Thursday 28 May 2009

A long weekend in Detroit [1]

So I was updating the thread I started on the purple radio forum with a few impressions from the weekend just gone, but thought it might be good to try and flesh things out somewhat for posterity.

Friday:

Arrived at the motel around 10:30pm. Being able to drive to Detroit after coming home from work still feels surreal (in a good way), but certainly wasn't complaining. About 3.5 hours' drive, plenty of time to listen to some recent downloads (Four Tet vs Burial stands out in particular, and the Surgeon RA podcast made a lot of sense en route). No fecking service stations were fully open on the 403/401 heading west, though - sort it out!

My room-mate, as discussed, has already left for the evening (he was off to a private barbeque/gig round someone's house) but my car license plate attracted comments from my neighbours - first time someone's GOT it, but hardly surprising under the circumstances. Turns out not only do these good folk know my room-mate, but we have other mates in common, *and* two of us are on DJHistory! You know when you sometimes feel "yup, I'm definitely in the right place"... hadn't been out of the car even an hour, and I knew this weekend was gonna be special :)

So I ended up tagging along with them to a party - early night, pah! - which my room-mate also happened to come along to. Can't really recall much, apart from Karizma was playing (and was great - so were the others who played before), struck by what a great crowd it was (very mixed, no attitude/lairiness, everyone up for it, and seemingly fuelled on little more than booze and ciggies - there's no smoking ban in Michigan). But a great first night in Motor City, and the festival hadn't even started!

Friday 8 May 2009

Nostalgia: from there to here

I recently got my ears around House of House's Rushing to Paradise and it piqued my interest. Those Northern rave style pianos that I loved, coupled with a classic house vocal, strung out into a 15 minute epic, made me delve back into my memories of when i first started going out raving. A word now that almost creates a weird feeling: isnt that what people used to do before the government got appalled and tried to outlaw repetitive beats?

I remember a time when pianos were not just allowed, but de rigeur. Of big sweaty blokes who'd normally be beating each other up, grinning inanely at each other under a cloud of dry ice and lasers. Of clubs scattered across the northwest with people going to service stations afterwards to keep the party going.

I might be a mid-30's dad who doesnt go out as much as he used to, but when someone sent me this clip a bit ago, the hairs on the back of my neck stood on end and I remembered when it all started for me. The clip is from Quadrant Park in Liverpool roundabout the start of the 1990's and the tune is N Joi's unbeatable Anthem. Rave on.



House of House - Rushing to Paradise listen here