astraboy

The last Tasty event I attended was a real eye opener for me. Having endured a string of non attendences due to clashing events, I finally made it to an event and walked away at 6am more than impressed. The third (and smallest) room of a hard dance event it may have been, but no corners were cut in production, lineup and most importantly, atmosphere. As usual, this next event shot up out from nowhere. Tasty usually dont announce their events till very late on and this was no exception. It was touted on the flyer as the last Tasty for near on 5 months. As usual there was a variety of events that were on on the same night, but on this occasion I knew where I had to be. Especially when the lineup promised so much.
Top of the Hardcore lineup was event promoter Billy "Daniel" Bunter going b2b with CLSM for an hour. This was the third leg of an appearence in every arena for these two and I was looking forward to the hardcore effort downstairs. As well as that, I was also well up for Brisk's set as you dont get to see him play out so much, to say nothing of another helping of Ramos and Supreme, fresh from shaking up the HTID outdoor stage last weekend. Dougal doing a classic hardcore set, two hours from the Raw Elements crew Cris-E-Manic and Uplift, and the evening punctuated by flying visits from Nu Energy main men Sharkey and Kevin Energy, I dont think there was one set that didn't tickle my fancy, the only problem I had was whether I could tear myself away from the Hardcore room long enough to go upstairs and have a look at the Hard Trance and Hard Dance arenas.
One thing I didnt have to worry about was getting in or not. I had taken advantage of the offer of the USH guestlist that had been posted up on the messageboard a few weeks before the event. Send an email with your USH name on it, get there before 11.30 and you will get in for precisely nothing. Thats right, a whole night of Hardcore from the best in the business for absolutely nothing. Well worth the price of sending an email, I was more than happy to do so.

Once the evening was upon me, I made my way to Brixton. As usual, I made my way from the station to the venue as quickly as possible, avoiding eye contact with passers by. I've never liked the atmosphere that Brixton generates, but as long as you look like you know where you're going, you are left to your own devices. Luckily, Mass is easy to find.
When i got there, a likeminded bunch of earlybirds were already queuing outside the venue. After fending off the homeless guy and the pusher in the locality of the queue, I got to the back and chatted with random ravers, as well as sliding my mates into the queue as they arrived
Soon after the queue started moving and before long I was at the front. The search was reasonably thorough, with nothing out of the ordinary, apart from hearing a bouncer apologising before going through a laydee ravers bra. Its not often you hear security treating the party people like that, but its nice to see some mutual respect taking place.
After handing over the ticket I had been kindly given (Cheers Bart!) I was in. No messing about with exporing this time, I knew exactly where to go. Up two floors, then into the Hardcore room.

When I got there, Cris-E-Manic was on the decks, playing the first set. The place was a little quiet, but the people in the place were warming to Cris-E's tune selection and the place got busier while she worked through her set. I cant think of a better way to get the party going, but dropping "3000 Cycles" and Delsolate Constriant's "Machine" is always going to produce results. In this case it was a good natured bunch of ravers on the dancefloor, having a good time by the time Cris-E and MC Spenno had finished with them.

Next up was another helping from the Raw Elements crew, DJ Uplift took over and took the party to the next level. Cris-E had whetted the raver's appitites and they wanted more of the same. Uplift obliged with another set I can add to the list of ones from him I have enjoyed. MC Storm took to the mic for an early set and together they got on with giving the ravers what they had come for. it was a top way to see the evening through to midnight, with more Raw Elements tunes getting mixed in with only the best from numerous other labels. I was particularly please to hear "Neckbreaker" getting aired as it has been a while since I have heard it. Other tunes of note include "Hand of God", "Midnight Resistance" and a nice remix of "Can you feel it".

For the 12-1 set, Sharkey made a welcome appearence. Storm stayed on the mic for the first half and then handed over to Scottie B for the second half. Sharkz did a similar effort with his set, splitting it in two. The first half was devoted to freeform remixes of popular Hard Dance tunes, the second, to upfront freeform Hardcore. Unfortunatly I cannot name any of the first half's tunes, despite me dancing away like a good'un to them. The second half, however is a different kettle of fish. "Bonecrusher", "Huggermugger" were both dropped, aswell as another welcome appearence from "3000 Cycles" to finish things off. A high energy set was just what was needed to get the rave on a proper footing and Sharkey came up with the goods.

After Sharkz had stepped down, one of the highlights of the night replaced him. I always have time for Ramos and Supreme, doubly so when Marley gets on the mic. In this case they didnt dissapoint me at all. Whilst not going for the highly polished old skool set that I like them for so much, the upfront set they did play was just as good. Leaning heavily on the mainstream sound, they played some awesome upfront tunes with lots of rushy vocals. "Creature of the night", "Black Magic, Bad magic", and best of all "Angel". While I was rushing my little head off to this amazing tune, Marley was on top form, telling the ravers to "Be proud" to be Hardcore. This was amplified when Ramos and Supreme neatly slotted in two of their new tunes in towards the end of the set, "Someday" and "All I ever wanted" I think there names were. Nice and dancable is what I know they were.

