England team flashed up on the screen.
Ben ‘Jerry’ Robinson with Fatboy Slim, HoneyLuv, & TSHA (pics Ben ‘Jerry’ Robinson) & Fatboy Slim at ‘On The Beach’, Brighton Beach 18.7.26 (pic Mike Burnell)
The set was fully underway, songs blended into one another, a tease of ‘Right Here, Right Now’ going straight into Fatboy’s own ‘Push The Tempo’ as flames jetted up in the sky around the stage.
‘I See You Baby’ by Groove Armada, and ‘Upside Down’ by Jaden Bojsen & David Guetta got a playing and plenty of crowd love as everyone sang “shaking that ass”.
‘Sinner Winner’ by Felix da Housecat is a Fatboy favourite and was only a matter of time until it came on, always an interactive one where everyone is encouraged to crouch down, as did Fatboy on the very front of the stage. A sight to behold 10,000 people all getting down and bouncing up to the music.
Screen visuals are a massive part of the Fatboy Slim experience these days, talking with Norman beforehand he said he was keeping the set similar each night as it was going to be a full on crowd pleasing one, also pairing it up with the visuals is a big thing to prep. This is true, the sets these days are an interactive spectacle rather than those 90s club nights where he would be armed with all the latest big beat 12” records to mix up. Some of the massive visuals we had this evening included, the zero f*cks speedometer, smiley faces, every morphing Normans, various graphics of him throughout his long career, and the lad from the cover of ‘You’ve Come A Long Way Baby’, he is always present! We had light tunnels, laser beams, crazy eye balls, ball room dancers, famous people dancing such as Christopher Walken, it was a non-stop extravaganza.
There were various nods and songs from the 2002 event such as ‘Sexiest Man In Jamaica’ by Mint Royale, ‘It Just Won’t Do’ by Tim Deluxe and ‘Love Story’ by Layo & Bushwaker which evoked memories for the oldies in the crowd like me, but new memories created for the younger generation.
The order “JUMP” came up on the big screens for House of Pain’s ‘Jump Around’, which turned into one massive sing-along and bounce about 10,000 strong.
More messages flashed up on the screens as the evening went on, such as “ARE WE HAVING FUN YET”, the answer was a resounding “YES”!
Fatboy’s very own ‘Praise You’ created an explosion of cheers as it built and built, plenty of camera phones came out during that one.
We were also treated to some of Fatboy’s more recent output, sadly we don’t get albums these days, but we do get some great one off songs, one of those was ‘Bus Stop’, featuring some rather strange visuals of a lady like Norman a bit like that scene of Jamie Lee Curtis dancing from ‘True Lies’. The track is immensely danceable, it’s a killer and had the crowd at it.
More mash up’s came with Underworld’s ‘Born Slippy’ and The Killers ‘Mr. Brightside’, we’d had our sunset, it was dark now and the light show was crazy whilst everyone sang along.
The end was sadly almost here as we got even more crowd pleasers such as Fatboy’s ‘Eat, Sleep, Rave, Repeat’ then ‘Right Here Right Now’ mixed with Nirvana’s ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’.
The set closed with ‘The Satisfaction Skank’, which mashes up Fatboy’s ‘The Rockafeller Skank’ with The Rolling Stones’ ‘(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction’, a song that has been a staple of his sets for years, but only got a sanctioned official release recently. The crowd loved it and it brought the end to what had been a phenomenal 2 hours set. Utterly relentless energy and positive vibes, not only from Fatboy and the music he played, but also the visuals, the flames, the lasers and last but not least from the crowd. This is probably the one big thing I love above Fatboy’s beach events; it feels like one big love in for the locals, always full of really happy people out for a really good time. This I think has trumped the previous events (not counting 2002), may the reign of Norman Cook in Brighton continue.
I should also give a big shout out to the great security and event staff, from bar staff, to gate keepers, to crowd control, all of them like last year, so polite, so helpful, really getting into the spirit of things, all doing a sterling job. I hope they are all back again next year with lots more exciting ‘On The Beach’ events.
The concept of back to back (b2b) for those that might not know is you have two DJs taking it in turns song wise on the decks, sometimes it can be a fun battle to see who can keep pushing things to the next level, sometimes it can be the pair are so in tune with each other they can anticipate each other movements and you end up with a sublime audio experience, Today in this b2b we have Special Request, the DJ alias of UK based DJ/Producer Paul Woolford, often he can be found playing in London and Ibiza, having played a clubs such as Space Ibiza, Ministry of Sound, Matter & Fabric. He has been active on the scene for over 25 years, he is a big ticket and this set is highly anticipated.
