Solaluna, Greece – September 2001 Solaluna Party Report
by Starlurk
Right then… where to start… I guess the beginning would be a good place ;o) We arrived at Alexandroupoli at 11pm on the 29/09 to find all the hotels full, and we couldn’t sleep on the beach because there was a thunder storm, so in the end we had to camp out under a shelter on the harbour. Needless to say we didn’t get much sleep, mainly because we seemed to have taken over a popular snogging spot… every 10 minutes a couple on a motor bike would roar up, take a look at the bunch of hippies squatting in their love-nest and then roar off again.
We got up early (not that we had much choice) to go to the ferry ticket office when it opened at 7am, because we had been warned that the boats got booked up very quickly. Unfortunately a lot of others had the same idea too, and when the doors opened there was a huge scrum to get in… funny how normally “shanti” people revert to “survival of the fittest” mode very quickly and easily in these situations ;o) After about an hour of intense, sweaty and claustrophobic queuing, Timo and I emerged from the office with our prize, to find there were now many more people, and very few tickets left.Our ferry, which was due to leave at 1, didn’t leave till about 3.30, after another mad scrum, this time to get on the ferry. So by this stage tempers in the group were fraying slightly, mainly due to the heat and lack of sleep; but, as the island drew closer our spirits lifted as we realised after nearly 36 hours of travelling and discomfort we were practically there… and even from a distance the island looked stunningly beautiful =o)
We had one more test when we got off the boat, as there were only 2 coaches for the several hundred people getting off the boat, but we all managed to make it onto one of them.We met the others and pitched our tents, had a smoke and went for a swim, which made us feel a lot better… at last it felt like we were on holiday :o) Unfortunately it seemed there was very little to smoke on the site, foreigners had been put off bringing any puff due to customs (there weren’t any ! doh!) and Greek prisons, and the Greeks because there had been rumours that there would be a large undercover cop presence (and Greek prisons ;). This caused panic in certain quarters, (namely myself and opul) so the quest for puff was begun in earnest, this took up the whole of the rest of the evening, and most of the next day too, but eventually we found what turned out to be almost the last of what was being sold… and pretty yummy it was too, dedication is what you need ;o))
The rest of the time leading up to kick-off was spent chilling on the beach, or in hammocks, and generally charging our batteries in readiness for the mayhem to come; so by the time 9pm came round we were all ready to go. Unfortunately, the same could not be said for the organisation, the official start time of the festival was met with a resounding silence. Apparently some sort of processor for the sound system was fried, and the dimwits hadn’t bought a spare; so this was the reason we hadn’t noticed a soundcheck ;o) Luckily, this problem had been spotted quickly enough in order to get another one onto the island that night. So to pass the time some went to bed, and others sat on the beach, felt wobbly and watched the moon ping-ponging across the sky ;o) Also there was this weird object in the sky; it was about the size a large star, and it was colour-cycling furiously…blue, green, red, all 8 of us saw it (and a couple of us were even sober ;o), none of us could work out what it was, and it vanished as suddenly as it had appeared… did anyone else see this ?
Eventually, at around 2pm, the soundsystem rumbled into life (for the 2 hours before they had just been using the monitors !), and the party began properly. We got an hour or so of a Greek DJ (sorry can’t remember his name) who was decent, but the sound technicians were doing the tuning as they went along so I probably didn’t get the best impression of him. Then it was a hoffman breakfast and John Phantasm, who played a storming night time set, his mixing and track selection were excellent, and it provided a brilliant release for all the tension that built up during the quiet hours, and also set the standard for others to follow :o)
Which, unfortunately, the next DJ, Dominic Lamb, didn’t do, well, not in our opinion anyway. He played a really badly mixed, directionless set of wishy-washy tracks, that had no energy. Luckily by this time it was sunrise, and I was tripping hard, so there was enough to distract me other than the music, in fact it was almost a total sensory overload. The dancefloor was right next to the beach, you could actually lie in the sea and still hear the music as well as you would do, if you were in the middle of the dancefloor itself. The sun came up directly out to sea, and if you turned round you were confronted with a stunning mountain range, covered with forests and deep gorges. There was not much other decoration (no back-drops at all), but with this scenery they really weren’t needed, words truly cannot do it justice. To top it all off, the dancefloor was covered ankle deep in lavender, so when it was stomped on by thousands of hippies a really pleasant smell was released (pity it wasn’t there on the last day, when it was definitely needed more ;). This smell (and perhaps the infestation of insects that lived there and in people’s dreads ;) attracted squadrons of enormous dragonflies which buzzed and dive bombed the dancefloor for the rest of the day, which was a sight in itself.
At this point we went back to our tent to get food (which was quite a mission) and other provisions, we were there a little while, when we heard the start of Hux Flux, so we quickly headed back again. He was excellent, he played a good mixture of released and unreleased stuff, and really had the dance floor rocking, and he looked like he was having the time of his life, which is always a plus IMO. Tob remarked to me at one point it looked like he was playing a manic game of pin ball, which it did, he then said “this is really cool”, at which point the music cut out and a very serious voice boomed out of the 45k soundsystem “there ain’t no question about that”… which was seriously cool in itself ;o))
After HuxFlux came Serge, it was getting hot by this point, and one of the drawbacks of the dancefloor location was that there was no shade at all, luckily though there was quite a strong breeze, and, of course one could always take dip in the sea to cool down. Serge was the best DJ at Boom last year for me, so I was really looking forward to his set. Although he wasn’t as good as he was then, (he didn’t put as much effort into his mixing as he usually does, it seemed), he played some excellent music, including a remix of Alien Project – Midnight Sun which rocked big time. After his set, Slinky Wizard started their live set; the first couple of tracks didn’t really grab us, so we decided to do the sensible thing and go back to our tents and rest up. About an hour later, I was lying in my hammock smoking a bifta, when I heard some really beautiful morning music coming from the main stage, but I could also hear the 2nd stage, which pissed me off, so I decided to wander back and check it out. Andrei came with me, and we got back to find Youth DJ-ing (it was supposed to be Gus Till, dunno what happened there). We didn’t have the energy to dance, so we sat in the only bit of shade at the side of the dancefloor and smoked, listened and chatted. Youth played some good morning tunes, including the Earth Orbit rmx by Logic Bomb, and his own Paranoid Sunglasses, but again the mixing was kinda disappointing. After an hour or so, sleep had to come, so we headed back off to the tent.