Next Generation's Brisk took the next set. 2-3 and all the partycrew in the place were up for what he had in store for us and so did I. Playing double hard and double fast, the BPM's shot up and my heartrate followed suit as I attempted to keep up. Spenno was doing an admirable job on the mic, comlimenting the tunes nicely as Brisk layed waste to all the previous DJs with top tunes including a strange remix of "We Will Rock you", aswell as taking it down for a brief spell of normalcy with "Heartbeatz" before upping the ante by moving into some Tasty (Pun intended!) new style Gabba. The place went bananas when Brisk made his move to the Nu-style and I totally lost it too. I made a point of saying how much I liked it when I bumped into him later on as well. Top set, it really made the night extra special as he was the only DJ to go all Dutch on us

Next up was meant to be a surprise live PX from CLSM, Bunter, Kutski, and Whizzkid, but this was delayed by the lateness of a certain MC . Jon Doe and Bunter improvised and got on with their set whilst Whizzkid made his way to the venue. The boys made a fine start to their contribution to the Hardcore arena, with a crowdpleasing set from the word go. "Taking me higher", "Turn up the music" and "Transmission to Mars" were all dropped before Whizzkid bowled in, fresh from a roadtrip of some considerable distance. As soon as he arrived, preperations were made for the PA. I have to mention the ancillary parts of the performance, Kutski's awesome scratching, Toasty the breakdancer(Top name!)'s wicked dancing, Whizzkid's vocal contribution, simply because I have no idea what Bunter and Jon Doe played! It was very danceable, but all of the tunes were completely unknown to me. Still the combined talents of all the performers definitely arrested my attention, especially Toasty's breakdancing.

After the PA had finished, the DJ's put themselves back behind the decks and finished off their set. Loads more popular upfront tunage was forthcoming with an appreciative crowd going for it while they pumped out tunes like "You're shining", "John Peel", "Wicked MC" and finishing on "Hardcore Hustler".

Next up was a DJ I knew a lot of people had been waiting for. Dougal had been promised, along with a "Classic Hardcore Set". Having missed his classic set at HTID the week before and not been happy about it at all, I made sure I was in the arena when he took over the night. OMG, what a set. It was awesome, I dont remember being so pleased with a DJs tune selection. No chinstroking here, just happy Hardcore classics which made me rush one after the other. Looking round the arena and I saw many smiling faces attached to just as many smiling ravers. I was going for it too, with Dougal and Spenno taking another hour away from the night in the best possible way. Tunes like "Here I Am", "Rainbow high in the sky", "Love and Devotion", "Love of my life", "Fly away", "Discoland", "Toytown", "Do you want to go my way" and finally dropping the cheesy classic "Field of Dreams" which had the whole place singing along. Including me.
5am had crept out of no-where and all of a sudden the ravers were faced with the last set of the night. Those wanting a "Sprint finish" were more than satisfied when Kev Energy stepped for another of his trademark BPM-a-thon. I was focused on dancing at this point, so I can only recall a few tunes such as "no1 can compete" and a VERY nice remix of "Hypnotizin" which I cant get enough of. The rest of the set was a freeform driven blur as Energy showed his sadistic tendencies by pushing 180bpm at 5am on a Sunday morning. Not that anyone was complaining, least of all me. The remaining ravers wern't going no-where, not until 6am and the last tune had played out.
Things I liked:

Entry price - Nothing. Nothing at all. An all night rave for free, you cannot get better value than that. End of.

Lineup - You'd think loads of poeple getting in for free would mean some corners being cut with the lineup. Not a bit of it. The Hardcore room was stacked with top quality jocks and MCs all night long.

Production - The cool multicoloured laser was in the place again, adding to the minimalist, but effective lighting rig.

The breakdancer - Deserves a special mention here as he was totally wicked. Like to see him back again.

Security - As with my last trip to Mass, the security were unobtrusive as ever. I still cant get over hearing a bouncer apologising for searching someone. More security teams like the one at Mass please.

Passouts - If you wanted to, you could get a passout and chillout on the grass at peace gardens outside the venue. The only problem with that was it involved leaving the Hardcore room. Still it was nice for it to be there if you wanted it.

Structure - IMO the evening's music was better structured than last time. A good variation of music, but with a better flow. Finishing on the Hard stuff of Kev Energy for example, as well as Dougal getting 4-5 for his classics set.

Things I liked less:

The heat - Again. The aircon seems to be easily overpowered by the heat of loads of dancing ravers. The venue staff, to their credit, noticed this and opened the emergency exits, but it was a sweaty astraboy that left the venue at 6am. Still passouts were available so its no-ones fault but my own.

Oranges - All gone by the time I left! Boo! Hiss!

Erm, The hardcore lineup was so good, I couldnt drag myself away and into the other arenas for more than 5 minutes! Sort it. Actually, on second thoughts, Dont!

My second time at Tasty and this time I was sacrificing going to other events to attend. But it was totally the right decision. Where else can you get 8 hours of Hardcore for free, featuring top notch production and the very best talent in the land? On this basis you'd have thought it would attract its fair share of toerags and na'er do wells to spoil the party. Well, if they were there then they were making themselves scarce. The atmosphere was tip top throughout the night. I didn't see one bit of trouble and loads of smiling faces were abundant all night. The numbers were everso slightly down on last time, but with Global Gathering on at the same weekend, then that is understandable. Not that it made a difference. If it did, then GG should be be on every time Tasty throw another one of their excellent parties. I know where I'll be if that happens and it wont be at an airfield in the middle of no-where with no Hardcore to listen to. See you at the next one.
astraboy.
Shouts to: Barticle, Lul, Saiirasaurus and her friends, Spenno, Stu8, Moron, Paul Zykotik (Briefly), Cris-E-manic, Dan Desire, Uplift, Mad Vic, Bubble, Scamps and Mayhem, Mini Smithers Jnr, Monkey boy (nice to meet you!), Storm, Whizzkid, Ramos, Supreme, Marley, Kev Energy, Sharkz and all the people I have forgotten.