Back to reality with a thud, Ibiza 2011 has been and gone. 7 days in the clubbing capital of the world burning the candle at every available end; 3 in the idyllic Mallorcan town of Sóller dining like a king.
This Friday just gone was my first day back in work and, to be honest, I was running out of superlatives. In fact, I think my colleagues found my tanned skin, slightly dazed demeanour and almost frivolous use of the word ‘very’ quite amusing. Needless to say, my mind was still not on work.
This week’s blog, ladies and gentlemen, is my look back on the best holiday I’ve had to date. As always, there’s a fresh mix from my CDJs for the public to enjoy - the third and final part of my Ibiza Specials series. If my slightly self-indulgent Ibiza ramblings are not your thing and you’re just here for some tunes, fast forward straight to the last 4 paragraphs and/or the usual SoundCloud link at the bottom of the page. You know the drill by now.
UNFINISHED BUSINESS
Although I’d already been to Ibiza twice before, there was certainly some unfinished business for me as far as this island was concerned. In 2005 I was 18 – young and naive, with very little experience of any clubbing, let alone ‘proper clubbing’. In 2009 I was already getting ill on arrival and barely survived 3 days before my body went into shut down. Don’t get me wrong. I fell in love with Ibiza 6 years ago. I’ve enjoyed every second I’ve been well enough to savour out there. Anyone that knows me knows that dance music is at my absolute core, it’s an energy that vibrates from me like no other. The same can be said of Ibiza and that’s why we get along so well.
But the older I get the more I realise that it’s not where you go or what you do that counts in life, it’s who you share it with. Some of the people I’ve been to Ibiza with previously are amongst my oldest and dearest friends, people I will share a pint with (maybe even in Ibiza) many times to come in the future. But the group I managed to pull together for this trip was bigger, more mature, more cosmopolitan, more diverse and more ‘trance driven’ than any group I’ve taken with me to the island. There were a few very notable faces missing, but, more so than ever before, these were my ‘clubbing people’ in Ibiza.
Despite having visited Ibiza twice before, I had never stepped foot in the capital, Eivissa, had been to none of the clubs on that side of the island and, other than the Sunset Strip, had seen very little of the island’s obvious, mystical beauty. I sit here now having wandered the towering walls of Eivissa Town, seen Armin Van Buuren smash up the iconic club, Space, swam off the picturesque coast of Formentera and, as if that wasn’t enough, chatted trance music with Above & Beyond’s Tony McGuinness.
This was also my first time in a villa as well and what a villa we had unearthed! The pictures on the website didn’t do it justice. The pictures we brought home with us didn’t either. It was a pretty much perfectly arranged and furnished living space. And nothing beats the feeling of getting up in the scorching morning sunshine and landing head first in your own pool - without having to fight your way past reception and all the fat, tattooed dickheads playing their playing their daft, cheesey dance music. We were at arm’s length from San Antonio’s beer boys.
CLUBBING EXPLOITS
We opened with Cosmic Gate and Claudia Cazacu at Eden on the Sunday. It was our first night; we hit San Antonio hard – very hard. I vaguely remember Between The Rays, Koko and Cosmic Gate’s new remix of The Theme. I also remember scaling someone’s shoulders to video the club in full swing and to exchange pleasantries with Cosmic Gate’s Nic Chagall. The vast majority of the pictorial evidence is a whole new world of shocking.
With Swedish House Mafia at Pacha sold out and charging 75 Euroes on the door, we graced Privilege for Tiësto and Nero on the Monday. I lagged a little towards the end, maybe with half an eye on bigger nights to come, but still had time to enjoy Zero 76 and, later on that night, White Noise / Red Meat - both tunes I handpicked for Episode 12 of this podcast so I was chuffed to hear them rattling around the world’s biggest club. Privilege is a cathedral of dance music – is never a wasted journey.
We were right to save ourselves for Wednesday. Be at Space was the night of the holiday for me. You could tell from the line up – Markus Schulz, Armin Van Buuren and Gareth Emery – that it was going to be big. I’ve been quite critical of Gareth Emery over the last 12 months or so. I’ve listened to his podcast less and less over the last 6 months. But he stole the show at Space. Chris Schweizer’s remix of Zombie Nation, that bootleg of KNAS, Insomnia and Coming Home, Sanctuary and Thing Called Love were all memorable tunes. When Rotunda was dropped for the second time that night, I was in my element.
