Ben’s Review

Two Tribes is arguably the biggest dance event in Australia (Sydney’s Field day would argue), and Melbourne is the biggest Two Tribes of them all. As the festival had decided to skip Adelaide this year, I made the trip to melbourne for the event. This years line-up had a considerably more house/electro feel to it, and although headlined by Armin van Buuren, was not focused on hard or underground dance, as it had been in previous years.

Arriving at 10:30pm, we were met by a horde of people trying to get inside.

While I realise there are only so many entry gates, nobody knew where to stand, and none of the lines seemed to be moving. Thankfully I overheard a security guard telling someone the furthest left lane was express for people with no bags, so we were able to enter reasonable quickly (it did take 40 minutes to get inside). Giving megaphones to the security guards would have let everybody know where they were supposed to line-up, and got everyone in a lot quicker. And next year, people, please – dont bring bags! It holds everyone up.

I checked out all the rooms initially to get a feel for the event. The only had time I had been to the Tennis centre was for the Tennis, and it certainly looked different now! Rod Laver and Vodaphone were busy already.

Vodaphone had a much more intimate feeling than Rod Laver, I guess because the seating goes right down to the floor. I caught some of Markus Shultz, who had the crowd jumping early.

I can understand having one entry door to these arenas to control the amount of people coming in, but it made no sense to have one exit door, and that exit door to be next to the entry door! With so many security people guarding the other doors, wouldnt it have made much more sense to open a few side doors for people to exit quickly, rather than battling through all the people coming in?

The side rooms (and there were about six of them) provided a surprise – they were all empty. This meant a real lack of atmosphere – its difficult to dance in a big square room with no-on else on the floor! Infact, Two Tribes as an event doesnt have much atmosphere – its much more focused on the music. There has been a lot of talk about the fact that the Hardware and Global Underground rooms were shunned away from the two big arenas and into smaller rooms, it signified a significant commercialisation of the event, moving the events focus away from underground music, and onto mainstream music. This pleases the masses, but underground enthusiasts have proclaimed this the beginning of the end of Two Tribes – saying its become ‘indoor Summadaze’.

Having missed TV Rock due to the lines outside, at 12 I settled into Rod Laver for the succession of international headliners. Coburn was a strange choice to have on so early – their set was far too hard for that time of night. I still think Steve Angello should have played that set time. The Coburn guys managed to throw all sorts of styles, moving from Hoxton Whores to Pendulum all in the same set!

David Guetta stepped up at 1am, and really got the arena going – leaning more on electro than house. His set was really a highlights package (which is about the best you can do with only 90 minutes) – lots of dub mixes, acapellas, and drop-mixing halfway through tunes. The dub of Joey Negro’s ‘Make a Move on Me’ was very well received, as was Royskopp’s What Else Is There (Trentmoeller Remix) but it was the stomping remix of ‘The World Is Mine’ that was the highlight. He teased the crowd with just an acapella of his worldwide anthem ‘Just A Little More Love’ to finish – the crowd desperately wanting the real deal, yet he did not play it. A set of popular, solid electro, with quick mixing. His timing of acapellas over tracks were a bit off, but he was clearly having a ball up on stage – jumping up and down, pumping his fists in the air.

Erick Morillo introduced Rod Laver as ‘his arena’. he was the only one given two hours (as oppose to 90 minutes), and jumped into deep, dirty electro house. His set was straight out of his subliminal sessions series, and the crowd loved it. He is called cocky, and arrogant, but I still respect him – he has done so much for house music. Like Fatboy Slim, Erick Morillo seems to be one of those ‘i-have-to-see-them-before-i-die djs’.

Steve Angello was a real let-down for me. He was the man I was most looking forward to. I dont know if it was because he started so late, or whether he couldnt match the energy of Guetta and Morillo, but I found his set monotonous. He jumped straight into his own remix of Eurythmics classic ‘Sweet Dreams’ and also featured his great remix of Mobys ‘Raining Again’.

He crowd was still going strong, but I was disappointed. I ducked back into Global Underground to try to catch some of Tocadisco, but seeing only about 10 people in the room, I didnt stay long.

John Course and Andy Van stepped up at 6am, played exactly what the crowd expected – brand new commercial house. John Course certainly has a far greater stage presence than Andy van, (who looked like a robot behind the decks). The dance floor was still packed- the night could have gone much later than 7am.

The nature of a festival with 20 internationals means there will be clashes

- I didnt see headliner Armin Van Burren, as I did not want to battle the queues, the crowds, and mising Erick Morillo. I missed Max Graham and Dylan Rhymes, but that was to expected – I cant be 2 or 3 places at once.

The low crowd numbers (isn’t there usually 20,000? There was only 12,000 this year apparently), meant it was easy to get around – they didnt shut Rod Laver off when it got full, and it was great having so many seats there to get away from everything.

I dont know what to suggest with the problem of the empty side rooms – but don’t fly internationals in to play to 10 people – it’s embarassing for them, and it’s embarassing for us to walk into a room like that (and quickly walk out). I think either have the event as a commercial-housey-nighttime Summadaze type event, or keep it focused on underground music.

