So I’m going to start this off a little differently, never mind the venue, the locals, the amped people or the CLUBBERS. First things first, THANK YOU BEARTRAP and MMD RECORDS. I mean seriously guys; each and every time this collaboration happens it gets better and better.
From the minute this tasty line up was announced, people had been frothing at the mouth for SMASHED to make an appearance in Cape Town. But we can discuss this madman a bit later.
The Venue: The Theewaterskloof area is one I truly love, from the dam itself to the hills and just a simply picture perfect setting. The best part of this area, little known to outsiders of the Psytrance community is the quarry which hosted Remanufacture 4 and more recently Remanufacture 5. This beaut of a venue has a walk of death (Yes I called it the walk of death) – fully equipped with its own chauffer service (a tractor for people who are slightly still a bit brain dead from the party). This did cost an extra R10. I personally am not one for the tractor ride, I prefer the excitement and discussions that happen on the walk towards the dance floor and people joking about how amazing it’s going to be.
The Music: I can’t actually find a word to best describe the beats at this party, but let’s try… fucking-amazing-ermagerd-wow-jizz; pretty much sums it up! I arrived at about 5 pm, this was a bit later than I had planned but a trip to Mungus Fungus the night before had limited my ability to move and function on the Saturday day. We arrived and immediately went on a friend / campsite finding expedition. This was not all that challenging as the camping pods that had been cleared on the walk to the dance floor made it easy to spot my crazy ass friends from a mile away. Once we had set up camp, we thought it best to acquaint ourselves with our home for the next 24 hours: the dancefloor.
By this time we could hear a solid 136-138 BPM coming from the Massive 60K Turbo Sound Flex Array rig supplied by RP Sound and Lighting and engineered by the Master of sound Mr Dale Byl himself. I am a huge fan of this kind of rig, full power and has a special tone to those LOW bass notes the full-on trance lovers just jizz to when being played. Mark was on the Decks and Spinning us some crunchy, yet not too mind bending as yet, I mean we still had a good 24 hours to go. I was busy taking a video of the dancefloor and surroundings when Mark Dropped Coming Soon’s – I Only Smoke Weed, this set the dancefloor off and got me going immediately, I mean come on, that track is just amazeballs.
Following Mark was Craig Marsh (Sci-Lab), part owner of Mungus Fungus. I had a chat to him before he went on about what was to come, in his words ‘CHEESY BASS’. And boy did he deliver; we got some Azax Syndrom and Bliss just to name a few and towards the end of his set his brother, Jeff, (Outter Limits) joined him on stage and they had a little battle. Nice one Mungus Guys. Gotta give Craig a bit more credit though as I found out upon arrival that the Mungus guys had been working for 3 solid days to perfect the décor for this party, and man was it beautiful.
Next up, the Mad Piper himself. What is there to say besides epic? I am a huge fan of Piper and believe he is going to be rocking our dancefloors for a while to come. That Remix of CHRONIC was simply AWESOME! Following piper was one half of Biorhythm – LUNA. This was originally scheduled to be a Live set, but that changed when he was followed onto stage by GUAPA LEE, one of the 2 Portuguese ladies were touring SA and have played at plenty of Parties. This match up went down well, with some slammers like the WORLD IS AT WAR I would expect no different.
Skarab then came onto the decks and did what he does best, read the crowd and delivered what we wanted. Thrashing the dancefloor with track after track of just pure depth and destruction. Phill really has proved himself versatile over the years, from playing a midnight set like this one to closing Village as is customary. Big ups dude.
The next guy on stage is a production genius, some of the best sampling I have ever heard has come from Barry FrozenGhost. I was looking forward to his set as a little birdy had told me he was going to unleash a new Dirty Motion bootleg remix of Marilyn Manson at 160 BPM. All I can say is: Barry and Stu (Dirty Motion), that track is a dancefloor disrupter of note! Keep it coming!!!
