Rise Nightclub was taken on an eclectic journey last Friday night with one of the key players in techtrance, Richard Durand. The time was taken to come and treat the Rise punters while on the Australian leg of the In Search of Sunrise tour.

As I walked up the stairs towards the kickdrums and basslines, Trent McDermott was warming up the crowd something fierce, with some nice prog trance. As a local boy, it’s always good to see Aussie talent pulling through – especially on the trance front where we aren’t the most prolific nation for Trance producers.

As we were waiting for the main event, my mate gave a cursory glance over her shoulder, turned back suddenly, and then grabbed me by the arm with excitement: “Oh my god, Richard Durand is grabbing a beer at the bar!” Sure enough he was right behind us, as if he was just a regular punter himself. I’ve said it once and I’ll say it again: the best thing about Rise is that you get to have a beer and chat with DJ’s that usually play to football fields of people.

As for his set, Durand hopped on the decks about midnight, which is relatively early for most of the big names that come to Rise – and a pleasant change in my opinion! For his set, he had a little time to build in the more traditional trance way. He started the first half hour or so with some almost baleric stuff- something I am not accustomed to hearing from him. But soon, the basslines started to get a little more choppy and the energy picked up: we were in tech territory. Although the set was cut short, the 2.5 hours we got were pulsing with high energy tunes and killer classics. Richard would only hint at them to begin with, then drop the main melody 5-10 minutes later. Building suspense without letting all his eggs out of his basket all at once is one of the great things about a Richard Durand set. Although his stint on the decks was somewhat abbreviated, Richard Durand delivered what a true fan would have expected: a well constructed set with a fair share of his masterful productions, and a multitude of banging tribal trance tunes.