Photos by Marek Richter

This Friday saw the Launch of Brighton’s Loop festival with their very own club event. I’m not too sure what happened here but the persons in attendance was limited. That’s a tactful and polite way of saying it was pretty damn empty. Is Brighton just not interested in artists like Nathan Fake or is the fact that no one has ever heard of The Jam the problem? Well let’s fill you in know if that is the case. The Jam is the new name for the Water margin, so for those people (including myself) who still call it Sumo’s, let’s quit and get with the time.

Kliks head man Lee Smith played first with some tracks perfect for the warm up slot – wholly suited to Nathan’s attack of beats and sounds. Lee Smith fans may also have been confused as the promotional material stated “Lee Smith from The Click”. With that aside he introduced Nathan with Damian Lazarus’ – Moment. A track that keeps growing on me with its effortless female vocals – Lazarus’ own singing aside!

Fake cuts quite a striking image, crazy hair, pouty mouth and I noticed that he does a cute pointy pose thing with his foot when deep in concerntration. Passionately hammering away, doubled up over the laptop and mixer he is quite the dancer too. I think he played the Sky was Pink at one point but overall used the oppertunity to show us his darker side of harder edge techno and new album “Hard Islands”. It’s a shame about the promotion, there could have been an excellent atmosphere if there were more people. Overall some fantastic techno and great blurpy noises that sadly seemed to echo in a sparce room…

So why the change? SP’s bookings recently have not been as well sourced as in the past. Cagedbaby, Evil9, Phil Hartnol among others are names known for quality but lack to bring in the numbers as they seem to be repeats of previous bookings. Let’s think back to Ivan Smagghe, Laurent Garnier, Andrew Weatherall, Steve Bug, Green Velvet, Damian Lazarus, Josh Wink and many more. These guys along with the SP residents have created many a memorable party. Yet the people or Brighton often want new bookings and artists, this is hard to do when faced with falling numbers of punters and stiff competition. We could blame the people of Brighton for not abiding to loyalties or being drawn in by chequered shirts. At the same time we can not ignore the hightened popularity of Indie music. Every bus load of kids we get coming to our uni’s is a step away from the club scene and and skip in the direction of maskara and tight jeans. You only have to look at your local source magazine to see proof of this. Dance music is not dieing here, the more underground scene is just not as popular with the younger generation. Guitars are in, 1210’s are out. Club wise students seem to be more prone to go to DnB nights or commercial shite electro. It’s a shame as we cannot deny the income their presence brings to our local promoters is much needed.

Having successfully kept Brighton dancing for many years from free parties, the Funky Buddha through to recent years at Audio, we salute Stompa Phunk for their contribution and work.

On top of their Bi-monthly spot SP with be throwing some special parties, starting with Darren Emerson at the Concorde on the 25th Jan 2008.

Words: Marek the Czech

(Please forgive the occasionally sneering tone of this article, but it’s the accumulation of too many empty nightclubs experienced in recent months)

Damian Lazarus has a reputation that should precede him. He’s the head-honcho (I hate that expression!) of the Crosstown Rebels label, home to such emerging talents as Sheffield’s Hiem, and Kiki and Silversurfer, and the man responsible for the latest Suck My Deck compilation (with the previous edition compiled by the mighty Ivan Smagghe, who was coincidentally booked for the cancelled Chaos Rocks gig tonight), Mr Lazarus had nothing to prove at the Ocean Rooms tonight. I must admit, when I noticed he was also playing his label showcase at The End on the same night, I had a sneaking suspicion he wouldn’t be hanging around for too long, so I made sure I got down there little after midnight. It really gets my goat when DJs go through the motions before hopping in their London-bound limos, but at least Damian had the decency to regale us with well over an hour of discerning dance music, starting off very minimal and getting progressively groovier as the set went on. I had heard reports of technical shortcomings, but as far as I could tell, the record didn’t skip once, and he always took the correct one off the decks. My only complaint was that he looked like a member of a German boy-band, all laconic sneer and ridiculously tilted trilby concealing the widow’s peak. But then again, if appearance were what I looked for in a DJ, I would have caught that train to London and seen Damian’s labelmate, Scarlett Etienne playing (seriously, Google this girl (She could play white noise all night for all I care).

Not quite as easy on the eye, but reassuringly easy on the ear, are The Jilted Johns, who stepped up to the decks after a Damian Lazarus shaped hole was hurriedly made in the back door. They’re known as the Jilted Jukebox, and rightly so as they pick out the freshest and best known electro and house hits of the day. You can expect the latest Soulwax and Lindstrom 7’s from these guys, mixed in with a few old favourites, all done with that inimitable cheeky-chappy acid-house sensibility that Brighton clubbers have come to know and love. I didn’t hang around for much longer with the lure of the after-party, and free booze proving too great, but I have seen these boys several times in 2006 already, and they are well worth checking out in a dancing venue near you.

To sum up, come on Brighton! It’s your responsibility to find out what’s going on round here, and make sure you shake your arse to the right groove! Next time some one of Damian Lazarus’ calibre is in town, how about giving me some company on the dancefloor? God, it’s ever so lonely being “cool” some times.

The Ocean Rooms
http://www.oceanrooms.co.uk/

1-2 Morley St
Brighton,
BN2 9RA

01273 699069

info@oceanrooms.co.uk

Words: Casper Clark