As we reach the end of the summer party season where warm nights and festivals seem still abundant; along comes one of Sydney’s biggest events: Two Tribes 2004. This year featured a mammoth line-up of international and local DJs including Fergie, Mauro Picotto, Hybrid, BT and many more. Having won the DMA award for best event of the year several times many clubbers look forward to this huge festival which this year catered for the younger crowd as well with all ages tickets available.
The drive out to Homebush was swift and parking was easy to find; although if you didn’t have about fourteen dollars in change for the meters then it was slightly more challenging. We got to the main entrance to see some enormous queues for the various pre-ordered tickets which several friends spent around an hour in. Once we had our tickets we entered through a swift security check and minimal police presence and proceeded to do a quick lap and initial inspection of the various arenas.
We walked in the Astrofunk arena to see the first international of the evening: Lucien Foort. After seeing him rock Submission (also at Homebush) over a year ago I was quite excited about seeing him at this festival. The vibe in this room was damn funky as Foort laid down some funky, dirty progressive tunes with enough tribal and tech elements to keep the sound tough throughout the whole set. We stayed in this room to see Hybrid who started the set with some great tracks and their characteristic booming bass lines filled the room. Some of the highlight tunes were their remix of Prodigy – Smack My Bitch Up and REM – The Great Beyond (Hybrid Remix) and Chable & Bonicci – Ride all mixed to perfection. Unfortunately this set didn’t seem to build to any amazing heights unlike last year when I saw them in Melbourne where they had the whole arena going crazy; this was more of a ‘sit down and appreciate’ set.
Since Hybrid was quite tame we moved to the Godskitchen arena where Fergie had just started. Having not seen him before I had no expectations but his set easily goes down for me as the highlight of the night. The set was remarkable from every perspective; his track selection, mixing, scratching, huge breakdowns that included some crazy sampling and tricks were all jaw dropping and had the entire arena going wild and dancing the hardest that I witnessed throughout the whole night. The sound could be described as funky tech flavoured tunes with only one track that I could recognise which was a tech remix of Tim Deluxe – It Just Won’t Do. Possibly the most entertaining aspect of his set was his energy and the interaction with the crowd; he definitely looked like he was enjoying himself up there.
Next up in the main arena was a man many were anticipating last year, Mauro Picotto, who was here this time to take over and lay down some more pumping techno in the main arena. I think he played a great set of tough tracks but the sound seemed to loose much of the crowd who perhaps were noticing the distinct lack of trance. However up the front the vibe was unbelievable and when it came to the last ten minutes of his set the crowd went mental as he dropped three classics Clockx, a personal remix of Iguana and Mauro Picotto – Pulsar (Picotto Verdi Remix) .
As Picotto finished up he made way for Tomcraft known for his huge track Loneliness. The set started off quite banging and stayed that way so we decided to use this opportunity to check out the other rooms. BT had showed up three hours late after missing his flight and was starting his set in the Astrofunk room at approximately 5am. The tracks were good but didn’t seem to make the crowd go off as much I thought they would.
Throughout the night I also dropped into the InTheMix breaks room several times to see some of the quality DJs billed throughout the night in a mixture of breaks and techno. Samuel L Sessions was laying down some tightly mixed tough techno tunes working hard on three decks, whilst later on in the night General Midi had everybody in the room moving to some great bass lines and storming breaks sounds. However the appeal of the other rooms always seemed to draw me out after a quick sample of the sounds within.
Despite all my careful planning with the set times as to what I was going to see I ended up like many floating around and enjoying whatever sounded great at the time. This is probably the best thing about festivals such as Two tribes. Out in the grassed area near the hardcore arena was a great beanbag laden chill out area where many were relaxing to the funky beats oozing out in the great outdoors. Meanwhile the pace was hectic every time I went past the hardcore arena but I couldn’t make myself stay and listen with the pace a little too fast for me.
This event I believe went down smoothly with only a few minimal problems for such a large scale event. The sound in each of the main arenas was pretty good on the actual dance floor areas the music was loud and clear, and the bass was crisp. This makes me wonder why so many people were complaining on the forums. There will obviously be some reverb problems in the extremities of the arenas of a venue such as Homebush and they should simply get over this. Lighting, lasers and general room production was great in the Godskitchen and Astrofunk arenas. The attendance was quite good with a people spread fairly equally between arenas and no blocking of main rooms happening throughout the night. Overall I had an excellent time and thoroughly enjoyed some sets from DJs I wasn’t even originally planning to see on the night, in particular Fergie and Lucien Foort. But with this many internationals on offer for a ticket price of $85 it is hard to resist. See you at the next one.
