After what seems an eternity, Helter Skelter have stuck their neck out once again and braved to put a pure hard dance night on in the heart of Birmingham. This night could not be missed and, being a midlands raver myself, I had to check this night out! A few of us (me, Sawyer, Hiney, Wilf and Gallagher) got the train from Lichfield (heard of it? Nah didn’t think so! ) and arrived at New Street station at around 10pm. We met up with the all round geezer and sound bloke Chedda and trundled off to Code in Digbeth. The club is a purpose built venue and is really nicely laid out, with nice seats upstairs and a clear, deafening sound system. It sure makes a change from raving in a sweaty shell of a warehouse, and I’m sure I could get used to raving in nice places (promoters – hint hint!) I knew it was gonna be a wicked night just from the first tune blasting out the speakers, ‘Transect’ by Scott Brown, oh yes! Demand was on the decks and played a blinder of a warm up set, dropping tunes such as ‘Rock you softly’ by Scott Brown and one of my all time faves, ‘Expansions’ by Vinylgroover and Trixxy. Gwan Demand! One thing I’ve noticed about Demand is that he’s very versatile, he can play a good warm up set but can also round off a night perfectly, as he’s shown at Slammin Vinyl NYE 2001 and Slammin in August this year. Big up Mr Demand! Next up was Billy Bunter, playing his selection of Honey Pot hard trance and various other stuff from other hard dance labels. Not being a big fan of Bunter (I pray for the day he comes back to hardcore haha!), I didn’t really listen hard but his set got the dancefloor going and it was nice enough to listen to. We had a quick walk upstairs and I was amazed to see quite a few people monging out already. Monging out at 11pm? Pussies! I had a quick walk round the venue and was surprised at how many ush people had come up from London (and other ‘down south’ places) for this event. Big up yourselves! After Bunter, Ribbz was introducing the next djs when, out of nowhere, came Sharkey’s voice.! ‘It’s not Sharkey, it’s Britney Spears!’ You could see the excitement on peoples’ faces, oh yes Sharkey on the mic and the decks, headset and mic bizness! Sharkey and Energy really killed the dancefloor, playing banging freeform to an appreciative crowd who were proper going mental, as it should be! Sharkey stopped the set halfway through and told the ravers to get ready for some breakbeat, and whoa was it heavy! The tune had the fattest breakbeat ever, with snippets from ‘Searchin’ for my rizla’ by The Ratpack. This tune went down a storm, and I gotta say respect to Sharkey for dropping this tune, it made the set trust me! I looked round the venue when this tune was playing, and the crowd looked rowdy as f**k. Everyone on the balcony was going mad, us lot were going mad, I think even Uplift twiddled his wrists in a slightly ‘This is as close as I’m gonna get to dancing so be happy’ way. In short, this tune was amazing. Half way through the tune the hardcore beat came in and, well what can I say apart from ‘Who did it and can I have a copy?’ Sharkey leaning over the decks mc’ing really got the ravers going and he’s a star for getting on the mic, the ravers love him and rightly so. Salute Mr Sharkey! Mark EG was on after Sharkey and Energy and I decided to have a walk round the club at this time. My mate got caught rolling a spliff by security (this kid is unbelievable, he’s been to 4 raves and he’s been chucked out once and been given a bollocking by security 3 times, he has gotta be seen to be believed, he’s blatant as f**k!). Mark EG was just finishing off when I walked back in the arena, and I literally bumped into Sy. I blagged him to play ‘Just play it loud’ and the geezer played it for his first tune, is Sy the friendliest dj around or what?!? Sy’s set was pretty much perfect, he dropped a nice mix of upfront stuff and slightly older tunes, and even played ‘Warhead’ by Dj Krust and ‘Devotion’ by him and Demo. It was so wicked hearing these tunes again cos most djs nowadays won’t touch the older stuff when playing out, but Sy plays the right tunes at the right time, he just seems to have a knack of putting a blinding set together, and his scratching on the rap sample of ‘Devotion’ was mad. Sy will always be a crowd favourite cos he knows what the ravers want, he doesn’t stick to one style or even one label (ahem raverbaby!), he’s a true dj in the real sense of the word and he recognises the fact that the ravers are paying his wages and need to be entertained. Sy for president! Hixxy up next on the decks and another stormer of a set, droppin half an hour of pitched up European trance and half an hour of raverbaby style stuff. I couldn’t possibly name any of his first few tunes but they were hard as nails and the crowd lapped em up. Later in his set he dropped ‘Lost Boys’, this