We all know a Friday night crowd at Sublime love their tunes hard and driving, so it seemed most appropriate that tonight’s guest was non other than the award winning DJ and producer – Nick Sentience (UK).

Upon entering the club I was instantly aware of the new revamp to the Home décor. A new giant mural was painted on the back wall, extra plasma screens on the side wall showing live feeds to the DJ box and visual displays, and upstairs had been decked out with much needed extra seating. The side stage area had been sectioned off for the guest of honour but there wasn’t a deck in site! Only a myriad of keyboards, beat machines, mixers and other contraptions that I had never seen before. This setup encouraged the atmosphere of anticipation among the paying punters as it meant Nick would be playing his entire set LIVE!

Amber Savage was on decks laying down some progressive trance tracks which she neatly picked up to her specialty – hard dance.  By 1:00am she had the dance floor packed and jumping bringing the bpm up in readiness for Nick Sentience to appear. By 2.00am the time was nigh and Nick took to the floor. I was both pumped and nervous. Pumped for what was in store, yet nervous because he had the balls to play his set live.  After all, what if he made a mistake!?

Nick wasted no time in laying down the pound. His opening was incredible! He just kept building new layers of beats and abstract samples replacing them about every 30 seconds. It was truly amazing to watch Nick Sentience at work! He played layer upon layer of sound until there were driving beats of different levels all working in perfect synch.

Around 20 minutes in he eased off the pace with a brief electro-metal riff pulsating through the club. The crowd stopped jumping and raised their arms, smiles erupted all round! But this lasted only briefly as Nick, standing by his beat machine of a million switches, gave a cheeky grin and motioned it was about to kick in again. With two quick twists of his hands it was back to full-stonk! The crowd was going off…again!

From the balcony, one had an even better view of Nick in action. Pushing through the crowd upstairs it seemed the entire mezzanine was going off! Nearing the front I noticed people were staring down at Nick Sentience like deer in headlights. I don’t think they had ever witnessed a DJ play live before! I spent about 10 minutes staring myself before heading back down to for another stonk.       

His epic set was the most original I’ve heard this year! Bringing in short samples of some of his older tracks, interspersed with bizarre sounds created by his Roland JP8000 keyboard and blended with a good share of his most recent tracks. Needless to say, Nick’s set was comprised entirely of his own productions or remixes, the most memorable tracks on the night being ‘Instrumental’, ‘Never Lost His Hardcore’, ‘Injected With A Poison’ and ‘Dont Stop’.

Nick Sentience held his crowd captive as he took them on a journey with his set. He delivered it hard and fast and all-the-while he was jumping around, smiling and dancing with the crowd. Although he only played an hours set, it was no doubt an hour of power, with enough tracks to normally last 3 hours brought into one. He finished of a mind blowing set with the wicked ‘Afrotekno’ which sent the crowd wild one last time and left smiles on every face. 

At 3.00am Jumping Jack hit the decks and laid down the tracks for the next two hours. Starting out hard he progressed into a more melodic, hard trance. The crowd were loving it as it was a good contrast to what Nick had played earlier. I even spotted DJ Nik Fish in the crowd going off. Towards the end Jumping played some true trance anthems, combining brilliantly with the new laser effects Sublime had on offer.

Nik Fish had the honours of rounding the night off and I have to say it was one of the best sets I’ve heard this year (and I have heard all the big names).  He again decided to play a contrast to what the crowd had been hearing with some real thrash guitar and rocking tracks. He was scratching like a true pro through his opening track before moving into a remix of ‘Blow Me’ and ‘R.E.M’ shortly after. When it came time to close the dance floor was still full, a rarity, and a credit to Nick fish. 

Overall, an epic night of Stonk! Nick Sentience certainly proved that he deserves the many accolades he has attained. Next time he tours, be sure to mark it off on your clubbers-calendar or you may be disappointed!