I slept till about 8, got up, got some food, had a couple of beers and a smoke. I couldn’t see myself pulling 3 all-nighters, so sacrifices had to be made, so I decided to go back to bed, and miss Dado and the Greek live act, Quantasia; but be up in time for Koxbox at 6.30am. I wish I hadn’t bothered. Frank E DJ’d an hour before their live set; I caught the last half hour of this, it was ok, but nothing special, in my book. Their live set was very disappointing, apart from the final 2 or 3 tracks; for the most part it was way too clubby with lots swirly, housey noises. Some people liked it, but not as many people seemed to be dancing as there had been.
After the live set Frank E took over for another couple of hours, so we decided to go and get some breakfast and catch Red Seal at Stage 2.
The low point of the festival came then; Timo had been feeling very unwell since he got to the island, and not being in comfort, or having food that he could actually eat, now became too much. They saw the doctor that was on-site, and he made a prescription for some antibiotics, but in order to get them (it was Sunday), and for the other reasons, he and Marita had to go back to the mainland. It was very sad to see them go, but they weren’t having any fun at all, and it proved to be the right decision.
It was at this time we heard Logic Bomb had started an hour early, but by the time we had said our good-byes and got down there, they had just finished. It didn’t bother me that much, because I had heard them in July at Senseblender, and I think the others soon forgot their disappointment because Dimitri from TIP started playing a stomping set, and we were all dancing like loons ;o) There was no breeze that day, and we were worried about getting too hot (it was over 30 degrees), but then the cavalry arrived, well, in this case it was the fire department, they drove their truck onto the dancefloor, and two firemen stood on the roof of the truck and gave everyone a good soaking, there was even quite a large rainbow because of it =o). It was much needed, and seemed to give the atmosphere a massive lift (not that there was anything wrong with it before, and they became a regular sight over the next few days; it worked a lot better than the sprinklers at Boom in keeping everyone cool, and the dust down. Bug was wearing some dark blue cotton trousers, which were quite new, and after she had been drenched a couple of times, the dye came out on her legs, turning them completely blue, so she had great fun running up to tripped-out people and asking them what they thought of her sun-tan; Tom.nl thought that she must be turning into a smurf ;o)))
Dimitri played for 3 hours, I didn’t recognise a lot of the music, but it was all excellent, and his mixing was by far the best of the festival up till that point. After him, Paul Taylor took over, he was also very good with both his mixing and track selection; by the end of it, most of us were flagging a little so we retreated to the shady spot to listen and dance from there. Jens and Julie bought along a huge watermelon, they had cut a hole in it, and poured in a whole bottle of Bacardi, it was absolutely delicious and goes very well with a bit of special K ;o)))
Stella Nuttela took over after Paul, and although it was good to see a woman up there, her track selection was a bit hard and dark for the time of day (4pm). She did play one really funny track with loads of police siren noises… does anyone know who made this ? We stayed for a while, and then decided it was time to go keta-swimming… which was feckin’ funny and very floaty =oD It was then time for bed, with the alarm set for 1.30 to wake us up in time for Etnica at 2am.
Which was about 2 hours too little sleep, but we made it out of bed anyway, only to have to wait another 2 hours for Etnica to start. Doh. I don’t remember much about the DJ before them, probably because I wasn’t awake properly, but they finally came on at 4am. I wasn’t expecting much, because I haven’t really like their last couple of albums, but they were much better than I thought they were going to be, according to our resident Etnica expert, Mr Opul, they didn’t play much he recognised, so that could be the reason why ;o) Matt also tried to phone Darin at this point (obviously we tried to tell him that this was an incredibly mean thing to do… not ;))), but unluckily for us, and luckily for Darin there was no connection ;o))
After Etnica, Dino Psaras started, but we went back to the tent for another hoffman breakfast, we chilled there for a while, but it sounded too good, so an hour or so later we were back. Dino played an excellent set, the music had a lot of energy, was very well mixed and he handled the transition from darkness to light brilliantly. Towards the end of his set a couple of tracks bordered on being cheesy, but they weren’t quite. He played the newest version of Sweet Dreams, which IMO is a massive improvement from the one with all the ‘orrible vocals that I heard at Boom last year. It was the most beautiful sunrise of the festival this morning, when the sun came over the horizon it was this huge, almost neon pink disk, and there were the most stunning, fluffy cloud formations, which were also turned pink by the sun. The peaks of the mountains were shrouded in the same clouds the whole day, which were constantly changing formation; the most surreal part, was that the strong breeze was again coming off the sea, but the clouds over the mountains were being blown in the opposite direction.
I thought that Max would have a hard job to follow, but happily I was proved wrong, in fact he not only followed it, but musically I would say it was much better; although his mixing was a little dodgy at times. Tristan came next with his live set, which again was excellent, and then he followed it up with unbelievably good, and well mixed DJ set, including a remix of “William”, the original “Athalon” and lots of other goodies. At one point I turned to Opul and told him that I had found a new god, to which I was told that I wasn’t the only one who believed in him ;o)))
Finally, at about 3pm, after many hours of dancing, a couple of funny little bits of paper, some horse tranquilliser and several soakings from the fire department, it was time for the Hallucinogenius himself. It was what we had all been waiting for, and he didn’t disappoint. He started with a new track (I think he played about 4 new tracks in all) which was good, with a really nice choppy vocal sample, we had brilliant remixes of demention, mill-loony-yum, the loin king, the pink floyd rmx and my own personal favourite Horrorgram. The other new tracks were excellent too, I can’t wait for his next full-on album on the strength of them. He played completely live for 1 and a half hours, so full respect to him. This, on top of all that had come before, nearly made my brain explode. The “Surprise” (except it wasn’t for us, because somehow I managed to find out the day we got there what the surprise was ;),Total Eclipse followed immediately after him, but I had to sit down in our usual shady spot to try and take it all in, smoke a bifta or 3, and try and anaesthetise the pain in my legs (which I managed to do successfully ;))) This time there was a watermelon full of vodka waiting for me, which helped ;o))
I don’t remember much about the first half of Total Eclipse, except for the fact it all sounded very good, but I managed to get up and dance for the 2nd half, which was, again, quite excellent, and they finished their set /me off with my favourite ever Total Eclipse track… Space Clinic, which by this stage, was exactly what I needed… or should that have been a Spaced Clinic ? ;o))
I was feeling distinctly wobbly at this stage, and had no energy left whatsoever for the last part of the surprise, which was James Monro, so at around 8pm, most of us staggered back towards the tent for some food, with huge grins plastered on our faces (along with about 3 days worth of dust ;)
There were a couple of bad points to the whole thing though; the first being the food, which was pretty dreadful on site, but we managed to make it to the local village for a decent meal a couple of times during our stay. By the time we left the dance area on the last day, they had already shut all the bars and the only food place inside the site, which pissed us off a fair bit. Also, the nearest bar was a good 10 minute round trip from the dance floor, which was fairly inconvenient, and it didn’t make much sense.
