Shrug and Vooooorn

Hal "Im afraid I cant let you put that track on..."
The sound rack-on display at the amazing Civic Underground. Truly a club built
for DJs and quality.

SHRUG, the monthly night at Civic underground, did the rounds last friday to a pretty packed Civic. The night is very musically focused in that it mixes established as well as emerging DJs on the scene. Minimal, house and techno all made appearances last Friday from DJs Walka, Robbie Lowe, Dave and Chrise Combe

Robbie the 'headliner' had a full 2 hours to play with so I was very excited to see where he would take things. Starting off a little chilled and housier than Walka, who played before him, Robbie coaxed the remaining people sitting down onto the dance floor in what could be said to be quite a housy set. I was hoping to hear some of his expertly mixed deep-house, tech and techno but alas the mood of the night was called for something more chilled and it really did show it by the middle of his set. Even though it was a little 'soft' for me, ie. at one stage the song was quite a vocal house affair, it suited the floor and mood of the punters completely.

By the last half hour of Robbie set things did pick up the pace with some more driving tech-house tunes making an appearance. It was great set that suited the night but ultimately left me wanting more edgier unreleased tunes..but then again I personally love pushing the crowd with something new but this doest always work or suit. No doubt COLOR night next weekend run by Robbie and Co for the famous Color mixes, will feature many a new tune.

Walka, who I had the pleasure of hearing for the first time really impressed, me anyway. Some great minimal and tech-house tunes along with some golden oldies, think Ilario Alicante, that definitely progressed the night well. Will be seeing him in the cave next time around for sure!

Chris, although I only caught half of his set, played really well with some great techno to get every going in the last hour of the night. Not his best (i.e. not an amazing 2hour Sunday School set) but a definite up-n-comer of the scene in which 09 should hold big things for..

Touch screen controller, 4 track layoyt on Traktor Pro, funktion one = Win!

JORIS VOORN, played at nevermind last night to huge applause. Imagine 4 tracks going through traktor Pro, touch screen midi controller for effects + samples (I think) all going through the DJM800 mixer and you have a platform from something great!

This style is pioneered by Ritche Hawtin who reguarly mixes with 8 tracks or more while DJing over 2 mac books and A&H mixer...

The amazing thing is even though they may be 4 tracks going at one time the whole process is extremely organic in that every track flows and complements each other. This is as much a testament to the DJs skills as it is to the amazing software that is Traktor Pro. Sure your tracks are all beatmatched all for you but this just opens the door to more creative processes in DJing, so Im not complaining.

This shined in Joris set. I'll admit he is not one of my favourites, I own very little of Joris's tracks and past sets I have heard from him were only OK in my books but clearly he has progressed.

Promoting his new mix for the Balance CD series, which also come from Australia, he made it into the Guiness Book of records for the amazing fact that he 2 disk mix CD features 102 tracks!! Thats ridiculous! I'll definitely be getting a copy asap and giving you guys a review of it.

Back to Joris's set however, there is one word that I think summed up his entire set. funky. Funky tech-house, funky techno both the main staple of the set that had the whole dancefloor heaving throughout the night until the end of his set (somewhere after 4am). I think the man himself was enjoying it too going over time at the end.