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Features
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| Introducing NEM3SI$’s new label Infinite Resistance! | | Mindbenderz talk ‘Lord of the Rings’ and fishing, as well as the creation of their new album ‘Celestial Gateway’! | | Iono-Music artists One Function, Eliyahu, Invisible Reality and Dual Vision talk Robert Miles, kids, dogs and vinyl, while we chat about their current releases! | | Luke&Flex talk influences, the Irish rave scene, why Flex wears a mask and Play Hard, their new EP out now on Onhcet Repbulik Xtreme! | | Lyktum expands on his new album ‘Home’ – talking about his love of storytelling, creating new harmonies and the concept behind his musical works. | | Pan talks getting caught short crossing the Sahara, acid eyeballs and tells us Trance is the Answer, plus shares his thoughts on his latest release 'Beyond the Horizon' - all from a beach in Spain! | | Miss C chats about living with the KLF, DJing in a huge cat’s mouth, training her brain and the upcoming super-duper Superfreq Grande party at LDN East this Saturday, 16th September! | | NEM3SI$ - I Live for the Night – talks superficiality, psychopaths, and bittersweet success, ahead of a plethora of evocative, emotional, and passionate upcoming melodic techno releases! | | Psy-Sisters Spring Blast Off! We talk to DJ competition winner ROEN along with other super talents on the lineup! | | Blasting towards summer festivals with Bahar Canca ahead of Psy-Sisters Spring Blast! | | Shyisma talks parties, UFO's, and Shotokan Karate ahead of his upcoming album 'Particles' on Iono-Music! | | SOME1 talks family, acid, stage fright and wolves - ahead of his upcoming album release ‘Voyager’ on Iono-Music in February 2023! | | The Transmission Crew tell all and talk about their first London event on 24th February 2023! | | NIXIRO talks body, mind and music production ahead of his release 'Planet Impulse' on Static Movement's label - Sol Music! | | Turning the world into a fairy tale with Ivy Orth ahead of Tribal Village’s 10th Birthday Anniversary Presents: The World Lounge Project | | The Psy-Sisters chat about music, achievements, aspirations and the 10-Year Anniversary Party - 18/12/22! | | A decade of dance music with Daniel Lesden | | Earth Needs a Rebirth! Discussions with Psy-Trance Artist Numayma | | Taking a Journey Through Time with Domino | | New Techno Rising Star DKLUB talks about his debut release White Rock on Onhcet Republik! | | PAN expands on many things including his new album 'Hyperbolic Oxymoron' due for release on the 14th April 2022 on PsyWorld Records! | | Psibindi talks all things music including her new collaborative EP 'Sentient Rays' on Aphid Records, her band Sentience Machine and 10 years of Psy-Sisters! | | N-Kore talks Jean-Michel Jarre, unfinished tracks and fatherhood! | | Celebrating International Women’s Day and Ten Years of Psy-Sisters with Amaluna |
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Logic's Fourth Birthday - Hooray! (review)
Reported by bunny
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Submitted 06-08-03 13:20
“Now we’re talking BPM!!” Halfway through the night and as Proteus revs up the tempo to unfeasibly manic levels and the audience pushes itself to the brink of human exertion, Anders turns to me mid-stomp to yell that sentence in my ear. We’re right in the thick of the chaotic dance floor, going off like rockets as the Fridge explodes like a Hunter S Thompson fantasy around us. The temperature’s hovering around the Sahara mark yet with every stomp a fine cloud of snow gently washes up our legs. It’s a weird, wonderful, bizarrely beautiful and sublimely surreal scene. Happy birthday Logic.
Rewind a few hours to 11.15pm on the 26th July 2003 and God’s in the process of giving his garden a damn good watering. The streets of Brixton are slick from a day’s worth of acid rain and everything on them is sodden, including the 2 massive queues stretching either side of the Fridge. But does this dampen the spirits of those clubbers standing in line? Hell no! is the most straightforward answer to that. This has probably been the most hotly anticipated weekend’s worth of clubbing this year so far (Fergie on the Friday, Riot! on Sunday) with Logic as one of the most eagerly awaited parties. As anyone who’s been to a previous Logic can tell you, it’s an event that doesn’t need to promise satisfaction guaranteed – it just delivers it. So before I’ve even taken a step through the club’s doors I can already feel the atmosphere sizzle around me. Then at 11.40pm exactly I walk into the main room to be greeted by the call-to-arms of the Stimulant DJs’ Blow Da Roof. Bring. It. On.
Before I go any further I’ve gotta at least try and describe to you what the inside of the club looks like tonight. If there’s one thing Logic can be relied upon to do (and trust me, it goes a lot further than just the one thing) then it’s to pull out all the stops on the decoration side. Tonight, the theme seems to be urban cyber, as if Dave and Nadya have enlisted the help of some street artist with a psychosis dabbling in the psychadelic. Two huge banners are draped either side of the stage with the legend LOGIC stamped down them in rich, neon-blue letters. All around the stage (which is heavy with equipment for tonight’s live acts, Proteus and the Nu Energy Collective) are graffiti-style banners in deep red and yellow and at the far back of the stage, resting just behind each LOGIC banner, two huge TV screens crackle with golden and fire-red lightening. It’s an awesome sight, and fills what can sometimes seem a quite cavernous main arena with so much colour, light and detail that (as the constant beat of the music throbs amongst it all) it makes the room feel very much alive. Of course, the inclusion of over a thousand bodies brimming with energy probably helps in that area too.
