Warehouse techno parties aren’t generally known for much in the way of sartorial splendor; jeans and T-shirt is the typical uniform of choice. And that was true of this past weekend’s Blkmarket Membership bash—though the end of carnival season (and the promoters’ pleas to “please dress up”) seemed to bring out the peacock in at least a few of the revelers, most of the attendees dressed in a…well, lets just say a practical manner. No matter—with the Wagon Repair label’s Konrad Black heading a lineup that included No. 19th’s Nitin, Bill Patrick from the Robots affair, and residents Taimur and Fahad, the music was freaky enough to make up for any lack of peacockery.

You may be wondering what took us so long to post this slide show from Dance.Here.Too.’s Cosmic Twins gig, held at Santos Party House on December 26. Here’s the reason for the lateness: We were utterly blown away by the two-headed beast formed by dance-music deities Derrick May and François K. (Well, all that holiday grog may have slowed us down as well.) Anyway, the pair were at the top of their game—and rather than the I-can-play-harder-than-you competition one normally gets from a night of tag-teaming DJs, this was a truly collaborative effort, with the vets feeding off each other’s energy for a truly sterling night of house and techno. More, please!

Photos by: Marc Whalen

Photographs by Diana Sonis

The night before Halloween at Webster Hall saw a rowdy crowd ready to get the weekend’s festivities  going. Simian Mobile Disco—playing behind the recent Temporary Pleasure—pulled and pushed plugs and switches to call up its dance-heavy electro. The crowd was enthralled, if a little burned out (see above).

Ever wanted to man the switches behind the pyramid? Those Daft Punk helmets a little too pricey for your Halloween costume? Well, now iDaft (apparently courtesy of some dude named Matias Najle) has made it possible to mix and match up the vocal cuts from “Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger.” You can get your French techno fix right here.

Or, if you’d prefer, watch the professionals do it after the jump…

Read more »

Did you know the Grammys have a dance-music component? If you did, you’re one of the few—the dance/electronic–related categories (a big three in all) have about as much chance of making it onto the televised portion of the show as does, say, Best Spoken Word Album for Children (for albums consisting of predominantly of spoken word vs. music or song). In case you were wondering, Yes to Running! Bill Harley Live took home that coveted award. But back to dance: The robot rockers of Daft Punk, left, and their omnipresent “Harder Better Faster Stronger”  beat out the likes of  Madonna and Lady Gaga—who are, essentially, the same person at vastly different ages—for Best Dance Recording. Read more »

Take a look at the Clubs listings in next week’s TONY, and you find something that hasn’t happened in six years: There won’t be a single listing for one of the city’s premier venues, the Meatpacking District’s Cielo. You may also notice that two of the spot’s standout weekly parties, Deep Space and Roots, are listed as being at Love. Visit the Cielo website’s calendar, and you’ll see a curious lack of events from February 1 till the 12th. And if you walk by the club during that time period, you’ll see a sign posted on the door with the following text:

We are currently working together with the NYPD in an effort to ensure a safe environment for our clientele. To this end, Cielo will be closed from February 1st-12th, 2009. We greatly appreciate your patronage over the last 6 years and thank you for your continued support and patience during this time. We look forward to seeing you again on the dance floor!
Best Regards,
Cielo

The reason: Something to do with a certain interaction between a Cielo customer and our men in blue, apparently, which led to a city-enforced temporary closing. “We are cooperating fully with the NYPD to ensure safety in the neighborhood,” Cielo head honcho Nicolas Matar told us via e-mail. “We do hope that everybody understands the current climate in NYC and we look forward to getting back to business on the dance floor.” Translation: In the future, please leave anything even vaguely illegal at home. We don’t want to sound like cranky old codgers (even though that’s pretty much what we are), but Cielo is one of the jewels of New York’s nightlife scene, and we could ill afford to have it closed permanently.

