Arriving around 11pm at Traffic I found the main room was warming up nicely with some nice, funky tunes, there were definitely heads bopping inside and the odd brave dancer. The courtyard was quite full already with people starting off the night with a friendly chat over a drink and there seemed to be a bit of green lighting, university lights through the courtyard shade, that provided a bit of a festive atmosphere.

The Nokia Terminal 9 Tour was originally scheduled as a street party, but due to complaints about the decibel level half the party was moved to Fowlers in the old Lion Arts Centre. The main room seemed to be running a little late with Terra Firma live at 12am. The main room was packed for this act and the crowd was amped with Terra Firma declaring they would drown out the drum and bass which was only just starting to float through from the courtyard. Meanwhile the expectant crowd outside was rewarded with some cruisy drum and bass tunes, with MPK quickly filling the dance floor. It was then MPK vs Patch as the beats got faster and the party got going.

I took a trip over to Fowlers to see how the other half of the event was faring and after the rolling party tunes of the courtyard, my brain took a couple of seconds to adjust to the slower pace of the Koolizm boys hip hopping it up. The crowd was really engaged with the three MCs stalking the front of the stage and batting lyrics back and forth like that fly in the V cow ad. I must admit I’m not the biggest fan of hip hop, but I was impressed with these guys, they really took command of the stage. The crowd participation was remarkable; at one point the boys split the crowd into two, competing for the side with the loudest cheers.

Back at Traffic in the main room, EK live had had a slow warm up as I left for Fowlers, but as I got back they had got stuck into some really phatt breakbeats. The MC was very intense and reminded me of Jay, from Jay and Silent Bob, which along with the fine tunes kept me entertained and in the main room for longer than I intended.

Making my way through to the courtyard, I found the DnB crowd was still going strong, a multi level dance floor emerging when there wasn’t enough room in front of the decks. Later G-Swift hopped on the decks and got a little more laidback with some dnb funk. I took a bit of a breather here and unfortunately missed Downsyde in favour of Greg Packer vs Pendulum in the main room, catching the tail end of Shredlock as the crowd flocked to the main room.

Xpress was on the mic getting the crowd revved up, although there was such a great crowd vibe already, it didn’t take much to get everyone going. I had not seen Pendulum play before due to unfortunate circumstance and have to say I was just a little bit impressed. It was definitely a set you couldn’t stop your feet moving to catching a few people jumping up on stage to express their enthusiasm. The Spiral remix Speed dropped was probably the highlight of the set for me, being my all time favourite track and it was refreshing to hear something a bit different to the radio edit.

All round an excellent night, great acts, good crowd vibe and the new venue layout seemed to be working well. I enjoyed the mixed genre event and gained exposure to Australian music I would not normally see.