Anyone who has once been to Miami during the Winter Music Conference knows the feeling of contentment, tension but also emptiness when stepping in the shuttle that links South Beach to MIA Airport. Contentment for having heard the best music in the world (non-stop), in such a short lapse of time and in the most cinematic city of the world, (that normally doesn’t receive such musical quality the rest of the year). Tension because you obviously arrived late for the shuttle since you stayed too long at the Sunday School for Degenerates and the people waiting are mad at you. Emptiness because you simply had such a BLAST that you can’t really feel anything, anymore…
Our week started on Tuesday with the Wave Music Party at Pawn Shop and Tedd Patterson opening our 6-days marathon with beautiful deepness and followed closely by François K (one of our favourites) and an unusual set (for the U.S) with a certain Techno dimension to it… Beautiful! As soon as François finished his bomb-dropping we ran to the back room to catch the last half-hour of Cobblestone Jazz Live! The trio composed by Mathew Johnson, Danuel Tate and Tyger Dhula kept the whole room in a rare intensity before finishing their set with the voices of my favourite track of theirs: ‘W’. Speechless…In the main room Radioslave took over François for some super-efficient stripped-down Techno, while DJ Three started rumbling the whole place with the backroom’s speaker-wall. All of Tuesday’s wonderful artists were super happy to receive a little yellow Giraffe and an Extraction Compilation. However we had to keep a little bit of energy for a special day…
… Wednesday started with the Freak’n'Chic (Dan Ghenacia and David Duriez’s Label) party: Jamie Jones, followed by Shonky and Marc Antona! What a line-up for this afternoon party. And what a venue: the Red Terrace of the Townhouse Hotel. Jamie Jones has a unique style, his beats really trigger something special in the people’s minds and feet. It’s simple, essential, super power and chic! Jamie really liked “Missing Keyframes”, Fase Miusic Sender’s track that is featured on our Extraction Compilation so he closed his set with it! Having the place melt under the mid-afternoon sun and handing down the commands to Shonky. Needless to say, AirDrop celebrated this properly, and had a hard-time making it to the OVUM vs. Pokerflat party at The Vagabond. The venue is great with such a big and tropical garden and two rooms.
Then we headed to Studio A, three blocks down for the absolute killing of Switch (closing the Downtown Riot party) and Justin Martin taking over for the Dirtybird afterhours. Switch is something apart and we all know it already, but having Justin follow up made it even more interesting. Justin is crazy, we all know that too, we had already heard him when he played for Soul Clap’s 3rd Edition of their Dancing on the Charles 2007 Party in Boston last summer but his style at Studio A was something else. No Comment…
Thursday, we needed to chill, and the Giant Step/ Demon Days party at the Delano’s pool was all the most welcome. With Roland Appel playing nice and relaxed, followed by Carl Craig and his profound slow techno synths. I saw him a few hours earlier at a panel, and Carl is so above everything that he didn’t even have to say a word during the whole panel, the other panelists kept on talking, but Carl is wisdom, and wisdom is silence. At the Delano, we had the time to congratulate Justin Martin for his set the night before, give our Giraffe to Claude von Stroke and Carl Craig and even cross paths with Harley and Muscle! After this a big mistake was made, the mistake however lead to a great thing. But we thought Crosstown Rebels Afterhours was the Friday morning when it really was the Saturday. So we went to rest to be fresh for that. Although, as I told you, it did lead to a good thing:
FRIDAY AT PS 14: CHEAP SUNGLASSES. In our view, it was the best party this year. We spent a beautiful day in the garden of PS14, playing hide and seek with the dancefloor, the boiling sun and the refreshing clouds; warming up to the beats of Tamur and the BLK/MRKT boys and going absolutely nuts to Italoboyz outside and Derek Plasaiko inside (who played for us in Boston two weeks ago, get the set at the link). Then, something good/ bad happened again: We had to leave PS14 in the middle of the afternoon: BAD; but it was to get to the interview Beatport organized for us at their National Hotel Headquarter: AMAZING. Check it out here. When this was over, Princess Anja Schneider just finished playing next to the interview booth and it was her turn to get interviewed, but it was also time for us to go back to PS14! And guess who closed the garden? Another Princess… Magda.
Saturday we decided to go back to Townhouse for Anja’s Mobilee Party organized by Listed, the Chicago/S.F boys. But before that: we also went back to the National Hotel/ Beatport Headquarter, which wasn’t on the program, but when we heard of the Ryan Elliott/ Matthew Dear/ Guy Gerber/ Richie Hawtin bonanza, we decided we couldn’t really miss that, could we? Richie was ending at 5:30PM, exactly when Pan-Pot was starting at the Townhouse, 4 blocks away. There definetely is a higher force ruling WMC. After Pan-Pot was Sebo-K and Anja Schneider for the finish-him. All I can remember is that it was great 
Right after that was Minimoo with a very special line-up and in a very special place, a hangar on North 24th Str. in Continental Miami! Minimoo have been gracing NYC with one of the finest quality party over the last few years. And once again in MIA they did their thing right, with a dope spot, a deafningly powerful sound-system and line up.
Sunday… School of Degenerates.
