‘Oh yes, oh yes!’ That can only mean one thing – Carl Cox is back on the White Isle for another season of momentous Tuesday night parties.
The Discoteca at Space Ibiza was busy and hot and Cox was getting each reveller into the rhythm with dark, deep techno that almost felt slow motion. It felt like an ominous sign of things to come as the sinister grooves bumped along. Maceo Plex’s ‘Conjure Sex’ blared out of the Discoteca’s giant rack of speakers hanging from the ceiling – certainly one of the sleaziest tracks around. With Cox building slowly from very deep beginnings, the sense of occasion was reinforced as the master ever so slowly raised the tempo.
Over on the Terrace, tribal legend Danny Tenaglia had the place rocking with a fine selection of jacking house. One of the heaviest hitting selections was Doorly’s ‘Groove Me’. He had the Terrace pretty wild, without doubt, and it was nice to mix things up a bit, but ultimately a certain Mr. Cox ruled.
When the main room is packed like it was, it’s hard not to feel a part of the collective raver family. Cox, having built the set on some murky deep tunes, now turned our aural attention to some thumping house that remained quite tough and minimalistic. Cox was slowly building his journey and we were all well aboard.
The legend (we’re allowed to use the term ‘legend’ in his case) treated us to the likes of Literon’s Freak Funktion and Yousef and Roy Davis Jr.’s ‘Believe In Love’. As the set carried on it became more and more exciting both sonically and visually. Inner City’s ‘Good Life’ sparked the crowd into even more liveliness as dancers appeared on the podiums, girls were suspended from the ceiling gyrated seductively above the crowd and the all new and updated production dazzled with lasers shooting to all corners of the room and long, thin LED screens blazed in time to the music on the left wall.
The drops were monumental, the atmosphere was rocking and the buzz pervaded every sense – it felt so right.
Plunged into peak-time oblivion it was time for some heads down dancing. One track saw dubby keys and Cox lifting the bass line tantalisingly before laying it back down to wild effect. We’d now entered pure rave territory as the mass of bodies swayed to the big man’s tough and raw yet infectious rhythm.
Everything was coming together perfectly as the icy blast of the CO2 cannons hit me square in the face, reinvigorating me for hours more dancing. With Cox at the helm the tunes took on such a physical element as the distorted bass thuds straight into your chest. Carl was in the zone, the dance floor was in the zone – it was almost subconscious by this point as the tracks were well and truly absorbed into my head, and my body did the rest. Carl Cox owns that dance floor and he knows it – thousands were still going whilst the sun rose.
Before you knew it, Cox had cranked it up yet another notch and we’d had a true rave experience on our hands. I’m just going to go ahead and call it church as it was that much of a religious experience.
Carl Cox has been on the island for years, but he keeps bringing back the goods because he’s an outstanding character and master selector. He knows what we want and he never fails to deliver. The maestro left me regrettably having to say goodbye and braving the hard morning sunlight. I left with the feeling of having experienced a true party – next Tuesday it is then Coxy. Oh yes.