Rainy weather wasn’t the ideal start to The Ivy Pool Bar season, but that didn’t stop the beautiful people from turning up for a Sunday SHE house session. SHE is synonymous with house music, and over the years they have hosted some of the coolest parties in Sydney at some of the biggest clubs about. With the recent invasion of electro and dub-step, house music has taken a bit of a back seat – so SHE is all the more important for reviving house music’s rightful place in the clubbing scene.

Arriving early evening, I unfortunately missed E-Cats but caught the tail end of Kocho’s set, which started off fairly chilled but quickly ascended into definite dance territory with his hit Controversy. By the time Kocho’s set ended and Robbie Santiago took over, the crowd was up and dancing. The cabanas were full, the bar was healthily populated and the music changed into a dance-friendly style of Latino house.

In the Changeroom section of The Ivy, Jewel Eyed Fox and C’est Chic prepped the crowd prior to Sushi’s performance with an upbeat, funk-esque style of house. After a quick glance at the time, my mates and I dashed back upstairs to catch headliner Shazam’s set.

Shazam, a.k.a. Cameron Parkin, broke into the music scene at the tender age of seventeen; grabbing attention for his sexy remixes of big, popular club tracks. His versions of We are the People by Empire of the Sun and Down to LA by Munk really shot him to fame and thankfully, found their way into his set. Shazam also delivered two quality house tracks, displaying a skill for, and taste in, music well beyond his years. Track Pool Party was a fun electro-house mash-up aptly named for the event, and Luckier proved a smooth house tune that would have been at home on any Café Del Mar album. The two-hour set was a definite highlight of the day, keeping the crowd up and dancing despite the occasional sprinkle of rain.

Back in Changeroom, Sushi had the place bustling and left no soul seated. Starting with some house tracks before sliding into some cool R&B remixes, his mixed bootlegs of Crooklyn Cran’s Be Faithful and Ice Cube’s You Can Do It were particular highlights. Sushi also dropped tracks like Little Bad Girl by David Guetta, You Gonna Want Me by Tiga and The Aston Shuffle’s super-catchy Your Love to great response. Sushi clearly has a natural ear for mixing, seamlessly moving between R&B and house, and has proved a fresh and fitting addition to the line-up at Changeroom.

The end of Sushi’s set pretty much spelt the end of a big night. SHE reminds me of the good old days of house music – and if it can keep up the rocking parties then we may see a change for the better in the Sydney club scene.