Monday, or as I like to call it Sunday part 2, is drawing to a close for me, and my concentration is waining slightly as I’m thinking more and more about all the nice things I could eat. But, I’m in far, far too much pain to move off the sofa I’ve called home for the last 12 hours, so you’ll have to excuse any food references throughout the review.
Sunday nights at Space are the dance music equivalent of a buffet - a good spread, with loads to choose from, allowing you to dip in and out of the room after enjoying a little taster of what treats lay inside. The opening party had a typically diverse selection of musical genres, from the classics you’d hear on the Premier Etage from island legend Alfredo, the tricks, bits and beats of Krafty Kuts, the deep house of Hot Since 82 and the set from James Zabiela - best described as ‘epic’.
Loosely, my night consisted of this. Starting out to catch the end of Hot Since 82 representing the deep house massive proper - I don’t wear snap-backs nor do I own a bum-bag but good music is good music, with Mr 82 finishing his set with plenty of it. The duo of Matt and Andy with the slightly homoerotic name of ‘Bicep’ were up next and passed me by slightly unnoticed to be honest, not bad by any means, but I wasn’t feeling it. Henrik Schwarz delivered the goods though, keeping it on the deep house train more or less right through to the end, dropping his own ‘Take words in return’ track to close out the set, before Carl Craig delivered a typically well put together closing performance for the terraza, which I unfortunately missed the majority of for reasons to follow.
Over in the Discoteca, things were initially a little more serious musically, in keeping with the dark environment, with Joy Orbison and Ben UFO settling in for two hours of back-to-back sessions. A lovely slice of Detroit house came in the form of Spencer Parker’s ‘Show Him You’re The One’, out on Tsuba, with the feel of the set keeping strictly along the head down, this is serious, road. Zabiela closed out the main room, for which he was hosting with his label Born Electric, and I have to say it was nice to step off the deep house train for a while. You can see why Mark and Sarah from We Love continue to work with him, the last hour of his set had everything, and it still blows me away how much the guy loves what he does, along with his ability to smile and nod his head a la Sneak non-stop.
I went slightly track ID crazy looking through my notes, but one of the highlights had to be going between the original and Spectrasoul remix of Pedestrian’s beautiful ‘Hoyle Road’ - a prime example of the eclecticism you can expect from a night at We Love, and on Zabiela’s label. But ultimate tune of the party is a complete curve ball. Coming out of nowhere we had Marky Mark (aka Mark Wahlberg) and the Funky Bunch’s ‘Good Vibrations!’ The remix came courtesy of Bodhi, which cuts out much of Marks hilarious rap (a shame, sort of), but the feel good vibe of the piano riff was there for all to enjoy.
My only regret is not getting myself down to the club earlier, nursing an already ruined body from the various other opening parties work required me to attend and enjoy - missing out on the Sunset Terrace. Smokin Jo, remembered fondly from her days with Tim Sheridan under one of the best names in dance music - NastyDirtySexMusic, is always a good performer and with Krafty Kuts and A-Skillz Trickatechnology later on... that was looking like a good night on its own. Within the We Love buffet, this would be the food you missed because you were still at the bar getting pissed. You’ll regret it for the rest of the night.
Anyway, thanks for that We Love, that was delicious. See you on Sunday for Disclosure live.
Photography by James Chapman