It would have been nice if they had kept to the schedule as well, because some us are big enough trainspotters to want to keep to it ourselves. And it would have been useful if there were more ferries (after all, as someone pointed out on the festie comment and suggestions board, it was on an island), a friend of mine who travelled all the way from Finland, had to wait till the 2nd day to get onto the island because all the ferries were full, which was a real shame.
But apart from that there was nothing to complain about that actually detracted from our enjoyment… it was a fine effort considering it was their first attempt at something this size (fnaar ;o), and the remoteness of the location.
Overall I had the time of my life, the setting was perfect, the sound system was a whole heap better than Boom last year, and the atmosphere started off good, and then built up to completely electric over the course of the 3 days, and the people were brilliant too.
Musically, it reaffirmed my faith; I had been getting bored of all the minimal pseudo-psychedelic/actual-techno plodding shite that I have heard so much of in Amsterdam, in fact it was boring me to the point I was beginning to wonder what the point was anymore. But there was nothing at all minimal or plodding about any of the music I heard on Samothraki. I can’t really comment on Stage 2, as the music was so good on the main stage, I never really spent any time there; although I did hear that I managed to sleep through a live sex show there on the Saturday night ;o)) I am already looking forward to next year… maybe if I start saving now I can go to Boom as well ;o)
Massive thanks to the organisers and Big Hugs to Marita and Timo, Jens and Julie, Tob and Tess, Andrei, Matt Opul, Sergei and Bella, Tom and Aisha, Sjoerd and Sanne, Bram, Goose, Andy, Erwin, Chris and Anna, Sluckie, Loula, Stephanos… and most of all, Bug… without you lot it wouldn’t have been half as much fun as it was =oD
A Final Bash at the Elf – January 2001 Final bash @ the elf...
courtesy of marita*
[6 january, 2001]
....so we figured we would not be justified in missing it, not that we wanted to anyway. =)
It was being advertised as a 24hr party, so we took our time in going there, and wandered over that way around 3am. it was rather full when we got there, but didn't actually get any busier, thankfully. =) it gave the immediate feeling of a good atmosphere even before i could get my coat off.
All available walls had been covered again with fluoro backdrops, fluoro wool decorating-, and mobiles hanging from the ceiling. a big fluoro pink cutout of DANCE was leaning against one side. as if we needed encouragement. ;)
Totem was playing when we got there. he played a really good set. one of those sets that have everyone grinning and bouncing around on the dance floor. gelfling from belgium came after him with a set that seemed to get better as it went on, and after him shakti-cat played just as the morning was starting to break. she plays brill morning sets, and didn't disappoint this time either. =) she kept everyone wiggling around the dance floor until well into the morning. =)
This woman that was playing when we left on new years day took over after shakti-cat, but i still don't know what her name is. =) she played a really nice morning set for a while, but then she lapsed back into what she did on nye again, and pushed the tempo up further and further until it wasn't comfortable to dance to that speed of music at that time of the day anymore. but we just took time out and sat down and chatted for a while and smoked a few joints together. maybe we didn't dance, but we still enjoyed it. =)
So we took that opportunity to go home to get the camera, and to pick up more tobacco. by the time we got back, gosse (shawnodese) was playing. the tempo was back to a more dancable pace, and the dancefloor was still full and wiggling for that time of the day, think it was around 11:30am.
Photo's to be found here on timo's page.
Check out the wee robot that was placed in the middle of the floor at some point of the morning. and later, someone put a wee wig on it. very very funny to see the expressions on the faces of some people as they almost tripped over it. ;))
Gosse played some really good tracks, his set would have been really really good if.... he left the jet effect on the pioneer 100's alone. but he didn't. can you imagine what it's like to have jet effects zooming over your fav music, not just once or twice in a set, but 4 or 5 times in almost every track? it was *terrible*. i can't understand how one dj, over the course of a couple of hours that is the duration of his set, could fuck up so many good tracks singlehandedly. gives me the impression that such a dj has absolutely no respect for the music he's playing or the artists that created it. and unfortunately, this wasn't the first time i've heard it from him. oh well. =/
Even that didn't and couldn't spoil our fun and enjoyment of the party in hand though. there were people there that i hadn't seen in such a long time, i think a lot of them made an extra effort to make it back for the last party. =) massive smiles and hugely friendly atmosphere throughout the whole thing. =)
I think we finally left around 2pm. we could have pushed ourselves further, but we really had to consider that we had to get some sleep in before work the next day. again, we didn't get to bed or sleep until 15:30 or more... i'll have to blame it on the mind altering substances, but i'm not complaining. ;)
We're certainly going to miss the elf. we used to have such excellent parties in the silo years ago. it was a squatted grain-silo, but it finally got evicted, and we had no decent party venue for about 3 years, until the elf was squatted. the elf recaptured some of the old atmosphere that the silo used to have, and indeed, there were people that came to the elf parties, that we never saw anywhere else outside the silo. =) fingers crossed that 1) the elflings find a place to continue their life style and 2) (on a more selfish note) that we find somewhere to continue our noncommercial psy parties! =)
Many many thanks to the elflings that provided us with, and participated in, all the parties at the elf. it's sadly the end of an era that won't easily be forgotten. i'm just hoping that it won't be the last time that we'll all be together in such an exceptional atmosphere.
Greets to one and all,
=)
marita.
DC Haze, USA – September 2000 DC Haze
by DjHaze*
On Friday July 7th 2000 I made my US DJing debut at San Diego's DRAGON LOUNGE night.
The gig arose through a handy email from another DJ in the US, one Joe Sweeney from North Carolina (thanx J!). He had visited the CRYONIX website and liked what we were doing and extended an offer of a set if I should ever happen to be stateside.