Next up was KillTank, the duo of Chemo Boy and Iron Lotus. I have seen these 2 gentlemen VS each other a few times now, and couldn’t wait to hear what they had in store. And did they deliver as expected, starting us off at a nice 150 BPM slammer and keeping us hitek and edgy the entire set. Both Clayton and Dani have such cool calm and collected stage presence, but you know all hell is coming when they raise their arms and do the BASS LINE 1 FINGER SALUTE!!!
Distorted Culture VS Archive is where it got a little bit hazy and I retired for a while. But having chatted to them beforehand I know it was going to be a LOW BASS TONE ripper with tracks like Mindbenders – Ozzy’z Legacy and some X-Side. I awoke to the sounds of Chemogen Vs Strain, 2 or so hours later. Fuzzy and eina, but ready for a belter of a day. Rahil and Aviv brought it nice and hard, not insane but just enough to keep us happy.
As the sun rose and the chilled drinks came out, Skragg took to stage and brought us some fiery morning style beats. It was at this moment I noticed, and a few others the Massive rig had been turned down a bit, but I could only imagine this was to warm us up for the explosion that was SMASHED.
What is there to say about SMASHED, besides HOOOHAH!? That was massive. 2 Hours of pure high energy full on melt your face off Psytrance. I personally am a fan favourite of the international producers getting 2 hour slots, 1 hour live and 1 hour DJ. This allows us to experience the Music they like to produce as well as the Music they like to listen to. And Boy did Smashed Deliver. Romain my friend, WELL PLAYED, WELL PLAYED.
Next up was one of my personal favourites, Deliriant. Ever since my first party some 3 years ago, and ever since, I have always been a huge fan of Shane. His production skills are top quality. The build and drop kinda music as I like to refer to it. Songs like Unstoppable and Deliriant – Life Form (Shift Rmx) got the crowd shouting and screaming (well those of us there who were alive after Smashed anyway).
It was at this point when my friend Steven Mullins handed me what would turn out to be my fun for the day, a small one hand water pistol. I have never in my life had such fun running around spraying people, both expectantly and expectantly. But enough about my fun, back to PSY…
EMP was up next, and delivered a banger of note, bringing 2 new beats that I could notice, From the popular Game of Thrones and Skyrim. Nice one Vaughn keep the monsters coming dude. Of course there were classics like BAD THINGS and MONSTER KILL. But the new tracks definitely brought the crowd to its knees. Super Evil were up next, and what a treat to get James and Adriano on a Sunday at midday. This is a recipe for broken brains and sore bodies. There isn’t much more for me to say besides well played boys, and I don’t know how Adriano didn’t melt going as mad as he did playing that guitar in the 4million degree weather we were treated to.
Following this was Mama bear AKA Sway. And did she deliver what I would refer to as Sexy Basslines and Funky melodies. Playing artists like Azax Syndrom VS Dapanji I would expect nothing less than a large scream when the bass drops. There were 1 or 2 moments when it seemed the sound rig was misbehaving during Sways’ set but this was quickly resolved by Dale.
Next up was Dillan M, and at this stage it was time for the party to start heading to a chill zone. No more FAT DROPS and 146 basslines, it’s a new era and it seems the organisers are starting to take notice and are having more chilled out sets to end the parties. Dillan didn’t disappoint my ears or legs, playing a bootleg remix of Bob Marley – Is this love, that track for me was just a summary of how beautiful and amazing this party really was.
Closing the party was Bernz, this for me was not what I really would have wanted to end a party, but then again I’m a party goer and not a party organiser. Still we gave it our all, even when it seemed the music was really, really, really fluffy, psy ambient type stuff – it could just have been my ears finally closing cause they couldn’t handle anymore.
I’d just like to say a big thank you again to MMD and BEARTRAP and all that were involved in making Remanufacture the amazing party it was. Wendy, hope you catch those CLUBBERS and put them in the naughty corner until they realise what they are doing to our beautiful scene.
P.L.U.R.
– Lee Williams
pics by Chantelle Joy Ova. To view more go here.