Most NYC clubbers—at least, those of an electro-rocky persuasion—will be familiar with DJ Cat NYC, who’s been spinning everywhere from her Pussy Party at the down-and-dirty Beauty Bar to Susanne Bartsch’s polysexual glitter-scrums. (In case you need a reminder, that’s the frolicsome young lass over there on the left) Well, she’s now setting her sights on the studio—and the results, produced in conjunction with Automatic Panic, are pretty darn impressive. She’s just released a three-track EP on Kinetika Music, but the cut that we’re feeling the most is the buzzy thumper “Hot Pink,” along with an ace remix from Blende. And here they are!

Dave Lee/Joey Negro

Anyone who reads the Clubs section knows that we have a soft spot for light-up dance floors, spinning glitter balls, a heavy-duty thump-thump-thump…in short, all things disco. So it’s natural we turn to mush whenever we see the name Dave Lee. The U.K. vet, who works under a skillion noms de musique—Doug Willis, Agora and Jakatta among them—recently sent out a beautiful mix of disco (and discoish) tunes made under the Joey Negro name, and there isn’t a single “Boogie Oogie Oogie” in the bunch. By and large, it’s fairly obscure material, and we apologize for not having access to a track listing. But who cares about song titles? This is simply beautiful music, and it’s best just to put on a set of headphones and fantasize.

Pete Tong

The Mediterranean island of Ibiza is one of the world’s clubbing capitals, a hedonistic orgy of electronic beats and nightlife revelers. At least so we’ve been told—we’ve never actually been there. But we’ve gazed at the photos, read the dance-mag articles, listened to all the This Is Totally Ibiza mix-CDs and dreamed of jet-setting our way over there for years. Anyone want to take us? We’ll clean the sand off your feet, we’ll keep your pills real neat… We’d prefer late summer, when the island is crammed with half-naked inebriated young’uns, but our second choice would be this May, specifically from the 27th through the 29th—that’s when BBC Radio jock/industry bigwig Pete Tong (pictured) will be holding the second edition of his International Music Summit industry get-together. Read more »

Regular readers of the Clubs section know that we love the just-barely-postpubescent Martinez Brothers. Okay, maybe not love—that would be a little weird—but we sure do like the talented DJ-producers, who are spinning in Pacha’s main room this Saturday 6, a lot. A real lot. When we interviewed them back in 2006, Steve was 18 and Chris was all of 15, yet they were able to combine their teenage energy with a confidence that spinners twice their age would envy. We always wondered what a few years of seasoning would do for the siblings’ steez, and now we know: Their upcoming single, “Debbie Downer” (produced with Berlin’s Argy, from the Poker Flat label) is an old-school sort of house track gussied up with that deep-tech vibe that all the kids are digging now—and it’s fab. It doesn’t come out till January 12—it’ll be on Dennis Ferrer ’s Objecktivity label—but here’s a little sneak peak to whet your appetite.

Some people like to party in dark, dirty basements with dubbed-out, bass-heavy, grinding techno. (That would be us.) Others like to gambol to hands-in-the-air, sparkling house music within the confines of shiny superclubs. And that’s fine, too—clubland welcomes all! French producer David Guetta (right) is one of the latter subset’s main men, and he’ll be spinning at Pacha on Friday 28. As a little teaser, here’s an as-yet unreleased David Tort remix of “Everytime We Touch.” The original, off of Guetta’s 2007 album, Pop Life (Ultra), coproduced with Steve Angello & Sebastian Ingrosso, is typical Guetta glitterball material, but Tort toughens the track up considerably. And that’s fine by us.

In just a few short years, Berlin’s Ralf Kollmann, left, and Anja Schneider have carried their Mobilee label to the top of the Berlin techno heap—which in that town, is a pretty damn big heap. They’ve done so by infusing their minimal-minded milieu with beats that flow with the smoothness of deep house, while still retaining the sense of otherworldliness that the best techno holds tight. In advance of Kollmann’s gig at Studio B’s Immerse party on Saturday 22, heres a little teaser: a subtle, spacey, slowly unfolding set from the label coleader himself.