As it happened I was due to be in sunny California at the beginning of July for a business trip - the annual pilgrimage to silicon valley to visit my suppliers. Joe in-turn hooked me up with a guy in San Diego by the name of DJ B-Side....who just so happened to run a nu skool breaks and drum 'n' bass night in San Diego.
Well, to cut a long story slightly short, B-Side (aka Ben - yep another one!!) and I exchanged a couple of emails and it was confirmed that I would be doing a back-2-back set with monsieur B-Side between 11pm-1am (prime time!) at their 7th July night....this was a last minute booking but they still went and got the flyers reprinted with my name on 'em. Quality! ;)
First DJ up on the night was an up and coming San Diegan by the name of MANTIS. His style of music was very similar to my own with a very heavy leaning towards the more progressive end of the breaks spektrum. A good DJ and definitely one to look out for should you ever be out that way. As you can see the club was a little heavily fogged! But trust me there is a DJ in there somewhere.
The decor for the club was really interesting with a general oriental theme about it. The mural that you can see behind the turntables ran the entirety of a 25ft wall and was some of the best graffiti I've ever seen! Pure class.
The resident MC for the night was BUCKSHOT...or MAN MOUNTAIN as I ended up calling him. He was HUGE!!! He was also a pretty good MC, and I hate MCs (except for Mr Wong who I make special dispensation for!). Talk about get the crowd going!
Talking of the crowd...totally unlike a UK club crowd. Where as in the UK people tend to stand around waiting for something to happen for the first couple of hours of the night, the American crowd start dancing the moment they enter the club! It's sooo coo-el - even the warm up DJ has a good sized crowd for his set!!
The attitude of the crowd was also very reminiscent of the old raves of the late 80's early 90's in the fact that every one was very open and friendly. One stoopid thing about the whole Californian clubbing experience is that you are not allowed to smoke inside the club....you have to go out into the car park!!!
Even more stoopid than that is the fact that you are not allowed to take open containers of alcohol (ie. your beer) outside into the street! Therefor you have to leave your beer inside whilst you go out for a smoke!!!
Ludicrous!
By the time that 11 o'clock came around the club was nicely filling up and I'd met some coo-el people who were really interested to hear that I'd come from the UK to play at the event.
There were actually two guys who had come all the way from Dallas (about 800 miles!) to come to the night 'cause they'd heard that a UK DJ was playing!! MAD, that's like driving from Reading to Aberdeen for a night out!
It was really nice to see that the breaks scene in the US isn't too far behind that of the UK. Though they were just far enough so that the tunes that I took with me were all unheard of to them...thankfully they really got into the style.
Yep, that's me..and look I got an onlooker!!!
The strangest, and most flattering, thing to happen during my set was when the crowd started chanting "Haze, Haze, Haze" over and over again in the middle of my set!! It was really wierd...but nice too. ;p
The three and pass routine that B-Side and myself employed worked really well. The blend of my progre-ssive stuff and his darker stuff was very much like Jurassik and mine's sessions at Cryonix back home!
Let me say a few words about my host - DJ B-Side. What a quality fella! He, and his friends, really made me feel at home during my stay and I hope to offer the same service to them should they venture over the pond in this direction. As a DJ B-Side has been playing the same length of time as myself and seems to have been into the same kinds of music as myself too.
He's currently the US breaks scene's rising star with gigs alongside Adam Freeland, Uberzone and Simply Jeff in the near future. Style wise he's very competent and mixes fluidly whatever the style (I've got his new demo at home and it's a quality mix of breaks and tech house!).
Definitely a Haze favourite!
After B-Side and I finished our set it was the turn of the drum 'n' bass crew to shake the place. And I do mean SHAKE the place! The people that provided the soundsystem for the night - PROFOUND SOUND SYSTEMS - did a seriously good job of looseing all of my teeth! Really good rig...nice and bassy.
Try as we could we were completely unable to make the system sound distorted...f**k knows what sort of compression equipment they were running. Whatever it was it was good. Very good! First d'nber up was FURY - all the way from Denver, Colorado. Another nice guy and also another good DJ. He played a real nice mix of hard n fast jungle (lots of cause for concern and bad company stuff!! - lovely) which whipped the already enthusiastic crowd into even more of a frenzy. Helped along by the orders being issued by MC Buckshot.
Last up was ALLEYCAT from San Francisco. A pretty good female DJ who dropped some of my all time favourite tracks - all be it new remixes of 'em! I will never tire of hearing Terrorist of Champion Sound - mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm!!!! All in all a brilliant night. And to top it all off I was offered several other gigs whilst I was in the US. Unfortunately due to prior engagements I was only able to do one of them - on Saturday 8th at the amusingly entitled COSMIC BOWL in San Diego.
Cosmic Bowl was a real interesting night. A much more intimate, bar like event, which isn't suprising as it took place in the bar of a bowling alley!!!! It was very bizzare to walk into a bowling alley like you see on the movies and hear tearing drum n bass blasting out from the building! Fred Flintstone never went bowling here - though he should've done! ;)
I got given a coo-el tour of the workings of a bowling alley...which was actually quite fascinating! No really, it was!! The best part of the night was just getting to hang out with the natives. Oh, and to play a corking breaks set for an hour, musn't forget that! So, all that's left for me to do is to say thanx to Ben (B-SIDE), Guage, Pete (MC BUCKSHOT), Mantis and his girlfriend, Alleycat, Fury, Jolt, all of Ben's mates whose names I have shamelessly forgotten (sorry!) and to all the people that attended the gigs.
Celebrity Moon, Haad-Rin, Thailand – February 2001 Celebrity Moon
February 8th, 2001
Report courtesy of Full Moon Party Thai Beach party site*
February the 8th was a calm day with gentle breezes coming from the ocean. By the time darkness fell on Haad Rin Beach, the making of a huge Full Moon Party was underway. The crowds were the largest in recent memory. The official guess is close to 10,000 dancing people filling the whole beach area. The full moon’s light filled the sky and competed with the many lights on the beach and the spotlights filling all of Haad Rin. The World Famous DJ from Germany, Sven Vaeth worked the DJ booth at Paradise Bungalows from early on to the daylight. Sven kept the energy alive with seven hours of non-stop playing. The party crowds continued to dance until the morning. The real troupers followed Sven to the after party at the Backyard where he played another six hours! The February Celebrity Moon Party was one the largest and most exciting party’s I have covered. Enjoy the pictures of the party people dancing the night away with Sven!
See you all in March on Koh Phangan.
Party On!
Ravey
Brighton Policing, not so right on – January 2001 Brighton Policing, Not So Right On
thread from internet newgroup: newsgroup:uk.music.rave
Hundreds of revellers had their New Year's Eve ruined when police broke up their party at five minutes to midnight. Champagne corks were about to pop when officers raided the illegal party in Shoreham. Two other illegal raves in Hove were also shut down during the height of the celebrations. One reveller said: "It was so mean spirited of the police.
"It was 11.55pm and people were standing around waiting for midnight with bottles of champagne and party poppers. Then the police arrived and people were in tears. They had come from miles around. We understand the laws are in place for safety reasons, but our whole evening was ruined."
Police, however, were unrepentant. Superintendent Graham Cox, commander of the Hove-Shoreham division, said: "I would rather be described as a party pooper than have to explain to relatives the next day why I
allowed such a dangerous party to continue until people were burned to death.
"There was a real risk of that happening."
Mr Cox said the New Year's Eve inferno at a disco in Holland where up to 12 people died and 130 were injured supported the police argument. More than 200 were ordered out of the Shoreham rave in an underground car park on an industrial estate off the A259. Another 200 people were ejected from an illegal party at 12.45am on New Year's Day on the second floor of a factory unit in Ellen Street, Hove, and 400 were shown the door at 1.45am from another rave in a factory in Fonthill Road, Hove.
Police took photographs of blocked fire doors and other safety hazards including old and dirty mattresses. Mr Cox said: "Each site had fire hazards and there were no safety provisions.
"Each venue was a potential death trap. In Ellen Street fire exits were boarded up, it waspitch dark in places and mattresses were on the floor. Mr Cox said tickets at each venue were selling for £5 and organisers were making upwards of £500 a time. Some broke licensing laws by selling alcohol and there was evidence of drug-taking at one.
He said electricity was being stolen and, at one location, damage was caused and there were complaints from neighbours about noise. He said: "We shall continue to take positive action against these illegal gatherings." At all three locations, organisers were ordered to pack up their equipment or risk having it seized. No arrests were made, but Mr Cox said police inquiries were continuing.
Follow-up:
"I had friends who were unlucky enough to be at *two* out of 3 of these NYE parties. First they went to the Enlightenment party - only for it to get busted. They thought they were one step ahead, and went onto the FAF/Ground Zero party nearby. Shortly after they got there, so did the Babylon. They then drove all the way upto Berkshire, only to find that the warehouse party that had gone successfully there [and where I'd
spent the night - bloody good it was too!] - had finished early and by 10am all that remained were folks loading equipment into vans. That party *didn't* get busted, but the venue was *very* close to some nearby shops that were opening for business early on New Years Day.
Well done to everyone who was lucky enough to get to a party that *didn't* get busted - it looks like Brighton got the worst of it this NYE :-(..."
Simon
Party Poopers – December 2000 Party Poopers
by P. Mills - New Years Eve 2000
Copyright: P. Mills
Hundreds of revellers had their New Year's Eve ruined when police broke up their party at five minutes to midnight. Champagne corks were about to pop when officers raided the illegal party in Shoreham. Two other illegal raves in Hove were also shut down during the height of the celebrations.One reveller said: "It was so mean spirited of the police. "It was 11.55pm and people were standing around waiting for midnight with bottles of champagne and party poppers. "Then the police arrived and people were in tears. They had come from miles around. We understand the laws are in place for safety reasons, but our whole evening was ruined."
Police, however, were unrepentant. Superintendent Graham Cox, commander of the Hove-Shoreham division, said: "I would rather be described as a party pooper than have to explain to relatives the next day why I allowed such a dangerous party to continue until people were burned to death.
"There was a real risk of that happening."
Mr Cox said the New Year's Eve inferno at a disco in Holland where up to 12 people died and 130 were injured supported the police argument. More than 200 were ordered out of the Shoreham rave in an underground car park on an industrial estate off the A259. Another 200 people were ejected from an illegal party at 12.45am on New Year's Day on the second floor of a factory unit in Ellen Street, Hove, and 400 were shown the door at 1.45am from another rave in a factory in Fonthill Road, Hove. Police took photographs of blocked fire doors and other safety hazards including old and dirty mattresses. Mr Cox said: "Each site had fire hazards and there were no safety provisions.
"Each venue was a potential death trap.
"In Ellen Street fire exits were boarded up, it waspitch dark in places and mattresses were on the floor." Mr Cox said tickets at each venue were selling for £5 and organisers were making upwards of £500 a time. Some broke licensing laws by selling alcohol and there was evidence of drug-taking at one.He said electricity was being stolen and, at one location, damage was caused and there were complaints from neighbours about noise. He said: "We shall continue to take positive action against these illegal gatherings." At all three locations, organisers were ordered to pack up their equipment or risk having it seized. No arrests were made, but Mr Cox said police inquiries were continuing.
