Two-night music festival gets underway in spectacular fashion spread across five traditional Al-Balad courtyards

• DJ duo Tale of Us headline as more than 30 artists perform
• Saturday’s closing night to welcome Carl Cox, Busta Rhymes and Xzibit as headliners

Jeddah’s historic Old Town was lit up by a light and sound spectacular as MDLBEAST’s boutique festival Balad Beast sparked into life yesterday.

The traditional courtyards of Al-Balad have been transformed for the weekend as 12 thousand music fans descend from across the Kingdom for two days and nights of live performances by some of the biggest names in EDM, dance music and hip-hop.

Italian music production and DJ duo Tale of Us ended the night one on a high note, enthralling the festival’s Omda Square crowd with a pounding 90-minute set, accompanied by a hypnotizing light and projection show across al-Balad’s spellbinding ancient architecture.

Presented by Saudi music and entertainment company MDLBEAST, Balad Beast is bringing more than 70 local, regional, and international artists to perform within the famous neighborhood. The UNESCO World Heritage site’s epic surroundings saw the latest illustration of MDLBEAST’s commitment to amplifying the unseen, channeling music innovation, delivering world-class productions, and bringing communities together to create art, make noise and inspire generations.

Balad Beast is MDLBEAST’s first festival to be held in Jeddah, and along with Tale of Us welcomed the likes of Rick Ross, DJ Salvatore Ganacci as well as local and regional talents including Vinyl Mode, Tamtam, Dana Hourani and Ntitled.

Hip-hop star Rick Ross commented on this year’s edition saying, “I was actually here four years ago in 2018. You must definitely see the growth, see the energy, see the culture and hip-hop growing. To see a gathering such as this with the different stages, different artists, local, and international. This is big!”

Weighing in on what Balad Beast means for local artists, Ntitled said “It’s a unique performance in Al-Balad, it’s a UNESCO world Heritage site. This is a different type of performance; Kalli-b have an album together that better fits the sound of Jeddah, It’s more afro rather than hip-hop. Jeddah has got that rhythm.”

Balad Beast follows on just a week from MDLBEAST’s signature two annual events: the XP Music Futures music conference, and mega three-day festival SOUNDSTORM, both based in Riyadh. Growing in size year upon year, this year’s SOUNDSTORM attracted more than 600,000 fans to watch live performances by artists including David Guetta, DJ Khaled, Bruno Mars, Tiësto, Swedish House Mafia and Post Malone, plus more than 200 other artists.