At eight o’clock on a Thursday in early April – as The Hague descended into early evening – what I can only describe as a ceremonial, near-funereal procession of wooden boats passes along the Hofvijver, opening this effort of ‘musical exploration and innovation’ with the water clearing its lungs, in preparation for a weekend of the unexpected.

A firm staple in the alternative electronic music fan’s calendar, this year marks the fourteenth incarnation of Rewire’s eclectic programme. The result is decidedly experimental, and so subs and brass bands sailing through the crowd seems, if anything, perfectly fitting.

Alvin Curran, the water-borne piece’s composer, is this year’s spotlighted artist, and his work is shown in multiple formats across the weekend as part of a goal to encourage ‘interdisciplinary approaches to sound and listening.' And despite what might sound like an overwhelming or ‘headsy’ commitment to being both prolific and alternative – over four days the city hosts 200 events across 25 venues, with performances ranging from live concerts to club nights, film screenings to exhibitions – Rewire manages somehow to not take itself too seriously, and the occasional crash of colliding boats sparks flashes of laughter from both onlookers and rowers. Curran himself can be seen blowing into a head-sized seashell, gracefully punctuating his composition "Maritime Rites", which has been evolving as a labour of love about bodies of water since the 1970s.

After the boats are safely docked back at the harbour, and with almost no time to comprehend what we’ve just seen, festival-goers are swept into the nearby Koninklijke Schouwburg (The Hague’s National Theatre) for part two of the evening. As the room is plunged into darkness, and a DJ with wrap-around shades strides towards the base of the stage, the auditorium is filled with an incredible cacophony of quivering synths, booming drum loops, and sharp intakes of breath.

This showcase is a product of the Puerto Rican Kianí Del Valle Performance Group, Spanish creative studio Hamill Industries, and the Argentinian music producer and DJ Tayhana. The result is also representative of the festival’s intentional mixing of acts from across many different nationalities, as well as artistic practices. Through forty minutes of dance, music, and audiovisuals, we are carried into a frightful but awakening look at displacement and mortality, where dancers move in impossible shapes, shifting between emotions and frequencies, always in time to the beat. With that, night one of Rewire flicks between birthings and endings, between chaos and order – a perfect foundation for what follows.

It is an undisputed truth that any festival is made infinitely more enjoyable by the presence of sunshine, and this one is no exception. The morning is blessed by the deities of good weather, making the first few hours of acclimatising to The Hague’s back streets and tucked-away music venues that much more enjoyable.

After picking up wristbands in the area’s largest cultural building Amare, festival-goers are charismatically welcomed into the weekend by rooms of experiment and artefact. That is to say that, cleverly, and before the official music programme even begins, Rewire’s commitment to alternative experiences already sets up a host of daytime activities, encouraging you to walk around some of The Hague’s artsy hotspots with the aid of a festival programme. For example, on display in Amare’s main foyer is Chris Salter and Marije Baalman’s "N-Polytope", a hanging structure that sporadically emanates pulses of light and sound, and also doubles up as a canopy to sit under and plan the day.

Working in collaboration with iii (instrument inventors) to create their side-programme, Rewire’s Proximity Music: Echoes of Entropy impresses with its concerted effort to connect "music, architecture, technology, ritual and play" through experience-based art forms. In this, the festival once again takes chaos as a theme, spotlighting work that considers entropy as a catalyst for change and creation, or perhaps some stimulation for the post-night out brain.

These installations are well-situated in venues like bookshops, art galleries, and libraries across the city, acting also as a kind of tour through sites of cultural significance. One exhibition by Aura Satz, previously hosted at London’s RCA and named "Warnings in Waiting" looks at sirens, alarm fatigue, and systems of warning – ingeniously located in the basement of a former political embassy.

Another, from Maison the Faux and Arno Verbruggen, aka Glampuss, explores pagan rituals and symbols through performance art, animal hides, and candlelight. And so, within just a day, I felt I had already gained some insider access to the arts scene in the The Hague, by floating around its secret rooms and wood workshops, followed by a faint trail of incense or the ringing of a cowbell

By the time the first band takes to the stage, our brains are already tingling. I begin the evening with LA’s improvised jazz group SML who, after gaining recent success with their host of west coast jams and 2024 album Small Medium Large, are playing their first show in Europe to a very eager and packed-out crowd. Their set forms a 40-minute-long breath of a song, an impressive and hypnotic improvisation led by synthesist Jeremiah Chiu, saxophonist Josh Johnson, and kraut-rock percussionist Booker Stardum.

Paard, one of The Hague’s leading concert halls and multi-space venues, welcomes some of the festival’s larger acts. Even arriving 30 minutes early to her set, people are in feverish anticipation for the 1000-capacity room to host Oklou, who recently came into her own with debut studio album choke enough. Her collaborative work with the likes of Caroline Polachek and Sega Bodega has had a true snowballing effect on the singer’s fanbase, who cheer adoringly for her as she paces onto stage with a mountaineering light strapped on her head. Distracted by her ethereal playing of woodwind instruments and stunningly affected vocals, it takes me a minute to register that she’s pregnant – and not in the early stages. “Obviously it was something we talked about,” she jokes to the crowd, “but I’m very happy to be here.”

