Saturday night saw the long awaited return of the electric Trancetribe parties to Sydney under the watertight adage “no bullshit…just a night of good tunes from good DJ’s.” The first TT branded event in over two years heralded an unprecedented scramble for the modest ticket allocation as the harbour city’s bona fide trance faithful hopped on board in anticipation of an upfront night of diverse trance music from three of Sydney’s hardest working laserjockeys.

Muziqlife’s Pato de Gomah kicked off a night to remember with a deep but seriously danceable set which flirted between melodic progressive and the deeper end of the trance continuum, managing to create a tangible buzz within a crowd appreciative of great sound and plenty of space. Easing from more obscure tracks into more recognizable prog trance fare, Pato deftly amplified the energy with his own noteworthy style including dropping a heavy self-made mashup incorporating the massive Chinook. Markus Schulz’s cracking new take on Power of American Natives turned the heat up as the ever-growing Scott Richardson lurked nearby, fiddling with the laser setup, digicam and well just generally chomping at the bit. Scotty opened with the current market leader Man On The Run from Dash Berlin before rocketing through his signature driving synth-heavy sound interspersed with tongue-in-cheek trancegod poses for the massive. Flicking between new blood and their (tr)ancestors we heard classics that defined an era from Three Drives, Veracocha and Plastic Boy that stood up flawlessly against the relative new kids on the block Oceanlab, JOC and Filo & Peri in three hours of anthemic bliss (think Meg Ryan in When Harry Met Sally but with more bass.)

Trance Essential face Rossco dropped my tune of the night to open, with the absurdly fresh sounding Saltwater before taking the constantly packed dancefloor through a European tour of tech-trance peaking with Cherry Blossom and always maintaining an undeniably funky sensibility. Special mention has to be made of the loop cutting skills that Rossco busted out, chopping a pair of synth loops from channel to channel to create a magic saw effect which sounded incredible – no mean feat and a wicked spectacle up close. Igor S’s Boomerang drove hands high before we spent our last with a modern edit of Exhale and Rossco’s piece de resistance; Massive Attack’s Teardrop; an epic close to an epic night.

A special night that will go down as one of my picks of the year so far, the Trancetribe boys led a sympathetic crowd through a whistlestop tour of modern and classic sounds, with stalwarts Armin Van Buuren, Cosmic Gate, Ferry Corsten and Markus Schulz all represented admirably throughout their various guises. Trancetribe Returns had a distinctly family vibe (perhaps helped by Scotty’s lovely missus handing round baskets of lollies) that has been missing from the Sydney scene of late. Abundant PLUR was the order of the day, and as Teardrop wound down at 5.30am, only one question remained – when is the next one fellas?