Hooray for Friday! Work on Saturday or not; another Drop event at The Empire’s Moon Bar always justifies a sore head the next day (Your boss may not agree so don’t quote me!). This installment was to be no exception with the addition of major international laptop deejay, Nathan Fake. One of the most talented artists in the electronic music scene, Fake is signed to James Holden’s Border Community record label and has had releases on both Traum Schallplatten and Satoshi Tommie’s SAW Recordings.

A previous engagement in the Tivoli meant that any happenings at Drop pre-midnight haven’t made it into this review. The Moon Bar and Empire Hotel in general had a seemingly poor attendance at this point of the evening, but fortunately for those faithful early punters proceedings gradually turned from lukewarm to boiling point thanks to the talent on offer.

At around 11:50pm Elliot Clarke was behind his laptop and coming to a finish with a few attendees on their feet making a go of a largely unpopulated dance floor. What sounds Elliot had to offer were as in the past impressive none the less, his characteristic shuffling dark and minimal techno sound aptly setting the mood. It would be interesting to see what he could do with more of a peak time set.

Shirking the evenings laptop theme was longtime local stalwart G-Money on the decks with a very smoothly mixed tech house set of the Berlin persuasion. The lighter more melodic nature of G-Money’s records struck a chord with the gradually swelling crowd which seemed a good deal more receptive (Or pliable perhaps, booze will ensure that i’m told).

Dave Basek brought the vibe back to the dark side with a fantastic laptop borne Ableton performance. The Byron resident is clearly very capable with his chosen tools, playing primarily his own tunes which found the mark with a ready crowd hungry for the dirty minimal/tech house on offer. Certainly a name to keep an eye on in the future, those dance fans who’ve not had the pleasure of seeing a Dave Basek performance owe it to themselves to make the time for one.

After the onslaught of Basek’s set what began as a rather empty Moon Bar was now very comfortably filled for the star of the evening. Nathan Fake more than lived up to his reputation with a pure glitch techno fest which acquired the simultaneous envy, admiration and curiosity of every DJ, aspiring DJ and punter in the room. Tracks from his recent Watlington Street EP on SAW were washed, rinsed and strung out by Fake in his Ableton set and with the way he manipulates loops with choppy and rapid length adjustment it was easy to see why his old laptop gave up the ghost on Wednesday mid performance in Melbourne! Eeek!

Luckily for Brisbane no such problems arose with his new one and long time Fake fans got the treat of his playing Outhouse as a finale. Fake’s set gave significant weight to the surging popularity of the Ableton Live software package as it capped off an evening of performances on said system yet most capably displayed the massive scope for individual creativity it affords the adventurous.
A tough act to follow, but Scott Walker carried the torch as capably as always despite a rapidly dissipating crowd. Of all the popular underground DJs Walker probably has one of the most distinctive sounds and a larger following than most but then again 3am is 3am(Curse the lockout) so the evening was not the best for him.

Cross your fingers for another Nathan Fake tour, but if you ever get to have a chat though just be careful with your beer, he’s as good at knocking stuff over as making music!