Earthdance, Holland – October 2000 Earthdance Groningen
14 October 2000
courtesy of daemon
Good karma
Blessed be the Androidz, for throwing a party when everyone seemed to have left for Voov, leaving me depressed at home and ready to boogie. Who could have ventured that that tiny, intimate event would extend all the way to this magnificent Boom! label/Earthdance party ? The whole experience was drenched in good karma, starting from the potential dull traintrip to Groningen. In Utrecht, I left a very happy newly-to-goa-introduced colleague after a nice chat, took the train and started talking to and older guy who was reading a Terry Pratchett novel, so he joined me. Socializing when commuting was nice for a change, and it got better still when another partygoer appeared, so the older guy went back to reading and we prepared for some serious action. No buses in Groningen, but there’s cabs so we kind of almost found it, and stumbled across other partygoers, offering us a ride in the right direction. Phew, saved us some searching at least. Things began to look splendid already, a searchlight indicating the general direction to the venue, and candles guiding us through a dark Blair Witch-like landscape. Compliments to the organizers, a real plus to the atmosphere ! And then… the boat where the bootieshaking would have a start in a few moments…
Aligning Energies Worldwide
Hearing the thumps from a distance, it was hard not to rush to the boat, well one might not manage to cross the walkway too fast anyway, so we calmly climbed on board. How nice to see the group of people met earlier in this wonderful partyseason ! All of the Androidz were there, some of them we hadn’t seen for a while, others we saw here ‘n’ there. But the tone was set: this was going to be a nice night indeed, intimate, amongst friends and other likeminded party animals, with some phat tunes that invited, no commanded us to get to the floor and dance the night away. Which is what we did, interlaced with some chilling out, but basically you had to dance. You cannot ignore a good DJ when you hear one, so what else is there than sweat before the discjuggling, DATswitching and vinylscratching master. Which is what all of the DJ’s were. At a certain point my body simply ached from fatigue, but my mind didn’t allow it to. Some of us got the wrong footgear, shame there aren’t pictures included of after-party blister sessions ;-). And when it got too hot, you could always stick your head out, or take a whiz outside, and enjoy the misty scenery. Perfect, just completely and utterly right, this was. Add to that the knowledge that at several places worldwide other people are doing the same thing, dancing for a good cause, now THAT feels good, this unifying feeling !But all good things inevitably come to an end, so with tears in our eyes we exchanged byebye’s and off we went…
Still karma to burn …
in a spaced car, nice and tight, seven of us, still wandering over and wondering about the experience, the people involved, the nice venue, the excellent music, the overall nice afterglow one has after a night well spent. If there is a party god, we have pleased him very much. If the other parties worldwide were only half as good, the dance or goa-community as a whole has made a difference. And if there’s another Boom! label party, we are so going to be there !
Thanks to all parties involved for a wonderful night, everything was perfect.
Technosense – October 2000 Technosense, Reading, UK - 19.10.00
by Nick*
It was an excellent night. The venue was just near the originally booked one and also near my gaff, so an easy walk, albeit not one I'd ideally choose to make, down that dark track. Seemed as though more people made it than normally come along to Technosense at the After Dark venue anyway which was nice :) At midnight we had a special Earthdance- style Prayer For W**kers viz the manager of the After Dark :)
Of course with no licence to worry about the play list went a bit by the board. I heard Dan (DJ Sideshow) play, and I heard Barclay DJ Dark Angel who was of course every bit as good as you'd expect. Thanks for all the top classic Dark Angel tunes mate, and especially for "This Is The House That X Built" - I did indeed notice it :-) :o) And I think James Scrawney Beaver, and D.A.V.E. the Drummer, and I don't know who else ...
I took two of my friends home to my place at about 2.30am or so, and we had cups of tea and a wotnot before they went to bed. I just chilled out, kept myself awake and listened to hard house :) before I went back to hear another friend, DJ Lucy, when he was supposed to be playing from about 4.30. He had been going to go straight on after D.A.V.E. The Drummer but with extra time there were extra DJs to fit in.
Unfortunately one of the James (was it James Daft Kunt) disappeared after he'd been given a play slot so Lucy was on earlier, and I missed his set of tearing hard gabba :( However our other mates said that it was very good indeed, and I'm looking forwards to hearing it on another occasion.
In another mail someone wrote to me:
> The new venue wasn't hard to find but it was *filthy* :) Underground in every sense of the word :)
> I am intrigued!!!
Heh :) It's an old factory building, someone reckoned it had been something to do with woodwork on account of the sawdust, though to me it was all just random filth. Downstairs is a large basement area (and I mean large), Technosense didn't even occupy a quarter of it, and of course it was the quarter furthest from the entrance so you had a long walk across a large dark space full of puddles, with only one floodspot and the rig lights to guide you. Mind you, finding your way back to the stairs to ground level was even more fun - fortunately this is where the large rubber torch came in very handy !
I could write more but I won't yet - it would be worth ringing the same partyline number (much) later tonight for more party details ...
But yeah, it was filthy, the ceiling had steel beams supported on cast columns and the girders and pipework were coated with black muck, also the floor was very very dusty and gritty (and I'm told also sawdusty as per previous email). Take good torches, and old clothes that you don't mind getting extremely dusty.
Still, it was a great and absolutely teriffic party, much better than at the After Dark Club so eat your heart out mate !! They were still going strong when I had to take Lucy home to crash, I don't know how long it lasted but I wouldn't be surprised if it kept going right through ...
Nick
Calm Seas, Thailand – September 2000. Calm Seas
September 13th, 2000
Report courtesy of Full Moon Party Thai Beach party site*.
The days before the party were windy and the water was choppy. Waves lapped the beaches and transportation to the Full Moon Party could be exciting this time indeed. But on Wednesday the seas were calm. The water was like glass with no waves on the beach.
It was a perfect day and evening for the Full Moon Party. The trip to Koh Phangan by speedboat was fast, smooth and dry for a change. The Calm Seas made the trip from the Gecko Village pass quickly. Above the moan of the speedboat, the beats of the night could be heard coming from Haad Rin. The September 2000 Full Moon Party was underway!
It was time to party! The crowd estimated at 6,000 seemed as calm as the seas. These laid back party people danced to the varied beats filling the beach. For the whole evening the seas were calm, the crowd was relaxed, the moon came out between the clouds, the party continued. We were blessed this time and there was no early morning shower.
The horizon was filled with clouds when the sun broke. The sea remained calm. The party continued for many while others waded to the waiting speed boats. What a fun Full Moon Party! There was excitement in the crowd. There was power in the air. Yet peace seemed to prevail. Even the return speedboat trip was reflective of the Calm Seas.
Here are my pictures from the party. Enjoy!
Party On!
Ravey
Good Mood Productions, Portugal. Good Mood Productions - New Year 1998
Herdade Barroca de Alva (Alcochete)
This is the day of the year that everybody is looking forward to make a big celebration, creating by this means false expectations, but this party was an exception to that.
The party was in a Huge farm, closed to a barn, in a big circus tent and the chill out in the barn itself, the decors was as expected Good Mood prods/Boom fest style, ie, lots of fluo stuff along with fluo mandala backdrops made by Pedro and Susana from the org.
The party started before 11 pm with Dj Migas from Portugal, who played bouncy swedish style tracks, but the party realy started at midnight when everybody was celebrating, shouting, etc, then started playing more heavier tracks but always groovy.
