After hearing so much about the first Townhouse, I thought I’d better check this one out and see what all the fuss was about. I wasn’t disappointed. It was Townhouse’s second party, and in light of Valentines Day it was a DJ battle of the sexes, so it was bound to be an interesting night.



True to their word, the Townhouse crew change venues for every event and for this one chose the Transit Bar on Kent Street. I rocked up to the address only to find closed doors and a ‘Townhouse’ banner across the floor to ceiling windows. I was a little confused at first but the sound of the music and the chalk arrows lead me to the rear entrance via the back alley. On arrival the whole rear lane was lit up with purple, pink and blue light and at that moment I just had a feeling that I was in for a good night.



The promoters went all out to keep with their ‘Valentines’ theme; from the candle lit staircases, heart decorations on the walls, and who could forget the plush red velvet day beds in both the upstairs and downstairs rooms – even the soaps in the bathroom were hearts! It was the first time in a long time that I felt a promoter/promoters had really gone to a lot of effort rather than just throwing some sound and lighting into a room.



But enough about the setup, lets get down to the music business. Like the last the venue was split into two rooms; the ‘Living Room’ downstairs for house and the ‘Rumpus Room’ upstairs for breaks, and both were equally as good. The Dj lineup was huge with around 20 acts, however there were definitely a few standout performers on the night. Dug was first up and playing on the ‘Stanton Final Scratch’ – I hadn’t seen one of these in action before and it was pretty amazing – I only caught the last half an hour but liked what I saw! My only complaint was the bongo guy, he definitely wasn’t with the Dj cause Dug looked as confused as the rest of us. Weird!



Cale, Airwalk and Jackster rocked the downstairs room with a fresh mix of funky house, with a few deeper tracks here and there and it was nice to hear some music that I hadn’t heard before. I had to keep running up and down stairs to catch Illbent vs Suzie Q and Kitten vs Jaffa. It was great to see the girls up against the guys and I must say that they definitely held their own. I hadn’t seen either of these Dj’s play before and they were very impressive. Tasty music selection and not a beat out of place.



Back downstairs and Supafly didn’t impress me that much, so I headed back up to catch JR and K-Note, with JR on the decks [x3] and K-Note on the mic. I don’t think that there was a person sitting down whilst these guys performed – they absolutely rocked it. A great selection of breaks, the best scratching I’ve ever witnessed and an MC that compliments and vocalises to the music as well. These guys are definitely ones to look out for in the future.



I finished off my night downstairs listening to Kate Monroe vs Paul ‘Flex’ Taylor for their two hour back to back special, when you’ve got two of Sydney’s best Dj’s playing together it can only be a good thing, and Kate and Paul did not disappoint. At about 5am it was time for me to get home, joining the member list on my way out, now knowing what all of the fuss was about. There was a great selection of Sydney’s creme as well as some not well known, a great venue [although a little hot] and a great atmosphere. What can I say, for a new kid on the block, Townhouse is very impressive!