The potential held in Aww Yeah was immeasurable throughout the minds
of the New England party kids. We haven't seen a line up this good
in such a great venue in quite some time. Columns of Knowledge always
puts on a good show, however, judging by the line up alone this would
out do them. When arriving at the New Haven Coliseum thoughts of a
high class venue were the only thing anyone could think of. It looked
and smelled almost brand new, which, as we all know, never happens.
Once inside
I bolted for the main room and flew down the mountain-like flight
of stairs surrounded by stadium style seating. Venom was spinning,
and from this master of disguise no one ever knows what to expect.
He dropped some of his more famous hard house tracks that always sends
the crowd out of their minds, along with his nasty scratching skills.
Both of his cd's (Straight Bangin and House Blend 7) have been proclaimed
"best selling hard house albums of the year" for 2000 and
2001. He will be coming out with a sequel to Straight Bangin with
a release date that is unknown.
With accomplishments in the rave and club scene dating at least ten
years back Scott Henry is best known for his involvement with Fever
and Buzz in DC. Through out his set he demonstrated the unique style
that has been his trade mark molding house, trance and breaks into
one amazing set. It was all done through keen track selection and
precise mixing that was unstoppable.
In the Jungle room Tech Itch and Decoder were splicing drum and bass
through everyone's brain while MC Trick did his thing. They did not
plan on having Trick MC but he didn't leave the stage after his set
with Static. Nevertheless, the two drum and bass originators blew
up the huge jungle room which was hardly at capacity.
There was only about 600 people in the jungle room when there could
have easily been 2000. It was definitely one of the best jungle rooms
New England has ever had, yet New England didn't represent like they
should have. This theme seemed to permeate throughout the night. The
capacity of the Coliseum was 4000 and it wasn't even half full. Chris
(Knowledge) from Columns of Knowledge put his neck on the line for
this party and should be thanked.
Even
though the party was not full the vibe and music were off the hook.
Green Velvet was on next in the main area. He was singing while others
in his group played guitar-style key boards. They played many of their
traditional songs that put a gaping smile on all the on-lookers. It
would have livened the crowd more if he was behind the decks as Cashmere,
but instead he chose his melodic techno persona.
Meanwhile, four young men from England were rockin the jungle room
with hurricane force. Bad Company has been at the forefront of the
drum and bass world for quite some time now. They have found success
through both DJ'ing and producing. Their set was well put together
with the track selection of champions along with unbelivable mixing
skills which proved to everyone why they are put on such a high pedestal.
In the main room Josh Wink was spinning a eclectic mix of house, techno
and trance. He is thought of as one of the fore fathers of the electronic
music scene and one of the greatest DJ's of all time. Unfortunately
this night would be different. He played some great tracks but for
a DJ who has been spinning for as long as him there shouldn't be any
mistakes. Many people I spoke to agreed that Josh was not on point
at all this night and train wrecked a few times.
Although Josh was not up to potential Dara simultaneously ripped it
up in the jungle room. He was playing some really dark drum and bass
that made the dance floor explode into a tirade of extreme dancing
throughout his entire set. His new CD which is unreleased as of yet
should be hitting the shelves fairly soon and is titled "Future
Perfect". Dara has never let us down and always gets the crowd
stomping their feet and begging for more. This night would be no different.
After
Josh in the main floor Kimball Collins hit the decks. This master
of trance was as sharp as a nail and blew the roof right off. It may
have been 4:30 am but by the look in peoples eyes they were just getting
started. This bald-headed wonder kept everyone dancing and happy until
the wee hours.
J-Smooth went on in the jungle room after a tremendous performance
by Dara and kept the crowd going just as strong. His unique style
of fusing hip-hop into jungle tracks seems to always grab people's
attention, yet still he is one of the more underrated jungle DJ's.
I hope the judges were watching this performance, because J-Smooth
was definitely a force to be reckoned with.
To close the night out Whilhem K tossed out some techno that was fairly
decent at best, but at this point the pace was not turned up enough
and people were fighting to stand up from the vigorous dancing. This
party was terrific, great selection of DJ's and awesome venue. It
is a disappointment that New England did not go out to support their
scene at this party. Knowledge definitely took a risk and lost out,
but he will forever be in our hearts for putting a positive effort
into our rave community in New England.