tune always seems to get everyone dancing, it’s the eeery sample that f**ks your ears up I reckon! He played a few more tunes then finished with the immortal ‘Wonderful Days’ by Charly Lownoise and Mental Theo (I hope I got that right?), the crowd kicked off proper when this dropped, its always good to hear a classic last tune! Ribbz introduced the guest for the night, all the way from Germany, DJ Crow. It was funny cos he shouted out the name of the dj and most of the crowd fell silent , those pesky narrow minded ravers eh! I didn’t know what to expect at all cos I gotta admit, I’d never heard of the geezer! I stuck around and listened to his set cos it was either that or some batty hard house upstairs. The drop in tempo was incredible for a hardcore event, Crow really slowed it down to around 150bpm and the ravers weren’t really sure what to do. A lot of people f**ked off cos, unfortunately, a lot of ravers just don’t like slower music. Sad isn’t it? I enjoyed the set though, it was gritty dance music, it just couldn’t really be pigeonholed. Every tune had a stompy, hard beat and harsh riffs, it was real headfuck music that doesn’t sound appealing at first, but it really grows on you after a while. I saw Oli G going nuts to it and I said ‘this is a bit shit ain’t it’, he goes ‘Nah its terrific!’ Big up Oli G sitting down but still rockin! Haha! Some of Crow’s tunes had a real hard gabba kind of beat to them and I gotta admit I was getting into his set by the end, even though the dancefloor had emptied a bit and the atmosphere was down. Special mention goes out to one of hardcore’s major celebrities who actually went un-noticed on the dancefloor for most of the night....as I’ve been to Diehard a few times I couldn’t have missed him, the cheeky chappy, utter loony, mad as a broom, off his rocker, completely battered, clattered, wrecked, f**ked and loving every minute of it.....JAY PRESCOTT! Had a quick chat with him, but talking to Jay is like talking to a brick wall, you ain’t ever gonna get any sense out the man. But big up anyway, true hardcore trooper! Last set of the night came round at 5am, and Styles took to the decks for the final hour. Well, what a set. Pure liquid raverbaby bizness all the way; he played ‘Sonic’, ‘You’re shining’, ‘Chemical love’, ‘Let me fly’ I think?, ‘Do you feel the same?’ – probably the best raverbaby tune done so far, and a few others that escape me. He also hit the crowd with a fair few new raverbaby tunes that I hadn’t heard before. Its best to get your old tunes released first before making even more ones though lads, ya gets me! The final few minutes of the night came round all too quickly and styles rinsed his new remix of ‘Heart of gold’ before the crowd got ushered out into the cold, shitty dark streets of Brum. The Lichfield lot walked back up to New Street via Digbeth market place (what a place for a smoke, thanks fans I don’t know how I find these places), and we sat in the dodgy overpriced (£1.35 for a bottle of coke? This aint London ya know!) café at the station with the lovely Cris e manic and the even lovelier (ooh er) Dan desire. I can’t really remember much of what happened in the café, cos I was being heavily distracted by pains through my head, strange noises in my ear (oh sorry that was just Sawyer talking bullshit ), and the bright (bright is an understatement) lights of the café. The time we spent in there was truly horrible for me but that’s life eh! It was still funny, but not as nice as being in bed with a cup of tea and some porn starlet massaging my poor feet. Well there you go, probably the longest and most boring review ever but if you got this far, respect to ya! Now just the shouts for the people I saw:- Sawyer (badboy), hiney, uncle wilf, Gallagher, chedda (keep up those mad dancing skills bruv!), crissy, dan, my sexy sarah from derby, andy m (big up mate!), the lost the plot/organised chaos lads (wiggi, oli g, mozz and the crew – nice seein you again lads), dave spice, astraboy, sharkey, carol, uplift, ponder, hb, immz, the wicked ted the pornstar and bedroom raver (always good to see you two and you know that!), paul, smithers, jay prescott and his crew (note to skelter promoters, give jay prescott a classics set at skelter and you wont be disappointed!), special shouts go to the illusion crew (alex, andy techno, stace and marie, big up you lot, seeya soon) and a special mention to dave pratley who actually stood and listened to me rant on for about 20 minutes about how he should organise his nights, hes a promoter who actually cares what his punters have to say, and he agreed with me that he should book Robbie long pronto, big up dave from helter skelter! Sorry if ive missed anyone out, and sorry if you died of extreme boredom whilst reading this, I will come to your funeral and offer my sympathies. Over and out!