Now for that very small, very foolish, proportion of people who aren’t fully energised yet, Shaf De Bass and MC Dri Weave are on hand with a b2b set that’d get a graveyard going. Matching the timeless classics (Tony De Vit’s The Dawn, which, after all these years, still sounds like the birth of Hard House) with the latest crop of dance floor anthems (Glazby’s Hostile, which I have no doubt will still sound like a riot in Bedlam X years from now) it’s a feet-itchingly evil set. Take a peek into the DJ box and even the DJs are going off; Shaf’s doing his funky monkey arse-wiggle while Dri Weave’s bouncing for England beside him. Wicked!
Up next comes Superfast Oz with a techno-tinged set of pure, unadulterated hardness. By now the Fridge is close to maximum capacity and you can almost see the joy in the air. I head up to the top balcony and clamber into one of those cages that jut out over the dance floor and take a look down at the scene. What lies below scarcely seems real. The Fridge has become a technicolour jumble of pulsing lights and bodies, a single mass of pumping movement, dancing to a furious beat. The zenith of the set comes in the shape of Guy McAffer’s new mix of Respectable, truly a Raw record, that sets off a chain reaction of gutteral screams of joyous recognition across the room, followed swiftly by the boom, boom, boom of a thousand plus feet releasing euphoria through the means of rubber sole to floorboard.
It’s 1.30am and Superfast Oz has just finished his set. The decks momentarily go quiet so I decide to head into room 2 to check out what’s going on in the Dirty DJ world. Then the screens crackle into life and it all goes a little strange. Everyone stops what they were doing and looks up at the screens. What turns out to be the first mini-movie for tonight blazes across the stage as an outtake from Tron (I think) ends in an eruption of fake snow and huge, hollering round of applause. How cool was that?! (This is where the layer of snow mentioned in the intro comes from… besides which, people can still be found wandering round at 5am with a shower of the thickest dandruff I’ve ever seen across their head and shoulders).
Alright, let me state this clearly and concisely now: What follows are undoubtedly the two finest sets of the night. First up: Proteus. This is a name that I kept hearing throughout the night. In the queue outside, by the bar, in the chillout room, everyone seemed to be dying to hear his set. And the theme of every conversation ran the same… ‘I saw him at the last Logic and he was fantastic! I can’t wait to see what he comes up with this time!’ No need to wait any longer… here we go…
Proteus is utterly unique. I can say without any hesitation that I’ve never seen another act like him. From his look (cyber-goth-industrial, a totally shaved head save for a long, dark, dreadlocked ponytail and a huge, wicked grin), to his stage presence to his music, there truly is only one Proteus. In fact, the only thing that isn’t a one-off when you’re describing him, are the quality of his sets. Tonight we were treated to 60 minutes of the very highest of Hi NRG, paralletically mental tracks that push the turntables to their limit and the crowd one step further. Anders + I decided to brave the scrum on the dance floor + muscled our way right to the front of the stage, where the real nutters were (we felt quite at home) and where we stayed for the almost next 2 hours solid. This was MOST DEFINITELY the place to be! Everyone was loving it, a mess of rapture unravelling in rapid waves across the floorboards as a multitude of hands were flung to the furthest corners of the ceiling, corners of mouths swiftly following suit. Up on stage Proteus, like the total legend that he is, is going just as ballistic, lunging and twisting his torso around as he mixes, tweaks and throws in tracks and sound effects into the melee, then the instant he’s free from a mix he bombs right out to the front of stage and gets down to avin’ it with the rest of us, sprinting the length of the stage pausing only to go beserk at either end. I love it when a DJ really gets into the music and the pure glee which Proteus feels for his music was obvious for all to see. Just a brilliant, highly talented individual and an equally brilliant set.
As it all goes quiet a sci-fi roar announces that it’s time for the second movie and the breath-taking Death Star sequence from Star Wars unravels across the screens, complete with Logic symbol flying away with the fighters from the exploding star base, just in time, and one hell of an explosion. Logic, I salute you!
At this point I’d like to apologise to the DJs in room 2 for not making it into there until the penultimate set. I know from many previous experiences that they can all certainly tear a room apart when they get behind the decks… my fault for not having the willpower to tear myself away from the main room. Although when there’s the Nu Energy Collective played, I guess you can kind of understand why.