When I bought tickets for today for my daughter, it was billed as Ewan McVicar which she got the most excited about, and that is the beauty of this year’s run of beach shows, the lineup has not gone all nostalgic it really is championing the current and upcoming names, admittedly I had not personally heard of most (which shows my age), but I am reconnecting. Anyhow, there was an unexpected turn of events as Ewan who was meant to be the other headline in this b2b was still stuck in Ibiza having played his Friday residency at Hï Ibiza last night. So what was to be done, the organisers pulled it out of the bag and TSHAstepped in and saved the day.
I must be honest by this point my concentration was now more on my dancing right out in the thick of the arena crowd and it took me a while without my glasses on to spot the change, it was only when I noticed the screen visuals only said Special Request and I spotted TSHA’s red hair I twigged. Needless to say the pair did an utterly sterling job; it was a thoroughly danceable set, great vibes, and great tunes, both of them on stage looking calm and cool. The set was just what we needed before the big man (Fatboy Slim) was to take to the stage.
The yacht count level at seat was now 25 with at least another 15 people in small dinghies and paddleboards as the sky was just starting to turn gold. I mentioned the set on Sunday morning to my daughter, she never even realised Ewan wasn’t there, says it all really, so good she and half the crowd never likely noticed. Speaking with TSHA afterwards, I congratulated her by asking “Were you prepared?”. She said “No, but it was all fine, we winged it”, like I say we’d never have known.
Some of the songs that were played during this set were; ‘Give It To Me’ by Marco Lys & Ben Miller, ‘Sume Sigh Say’ by Todd Terry & House of Gypsies,‘Save Me’ by Adelphi Music Factory, ‘Superstylin’ by Groove Amada, ‘Body Move’ by Sophia Guerrero and ‘Burn Me’ by Essenn & Antony Grey.
HoneyLuv is an International DJ & producer, born in Cleveland, USA, but UK based.
Her bio reads “HoneyLuv was announced as Future Star of 2023 on BBC Radio 1 by Danny Howard. After the success of her songs ‘Your Tongue’ and ‘Thr33 6ix 5ive’ that year, she continued by taking the music scene via storm with ‘Sway’ feat. Dope Earth Alien which was hottest record on BBC Radio 1. She has remixed and toured beside some of the greatest acts in dance music. She has performed at some of the most important venues and festivals in the touring scene such as, Coachella, EDC, Brooklyn Mirage, Ushuaia, The Beams, Space Miami, Hi and many more”.
HoneyLuv is set to continue her global domination this upcoming year with dates lined up in Ibiza, Malaga, Zurich, Croatia, LA, Malta, Amsterdam and Sydney, Australia, but today, it’s all about Brighton Beach.
At 17:15 we had another perfect change over as HoneyLuv flowed effortlessly into TSHA’s last song. Again another cool looking DJ, as she sported a white bandana and a baggy red/yellow/black top. She is one cool looking cat. The party level took another gear change, the sun still beating down and the arena nearing capacity as last entry had now passed. Visuals on screen were a mix of flashing purple squares, crowd and DJ footage and HoneyLuv logos. A stonking set if I dare say, the crowd totally dialed in and all going for it.
Songs that were included in the set were ‘Omnivore’ by Extermination Dismemberment, ‘Sideman’ by Interplanetary Criminal, ‘This Is House’ by John Julius Knight, ‘Wawa Mix’ by Havana Funk, ‘Finally’ by Kings of Tomorrow, ‘Spellbound’ by Grant Nelson, ‘Love Will Save The Day’ by Fortuna and ‘Back To Tae Ayr’ by Ewan McVicar.
TSHA is the professional name of Teisha Matthews, a London based British DJ and record producer. Aside from her impressive DJ sets worldwide, she has also put out a string of singles/EPs since 2019 and two albums; 2022’s ‘Capricorn Sun’ and 2024’s ‘Sad Girl’. Since 2025 her output has been coming out on her own record label Jackfruit. There is no letup in dates of her live DJ sets, with plenty of Ibiza super club dates done and still yet to come over the summer.
At 15:50, TSHA slid on to those decks, cutting a cool look, her red hair held back with a red bandana, blue jorts and black top with a gold necklace. Everything switched a gear once more, a mix of Grove Armada’s ‘Superstylin’ kicked us off. A nice nod to the 2002 ‘Big Beach’ event.
