Faced by a plethora of festivals the people at Mezzmusic have stretched the limits of the increasingly busy summer season to guarantee their events an exclusive weekend date.
This said, their Oxford Mayday bash is becoming a firm fixture on the first, most chilly of the summer's bank holiday weekends, and now they've just announced plans for an End of Summer Ball at Donington on the not exactly scorching day of September 29th.
Tha advantage of throwing outdoor events on such temperately unpromising dates means you prepare for the worst rather than hope for the best weather.
Accordingly on arrival at the Mayday Ball, the site has been completely covered, floored and carpeted throughout albeit creating a slightly erratic surface in places.
The temperature of course is still almost freezing, but we're all here to dance so it doesn't take long for the big arenas to start getting hot and sweaty. Unfortunately this ingenious undercover operation means the layout proves to be a bit of a maze to navigate, generating some confusion, a few lost mates and a sense of collective disorientation.
Some people pay good money to get into this condition, but tonight we've all got it whether we like it or not.
The two main arenas fill up fast before darknesss has even fallen. Hard prog house is definitely what the majority of the crowed want to hear and the likes of Seb Fontaine, Guy Ornadel and Graham Gold are all serving it up as expected.
Over in the DJ Magazine arena Gilles Peterson is playing to a thinly populated dance floor as it's taking people a good hour or two to actually get this far around the labyrinthine tunnels and tents.
By the time Boy George puts on his first record at midnight even this outpost is bustling and in fine party mood.
Quite how he handed over to Goldie though, and how this dramatic change of programming went down with the assembled clubbers remains unclear because by that time the throng of excitable post-cyber club kids and the occasional dinner jacketed student in the main arena had totally blocked our passage back.
Dave Pearce may not be the most credible of club DJs but he's certainly a big name, and at an event which seems to value big name DJs above all else, that's a good enough reason for him to be rocking the biggest crowd of the night. He hands over to Paul van Dyk who gets the crowd to roar with a simple wave of his hand, and then blows them away with his music.
To really be called a festival the Mayday Ball might need to alter its philosophy - musically it's not at all challenging and the various arena line-ups certainly aren't inspired. But in terms of a huge party, with the country's most popular (and populist) DJs playing to vast, enthusiastic dance floors, it certainly doesn't disappoint.
