It’s been two years since Tyler Stadius graced our shores, but on Saturday night the Canadian Fabric resident returned and it was definitely worth the wait. Supported by a stellar local lineup, it was almost guaranteed to be a fantastic night of music – and that’s certainly how it ended up.

Mo’Funk opened up in the Sand Bar, playing his trademark blend of funk, soul and party hip-hop to those who had arrived early. For those have yet to see Mo in action, he utilises Serato Scratch Live, a half-PC/half-turntable set up that allows him to remix tracks on the fly using only traditional vinyl. Mo worked the software to its full extent, constantly looping and re-editing tracks, and also demonstrated considerable turntable skill, scratching, cutting and juggling tracks like Queen’s Another One Bites The Dust and Jamiroquai’s Canned Heat.

Down in the Laundry the crowd was getting warmed up by The Lady Killers with a diverse, well-mixed and smooth-flowing blend of tech and electro house such as Dave Spoon’s At Night and Jona’s remix of M.A.N.D.Y. vs Booka Shade’s Body Language as well as some big floor fillers including Tonite Only’s remix of Sneaky Sound System’s Pictures and Mylo’s ever-popular remix of No More Conversations from Freeform Five. Thankfully, in spite of them playing a set of tunes aimed squarely at the dancefloor, the boys never pushed the set too hard too early. This is never an easy feat and it’s something a lot of warm up DJs struggle to do successfully, so massive props to them.

Meanwhile, Matt Nugent was on warm-up duties in the Cave, giving the punters a taste of the darker, tougher end of his musical spectrum and preparing them for the onslaught that was soon to come from Mr. Stadius. Starting off on more of a glitchy, bouncy tech house tip with tracks like Gotta Get Up by Solid Groove, Nugent soon upped the intensity and started laying down some heavy electro house sounds from the likes of Bobby Lorenz & Kristoph with Switch and Sebastien Leger with Hit Girl, before pulling things back a little and returning to the bouncy tech house sounds that characterised the earlier portion of the evening, giving Tyler Stadius plenty of room to take his set wherever he wished.

The Canadian king of all things tech and house then took over the controls in the Cave and proceeded to smash it to little pieces with a faultless three hour set that blended the sounds of tech and electro house, techno, house and minimal in to one mammoth body-shaking groove full of filth, squelch, funk, warmth, and even the odd bit of melody.

Stadius’ first hour was as diverse as it can get. Kicking things off with some very dark, twisted tech house including Claude Von Stroke’s stupidly massive The Whistler, Stadius set up a groove that was to pervade the entire set and capture everyone’s attention over the entire three hours of his set. Things soon took a turn for the lighter and quirkier, with Stadius heading in to glitchy house territory with tracks like the Switch remix of See Me by Herve and also Switch’s mix of Def Inc’s Waking The Dread, before dropping some funky acid house sounds that had plenty of punters screwing up their faces and asking “what the hell is that?” In a good way, of course.

The second hour of the set was characterised by darker, more banging sounds, which the first hour had made way for perfectly. Deep, chuggy tech house soon gave way to electronic, robotic minimal grooves and filthy electro house such as Marc Romboy and Blake Baxter’s House Ya, which set the stage perfectly for about half an hour of thumping, loopy melodic techno from the likes of Milton Jackson’s Fade Runner and Let Them Go from Bibi’s Ghost, as well as some more minimal, percussive styled techno, including That Dro by Chicago legend Bryan Jones.

For the final hour, Stadius took it back down a notch and gave the crowd a chance to rest their feet and regain their composure after two hours of perversely enjoyable aural punishment, dropping some wicked wobbly tech house, most of which was unreleased, leaving this reviewer somewhat in the dark in the trainspotting department. In the last half hour, the loyal fans that chose to stay right to the very last tune were treated to a peak in to the lesser known portion of Tyler’s musical repertoire, with Mr. Stadius delving in to warm, jackin’ Chicago tech house grooves, including a ridiculously fun remix of Laurent Garnier’s Crispy Bacon.

Of course it goes without saying that Tyler’s mixing was absolutely flawless. This guy has been at the top of the game for years now, and he’s not a Fabric resident for nothing. Not only was his beat mixing scarily tight, but his tracks all harmonised perfectly, and his phrasing was so sublime it was like he knew his tunes backwards. But what was most impressive was how well the set flowed. Despite covering a lot of ground style wise, and even ebbing and flowing in its intensity, the set came together excellently and never once did a track sound like it wasn’t the right one for that exact moment. One of the sets of the year in this reviewer’s opinion.

For the brief moments I was able to tear myself away from Stadius’ outstanding set and check out how things were travelling in the Laundry, both Craig Obey and later The Potbelleez, accompanied by MC Blu on vocals, were working the crowd in to a frenzy with big room electro house. Obey focused mainly on the big floor fillers, including the Boys Noize remix of Bloc Party’s Banquet, D Ramirez’s mix of Yeah Yeah from Bodyrox and even Fedde Le Grande’s Put Your Hands Up For Detroit while The Potbelleez went a little harder and more underground, going for the electro-tech-house crossover sound that seems to be coming in to vogue in Sydney lately, dropping tracks such as Feedback by Madox & Acquaviva which quite simply caved heads in.

Not much more needs to be said really, this was a great evening of great music at a great venue. Tyler Stadius demonstrated why he deserves his residency at Fabric, the local lineup showed that Sydney can hold its own against the international scene, the crowd never stopped moving, and the sound system in both rooms got a solid work out. A top night in anyone’s language, really.