review IBugged Out! 21/7/07I should start by saying that it was a Bugged Out! night at Cream in Liverpool in 1998 when I first fell in love with French dance music. While all my mates were through watching Dave Clarke I stayed in the smaller room - my ears glued to the looped up Disco madness DJ Falcon was playing. I remember I had just bought Music Sounds Better With You thinking it was a one-off...a sort of novelty record. How wrong could I have been! With a a lineup that included Erol Alkan, Feadz, Crookers and Riton, Bugged Out! at The End on Saturday was predictably great night. Despite the tedious smoking ban (especially tedious at this venue, where it involves queuing up for 20 minutes only to be herded into a space the size of a cot!) and long drinks queues, the DJs delivered to the max. My first highlight has to be Feadz - it was the 3rd time I'd seen him and he didn't disappoint. He has a real frenetic energy behind the decks, mixing old House with new Electro, and playing about 2 minutes of each track, all of which were bangers. He's also got a knack of making everything he plays - including favourties like Show Me Love and One More Time - still sound fresh. I think Feadz is the best DJ from the Ed Banger stable (along with Justice's Xavier). 
FEADZ
Feadz provided the perfect entree to Erol's main course (?!) - a 2 hr extravaganza that proved once again that he is the best Electro DJ around . Starting with an odd selection of progressive House records, I got into it about 20 minutes in -- when he played what I later found out to be Justice's remix of ZZTs Lower State Of Conciousness. I heard this first in the other room when Naomi// played it, and immidiately thought 'SebastiAn!', but low and behold it is the latest work of genius from Justice, and it's f***ing amazing. People are saying that Justice are starting to sound more like SebastiAn - this is the first time I've noticed. Another one of my faves atm is End Hit by Shadowdancer on the Boys Noize imprint, another tune which Erol used to great effect. Here's a reminder to jog your memory (if you've not heard it then you're in for a treat).
Shadowdancer - End Hit (JAM Edit)
One of the reasons I like it so much is because it samples this Prince track.
Prince - Head
You can't get much funkier than that.....Sex on vinyl! (Very scratched vinyl - apologies). I've also made a bootleg featuring Shadowdancer and Paula Abdul but I won't make you endure that just yet!
Anyway, back to Bugged Out!.... It wasn't all about the main room - young starlet Naomi// played a pretty proficient set in the other room, as did Crookers with their distinct brand of fidgety fun. As the night plodded on and the crowd started to run out of batteries, Riton provided the perfect wake-up call. I've got to say that his proggy Tech-Elec style isn't really my bag - but when he dropped an amazing Techno re-edit of Justice's Phantom II I was completely blown away. Imagine the original masterpiece, sped up to a 4am pace with lots of added percussion and looping and you're half way there. It was the best thing he played (granted this is coming from a Justice fan that doesn't really like Techno!).
RITON
We decided to call it a day at around 6 (apparently it was open til 7), stumbling back into the rain with eyes like saucers, agreeing that we'd had hours of great dance music.
Amen.
