James Holden & Steve Gerrard @ Gas (03/10/2003)
Reported by Bing Sunday, October 5 2003
To get the most out of the Ministry gig this weekend, read no further, turn around get back to playing in the codshite corner and do not ruin the surprise for yourself.
Still here? Ok then, you had your chance.
Sweet Chilli is held at Gas nightclub, and oooohhhhh mmmmmyyyyyyy what a nightclub! The main room is bigger than Syrup but not so massive that it felt like a barn.
The lights were cool, there was room for chilling out upstairs in the mezzanine and the drinks were ridiculously over priced. Two waters, thanks. That’s $8 chief. No really.
What really struck me was the sound system - it was unbelievable. Standing on the dance floor you can feel the kick drum shake your chest. Somehow they manage to produce this without turning the highs up so loud that you feel deaf. Awesome.
And on to the music.
Two of the clubs residents were playing a vs warm up set – a good idea in theory but it lacked in execution. Perhaps these guys were having a bad night (everyone does sometimes) but it was a pretty poor showing.
The only reason to remember the names Daniel vs Crispin would be to avoid them if they are playing a gig you will be attending. Maybe it is just me, but in a big city, in a big club, on a night where two internationals will be taking your normal peak time slot, I would have thought they would be trying their asses off to impress. Messy mixing, some old music (to old to be current and not old enough to be classic) and zero respect for the DJ’s playing later on (doesn’t anyone know how to pull back the reins a bit, is a warm up set so difficult, do we always have to bang it out harder and harder?) led to their downfall.
What did impress us was that both headliners were in the club early to witness what was being played (instead of the old show up 10 minutes before you play, grab your money and fuck off to the hotel routine).
Then Steve Gerrard hit the decks. This guy is the fucking business.
After the early onslaught, Steve did a great job of taking the foot off the accelerator without loosing any energy out of the room. The first half-hour of his set was made up of some of the best breaks I have heard this year. Deep, lush, devastating.
From here he picked it up a little with some really good progressive. Deep again, but far from boring (as is always a worry for some people). Behind the decks Steve worked the crowd without being an over the top performer. By the end of his set there wasn’t a dry body in the house.
My personal highlight was Steve’s own remix of classic track Age of Love.
Before we get onto James Holden I should make a comment about the Sweet Chilli crowd.
All to often when I have gone to events on the mainland I have found the crowds to be quiet and unresponsive. I’ve never been able to figure out exactly why. Are they harder to impress? Are they too cool to throw their hands in the air or scream like a nutter?
So, at Sweet Chilli, I was pleasantly surprised to hear the crowd going absolutely off. To see them really, really, really getting into it has refreshed my thoughts about big city clubbing.
At a guess, seven hundred and fifty people made more noise at Gas than eight thousand did in the Global Underground room at Two Tribes, without doubt.
The other thing that impressed was how educated they are. It is normal when a huge tracks drops for people to scream (well at least in Hobart;)) but these guys were starting to squeal as the track was being mixed in two minutes prior to it actually dropping. Nice.
And then came James Holden.
The next two and a half hours are a bit of a blur (for the most part I just grinned like a twisted clown from the movies and danced like a ninny) for the rest I saying over and over, “fuck me, what is this track."
For those that have had a listen to his Balance CD there were quite a few familiar tunes played from it. And just like the CD James played right across the spectrum. Melodic breaks, progressive, house, a fuck load of techno (I found this amusing as he is suppose to be progressive’s great white hope isn’t he? - hehe).
The set was perfectly crafted. He’d play some deeper, twisted stuff that had people’s eyes rolling in their heads and then he's slam in something completely different, then he’d switch it up again (all the time building into climaxes and breaking them back down again, valleys and mountains style).
Over the years there has been quite a bit of conflicting talk about whether Holden can mix at all or if he is just another clever producer who should stay in the studio and away from the decks. I am pleased to announce that if he use to be crap he has definitely been practicing his ass off. He may not be Sasha but he was tidy.
Highlights are a bit difficult, as I loved every second of the gig – the deeper stuff and the bombs. So let’s talk bombs. Yes he played Jase From Outta Space – Do What You Want (Infusion Sky Mix). Also huge was PQM – You Are Sleeping (Chable Vocal Pass). He played his own Break In The Clouds and the next single from his label Nathan Fake’s Outhouse, both devastating at that volume (I just hope the sound doesn’t get lost on the Syrup system).
Before the gig I spoke a lot with friends and DJ’s about Holden playing beatless, ambient tracks in the middle of his Balance CD. A bold move no doubt and one that works just fine for home listening. We all agreed that it was cool as but how could it possibly work in a club? We were wrong.
About two hours into his set, James could obviously see he had the crowd in the palm of his hand, so he played the down tempo, haunting ambient remix of Outhouse. And it worked. How the fuck did that happen? When the bass of the next track eventually gave the crowd dancing relief I thought the roof was going to be blown off. Explosive.
But the best of the lot, without doubt, was when James played a cheeky unreleased breaks remix of Nothing. The style was reminiscent of the JXL remix of Legacy. A slow, pounding kick that sounded like a bass explosion, a weapon of mass destruction without doubt every time and the gorgeous vocals of Julie Thompson floating over the top.
Fucking hell, talk about a big moment.
I can not wait for this Friday night.
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