Digweed, Sasha, Kazell - Philly

[88Mariner]

what a night. I start this thread so that when i wake up tomorrow and check the board, I'll be reminded to actually put a full review up.

--in under an hour since the last record finished, there are already three videos of this up on youtube. what an interconnected world we've become...

[Dhar_2]

Re: Digweed, Sasha, Kazell - Philly

cant wait for the full review with pics and linx!!

[Steve Graham]

Re: Digweed, Sasha, Kazell - Philly

looking forward to hearing how Kazell was.. s&d i'm sure were good.. kazell is someone i have been wanting to catch live

[Homegrove]

Re: Digweed, Sasha, Kazell - Philly

Was Sasha using cds or Maven?

[threehills]

Re: Digweed, Sasha, Kazell - Philly

So everything was A-frigen-mazing. I'll let 88Mariner give the full review as I am sure he can do it justice much more than I can. He's hardcore as he came in all by himself and had class first thing this morning.

I took a bunch of videos but they massive sound system destroyed all but one of them. The sound, damn, there was no where in the small club that it coulnd't find you. Video is of Digweed.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SwLkjgOBW_k[/youtube]

[BureOne]

Re: Digweed, Sasha, Kazell - Philly

? that vidz not more availablezzzz ?


...Neverz mIndz lol?

[threehills]

Re: Digweed, Sasha, Kazell - Philly

I think that was only for 10 seconds or so. Working now.

[88Mariner]

Re: Digweed, Sasha, Kazell - Philly

I get to the club about 8:30ish. The tickets say doors open at 9, but there’s already about 600 people inside. I’m told this by Ron the head security guy who later offers me a summer job at the venue. I’m stunned, because I wanted to see Kazell do his entire set. But out in the drizzle you could hear it pretty damn well. So I had a few cigarettes, chatted up a few random people and had two quick pints of stella at the bar next door. Going in, the place reminded me of what the Hacienda looked like, except that it had a balcony with stadium seating so you could look down at the stage. It was packed nearly the entire nite, as was the dancfloor, but not too packed: there was definitely some room to move around.

So I’m walking in, and there’s this really lush groove being laid down by Kazell. I’ve heard his kissfm sets but the stuff I’m hearing sounds nothing like it: it sounds like plastic city heaven. Lush, fat bass, really beautiful music. I would go see him again in a heartbeat for the hour or so that I saw him play. He was nice enough to hawk out a few cd’s to the crowd at the end of the night (I came up empty handed, but he was affable enough to have a few words with me).

Closer to 10ish he starts laying down something a bit more darker and dirtier. This is no surprise cause Digweed pops in to the side at this point. I met up with ThreeHills at this point and had a good quick chat with his wife and crew. (all very good people btw! Glad to see you made it back safely!). Digweed gets on and you can hear the crowd roar.

I literally walk right to the front. The stage is right there. The set-up was so close you could easily hand stuff to them. Some kid next to me handed them a promo cd of his. I’m sure it was the defining moment for him as a producer. I wished him luck and hoped all the hard work he put into those tracks had an amiable audience that would play it out.

Sweat. Weed. Fog. Booze. It was only past ten and I knew the smell would only get….better. And it did. Digweed started laying down some really sick stuff right off the back. He was only on for about 45 minutes and the crowed was just locked into what he was doing, whatever it was that he was doing.

The visual backdrops were money. It wasn’t like Delta heavy, but I liked the concept they had going on: Sometimes less is more. As the night progressed on the music tip, so too did the visuals and lighting: more and more trippy.

You could instantly tell when sasha came on. The crowd went nuts when he took the decks, but the sound was different. Not necessarily in a good way. The structured groove digweed had put together fell off. Perhaps this is what he intended to do, I don’t know. But I later had some insight as to why this was.

Sasha, from what I recall, started playing some hard but minimal tribal. It reminded me of the first few tracks on the bonnaroo set. But it didn’t flow well from what digweed had just played. Throughout the night I realized why the Vagabond set I’ve been reading about was so monumental: it was for two reasons. One, the style of music being played that evening, that hard, twitchy, tweaky house music works so much better with the digital format they were playing. Two, Digweed’s style of music works so much better with that format than does Sasha. I think it explained why I was slightly, slightly disappointed with Sasha’s set. Sasha is known for the more melodic and beautiful side of the music. But this digital format he’s been using doesn’t give it that warmth, that rawness that most of us have come to know him by. It’s the difference between a robot playing a violin and a human playing a violin. Digweed’s style never catered to the lushness…he kept it dark, dirty, twisted the entire time he played. It reminded me of the first Disk on GU: Sydney. Some of his first tracks sounded like Mauro Piccotto remixed by deadmau5.

Every time digweed took the decks, whether it was solo or with sasha, there was absolute magic in what was being heard. It was only when sasha went solo that the groove took the backburner.

I watched sasha do his thing, and he was really really concentrating on what he was doing. I can’t fault him for that. But like I said earlier, and I think this echoes some statements I’ve read on this board, the sound he has taken up just doesn’t sound like sasha. It almost seemed as if he was trying to be digweed actually. I hope this provides some of you with some insight as to perhaps why that Vagabond set was so monumental for those who were in attendance. Digweed is hands down a better DJ than sasha. I can’t find any way to argue around to the contrary.