Then at 1 am came Dj Pena also from Portugal, who dat played very powerful, with lots of unreleased tracks, along with some guitar and swedish tracks which the crowd was looking forward to and retributing with a non stop frantic dance. Then, appeared a non schedule portuguese dj, Paulo by the name, resident in France and Totally Blind!!!
He plays from dat and knows what to do with them, playing almost unreleased tracks and very danceable style (he usually plays very dark with some breakbeats, but in this day he decided correctly, since he feeled the party mood),he only played 1.45 min :(
At 5 am started Sun Project live, playing their classics and some new tracks from their new album, the crowd was amazed by their style (personally I expected some more new tracks but it was very good though), great performance!!!
Then came James Monroe, the mainman from Flying-Rhino recs, who played from cd-r, dat and vinyl with a suberb style showing all the possible forms of mixing. He played F.R. new sound direction (forthcoming releases), techno/bouncy trance very deep and hipnotic along with some other stormers.Great!!!
Finishing up the party Dj Pena and Dj Migas played again in some sort of ping pong, both playing uplifting tracks since James M. didn´t play until the end of the party like he was suposed to(but we forgive him). Excelent work !!!
Suberb Vibe!!! Boom Shankar Diogo, Pedro and all the Good Mood family...
By João (Dj Pena - Flow Records) - http://www.flow-records.com/ - joaogarcia@mail.telepac.pt
Neon People, Thailand – March 2000 Neon People
March 19th, 2000
Report courtesy of Full Moon Party Thai Beach party site*
In March the weather in South Thailand got remarkably better. So this time we packed our things again and headed to the party to take some shots for your viewing pleasure.
Estimates of 6,000 or more party people danced from 10 pm to 10 am. The warmth of the night made the cooling sea a refreshing pause for dancers, while others danced in the quiet waters along the beach.
Dawn’s presence was made known as the brightness in the east slowly began to fill the sky - even for us again and again an unforgettable impression. The night melted into day as the beats continued but the dancers did not stop. The black lights yielded to the sunlight. The "Neon People" took on new colors in the bright sun. The bars were reduced to selling warm beer as the party continued.
Party On!
Ravey
Haze – December 2000 Haze 2k
by Dj Haze
After waking up on Dec 31st with plans in place for a party at our DJ castle in Basingstoke things took a downward turn. Mental phoned to say she had split up with Duncan (also known as Gordon to a select few) the night before so would not be attending. Her friends obviously wouldn't be coming either so the numbers had dropped significantly. Bugger!! About an hour later Duncan phoned. Pretty much a re-run of the earlier conversation with Mental.
People dropping like flies! Time to take drastic action!! What were the Haze's to do this Millenium Eve now that the party had been reduced to tatters in a very short space of time?
There was the possibility of a set at Free State's wharehouse affair, but the prospect of hanging around waiting to play a set didn't sit well. The solution presented itself shortly when Gid, an old friend and would be promoter, phoned to say that the AMP NYE bash was in desperate need of another dj and that well...say no more. So that settled it. I was to play from 2am to 3:30am. Bargain! Happy Haze's. Now all we had to do was find somewhere to send Lois. Thus followed a phonecall along the lines of...
(globule's) "Hi Mum, you know we were supposed to be having a party...blah, blah, blah.."
(globule's mum) "No problem".
Hurrah!
Well to cut a long story short we dutifully turned up at the wharehouse which happened to be just round the corner from Free State's studios. Small world. Illusion from Ooops! Sound System was already there and the 4K of sound was setup in a cliff like arrangement some 20 feet from the turntables. Facing back at the DJ! The thought of all that sound running full speed with hard as you like jungle flooding out was enough to make me go week at the knees!!
The party kicked off rather strangely with The Chemical Brothers performing their latest album from the safe confines of the cd player! First DJ up was an old friend of mine, Plenty, mixing up and ecclectic selection of styles including Hip Hop, Big Beat, Drum n Bass and the totally splendid Fool's Gold - Original version!
Next up, and to take us up to midnight, where two guys from London town whose names escape me. The selection of tunes was superb with some of the best old skool hardcore tunes from 92 cranking out of the system. The crowd were seriously jumping and grins were most definitely on display! As midnight approached the sound was cut and the countdown was delivered by Mat, one of the promoters. On the count of 0 the sound went back up amid cheers, popping champagne corks and party poppers. Half of cuba went up in smoke and the partying started seriously!
Hello year 2000!!!
Goodbye eardrums!
Next up was supposed to be another one of the London crew but they appeared to vanish into thin air. Never to be seen again. Wierd. So up stepped Illusion with a set that got me going almost as much as the hardcore. Whacking great chunks of bassline washing over the crowd. Lovely! With the dissapearance of our friends from the big city my set got moved up to start 1:30am and extended to to cover two hours. Yippee! The night was getting better and better!
I started with Nu Skool but only played two tunes due to the serious tempo drop from the previous set. So onto the hardcore I went. Basically filling the gaps that the earlier guys left. After about 1 hour it was onto the jungle. Racking out the tunes like it was going out of fashion. As the night went by the music just got harder and harder and the bass seemed to get louder and louder. Hmmmmmm :) All told I ended playing for 2 1/2 hours until I said enough was enough and that a replacement had to be sought.
So on went Gid continuing the jungle feel that had pretty much dominated the start of this new year. Su-fuckin-perb! At around 5 o'clock I had to go home as I just wanted to sit down with a cup of tea and relax. Besides my ears were ringing so much that it was stoopid. It was so loud that one image that will stay with me for a long time is that of my friend Steve O stood on the dancefloor, whilst I was playing a new RAM Trilogy track, with his fingers in his ears!! My ears continued ringing for about 4 days after!
Now that's what I call music!
HAPPY NEW YEAR!
Haze ;p
Reading, UK – December 2000 Reading 2k
by bugsy*
Location: High Wycombe/Reading
Date: 31st December 1999
Soundsystems: J14-Survival/Freestate- Engineering-J10
Rather than writing a number of different reports, I thought I'd gather together the information I had about the various parties which happened over the NYE celebrations. First up, I went to the Junktion 14/Survival party near Aylesbury. Although unfortunately the original location was raided early on by a police taskforce arresting several people in the process; the second location, a series of huts in the middle of nowhere was looking good as a convoy of about 60 cars arrived, but unfortunately the system hadn't been setup...