Mr. Oizo, one of our favorite French electro-rockers to come to fame through a puppet-starring Levi’s ad (okay, our absolute favorite French electro-rocker to come to fame through a puppet-starring Levi’s ad), is about to release his third album, called Lamb’s Anger, on the Ed Banger label. While we haven’t heard the record yet, and so don’t know if it contains anything on a par with "Flat Beat" (that’s the Levi’s track), we can confirm that Oizo still has a thing for puppets. The proof is in this video promo for the LP, featuring a cute li’l fuzzy-wuzzy who suffers an Andalusian Dog–style fate.

First, the bad news: If you haven’t been to Cielo in a few weeks, be prepared for the clubs all-new, jacked-up pat-down security routine that you’re now treated to upon entry. Though we must admit the gonad-grip part of the search that we experienced last night wasn’t unpleasant, we’re a little less sure about having wallets and purses peered through—we wouldn’t want anyone to find our AARP card and discover exactly how old we are, now would we? In Cielo’s defense, the big-club-style set-up isn’t the club’s idea; it was “suggested” by the city. (The neighboring APT now has a similar system in place as well, so if you’re heading to the Meatpacking District, be careful of exactly what you’re packing.) Once inside, though, everything was warm and fuzzy, as it should be. Sleepy & Boo performed their usual opening-set techy-housey magic, while the Brazilian lush-techno specialist Gui Boratto (pictured here with the very same contraptions he was performing with at the club) was dropping plenty of indie-rock–tinged thumpers, sort of like early Cure with a juicy 4/4 kick drum. (Trust us, it sounded better at the club than it looks on paper.) Here’s a review that we ran of Boratto’s 2007 album, Chromophobia, which is well worth getting your hands on if you missed it the first time around.

Well, who woulda thunk it? Studio B, despite silly-billy nit-picking over cabaret-licensing issues or building code violations, is back! Cruising our way around the Internet, we popped by the Greenpoint club’s website for old times’ sake, and were delighted to see that a grand-reopening party has been scheduled for Friday 17, featuring house-music overlords Derrick Carter (pictured) and Doc Martin. (That’s a pretty amazing team for a club that many thought was gone for good.) Not that we’ve been missing those long treks out to Banker Street, but with the limited supply of music-oriented dance clubs we have in NYC, we’ll take it. Now all we have to do is pray to the nightlife-hating city-authority gods that the joint isn’t shut down again anytime soon.…

The last time we caught a live set from the influential minimalist-funk combo ESG, fronted by the South Bronx’s Scroggins sisters, was around 1980, when they played with the similarly indispensable Liquid Liquid at the midtown club Hurrah. (We were obviously infants at the time.) The show was one of the formative moments of our nightlife upbringing, not least because three tracks recorded by the Scroggins sisters (pictured) and their pals formed the live side of that classic self-titled EP they released in 1980—you know, that one with “Moody,” “You’re No Good” and “UFO.” So, needless to say, we were quivering with excitement when we arrived at Santos Party House this past Saturday to hear the still-active combo at its first NYC gig in, like, forever. And we weren’t disappointed—those old tunes sounded as stripped-down and otherworldly as ever. There were a couple of changes, though. First, some of their newer songs featured a wailing guitar, something that would have simply not been acceptable in the No Wave era of the band’s early days. (Not that the Santos crowd, most of whom weren’t even born when that Hurrah concert took place, seemed to mind.) Second, the band is now blessed by the charms of second-generation ESGers Chistelle and Nicole Scroggins, whose chief duties seemed be smacking the occasional wood block and shaking their bounteous stuff. We’re not complaining—it was the most fun we’ve had at a live show in eons.

