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Heres some more but in nov 2001:
'Twinkle twinkle, little star,
How I wonder what you are.'
Don't ask me why, but I just do. And if you did so much traveling around the country at night, peering aimlessly out of car windows, so would you too. The past weekend was no different. When our driver arrived at 6pm sharp that Friday night, Chrissi and I knew we were in for some serious motorway travelling. Our first port of call was to be Bognor Regis. 'The sunniest seaside town in England', says the Official Web Guide. Well good, because when we left Leeds it was colder than a six-pack of Linda McCartney's Frozen Vegetarian Sausages.
So we headed down the M1 with the usual tape selection - plenty of recently mixed techno sets and a complete selection of drum n bass classics including the recent United Dance tape packs. And with the conveniently placed Saisho speaker in between the driver and passenger seats, the trusty Nissan Sunny was well and truly rocking us all the way to the sunshine. Yet, arriving at our destination, it was so windy that the short walk from the car to the club felt like a ten-rounder with Lennox Lewis's left hand. Sunny seaside town my arse.
The club night was called Frenzic and I was pleasantly surprised to see that, although it had only just turned 11pm when I began the set, the crowd was up for it and ready for action. So I dismantled some of the decorations and proceeded to dish out my newfound bits to some of the people dancing at the front of the decks - something that went down an absolute storm with the locals.
After being chased out of the club by some huge bouncer threatening to chop off my hair with a large pair of scissors, we re-entered our techno transportation pod and set the dials for Hitchin near Milton Keynes. It was only meant to be a one and half hour drive but after stopping off to play my favourite shooting game at Toddington services, we'd added half and hour onto our journey time and arrived with only seconds to spare. It wasn't particularly busy, but I did enjoy the experience, especially as the bar was still open - which enabled me to cram in a load of Stella so that the dancefloor looked twice as full. How cunning of me!
Sleep is something you rarely get at the weekend if you do the whole Djing shaboodle, so I was pleased to grab a grand total of three hours in Leeds before setting off for Flashback at The Que Club in Birmingham. Now this was to be the first old school set M-Zone and myself have ever done together, so I'd spent much of the week before preparing what I'd have in my box. It wasn't an easy job either. Should I play early house stuff such as Marshall Jefferson or Adonis? Or perhaps 88 acid house such as Phuture or Spanky? In the end I opted for Belgian techno of the R+S variety and throwing down such classics as D-Shake's 'Techno Trance' and CJ Bolland's 'Ravesignal III' strangely made me wet my pants. I think the fact that thousands of people in front of me were going ballistic to some of my favourite ever tunes was a bit too much for the old bladder to cope with.
Stinking like a sixty-year-old urinal, I quickly leapt back into our vehicle and raced down the motorway to Bristol's Lakota Club. Now this is one place that can be hit and miss sometimes, but with the well established GBH teaming up with Slammin Vinyl it promised to be a good one. In the end I was 10 minutes late because of a ridiculous diversion on the M4, but hey - at least we made it. And just so you know, it was as hot and sweaty as it should have been so my boxers got a proper rinsing before heading off to the Country Club.
As someone who DJ's in allsorts of weird and wonderful places, I have to say that this place in the middle of nowhere is one of my favourites. And tonight it was rammed to the rafters with hundreds of hard trance heads with nothing better to do than to scream at every kick drum change that thundered out from the crystal clear sound system. The DJ monitoring is particularly good here, unlike many places where you can hardly hear a thing because it's all powered by a 1970's bedroom amp. At the end of the day there was no need to start smashing things up, because the crowd were doing that all for themselves.
The clock struck eight in the morning and the thought of leaving on a 5-hour journey back to Leeds didn't appeal to me at all. Never one to miss the chance to socialize, I stayed and partied with the owners and DJ's until 12pm before finally realizing that if I didn't head back soon, Chrissi and I would miss our usual Sunday night knees up at the local pub. Arriving home in the dark, it wasn't long before we were both lent against the bar only just managing to put our sentences together to order the final drinks of the weekend.
When 10.30pm finally hit us, there was nothing left to do than walk the short distance home and reflect on what a great weekend it had been. I do enjoy my little trips to far away places, but nothing beats not having to get on a plane at the end of it. We'd only just managed to figure out how to unlock the front door when, five minutes later, we were both asleep in front of the TV - dreaming of all things techno before awaking to another week of musical pandemonium.
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