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Tuesday 12 May 2009

Orange "Summer of Love" - Club Review


ORANGE “SUMMER OF LOVE” PART ONE – MONDAY 4TH MAY
REVIEW FOR SEENQUEEN


Every now and then comes the occasional surprise, something entirely unplanned but which often ends up being a real highlight, a delight & an experience not to forget. And as much as you could have planned for it, doing so would only serve to dampen the impact and ruin the surprise, but then if you had planned for it, then what would have been surprising about it in the first place.

Well, everybody likes surprises don’t they? well we know we do and this Bank Holiday certainly turned up one of the biggest surprises we have enjoyed in a long time, coming our way in the form of Orange “Summer of Love”, on our part a totally unplanned encounter and one we really didn’t expect to happen at all. But happen it did and looking back we are certainly glad for it, not regretting a minute, rather savouring every second of this summer surprise.

With what we thought was out final fill of the weekend ending with Matinee, our slow walk across Vauxhall towards our charge home saw us bumping into a clubbing pal who begged the question, which is a better choice Fire or Area? At 7 a.m. when after a plethora of clubs under our belt, we would normally have just carried on home, we were somehow intrigued that Area was open, surely it wasn’t Beyond, so what was going on? We certainly weren’t heading for Fire and suggested to our friend that Area would definitely be the better choice and decided to make our way over, with the mere intention of winding down from our exploits & nothing more.

However, upon arriving at Area’s doors and spotting the outside space full of revellers, it was clear that there was a pulsating party well & truly underway and with the security clearing our entrance, we stepped inside, waving at Jay Sharp Vokins, whom we had bumped into at most, if not all of our previous event outings, quickly finding a guest ticket being pushed into our hands (wow, that was a nice surprise!...maybe an indication of more to come). Making our way round past the usual coatcheck which was already full, we entered the main room and joined the queue for the impromptu coatcheck, which was up the stairs. Looking around, the room was absolutely packed with bare chested boys & gyrating girls dancing to the super speed sounds of The Sharp Boys (well we didn’t know it was them at the time but soon found out!), which served to raise our tempo in an instant.

So, with our bag safely stored away, we were keen to find out exactly what event we had landed ourselves upon, was it an extra Beyond? or just an impromptu post Fire party? But something in the back of our mind seemed to indicate that this may have been some sort of afterparty, was it Hustlaball’s?, well there were plenty of leather clad hunks around, but when a burst of none other than Steven React Sharp’s characteristic tones came wailing across the microphone in the main room, it suddenly clicked, could we be at some extra special Orange party? Well yes we were, as we spotted a poster on the wall by the main room bar, a D.J. listing with the heading “Orange Summer of Love” on it. My goodness, had we stumbled on a fire(esque) party, well yes, but being in Area it did have the feel of Beyond about it and at 8 a.m. in the morning, well that was good enough for us.

With the main room bursting with bodies, we wound our way around through the terrace bar and into the second room (commonly known as the “black” or “raw” room), to find a much more pleasantly filled space, a select crowd savouring some much more tougher & funkier sounds than the more uplifting offerings in the main room & terrace bar, these harder edged tunes being much more our style, as our energy levels received a further boost and we quickly found our pace. Looking across to the D.J. booth we spotted none other than D’Johnny behind the decks, delivering a set which was ten times stronger than we had enjoyed at Hype, this class act of a D.J. seemingly far more at home in the Area atmosphere, bopping beautifully in time with his track selections which had us dancing deliriously. It was evident that many who had partied beforehand, decided to continue their Bank Holiday in style, as we spotted & said hello to the likes of D.J’s Gabriele Cutrano, Lee Yeomans, Paul Coles, not to mention promoters Alex Erfan & Logan Schmitz, the latter on dancing duty (or so we understood), not to mention Matinee’s own Romano & Bam Bam, both who like us, were deviating on the wild side!!

As if D’Johnny’s music wasn’t enough to set our hearts alight, hardly moving from the second room for the remainder of his set, the arrival of Hi-Fi Sean Dickson only served to increase our temperature even more, as he assumed the decks and took us on a gigantic journey of terrific techhouse heaven, with track after track enthralling us and our select fellow followers, with amongst others a superb remix rendition of one of our favourite tracks “Get Busy”, which had us spellbound on our spot. With plenty of friendly and familiar faces continuing to pass us by, with the room emptying out a little, we tried our hand, first in the terrace bar and then in the main room, but nothing quite compared with Sean & Johnny and we kept returning to the second space to savour what was, for us something so special, not so much a surprise, but a tremendous treat.

Were there going to be more treats in store? well yes there were, as with 11 a.m. fast approaching, who else but the legend that is Steve Pitron would be stoking up proceedings in the main room, a place which for us truly belongs to him, right from the awesome Area launch party way back when, to the brilliant Beyond bashes of recent times. Moving into our favoured spot just shy of the D.J. booth and podiums, we slotted easily into Steve’s more upbeat musical magic, as he set about delivering a colossal collection of hands in the air heavenly house tunes, which well and truly set the room alight. With Area’s superb laser lighting in full swing, complimenting Steve’s stunning set, it was a classic Pitron performance which ensured we saw out the remainder of this outrageous Orange Summer of Love party in scintillating style. It was made even better by another surprise to round off our time, as Steve handed us a copy of his new double disc mix entitled “Addicted” (which, incidentally we haven’t been able to stop playing since), how appropriate as we were well and truly addicted to his set, like D’Johnny’s, much much better than at Hype and reassuringly so.

So, was Orange Summer of Love the surprise we said it was? Well, indeed yes and for many reasons too, not least that had we known, it would not have been our choice at all, but not just that, we were genuinely surprised by just how good it was, life is often full of surprises & this event was no exception. If you had blinked an eye, you could have mistaken it for a Beyond bash, well it had all those incredible ingredients and it did feel like it, with only the Orange signs reminding us it wasn’t and as for the music, well, we were certainly captivated by some superb sets, D’Johnny, Hi-Fi Sean & Steve Pitron really making our May Bank Holiday Monday morning memorable and the flock of familiar faces also helping us hold our head high in the knowledge, that yes, we were on what some would call foreign territory for us, but what the heck, if its is partying what the scene should be about and believe us, it should be, then Area in the hands of Orange certainly delivered.

In these days of competitive choices and seemingly loads of bitching between promoters & club owners, not to mention underhanded activities by certain individuals on the scene, isn’t it about time that we concentrated on what it should all be about? As someone quite rightly said, after all it’s just a Disco and whether it be Matinee, SuperMartXe, Salvation or Beyond, isn’t it time we just all got along? Yes, we draw a line somewhere, but that is our choice, however we don’t mind reporting on great parties, whoever may be involved, but will also reflect our views in an unbiased way, good or bad, despite opinions to the contrary. So, to the doubters of you as to our allegiances, Orange Summer of Love at Area was not only good but great and we loved it, so there! (DISCO MATT)

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