However half an hour or so later, the police turn up in force. A riot van and 8 or so cars. Their intention: not to let this party happen! Coming in heavy handed, outside of the law, they STOLE a set of decks. No public orders were served on Junktion 14 or Survival. After hanging around for a while, it was looking like the police were not going to leave so we decided to head over to Reading, heading for a party happening near the (annual) festival site. A large warehouse was used and after finding the place around 11.30pm we entered the building via the kitchens. Junktion 10 were in charge of the Drum and Bass room, Freestate had a large system setup in the next room and were playing old skool tunes, while in the main room, Engineering had another large system playing the beginnings of loud techno. A chill out room had also been setup and setup quite well - sporting comfy seats, a bar and laid back sets of acid jazz and chilled music. We had a good night here, but things might have been very different had the first J14 venue not been busted.
Other parties happening around the South of England were all over the place. Listing but a few, the main three London parties were all packed out. Shoreditch had 6 floors of systems and played host to a lot people - may'be too many. In Uxbridge, Underground Sounds/United Systems did their thing in a huge abandoned sports hall. Over in New Cross, Headfuk, Damage Control held a party in a disused Bingo Hall - combining all of their systems to fill up the main room. Exodus had a large attendance of 4000 people, using the same building they used for their Xmas Day party. Down in Bournemouth a large Squat Party was raided and even in Norwich a large party was stopped from happening in a disused factory.
The Old British Rail Offices Paddington, UK – October 1999 The Old British Rail Offices Paddington, London
by Derek Williams*
23rd October 1999
Pendulum and loads of other systems
Leaving the safety of Norwich, I go see my squatter friends in their 19 story high rise squat in Hackney. They get the location of the party from their own contact and around midnight or so, we go find a taxi.
We tear across London in a cab driven by an old skool DJ with a pumping sound system who enjoys a smoke of skunk weed. His car has very good breaks and first rate road holding. We get to the Westway motorway and see the building ... oh, oh oh.
First, this party is no secret. Its in a very respectable area (London's "little Venice"), one of the better examples of 60's architecture it was a pre-privatisation British rail office complex built into the motorway junction on the side of a hill. We enter under the motorway which is on a flyover bridge, push past the barricades (this party isn't going to be shut down), pay 3 quid "donation" and go in.
Darkness and pounding techno echo around a vast stairwell, a huge spiral staircase which winds up about 5 stories to the first office level. The staircase heaves with people, I go explore.
Essentially three levels of techno, jungle and stuff. The techno level is the best in my opinion, in particular one huge room with a big pumping system with a very nice sound. Something like ten or more systems are kicking off around the place all told.
The main problem is the lack of lights, there was one small strip to light the stairway and the systems had lights of course, but beyond that, we had to live with the light coming in through the windows from the motorway outside.
The other problem is no running water, or toilets, although that didn't seem to upset anyone. Well, it was a London squat ...
The view in the main techno room was breathtaking, a massive room which eventually filled up with a loads of people, the big widows giving a backdrop of the Westway motorway with people dancing in silhouette, I spent a lot of time in here. Although it hadn't been used for around 10 years or so, the place hadn't been cleared out, the offices were still furnished and there were huge metal storage cabinets all over the place. In the room with the massive system, people were dancing on these high above the dancefloor and some had already collapsed into a twisted heap of metal.
Actually, I suspect the unstable ones had been collapsed on purpose and the remaining ones were actually quite firm, they didn't fall over anyway. The rhythm of the people dancing on the metal shelves added a strange quality to the pounding bass of the music, so the sound was all around as you danced, plus it had this echo that you only really get in warehouses and dead office blocks. This is what I like about squats, a quality you just don't get in sanitised clubs, seriously, the place was alive.
The London parties can have a darkside though, and this one was a bit on the darkish side. Some of the events of that night really did my head in and overshadowed the rest of the party, just a bit.
Sections of the two main floors were offices, once plush 80's style suspended ceilings, smart window blinds and so on, the rooms too small to use for the party. As the night progressed, the office areas became the places to go for a chill and to have fun in the offices, which of course, didn't remain plush for very long.
Huge shelving units still full of 80's style "yuppie" promotional leaflets get pushed over, doors pulled off hinges (the offices were really only made of fibre board walls) and chairs thrown through the suspended ceiling, which fluttered down like confetti. There was a sort of continuous good natured general mayhem and the place got trashed.
But then as a couple of kids were ripping the ceilings down, one kicked out, slipped backwards and smashed through a window - we were several stories above ground level remember - anyway I caught him and pulled him back. aaarrrggghhh, that was close.
Later I find a "body", still breathing but out to the world lying in a heap of trashed office furniture (I guess deep in a ket hole). There's no lights of course, so by the flickering light of a ciggy lighter and with help from a couple of others I give him a quick check and roll him into the recovery position.
I find another staircase which leads up to the roof, there are a lot of people up here, then the sound of a big window being smashed and another. I come down.
Later in the darkness a voice says "rocks?" - crack cocaine. You don't often get that at parties even in London.
In one room the music stops with a flash of sparks as the suspended ceiling collapses, not sure what happened after that.
Daylight comes eventually to show a scene of utter devastation in what was once a very smart building. Walls covered in graffiti, broken glass everywhere, trashed offices. Everyone is off their heads, walking round through the scattered yuppie literature, ceiling tiles and general chaos or else going wild in what was left. London squats have this darkside sometimes, be warned if you've never been to one ...
A strange thing happened as a result of the trashing of the offices though. The place had been given this makeover sometime in the mid-80's. Before that it had been some strange kind of British Rail warehouse, which it had suddenly become again, the place had totally changed.
I go back up the staircase - actually a water tower - with some other people this time. The view from the top is mind blowing, the whole of west London laid out like a map, a lot of people up here running around, looking over the edge, shear drops through broken windows. We find a door to the outside and there's the window cleaning machinery, we resist the temptation to play in the cradle, but I'm sure someone would have done.
Around 9.00am and I'm finished. It's been a long day (I was in work at 7.30 in the morning!) and the body was saying "sleep", I had to go, like I say, my head was done right in. The party continued of course, it was still going at 4.00pm when my friends crawled home anyway.
So I leave and suddenly I'm in the real world again, clean people, walls not covered in graff, windows not smashed, reality - it takes a bit of coming to terms with sometimes.
Footnote: By the time the photo's were taken, a few months later, the place was being gutted and refitted for a new use, nothing of any value was trashed.
Derek
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