After sell a sell out gig at Gilkinsons last year Spor returned to Perth on Friday September 4th; this year graduating to Metro City. With word of a new sound rig at Metro’s there was no one more capable to test its capacity than Spor himself. With Dubstep pioneer Distance in support the night promised to be filled with dark and grimey beats and the two prolific artists didn’t disappoint.

Newly rebranded promotions crew Knowledge Music where behind the organisation of the event; one of many in the past year and coming months to incorporate both Drum N Bass and Dubstep. While in my mind the blending of these styles always makes for an epic night it often doesn’t work too well in a one-room club. There isn’t enough support for the Dubstep sound in Perth’s Drum N Bass scene as could be acknowledged by the more than lacklustre response to Distance during his set.

The night started off with two of the local scenes many talents; Rekab representing the dubstep sound and international player Rregular rocking the drum n bass. Both provided solid sets; their mixing was spot on; and their track choices laid the blueprint for the harder style sound which would be prevalent for the rest of the night. At midnight Distance took to the decks, mixing exclusively with vinyls; something that’s always good to see. Distance’s skills were pretty amazing from a technical point, his set had a very concise flow and the mixing itself was seamless. From what I gathered there were a significant amount of dubplates being spun which made for a very fresh sound; scattered through were also several of his own productions from his 2008 scene masterpiece Repercussions, with Koncrete and V getting the warmest response from the crowd.

By 1:30AM Metro’s was surprisingly packed, with the balconies and most available space occupied; of course considering Spor’s reputation as a DJ (placing in two categories in the recent D&ABA awards) and Perth’s love of the harder styles of drum n bass the support can certainly be justified. Spor started his set with his remix of the Two Fingers track That Girl, building up slowly and finishing with an epic drop that got the crowd jumping. For the next two hours he didn’t relent, bringing in some big tracks from artists all over the scene; in particular his own productions like Claret’s March and Aztec and his remix of the Qemists Stompbox got a really frenzied response from the crowd. Spor’s mixing as to be expected was very tight, he used his effects well and was double dropping tracks nicely; he read the crowd well and despite some lulls most people kept dancing for most of his set.

Killswitch filled the closing slot for the night; keeping the lifted sound going well into the early hours of Saturday morning. These guys from Perth have been gaining significant ground in the last few years, a search on the net will link you to some killer tracks to stream; definetly worth some further investigation.

Overall the night was as epic as I personally imagined it would be; indeed a night with two of the biggest international artists in their respective scenes couldn’t go wrong. Yet as I briefly mentioned above, the one-room event with both dubstep and drum n bass doesn’t always work out to well. Precious few in the crowd seemed to know who or how big Distance is on the DJ circuit, and most didn’t dig the dubstep sound; which is fine but it’s never acceptable to yell out “DRUM N BASS” during a DJs set if he’s not a purveyor of that style (from which I was told was happening on the top balcony). A little bit of respect would have gone a long way into making the night really memorable; but all in all a very good gig.