Fantazia: the promoter behind the biggest indoor rave Britain had ever seen
Three co-founders, six years, and a run of raves that got bigger every time - up to 28,000 people at Donington Park in one weekend.
Three founders, one New Year
Fantazia was founded in 1991 by James Perkins, Gideon Dawson and Chris Griffin. Its first major event, Fantazia New Year's Eve, ran into 1992 at the Westpoint Exhibition Centre near Exeter and drew 10,000 people - a scale that set the template for everything the promoter ran afterwards.
It did not stay that size for long. Summertime, held at Matchams Park Stadium in Bournemouth in May 1992, drew 16,000. One Step Beyond, at Donington Park that July, drew 28,000 over the weekend.
The Big Bang, and the scale of it
The Big Bang, held at Glasgow's SECC in November 1993, brought 12,000 people together indoors and was reported at the time as the largest indoor rave Britain had seen. Fantazia also released compilation albums - The First Taste in 1992 and Twice As Nice in 1993 - carrying the brand beyond the events themselves.
The promoter was best known for events on this scale during the breakbeat hardcore era's peak, and the name still surfaces on line-ups - Fantazia nights ran at Milton Keynes' Sanctuary alongside Dreamscape and Helter Skelter through the venue's own run.
After 1997
Fantazia's run as an active promoter ended in 1997, with a brief revival that October. Co-founder Gideon Dawson died on 14 April 2019. The name remains one of the reference points anyone writing about the era has to go through - a promoter whose events got measured in tens of thousands before most UK festivals did.