I thought the lighting in all rooms apart from Vodaphone was really pathetic. No lasers in Subliminal (Rod Laver Arena), and given that there were such enormous rigs hanging from the ceiling, there were hardly any lights hanging off them! Ive seen better lighting in small-free-entry clubs before. With all that money, they could have done a hell of a lot better.

Global Underground had about six lights for the whole room!

The rubbish was also a problem – towards the end of the night (5am), the toilets and inside Rod Laver was really filthy. Given there were staff collecting rubbish in the foyers, why weren’t they in the toilets and in the stands? Seeing people passed out in the stands was also a little worrying – if someone overdosed, or had some kind of serious medical problem, there were no security staff walking up and down the ailses. If someone had died in their seat, no-one would know until 7am when they were clearing people out.

So overall, a great night of electro for me- more party tunes than serious underground msuic, but the crowd loved it- David Guetta was certainly my highlight – he seemed to enjoy it as much as I did, and it makes such a difference. I’ll make the trek again next year!

Emma’s Review

Uncomfortably long queues, menacing sniffer dogs & buckets of early night rain did nothing to deter the partygoers at this year’s Two Tribes.

2006’s festivities however have received mix reviews.

Complaints included poor mixing by several djs, the one door in/one door out policy into the Subliminal & Godskitchen arenas, a lack of crowd appreciation for breaks, techno & progressive with several of the smaller rooms strangely empty, most notably Hardware & Furturebreaks – where Dylan Rhymes had his set cut unceremoniously short due to poor crowds. 

Many people still lament the old days of Two Tribes at the Docks.  Yes, the sheds will always be revered & remembered as the TT venue – but no one can deny the adrenalin inducing euphoria when descending the stairs of Rod Laver Arena, seeing it packed to the hilt with ecstatic dancers bathed in chaotic laser lights & the feeling of the resounding bass coursing through your body.

This is exactly what greeted me as I arrived at the Subliminal Arena where TV Rock duo – Grant Smillie & Ivan Gough, were serving up a plethora of crowd pleasing favourites, the most welcomed of these their own big bass lined, sleazy vocaled ‘Flaunt It’ (featuring Seany B of Dirty Laundry).  As well as tracks ‘Same Man’ (Til West) & the closer ‘It’s Too Late’ (Evermore).

Up next, Coburn’s electro-rock set, while excellent was perhaps placed a little early in the night for most TT goers.  Nevertheless, tracks like ‘Out to Space’ (Prodigy) & a thrashing remix of Gwen Stefani’s ‘Hollaback Girl’ was excellent.

After all the main room action I thought it was time to check out some of the smaller rooms.  In contrast to the atmosphere in the Subliminal arena, Pharmacy, Global Underground & Planet Hardware were resoundingly empty.  Furthermore, though you can’t expect the lighting, lasers & visuals that are outfitted in the main arenas, a little more attention to these may have enticed the crowds from Subliminal & Godskitchen a little more.  After traversing between the various stages it was time to return to Subliminal to catch Dave Guetta’s cracking set.  Despite hearing the highly rotated Eurythmics remix ‘Sweet Dreams’ yet again, Guetta set was still infectious.  His ‘The World is Mine’ remix was awesome, as was ‘I Just Can’t Get Enough’ (Herd & Fitz ft Abigal Bailey). 

I cut a course to the Global Underground room to catch a sample of James Lavelle.  As Lavelle was the drawcard for many, crowds were perhaps expecting a slightly better set.  He endlessly teased the crowd with his build-ups that just didn’t deliver & his mixing at times was sloppy.  Even so, tracks like Massive Attack’s brilliant ‘False Flags’ & Lavelle’s own ‘In a State’ – great in its live form – kept the fans happy. 

After a quick sample of Lavelle it was time for Armin Van Buuren’s three & a half hour smooth mixing trance-imbued set featuring tracks James Holden’s ‘A Break in the Clouds’, Buuren’s ‘Zocalo’ (also feat. Gabriel & Dresden), ‘Summer Dream’ (Kuffdam & Plant) & ‘Shadow World’ (Thomas Bronzwaer).  The unlikely law graduate (yes you heard me), remixing master, regular in DJ Magazine’s top ten DJ’s of the world & a leading talent in the echelons of trance music, boasting residences in both the UK & US, Buuren wowed the crowd with an awe-inspiring set.

To finish off the night, I briefly took in Andy Van vs. John Course (aka Vandalism) as they dished up an impressive set with heavy bass driven tracks & witnessed ‘Coursy’ signing along enthusiastically to ‘Midas Touch’ (Midnight Star) & the infectious tune ‘Love Generation’ (Bob Sinclair).  Always great to see a DJ so obviously enjoying themselves.

Two Tribes is the party that attempts to cater for everyone – the rave ‘purists’, the TV Rock loving One Love crowd & those just wanting to have a good ‘ole dance.

Perhaps the best advice when entering Melbourne Park in the future – just get on with it & party!