There are only a few special times that such a master of his trade graces us. This night was one to remember, with an incredible foray of progressive trance/techno goodness that went on into the wee hours. Perfect Stranger (Iboga Records) aka Yuli Fershtat from Israel played for four and a half hours on Friday night at Brown Alley, a massive set for any artist to play in a club. The night is the launch party for Maitreya festival 2010, which is a much looked forward to festival in the psytrance community.

Suseri kicked off the shenanigans with some techy-electro goodness. Brown Alley is very conducive to nights like this, with open space and elevated levels making it easy for people to navigate and dance. Sun Control Species (Iboga Records) then graced us with his psy-gressive performance through to Saturday morning, with some snapping snare drums and melodic overtones. Uniqueness and punchy rhythms are just the tip of the iceberg from SCS’s repertoire.

Perfect Stranger (Iboga Records) starts his marathon night with his live set early Saturday. The main dance floor is noticeably bobbing and pulsing with excitement. His live set was solid and deep, with throbbing beats and tech-layers that developed into something entirely different before you even knew it. The die hard fans of Yuli are obvious as they are completely going off the entire one and a half hours of his set, spraying sweat and good vibes abound.

After the set I headed upstairs to check out the Psy’D Stage and Slytrance was pumping some very dance-able tunes. Having a well-deserved sit-down proved to be as entertaining as dancing as I had a perfect birds eye view of the crowd and decks below. Crimemaster GoGo and Hijacker were playing downstairs with pumping progressive trance, with the crowd showing no signs of slowing down. The venue was quite packed but always with space which was nice. On the verge of Yuli coming back on we head back downstairs.

After grabbing a drink I head to the dance floor; the clapping signifying the start of something special. Perfect Stranger. Three hour DJ set. Awesome! I personally prefer Perfect Stranger’s DJ sets – they are usually longer, usually plays more of a variety of his music and generally he has more crowd interaction as he isn’t hunched over his laptop. His DJ set seemed very long but was over in an instant at the same time. He played various tracks from his Free Cloud album including some older tracks from previous albums. Perfect Stranger’s style is conducive to a club environment – his sound contains tribal and earthy elements, but with a deep bouncing bass to keep the flow going. He blends elements from progressive trance and techno so flawlessly that the boundaries are completely blurred which I love – all the while with heavily psychedelic elements. At around 6 am his set wraps up and the crowd applauds his effort.

Sensient (Zenon Records) tops off the night with his trade-mark deep, dark and psychedelic beats, that kept coming until very early Saturday morning. By this stage the crowd had thinned out but everyone who stayed was in such a great mood from a brilliant night of music.

I put my hand up for any chance to catch another glimpse at Perfect Stranger’s brilliance. Friday brought with it fantastic tunes, people and vibes. Brown Alley was a top choice to hold the party, a smaller venue wouldn’t have done the job. Until next time…