Ricardo Villalobos at fabric 08/09/2012
Posted
Yes it has taken me two weeks to get round to doing this review…I moved house and then went to Ibiza so I am kind of a little bit behind at the moment!
January was the last time I went to fabric. I went rather a lot between last September and January, almost every other week for a while which is quite a feat for someone not living in London, as this requires a 9-10 hour commitment in London.
8 months without going to fabric is an unusually long time, one of my longest ever stints without a visit since I started going back around 2003/04 but I think last year’s repeated visits were a bit overkill and I wanted to try other venues, some festivals, also I have spent time designing, developing, promoting putting on my own house music event, which takes up a ridiculous amount of time. I have to hand it to any promoters reading, especially those who work full time on top of promoting. Also my most regular clubbing partner had had some time off for studies and holidays this year and clubbing is not the same on your own.
There was no way I was missing Ricardo Villalobos, my only reasonable opportunity to see him this year (thankfully in July I chose Monsoon In The Park over Bloc!). A year without seeing Ricardo is not a valid year. Perhaps not my best decision to go to fabric the day after moving house, 2 hours before I was supposed to be catching the train I was rather stressed as I had no idea which of 700 boxes my clothes were in, nothing was cleaned or ironed, no shaver, no toiletries, oh and I was rather pickled from a day in the park.
Going back to fabric, is like going home. Like a dark version of going to Ibiza with hot girls in short skirts rather than bikinis.
We arrived at midnight to no queue. Even my friend who wasn’t able to take advantage of the member’s entrance only had to queue for 5-10 minutes. Very odd for a Ricardo night. Lots of girls too, well there was in the cloakroom queue anyway. A hell of a lot of tourists – yes I know this is fabric but seemingly more than usual.
The crowd in general was a good crowd, apart from the two grotty drunken inhuman specimens shouting obscenities to those waiting for the toilet upstairs, not very peace and love, I resisted temptation to tell them where to go, they were horrifically ugly so I was quite satisfied that they must have a miserable life anyway. No pushing on the dancefloor, very few drunken idiots, just nice happy smiley people all here to experience something very special.
And very special it was.
First up was Craig Richards – one of my all time favourites and fabric without him is just not the same. A delightful set of groovy music, varying from deep house, to touches of disco and techno. A magical warm-up, not that I expected anything else.
Then came Mathew Jonson and Minilogue – a 2 hour live performance with some excellent moments. I recall hearing snippets of Elephant’s Parade, one of my favourite tracks from my minimal era though maybe I was just hearing things.
We didn’t spend too much time in room 1 during the live set as this was perfect opportunity to see what was going on in the other two rooms – all 3 rooms were house music, no techno, woohoo! I don’t recall who else I saw but everyone was top notch.
But room 1 is my favourite room in the UK, even more than the toilet at work whilst watching Redtube, so we didn’t stay out for too long and were back in time for Ricardo, and the change to complete musical magic, with that super special room 1 fabric vibe that only Ricardo nights and birthdays can give, and though very busy, I have known it far worse and there was room to shuffle, and later on to dance a bit.
Musically Ricardo started off slow and groovy, enticing us into his unique vibe that he creates, before becoming surprisingly tough and techno like, with some recognisable tunes, brilliant inventive mixing (ok there was a clanger or two, but this is Ricardo not a sync button), some weirdness and some house.
We left around 730/8am, though I could have gone on for a couple more hours, and hopefully I will learn my lesson next time as apparently we missed Donna Summer – typical!
Totally brilliant night, well deserving of a 10 out of 10 and I could not have realistically wished for any more.
I will not be leaving it so long until I go back home to fabric next time.
And Ricardo is officially my favourite DJ in the world now.