We’ve held off posting anything about the recent closing of Studio B, in hopes that we could speak to someone at the Greenpoint club to get their side of the story, and to see if the spot is reopening anytime in the near term. Alas, no one seems to be answering the phone, and e-mails to music director Justine D (our usual go-to gal at the club) result in an auto response stating that she’s out of the country. So…yes, it looks like Studio B is closed, for at least a while. The immediate reason was that it apparently failed a Department of Buildings inspection (we had a feeling that the new roof deck was a bad idea). But neighborhood opposition to the nitery probably had something to do with it—on July 31, for instance, the community board had recommended against granting the club its all-important cabaret license.

Much has been made of the city administration’s recent signals that it’s ready to consider revamping the cabaret-license law, that wacko bit of Prohibition-era legislation that effectively makes dancing illegal in all but a handful of local niteries. But don’t forget that we’ve been down this road before, specifically in spring of 2003, when Gretchen Dysktra, then the Department of Consumer Affairs commissioner, announced plans to drop the cabaret laws in favor of something called a "nightlife license." Much huzzahing ensued—until the fine print was read and people realized that the proposed legislation was even worse, since it effectively allowed the nightlife goon squads to shut down bars a clubs for pretty much anything they felt like. Luckily, that bit of three-card monte didn’t pass, but it would be best to take a close look at what this city proposes this time around before anyone starts slipping on their boogie shoes. (May we suggest writing the DCA and your local councilperson?)

While we’re here, lets raise a toast to ’70s-’80s nightlife impresario Arthur Weinstein—may the heavenly branch of hurrah be forever rockin’.

And in a shameless bit of self-promotion, I’m extremely happy to announce that the fabu Bitches Brew boss lady DJ Cosmo will be joining me on my East Village Radio show, Body Control, this Sunday 21 from 8 to 10pm. Check it here!

A promoter’s event is only as good as the photographer capturing the moment. With the popularity of lastnightsparty and event photographer Nikola Tamindzic becoming a well-known name among the Gawkers of the Web, the need to capture a moment and strike a pose has become more important than having a good time.

Two New York event photographers, Tone and Texas, have taken matters into their own hands with a new series of events, banning the camera and increasing the fun. Tone has constructed the events with Texas and Trevz of The New Pop, based around the idea of providing a comfortable environment for downtown clientele.

"I always loved that scene in Platoon when all the guys were chilling in a downstairs lounge smoking, lifting weights and just listening to Motown," says Tone. What better place to re-create that than at the small Cafe Khufu? The smoke from multiple hookahs filled the air in the dark lounge as the owner walked from table to table, showing off and blowing bubbles, while classic Motown—with a hint of J Dilla and Madlib—kept the intimate crowd in a friendly mood. Partygoers were also treated to the latest recordings from Raphael Saadiq, who is currently finishing up a throwback album of ’60s soul on Sony records.

No Cameras Allowed is planned as a series, but as these are invite only. Check out The New Pop to find out about the next one.

You certainly can’t accuse the Minimoo crew—the minimal-techno–fixated party tossers who have been hosting semisecret soirees in lofts and warehouses throughout NYC for the past few years—of not being ambitious. Starting on September 12, the gang is presenting a three-day festival devoted to all things techno, to be held at an as-yet undisclosed location, with a killer lineup of international and local players already in place. As of now, here’s who’s signed up for the Minitek fest: Richie Hawtin (pictured), Marco Carola, Guy Gerber, Magda, Troy Pierce, Audion, Martin Buttrich, Paco Osuna, Konrad Black, Guido Schneider, Adultnapper, Alexi Delano, Davide Squillace, Paul Ritch, Jeremy P Caulfield, Pan Pot, Format: B, Exercize One, Monoblock, Seph, Dilo vs. Gurtz, Butane, Camea, Fase Miusic Sender and Minimoo’s own Memek. There’s sure to be some more DJs and performers in place before long, but if only half of the above list shows up, it will still be the biggest techno shindig we’ve had here in, like, forever.