Josh Wink's 1995 floor-pounder 'Higher State Of Consciousness' was beating from the Es Paradis sound system at the point I entered the club's opening fest. This monster has been laying into crowds for 22 years, and the one to bring its violent potency to the floor was seasoned Ibiza resident Clara Da Costa. She's been spinning at the San Antonio superclub since before Wink's record was released. To be more precise, her first Es Paradis opening was 25 years ago at the age of just 15, and when you bear that point in mind, you know that she knows how to get this plush club into a heightened state.
For her, the Es Paradis openings certainly seem to be an opportunity to give a little love to classics of the '90s and early '00s. And in jumping back to 1995, Costa paid tribute to Robert Miles, who sadly passed away last week. She hit play on his classic trance record 'Children' and it was undoubtedly a poignant moment for those who knew. She stuck to the classics with David Morales' 1998 house beauty, 'Needin' U', and ignited a dance floor singing session. In a nod to the present, but with a foot still firmly in the past, she gave us The Martinez Brothers' nostalgically laced record 'H 2 Da Izzo'.
There was the music for our ears, but in a club that's regularly touted as Ibiza's most beautiful superclub, there was a lot going on within its ivy covered walls to hold your gaze. Podium dancers elegantly using the space, and an aerial silk performer twisting her limbs in a way that has the inflexible among us contorting our faces in faint appreciation – when did you last touch your toes, eh?
Back in with the tuneage, and you had 2VILAS - one of Ibiza's most prolific duos of the moment – delivering their dance floor meat. They burst in and we got another licking of the ´90s with 'God Made Me Phunky' by MD X-Spress, Chez Damier's 'Untitled' and 'Muzik Xpress' by X-Press 2. In similar vein to Costa, they gave us Floorplan's seminal track 'Never Grow Old', which while the Re-Plant version only burst into our lives three years ago, with a sample of Aretha Franklin's 1962 record of the same name, it's a gospel-tinged beast that has you intensely rocking your head back and forth almost instantaneously.
Nicely played, Es Paradis.
WORDS l Aimee Lawrence
