“Good evening! I am Colonel von Dichtarschen! Velcome to Stalag 14, or Ze Palace as I like to call it! Ve haf some rules zat you vill obey or suffer ze consequences! Rule number one: you vill line up and you vill vait before proceeding! Rule number two: zere vill be no photographers! Rule number three: zere vill be no bags! No backpacks! If you bring zese things ve vill take them from you! Ve vill also take what’s inside and throw it away! This includes perfume! Textas! And other things ve don’t like! If you follow these rules we can co-exist happily! And I’m afraid you vill find that escape is quite impossible!”

Standing out in front of ze venue, in ze cold, many people would find such a speech intimidating. Luckily however for me it was not a problem, as last level up I put points into my persuasion and charm skills and was able to talk my way past the guards and make my way inside (Rocca uses persuade. Success! Roll 14 + base 9 vs. DC 20). Once in I was enjoying myself straight away with Giuseppe Ottaviani rocking the dance floor. I really enjoyed his set, he has a great way of showing the uplifting and melodic side of trance without being overly focussed on huge long breakdowns and buildups. The crowd liked it too, going off to the likes of No More Alone and The Streets Have No Name.

It was then up to Trent McDermott to handle intermission duties as the stage was being setup for the next part of the show. I took the time to relax and recharge the batteries so I would be fully prepared for headliner Ferry Corsten and his ‘Twice In A Blue Moon Experience’. The big crowd was ready for Ferry and he got things started very nicely with some progressive trance. The sound was coming in loud and clear and a little too loud for my well worn ears so I moved back and went for a wander. It was good to see the place pretty packed out but I still found it easy to get around.

Having done some time with the die hards at the front, I hung out at the muscles corner towards the back to try and pick up some new moves. With my newfound arsenal I decided to head upstairs to hang with some lovely ladies in their sashes and did my best to wow them. Unfortunately I didn’t make much of an impact and wasn’t really impressing anyone with my dancing so I decided to concetrate instead on rocking out to the awesome tuneage. And in four hours, there was plenty of tuneage indeed. Tunes like Saltwater, Flaming June and 1998 all went off as well favourites from the current album like Radio Crash, Shanti and Made Of Love that destroyed the place with live vocals from Betsie Larkin.

When it was getting towards the end of the show I was beginning to wonder how much the crowd could take, he kept dropping bombs and the crowd just kept lapping it up and responding, it was pretty fun to see. We were all still having fun since the place was still packed after 4am when Ferry went for a trip down memory lane, playing Gouryella, Exhale and Carte Blanche among others, I was wondering with a mate what is he gonna pull out next, it’s just going off!! When 5am finally rolled around we couldn’t relax just yet, as Ferry got on the mic to say hello, thank us for rocking hard (Melbourne does it best!) and apologise for a few technical issues, before playing Force Of Gravity to finish off, then wandered the stage signing everything people were throwing at him!

When it was over we could think back on an epic night while walking out, the lights and visuals were on par with the music, all the performers played great sets, the crowd was going off the whole time, it was fantastic! I couldn’t help but feel though that it could have been more in a way. I keep thinking recently, all these big name DJs who make their name from their productions and artist albums (that Ferry is still promoting in the case of this tour), why don’t they step it up a little and play more of a live show? BT has been doing it for years, hell even the warm up, Giuseppe, bangs it out with the keyboards and laptop. It’s definitely something I would like to see more of the trance big names do. I guess though at the end of the day, we all enjoyed the show as it was and that’s what matters most. So thanks to Ferry and Giuseppe for bringing us some tasty Cream!!