Thursday, as always, is Cream Amnesia – a night I managed to miss in 2009 when my body finally caved in to suspected swine flu. This year I made it through the doors for Cream and got a taste of what is still my favourite club. Jaytech played Milano, Above & Beyond played Sun & Moon, You Got To Go and Around The World, Ferry smashed Arty’s mix of Punk.
THE GROUP THERAPY BOAT PARTY
But the holiday had always been building up to the Above & Beyond Group Therapy Boat Party. We knew when the 80 tickets on sale were sold out in 8 minutes that this was going to be a bit special. I know there were a lot of Anjuna fans around the world who would have paid double, maybe triple, the price that we paid for that experience. And I wouldn’t have blamed them.
But there was no stopping me though. Once the sun sank a bit more in the sky, a few vodka & oranges had been consumed and Jono and Tony of Above & Beyond got behind the decks, things were looking a lot more like it. It was pretty much the perfect setting. And even before the incessant swaying and rocking of the boat calmed, paying for a drink literally a few yards from where the DJs were playing and then grabbing frantically onto the bar to stay upright was both surreal and hilarious. Never before had I danced whilst carefully reaching out for nearby rails and ropes. You don’t forget shit like that.
But the whole experience was made by getting to meet and chat to Tony McGuinness. They say you shouldn’t meet your heroes. You know what? On this evidence, I disagree. There were so many things I wanted to chat to him about but when he came around to speak to us it was Tony that led the conversation, bursting with all the knowledge and enthusiasm you’d expect from someone living the dream. I loved that! I also loved that he was happy to take the piss a little bit over something I said. You could tell this wasn’t an exercise in buttering up the fans and saving face.
He spotted straight away that I was from near Liverpool. He jumped straight into telling me about Liverpool duo, Richard Simmonds & Stephen Jones who are known through about 10 aliases in trance music, including Ascension and Chakra. And it was really weird that he did because either Armin or Markus Schulz had definitely played a version of Chakra – Home at Space only a few nights before. I’m not sure exactly what version was played at Space, but the vocal blew me away that night. Being so old, it’s not a tune you hear out clubbing on a regular basis. And since Above & Beyond’s remix of Home is a real old favourite of mine, it was at that point that the whole holiday seemed to add up. Looks like we already have a candidate for the ‘oldie’ at the end of Episode 15.
I’VE COME TO TAKE YOU HOME
But then, after 3 exceptionally chilled, food-filled days in Sóller, it was all over. It’s really strange. Normally after a holiday or a festival I find myself not really listening to trance for a while. You can have too much of absolutely anything and I normally find myself taking a natural break after long stints clubbing.
This time though, it has been different. Listening to my iPod alone on the train back from London to Liverpool, certain tracks emotionally cut me in two. A couple of Super8 & Tab tracks – Mercy and Black Is The New Yellow – came up on random and shook me like I’ve never been shaken by music before.
“We can love and live forever
We can taste these feelings come alive
And my interest is in love
And I cannot take this pressure
And I wonder who of us survives
There’s no conflict from above”
Super8 & Tab feat. Jan Burton – Mercy
The fact that I was moved like that was as good an indicator as any that the days that had just passed had been special ones. It was a sense of sadness – reality fading to memory, friends left behind to be missed until next time. But also elation – that something I had organised had clearly been as meaningful and memorable for others as it had been for me. Those emotions coupled with the music itself was a potent cocktail.
And even now, in terms of music - my mixing, my podcast, keeping up-to-date with what’s going on in trance - I feel primed and energised. Surprisingly, Ibiza hasn’t done that to me before this year.
The talk amongst the group is already about how we are going to do it all again next year. Without another DJ meet-and- greet boat party, 2011 will be difficult to top. But with more people to add to our already fantastic group and the fact that there is still even more to uncover, it’s hard not to look forward with excitement.