It was about midnight. And I’m realizing there’s two more hours of this shit. Holy fuck. I’m having a blast and so is everyone else. I look back and the balcony was getting crazy. If the chandeliers were any lower, I’m sure people would have been swinging on them. At 12:30 josh winks shows up. I don’t think too many people realized this. But he was chatting with digweed for a while. That was one of two annoying things that happened that night: not josh wink being there, but the random people that would be walking around on stage. And second, was these two fucking fuckfaces who were shouting “PLAAAY HEAVEN SCEEEENT” at the top of their lungs. It was funny at first, and then it got annoying. And digweed was annoyed by it too. He told them “no” but they didn’t let up. I was ready to take them down. Fucking dicks. There are a few youtube videos (search: Digweed tla) where you can hear this. It’ll probably be the one reason why they wouldn’t air this set on transitions. GRRRR

Alright, so 12:45 they hit the vortex. Digweed came back on with sasha and the lit the place on fire. IT just gots nuts. NUTS NUTS NUTS. (See ThreeHills video, I think that’s when it started to get crazy). Sasha walks off for a bit and digweed, back in control, just…..ugh. I remember a point where I just stopped dancing. Just stopped moving. I was absolutely paralyzed. I couldn’t believe the shit that was coming through the speakers. And it built, and built……

Time went slow, time went fast.

All of a sudden, two girls with glowsticks rush the stage out of nowhere. They started dancing with john and sasha. It was kinda funny. Cause here are these two petite ladies in the dj booth with Soapy and Dishrag. They started cracking up after they escorted them off the stage. (it was kinda like partyboy from Jackass..but with two small girls and glowsticks). Anyways….glowsticks. If I ever see one more glowstick, I will break it open and make you choke on the liquid. That shit is annoying as fuck. Grow the fuck up already!

So…. Let’s see. Yes, sasha and digweed just lit it up over the next hour. It never got too melodic though until the second to last song. It was really perfect timing…but I guess that’s to be expected. They let the record play out, and digweed put one last one on. I don’t know what the track was….but whoever produced it should get a gold medal. It was the best sounding piece I’ve heard in a while. It sounded like a Voyager track. Such music is hard to describe, but it sounded old-school. It could have been some chemical brothers remix, but I can’t say for sure.

And the lights went up and we sang Digweed happy birthday. I don’t know how old he is, but I wonder how much longer he’ll be doing this.

I woke up this morning feeling like the way he looked.

Kazell: 9.5
Sasha 8.5
Digweed: 10.5

I’ve got pictures, but not all of them are good (have a really good one of Kazell though). It took me about 20 minutes to figure out the best setting with the lighting. I’ll figure out how and where to post these later.

All in all, I would travel long distances to see digweed again. There’s only so much time left….

And for those wondering about Kazell....just do it. He was ace at reading the crowd and pacing the night.

[dannyboy]

Re: Digweed, Sasha, Kazell - Philly

Cant wait to here them in toronto next friday.

[Lorn]

Re: Digweed, Sasha, Kazell - Philly

Good review bro. You are spot on about Sasha. Everytime he came on I didn't have to look up the drums told me. Overly loud, tribal beats. Don't get me wrong, I like tribal but it didn't quite fit with Digweed's playlist. I will say Sasha had some really cool transitions, that was fun to hear.

I thought the sound system was overpowering. The reverb messed up a lot of the intricate sounds if you were standing in the back. Moving up to the front of the place help that.

I always enjoy these two blokes. Great night. I'm sure they will throw everything they have tonight in NYC. Have fun there!

[threehills]

Re: Digweed, Sasha, Kazell - Philly

To follow up on what Mariner said... I remember thinking at one point when Sasha was playing " 8 times out of 10 I would say Digweed is the better DJ compared to Sasha, but this is pretty fricked good, Digweed is gonna have a hard time topping this..". But then Diggers played. It just did not compare. The man is flat out ridiculous. Nothing else compares to the nasty nasty stuff that he comes up with in his live sets.

I also noticed the minimal lighting and thought it worked really well. It was largely only the screen you can see in the video and a few simple stationary lights overhead, nothing mechanical or strobe in nature. As things built up, the subtly worked in some other aspects, but nothing over the top which was kinda nice.

[Lorn]

Re: Digweed, Sasha, Kazell - Philly

wtf...I have posted twice to this thread and both posts don't show up.

[subdude]

Re: Digweed, Sasha, Kazell - Philly

Thanks for talking the time to write the review. Good work!

[simonr]

Re: Digweed, Sasha, Kazell - Philly

Great review .. you hit the nail on the head about Sasha - that limp clicky minimal stuff is nothing compared to the previous lush sounds and vocals of previous years.

[chuckc]

Re: Digweed, Sasha, Kazell - Philly

I remember thinking at one point when Sasha was playing " 8 times out of 10 I would say Digweed is the better DJ compared to Sasha, But then Diggers played. It just did not compare. The man is flat out ridiculous. Nothing else compares to the nasty nasty stuff that he comes up with in his live sets. .

digweed is light years ahead of sasha now. he truly is the best in the world.