‘I’ve waitied so long to hear music this good but I’m saving myself for the Nu Energy Collective’ – quote from a learned clubber
Taking over from Proteus, the Nu Energy Collective are real Logic favourites and, like the DJ before them, a very unique and inspiring act. Again, there’s been a great deal of buzz surrounding their act; a lot of people here are seasoned Logic regulars who still bear the negatives from the white-hot lines of ecstasy burnt across their brains during the Collective’s last set. The room fairly hums with anticipation as they stand poised behind the decks, and for that moment before the needle drops it feels like time itself is holding its breath. Then the music surges back in and the small and surreal universe within these four walls explodes into life… kinda like the Big Bang, only in stereo and with a kicking soundtrack. It’s pure, unadulterated and uninhibited pandemonium. The Collective are pounding out the most intensely uplifting Hi and Nu NRG beats you can imagine, loaded with enthusiasm and pure joy and fast enough to make even Roadrunner break into a sweat. But it’s not just your ears and feet that are kept busy; there’s a whole floorshow going on around you too. Above you, a whole spectrum of lights swirl about the place, splattering random patches of rich colour over everything, over and over again, and you feel like you’re stomping through one of Picasso’s paint palettes. Up on stage, while the Nu Energy Collective bounce, yell and dash about behind the decks, a funny Green Man {who I later found out goes by the name of Vinnie) plays about at the front of the stage, his bare torso covered in globules of green goo. This guy was wicked, I’ve never seen him before but I hope he comes out to play again! All the way through the set he was playing with the crowd, firing glitter guns over the dance floor, running up and down the length of the stage, snarling at the clubbers, juggling sticks and working us even further into a frenzy. Mischievious to the max but a hell of a lot of fun. I spied quite a few Harderfaster people down by the front of stage – pleasure as always stomping with you!
Now, I think I’ve got this next part right but forgive me if I’m wrong, I lost the notes. Right at the end of the Collectives set they dropped in a filthy little Drum’n’Bass track (nice touch) which was very warmly received by the crowd. Then the lights went out and the two TV screens crackled into life once more. The time-jumping scene form the end of Back To The Future plays out across the screen. Even though we know the outcome, we still stand there with ur breath held in our chests as we watch the Doc try and hook everything up in time. It’s these little touches that Logic put into their nights that will forever make them stand out for me, it’s something that no other night does and it always works so brilliantly. Just as the Delorian vanishes on screen a riot of pyrotechnics erupt across the stage (admittedly scaring the crap out of me), prompting a similar explosion of screams and cheers from the crowd. Well, well wicked!
After the Nu Energy Collective Spencer Freeland steps up to the decks and takes things down a pace or two. I have to admit that it wasn’t one of the best sets of his that I’ve experienced but then he was up against some very stiff compatition that night. That’s not to say it wasn’t good, because it was, only after the pure excellence of the sets that had come before him I had gotten greedy and was still hungry for some intensive, high-speed Hi Energy, so his well blended Hard Trance sounded unusually chilled.
4.15am and the second room is seriously going off! Dave Lochrie’s behind the turntables wrapping up an awesome set, finishing it all off with his latest floorfiller, Escalation, a ferocious chunk of Hard Trance that sets your heart beat rising with the sublime synth riff. (He was later to continue the damage at Twist with another fantastic set that kept us all stomping til long past midday). At 4.30 Tom Allen takes over and the crowd positively yells itself hoarse over his first tune: Prime Mover mix of Breather’s Come On. This has to go in my top ten all-time favourites, that manic breakdown and the total elation that runs throughout the entire track get me going every time. Straight afterwards comes Black Dogs and the whole crowd is hooked. I think I pretty much levitated my way through the set I was stomping so furiously.
Back in the main room for the remainder of Rubec and Oberon’s b2b set and the atmosphere is pretty much the same. The music is a heady mix of powerful Hard Trance and Hi Energy and the club is sucking it up like a whore with a hosepipe. Way up in the cages over the top balcony Anders, Bex Bunny and myself are going for England, stomping so hard the whole frame works judders in protest but there’s no chance of us stopping until the last track plays out. Below us the whole place is seething with a vibrant movement and life, as the club pounds the last remaining shreds of energy from its worn and wasted bodies. When the last track finally does play out you can almost feel the walls themselves sigh with contented exhaustion, the kind you only achieve through a night’s gleeful raid of your serotonin supplies. As the club spills out onto the limbo-esque early morning streets of Brixton it emerges as one weary but wide and beaming smile. It truly was a happy birthday for us Logic, and something tells me it was just as good for you.
A big thank you to Dave, Nadya and everyone else at Logic for indulging us with these incredible parties, and to all you lot out there for coming to them and helping make them what they are!
The next Logic is LOGIC presents TheLastEverLogicAtTheFridge2003 on Friday 22nd August - for full details click here.
With thanks to Amy & Anders for the use of their photos
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Other Features By bunny:
It's about music - interview with Alex Parsons
Monkey business as usual: interview with Shaf De Bass
Twistathon – Twist’s 12 Hour 1st Birthday Bonanza
Zoology's 2nd Birthday - Review!
becomeone: Unified in Sound - Review
The views and opinions expressed in this review are strictly those of the author only for which HarderFaster will not be held responsible or liable.
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Great review and thanks for comments Bunny