The arena was really starting to fill up now, the beats and tempo massively picked up in this set, I can’t even describe how utterly danceable her set was, so strong. The visuals were changed up to various logos and interpretations of TSHA, cycling through along with footage of her DJ’ing and the crowd dancing. We had more bursts of flames during the very funky ‘Grab yo Booty’ by DJ Aaronmat. As the intro to Corona’s ‘Rhythm Of The Night’ played.
I looked out, not a cloud in the sky, sun beaming down, the crowd dressed in all manner of outfits for the occasion, all so happy and all dancing. TSHA a few times came out to the front of the stage singing along with the vocals and dancing away, one of those was ‘Craziness III’ by Vandio DJ. She hugely brought the vibes, possibly the highlight set for me from all the support DJs.
Some of the songs played during the set included; ‘Nasty 90’s’ by Dale Howard, ‘Kamasutra Express’ by Kamasutra, ‘Cha’ by Huxley, ‘The Grove’ by Airwolf Paradise, ‘Voodoo Jelly’ by Bella Blacke, ‘Finder’ by Nietoes, ‘I’m Going Back’ by Super Disco Club & The Rubber People and ‘Love Desire’ by Cassimm.
Delilah is a London based House artist, her bio on Resident Advisor reads: “Delilah is a rising force in electronic music. She’s been making waves in the studio and behind the decks, delivering bold, high-energy sets that celebrate the international sound of house. She’s performed across the UK, France, Italy, and India, with standout singles like ‘Get Up And Go’ and ‘Need To Breathe’, the latter hitting No.1 trending on SoundCloud. With a unique sound blending soulful house, garage, and brooding bass layered with her silky vocals”, she has dates in the diary over the coming months in Ibiza, London, Brussels and Malta.
The beauty of DJ sets, unlike gigs with loads of instruments is there is no turnaround break, so Delilah was there ready and waiting dressed in blue jeans and a turquoise top and a big smile to seamlessly take over from Aline Umber. The first song played was ‘Cada Vez’ by Negrocan, instantly this set felt like it had more Latino vibes.
She was right into the groove, loads of smiles and geeing up the crowd. Visuals during her set were more melting effects, like a lava lamp over images of her playing, she danced and beckoned to the crowd, a few people joined her on stage, to watch and dance, I think possibly they might have been her parents, they got big cheers every time they looked out to the ever building crowd.
It wasn’t just the crowd inside the arena, the boat count moored up in the sea whilst she played ‘Renegade’ was now at twelve, I could sense boats will be fighting for space later. There were a lot more vocals in the songs she played, we even had our first burst of the jet flames of the day, shooting up at the front of stage during a mix of Soul II Souls’ ‘Back To Life’.
Other songs played in Delilah’s set included: ‘Move Around’ by Locky, ‘Keep The Crowd Moving’ by Boss Priester, ‘Dreams’ by Smokin Beats, ‘House Mentality’ by Dale Howard, the set closed with ‘The Renegade’ by Friend Within.
Aline Umber are a French duo composed by Aline Brooklyn and Aman Umber, together usually they are a groundbreaking live project where the performance is different every time. They often bring in local musicians wherever they play and compose an unforgettable experience.
Today they are strictly DJ’ing, so no extra musicians, but boy did they cook up a fine opening experience. The pair almost didn’t make it in time, whilst I was awaiting doors open, two men bolted past shouting “Where is the artists entrance, we are on stage in 1 minute”, this was very true, it was 12:59, however even though my entry was swift and trouble free, they had still managed to get to the stage and were playing as I walked in.
As I was first in, I figured I should make the utter most of this and be the first and only person very briefly to have the entire area dance floor to myself, a private set just for me, the pair appreciated it, giving me a salute from behind their decks (“Legend” -Ed).
Both Aline & Aman were looking super chilled, both wearing dark black trousers and similar plain green t-shirts, considering their dash to get in. They were clearly having fun on stage, laughing and joking with their team.
Visuals were also chilled as the sun beat down, mostly just their name and video of them in a purple grey misty effect. Some of the tracks they played included; ‘Dancin’ (Extended Mix)’ by Earth n Days, ‘Crystal Dreams’ by Torsten Stenzel & Sammy & Worf, ‘Sera’ by Ciudad Feliz, ‘Sanctuary’ by Oliver Dollar & Admn, ‘Classic Man (Club Mix)’ by Wayne Gardiner, ‘Anywhere’ by Dillon Francisand they ended their set with ‘Window Glass’ by Ciudad Feliz. They came down off stage with cups and drinks for some of those at the front to toast and thank them for coming down early. The perfect start to the day.
