Another Friday night, another Sublime Weekly Festival. The last time I had been to Home was for Livewire, and since then a couple of changes have been made to the main room – seats missing in the ‘Bay’ areas at the back of the dancefloor, tables and chairs at the side of the dancefloor, and the area located next to the DJ booth is now draped off with black material. I should also mention now, rather than later, that the crowd was noticeably smaller than usual, which was a pity because the night wasn’t anything less than what they usually have. Let’s just blame it on the cold weather, which even tempted me to miss this one out!

Back to the night though. I made sure I got to Sublime early enough to watch Cameron O’Shea open in Voodoo. I have always enjoyed his sets, and this is the first time I have been able to see him in a while. For an opening act he definitely set the pace for a quality trance night, mixing from uplifting tech-trance to driving tech-trance to a dancefloor of perhaps twenty. The set progressively got harder as Cameron prepared to hand the stage over to Jumping Jack. Jumping Jack’s set ranged from uplifting to hard trance, playing some current favourites such as Gabrielle & Dresden’s ‘Without You Near’ and Nic Chagall’s ‘Monday Bar’. At this point the crowd was piling onto the dancefloor, and even I managed to get on there for a song or two.

During JJ’s set I went to check out the Subbies Band Room, where DJ Disorder was killing time before the first band. This is the first time I have seen DJ Disorder play, and I really liked the uniqueness of his set, which was a bland of funky dance with rock. The first band on stage was Canberra’s The Young and the Restless, a boy-dominated band with a female lead singer. Their punk rock sound with her screaming scratchy vocals was like AFI meets System of a Down and the Mint Chicks.

I eventually wandered into the Cargo Room to catch a bit of Kate Monroe and Matt Roberts, who played nothing less than the funkiest of funky house. I was waiting for Illya, so after tapping my foot and bopping my head for a good half hour, I headed into the Beat-Fix room to pass some time. I must admit, I know absolutely nothing about breaks, but I ended up in this room more than any other for the night . Maybe it was one of those ‘instant realisations’ that I could like the music, or perhaps Klaus ‘Heavyweight’ Hill and Kemuri, together with the freestyling of MC Losty, were in top form that night. Either way, I was shuffling and ‘breaking it down’ with the rest of them in the room. Being the trancenut I am, I was also quick to notice Zombie Nation being played by Klaus and Kemuri, and no doubt the happiest to hear the song!

Somewhere between every other room, I managed to get back to the Subbies band room as The Gingers were into their first song. This female trio from Melbourne may look petite, but their indie punk sound proved to be more powerful than what I would have given them credit for. Where they excelled in their guitar and drum skills however, I felt they lacked in their vocals (to which my description of it I won’t go into).

And now up to Cargo to watch Illya. My knowledge of house music is as non-existent as my knowledge of breaks, but hey – I am just getting into funky house, and Illya was on my list of people I should at least check out. Needless to say that I enjoyed what I heard. I got front and centre on the dancefloor for a while as I did my left-foot/right-foot dance. Illya really knows how to play it track by track, keeping the crowd energised throughout his set with a bit of funky and deep house.

Down in Voodoo, Pee Wee Ferris had started his 4 hour epic journey. Credit goes to Pee Wee who always knows how to mix such diverse sounds perfectly. This guy played it all – from uplifting, to driving, to tech-trance, to hard and even progressive. Towards the end of his second hour, I suddenly noticed a guy on stage playing the drums, as well as other various instruments! I was surprised how well the drums went with Tiesto’s ‘Adagio for Strings’ and ‘Traffic’ – Pee Wee definitely made the effort to ensure the crowd loved the music.

All in all, I left the club a tired little girl, with the rain pelting down on me and the cloudy sky still too bright for my eyes to cope. But try and stop me from doing it all again – cold weather included!