Desire
Old Skool Jungle b2b special part 2
Saturday 3rd September 2005
Scala
London

Tonight saw me venture back to the nation’s capital in London for Desire as they presented ‘The oldskool Jungle back to back special part 2’. After hearing the success of the first back to back special I thought that I really wanted to go. Seeing the line-up as it featured some of the great names from back in the day such as the old Awol legends DJ’s Ron, Kenny Ken, Randall alongside many other’s too it had to be done. With advanced tickets costing only £10, I thought it was definitely a bargain!

I’ve not been to The Scala in London before so never knew what to expect from this venue. Having rallied the troops in Birmingham we left and headed down the motorway and arrived in the capital. The Scala is located very close to Kings Cross station so finding the venue wasn’t a problem. Having parked up close by, we headed down to the venue.

We got to the venue around 11.30 and were greeted by a relatively small queue. It didn’t take too long to get moving, having emptying my pockets and a brief search from the door staff, at reception I was greeted by John from Desire and after a brief chat we were finally in.

Headed directly to the main arena via the main foyer, just near the main arena doors was a list with tonight’s set times which was quite handy even though they were posted on the net a few hours earlier. DJ’s Slick and Trust were finishing up playing some tunes from the ’97 era.

At the front of the main arena was the main stage there were a few balcony’s over looking the dance floor and at the back of the arena was the lighting / sound box. The dance floor was starting to get quite busy as the floor was filling up. Headed to the bar in the main foyer and was quite shocked, it was quite expensive to drink in here. £3.80 for a tin of Red Stripe, stupid prices to be honest bit like Air back home in Birmingham.

Back to the action and it was the 3-way back to back from DJ’s Phantasy, DR S Gachet and Kenny Ken along side the Ragga Twins. The set was littered with plenty of Jungle tunes from the yesteryear as they were playing though the years. The 3 DJ’s dropped tunes such as ‘Set Speed’, ‘Tekken’, Calling all the people’, ‘Dubplate’ and ‘Lighter‘ before moving up the years.

It’s been years since I last saw the Ragga Twins and I enjoyed what I heard from these two. They were working off each other back to back chatting with their ragga and patois style. The DJ’s finished off playing more 96-97 tunes, they ended the set with ‘Super Sharp Shooter’, ‘Bad Ass’ and DJ SS’s rumbler ‘Black.’ Though what was surprising was DJ Phantasy dropping ‘Shake your body’. The tune was totally out of context to the rest of the set , Phantasy did try to redeem himself by dropping ‘Chopper’ over it.

After the 3-way it was Kool FM’s A-Team DJ’s Ron and SL, with MC’s Moose and Five-0. It was amusing to see Five-O MCing with two mics in one hand, other hand with a fan and sporting his infamous torch glasses. Ron and SL were playing an AWOL style set. There were plenty of the lesser known Jungle tunes being played as it looked like that these two digged deep in their record boxes. They started the set with ‘Bonanza Kid’, ’Warp Ten’ (The Rocky tune), ‘Champion DJ’ and’ P Funk Era’.

There was enough people on the dance floor shocking out hard during this set as it was quite busy at this point, the dance floor was rammed. I decided to have a wander around the venue, well a guided tour from someone who’s been before. I was trying to find out how to reach one of the balcony’s all night till someone pointed it out to me. This is what I like about going to different venues, as it about exploring them and finding little rooms

There was another set of corridors located in the main foyer near the up and coming room, this led upstairs to the other drum and bass room, were there was more upfront stuff being played. Through here lead onto a balcony which over looked the dance floor, what a spectacular sight this was. Seeing people shocking out from a distance and Fiv-e0’s torches glowing on stage!

Back to the dance floor I was trying to find out were Moose was MCing as I could hear but couldn’t see him. Moose was using a cordless mic and MCing in the sound engineer’s box for most of the set with him appearing occasional on stage. Ron and SL closed the set with ‘Worries in the dance’, ‘Junglist‘and finally LTJ Bukem’s classic ’Horizons’.

After the set from the Kool FM Dream team it was the turn of Remarc and Marvellous Caine. Remarc and Marvellous Caine are more known for there producing, they had hits with tunes such as ‘RIP’ and ‘The Hitman’ to name a few. Well it wouldn’t be a complete set without them playing these two awesome gems! This set also saw the return of MC Rico to the Jungle scene, more known as a garage MC these days, though he did start off as a Jungle MC many years ago sparing with MC Eksman who’s older brother is DJ Remarc.

This was a good set lots of great tunes being played though plenty of rewinds and triggers fingers from the crowd kapow! Big tune after big tune was being dropped, ‘Man of Steel’, ‘Reservoir dogs’,’ Screwface’, ’Yes Yes’ and ’Dirty chopper’ which kept the crowd happy and skanking out hard!.
The MCing was off the hook as I’ve never seen or really heard Rico before this event and him with Eksman worked amazing well together. Don’t know how Rico would suit to an upfront drum and bass set, but to Jungle the guy was outstanding.

It was good to see these two DJ’s not reaching out for the typical anthems and playing lot of the more underground tunes, they continued to play ’Dirty Games,’ Spiritual aura’, ’Tune your bass’, ‘Clear skies’ and ‘Bambatta’. When ‘Bambatta’ was dropped the crowd went wild had to get another reload!

Well last set of the night was Randall and Cool Hand Flex with MC’s Foxy and Rage. GQ was originally booked to MC for Randall and Cool Hand Flex though due to his commitments abroad across the Atlantic GQ was replaced with Foxy an MC with the same calibre as him.

We didn’t hang around too long for this set though I enjoyed what I caught from Randall and Cool Hand Flex, Randall dropped ‘Hearing is Believing’ and ‘Together VIP’.
Ok ‘Together VIP’ is quite a relatively new tune but with its slow tempo fitted in very easily into this set.

Overall I enjoyed the sets that the DJ’s played were awesome and good to see none of the familiar Jungle anthems being bashed all night. As most of the DJ’s made a good effort to dig deep into their record boxes playing none of the typical anthems you sometimes get at oldskool nights. The crowd were amazing I really enjoy my oldskool Jungle nights in London there’s a good mixture of ravers of both oldskool and nu-skool appreciating the yesteryear.

Is a shame that the club wasn’t full thought there was about 600 people in tonight as I think Scala can hold around 900, with 600 tunring up it wasn’t too bad of a turn out really.

I think with it being a week after the bank holiday didn’t help too much, but still it was quite a busy night. The sound system was ok though could have been louder and had more bass.

The big debate about Phantasy dropping ‘Shake ur body’ in an oldskool set well it didn’t work out as well as it could of as the tune is very fast and the tempo wasn’t right for the set. Were as Randall playing ‘Together VIP’, is a totally different matter, the tempo and speed of ‘Together VIP’ compared to ‘Shake your body’ is relatively slow and fitted in easily to the set were as ‘Shake your body’ stood out like a sore thumb.

Generally a great night out nice venue, good tunes and an awesome atmosphere what more could you ask for? Will definitely want to come back again just need to beef up the sound system though rumour has it the next one may feature Valve.

Massive shouts to John and the Desire team, Sanjay (u soldier), Escape, Satin, Will, Foxy, Kenny Ken, DR S Gachet, Shortston, Five-0, Eksman, Food Junky, Devious, Stamina and the DNBA forum crew.