Our late evening is soundtracked by Clarissa Connolly, who performs in another kind of venue Rewire offers: a church. From the back gallows of Lutherse Kerk rises an uncompanioned yet overpowering voice as the Scotland-born singer/songwriter saunters down the aisle, serenading the congregation to incredible effect. With a backing of trip-hop drums and finger-picking guitar, along with the sampling of church bells, her music merges perfectly with the spiritual as the clock strikes midnight, marking a beautiful end to the first full day of music.

Rewire’s Saturday programme continues with pop-ups, musical lectures, and curated conversations. As anticipated, there were a plethora of events to attend, including a surprise appearance from DJ Python at 3345, a cool and well-stocked record store in the north of the city. Page Not Found, a carefully curated bookshop and centre of artistic publishing is also a great hangout spot, offering a suite of insightful conversations on themes such as material ecologies, noise as a form of resistance, and the punchily named lecture "Bones, Drones, and Tones". A few honourable mentions must also go to a marbling and zine-making workshop I attend – admittedly maybe for children, rather than adults – and a demonstration of the music coding language Strudel by Patrick McGlynn.

Now feeling familiar with most of Rewire’s venues, I lock in early evening for some room-hopping at Paard. The night begins with a breathtaking set of spoken word and alternative rap from Isiah Hull, who is a former member of Manchester collective Young Identity – a group I grew up seeing myself, and distinctly remember Hull’s affinity for words. It was stunning, then, to see them in this new iteration, with Hill swinging around the stage spewing potent vocabulary to visuals of contemporary life through his eyes. One particularly powerful track sees him speak – while lying on the floor– on the aesthetic politics of being in a young Black body, while the image of a chiselled boxer looms over him, an apt omen for his astute commentary.

Back in the main hall, Erika de Casier is being effortlessly cool. Strutting back and forth down the stage, headphones on, the Copenhagen-based Portuguese singer opts for a minimalist approach to staging and design, letting her voice and music do all the talking as she performs solely to track, with a backdrop of lo-fi/handheld visuals – clips of her at the beach, or walking down the side of the road.

Then again to Paard’s smaller black-box room, where the line is spilling out the door for John Glacier. Arriving from East London’s underground scene, she’s been making mantra-rap with some of the UK’s top producers (Vegyn, Kwes Darko) since her debut album SHILOH: Lost for Words four years back. It’s pretty rare to see her perform – she has been living with longstanding health issues such as Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome, meaning bursts of immobility – and so the crowd gives her an extra warm reception. “Hi I’m John Glacier and this is DJ Dancy Dance,” she beams on stage, giggling while vaping, and then launching into latest hit "Money Shows".

The evening is still very much alive approaching midnight as we head to Concordia, another great venue, which has previously moonlighted as a theatre, a museum, and an editorial office. We’re there for fire-tongued New Yorker rapper billy woods, who walks out to rapturous applause and with classic nonchalance halts attention and stalls the show by plugging his MacBook in and out of the power sockets several times, before deciding which of his extensive catalogue to perform. It’s not my first time seeing woods, but he continues to amaze in how, over the crackle and swell of the speakers, he can spit such intensity for 45 minutes straight.

The remainder of the evening splinters into a few potential avenues. For the restful: an exploration of voice and bass from Swedish-Danish quartet BITOI, once again in the majestic church setting. For the adventurous: back to Paard’s big room for a night of euphoric dance music. Closing the venue is the legendary DJ ¥ØU$UK€ ¥UK1MAT$U – your favourite DJ’s favourite DJ, according to his bio, and a former construction worker who quit his job to pursue music full-time when he was diagnosed with brain cancer ten years back. ¥UK1MAT$U’s ability to mix across styles and genres has been heralded genius by global music heads, and his set – a wild exchange of crunchy samples, pounding bass, and springy tech classics – certainly lives up to the hype.

On the final day of the festival, we find yet another central hub, or rather self-described ‘nexus’ where art, music, digital culture, and food merge seamlessly. This is the intriguingly named The Grey Space in the Middle, where, in the corner of the room, Rewire has made a home with Radio WORM to broadcast live interviews. Passers-by are encouraged to listen-in to the broadcast while browsing their pop-up record store, or mingling with other festival goers over a Grolsch or Club Mate in the foyer.

In an effort to then let the weekend lull down naturally, I choose to stay rooted in Concordia, where several performers are closing-out the festival. Danish-Chilean band Molina, headed by producer and composer Rebecca Molina, play in the pitch black with a disorienting set of soft shoegaze and light, undulating vocals. Shortly after, the eight-piece Caroline grace the stage with their English affinity for folk-rock. It’s like watching a live version of their mesmerising Tiny Desk show from 2023, the stage brimming with talent across instruments and influences, the audience gently rocking back to their noise.

As the sky that evening melts into a blood red, I fly home feeling like I had witnessed a collection of unique showcases by some of both my long-time and now new favourite artists. Rewire's stages are met with a particular energy from each performer, who clearly recognise the special nature of where they've been asked to play and the kinds of attentive crowds that would be watching. And pretty much all of them rose to the challenge, offering interesting visuals, or bold sonic statements with their shows. The result was, despite any intent towards chaos, quite tranquil and inspiring, an effect that I hope will only flourish into Rewire’s next iteration.