Max Kane

Would have thought it'd be Taiko or some new remix of it at least

Taken from http://www.dancefield.com/ Quote: Dear friends of the electronic dance music, My name is Werner Griese, I am the owner and director of the management, booking and event agency Dancefield. For over 8 years, Dancefield has been a solid and reliable member of the electronic music scene, representing a variety of artists like for example Dr. Motte, Felix Kröcher, Lucca, Mauro Picotto and ATB. Each weekend, with our worldwide partners, established through high quality, honest and trustworthy work, we schedule artists all over the globe. Furthermore, we have a long-established and trusty partnership with the Love Parade, Nature One, Mayday and the Alpha Festival. Until today, I had the utmost faith in this electronic scene and especially in the people working within this scene. But sadly, last weekend I had to realize that there are black sheep in this scene who put their money aims above quality and foremost above your rights and wishes to have the promised party with the scheduled and booked artists. As you all know, this weekend at the Planet Love Festival our artist ATB was scheduled to play a two hour set for you, other artists at the festival were Judge Jules, Marco V, Fedde le Grand and Paul van Dyk. For this performance, a booking contract was made between ATB and Planet Love Festival via Dancefield, in which ATB was contracted to be presented by the festival as the 2nd Headliner. Among other things, this contract specified a fixed time slot for ATB’s 2 hour performance from 22.00 hours - 00.00 hours. ATB was the only artist besides Paul van Dyk to be contracted with a 2 hour performance time. Surprisingly, this Saturday evening (5th September 2009) I was called at our hotel by the festival shuttle services. I was asked by shuttle services if we could play at another time slot as there were delayed flights of some DJs who consequently wouldn’t make it on time to the festival. Generally, I have absolute understanding for situations like this and I always try to help, but it simply would not have been possible for us to make the proposed 20.45 – 22.00 time slot, as we were still at the hotel. Besides, it was not the contracted 2 hour performance time. And last but not least, I don’t know why the Planet Love promoter didn’t call me himself, he has my mobile number! What is more, in my 15 years of working as a stage manager at the largest festivals and events in Germany, I have never encountered the situation that a headliner was moved from his contracted time slot to a shorter and earlier performance time. Arriving on the festival site, we tried to talk to the promoters to discuss and clarify the situation and to find a solution. But during the various talks, it became clear that in the run-up to the event the organisers were informed by Paul van Dyk that ATB was not to play directly before him, otherwise he threatened the organizers that he wouldn’t perform at the festival. I was told this straight to my face and in front of many witnesses, and I have to say I am more than shocked by this! The organizers told us that they have no possibility of changing this situation and they were very sorry about this. My question as to whether this was common practice and a basic example of how their organisation works, letting certain DJs decide who is to be contracted for the line-up and when they are to perform, was shamefully ignored and not answered. In the end, the issue was not about changing artists in the line-up due to problems like delayed flights or other problems, but it was only about Paul van Dyk not wanting ATB to perform directly before him until 00.00 hours, because Paul van Dyk did not want this. But now the promoters have started spreading wrong and false facts which I will not discuss in detail here. Such behaviour can not be tolerated and certainly will not be tolerated by me, as it throws an unfair light onto my artist who is innocently dragged through the dirt. Sadly, Planet Love did not and still does not have the courage to stand up against someone who tries to dictate to them how to do their job. They are still continuing this behaviour after the event, which saddens me deeply. Also, I do not understand why it is impossible for Paul van Dyk to have ATB play directly before him. Up to this very day, nobody can explain this to me. Such behaviour in our scene is absolutely intolerable, especially for you, the fans, the lovers of the music, who have paid to party and can expect to be treated respectfully. Surely, everyone can understand that such a situation is simply not tolerable for us. Although the behaviour of the organizers and promoters put us into a state of shock, we did offer to play from 23.00 – 00.00 hours. But this offer was also refused by them due to the instructions given to them by Paul van Dyk. You can be assured that this decision of not performing was not easy for us at all, and I feel very sorry for all the fans. Everyone who knows me and ATB is well aware that we always do everything to make a gig possible, but in this case even with our willingness to help and our offers to solve the situation, it was just not possible. Finally, I want to make clear that at no time during the discussions were there securities present or in the vicinity or even necessary, and that at no time were threats issued by ATB or myself towards the organisers/promoters or their staff. We want to clearly dissociate ourselves from the allegations made by the promoters/organizers of the Plant Love Festival at this time. This event will leave a black spot in our memories, because in the end the people who got really hurt are you, the fans. And that surely is something we never ever want to happen! