Xylem and Phloem have a reputation for throwing some of the fattest medium-sized prog parties in Melbourne, so it was no surprise to find Room680 packed on arrival. Nyquist had the place bumping along nicely, without providing anything particularly inspirational.

There was a brief silence and as the bar staff struggled to keep up with demand, Antix stripped things back to a solid progressive groove. They built the set up with melodic loops before dropping into some more bassy gear, then back again out into club friendly prog. While fending off bartenders eager to clear their workbench (the drink was quarter full but the bar was half empty), I couldn’t help but notice a trendy electro minimal influence in the sound that had so distracted the drinkers. During a classic Antix rising-3-note-bassline-with-house-percussion-and-fluffy-synth-wash moment that had the crowd in somewhat of a frenzy, one punter was noted as having uttered the word “pedestrian”. Meanwhile the vibe of love was alive on the dancefloor, which was full and writhing, complete with podium/cage contact dancers. Hands were raised as the atmosphere developed an as yet untouched level of epic-ness. This signalled the end of the set, then as the audience cheered, threw their hands in the air and applauded the rising stars of prog, Aaron Smiles decided to take things in a different direction.

First up he dropped what seemed to be essentially house with a dash of tech and some annoying ‘rock the party’ style hip hop samples that had a few people in the crowd wondering what was going on. He recovered quickly though… Obviously a fun opening gambit. He moved immediately into electrotrance and the crowd was screaming in no time. That was around the time I checked out. From then on it was housey Melbourne victory prog with a hint of electro, that at best leaves me nauseous. There seemed to be some minor computer problems as well.

The place looked great, the people were lovely, but the music left me relatively unimpressed. Antix had some good sounds… it certainly worked in a club context. Generally people seemed very much into it, but my conclusion was that this is not for me.