Szentek Review 2019

By Greer Ross-McLennan

If you’d ever wondered what it would be like to rave in an old barn in the middle of nowhere dressed in neon tie dye and tinted sunglasses, Szentek 2019 was your kind of place. Partygoers were photographed dressed in countless neon colours, bucket hats, fur coats and even.....Santa hats? There didn’t appear to be a set dress code so much as a prompt to let one’s imagination run as wild as possible, and people certainly went hard.

I also wouldn’t necessarily classify Szentek as a rave, per se. It has a certain element that North American raves back home, where I’m from, can’t quite replicate as well. Maybe it’s that there’s a certain degree of familiarity; I saw so many friends on the dance floor who I’d never imagine would be out on a Thursday night. You couldn't dance for twenty minutes without running into a friend or someone you knew from a tutorial, and you would both scream and dance before dispersing and repeat it all again. It felt fun and community-oriented in the way that a random club night wouldn’t. The décor was fun, if somewhat unorthodox––the crowning jewel being a hand-painted tapestry of Donald Trump with a ball gag in his mouth (can I buy this? Please? Let me know if it was you!). Student art adorned the walls of Kinkell Byre, providing a welcome change from the sparse fairy-lights-and-candles typical of St Andrews ball culture.

Oh, and the music. As I may have mentioned before, this year’s Szentek boasted an impressive lineup; I split my time mostly between Room 1 and Room 2 (heading out to enjoy Room 3 before the rain forced me back inside), and I was not disappointed. As someone who enjoys actually dancing when I go out, it was refreshing to hear a vast array of artists who followed through on delivering top-notch tracks that allowed everyone to move around. There was no one artist who stood drastically above the rest: the whole night allowed students to move around seamlessly between rooms and still enjoy themselves instead of swarming some areas and leaving others empty. The showcase of Room 2 was particularly powerful, with the huge ASHA soundsystem set up and letting the floor vibrate with the beat.

At risk of sounding too cliché, Szentek was one of the best nights out I’ve had in a while; positive vibes circulated around and seemed infectious to everyone. While it’s only been four years, it feels like Szentek has been an integral part of the St Andrews scene for a lifetime.