Ewan McVicar on Ayr's Pavilion Festival

You can take the boy out of the town, but you cannot take the town out of him – it's a cliché hard to look past when it comes to Scotland’s superstar Ewan McVicar. From his breakout Street Rave EP to the big room Ninja Tune hit Heather Park, an ode to Ayr is always there. Both released either side of platinum breakout record, Tell Me Something Good, the port town DJ and producer has always kept his feet in the sand.

Grafting from his garden studio on a scarce sunny afternoon, and a week off the international gigging circuit, the 31-year-old sits at a transitional point in his career. Having recently become a father, he's also the brains behind beach festival Pavilion – fast propelling the regeneration of southwest dance culture – McVicar is a parent in more ways than one.

“Being a dad and a producer and trying to figure out your career at the same time, it comes with a lot of stresses,” he admits. “I don't wish it on anyone... but I wouldn't do this if I didn’t love it. Having a baby is the best thing that’s happened to me, it’s the biggest lever to come home and see the smile on his wee face."

Reflecting on his career, he continues: “Going from working in Sub Club, making underground acid house productions as Granary 12 to all of a sudden being in the charts overnight, you almost get flung in this conveyor belt of the ‘next big thing’," he explains. “But I never wanted to be that guy.”  

Through scaling the decks of humble – but bouncing – small-cap pubs around Prestwick circa 2017, there’s a case to be made that McVicar was always the guy. The guy that was going to make things happen in his hometown and at any cost. “It was a ten-year dream of mine to do a festival," he says. "I used to go drinking down The Low Green (where Pavilion Festival is now held) when I was a wee guy growing up and always knew this was the spot, but it was never really a reality, just something I imagined at the time.” 

With Ayr recently voted in a survey as the worst seaside town in Scotland, it’s hard to conceive how McVicar’s coastal showcase Pavilion Festival could shift tens of thousands of tickets in a handful of minutes in its first year. Currently gearing up for its third edition – hosting Happy Mondays, Robert Hood, and James across three stages – the fast-growing festival seeks to combine decades of cultural heritage into three days of live music.  

Pavilion Festival. Photo: Franny Mancini

“My mum was pregnant with me while she worked in the Ayr Pavilion in the 90s at a night club called the Hangar,” explains McVicar on how the name of his festival came to be. The multi-purpose hall was also home to the Powerhouse Rock Club: “that’s why we have a stage named [Powerhouse] in homage – dedicated to local bands of Ayr on the Friday," he tells us.

“I was born in the wrong era,” McVicar laughs, pointing to a STREETrave documentary he’s practically studied as a primary influence on Pavilion, the festival he co-runs today with STREETrave and Colours head honcho Ricky Magowan. “He started what basically became Scotland’s Haçienda, so I thought it would be biblical if I could get him on board and bring STREETrave home. Ricky threw parties at the Ayr ice rink and got planning permission to do a rave at Prestwick airport, but all that history was gone by the time I was growing up... that’s why I started my own [club night] TEN.”  

Taking pointers from his place of work at Glasgow’s weekly I AM party, McVicar made it his mission to add to the diversity of music and nightlife in Ayr again. “It was about working out how to start something with quality music that wouldn’t go over people’s heads because although I was obsessed with it, the town wasn’t.”  

Building a sound system, no-nonsense music policy, and slick graphic design with good buds Roose, Cairn and Steven, the bunch of pals found local BNOCs to share their cause on Twitter. The coastal town renaissance would begin in the countryside with a rave in a nearby forest, though the ambition to do something different didn’t come without backlash. “People would say, ‘Who does he think he is selling early birds, Carl Cox?’" he admits. "I love Ayr so much, but fuck me I couldn’t wait to get away from it in that sense. There's a 50,000 population and if you whittle that down to how many folk are in your year at school and others, everyone knows your business.

“But I think that doubt is what made me who I am today. I’ll meet DJs from Amsterdam, and they’re almost arrogant in comparison because that self-assurance is just alien to us. It’s easier to put yourself down and take the piss before you pat yourself on the back – it's just being Scottish man.”

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Pavilion Festival takes place on The Low Green, Ayr, 2-4 May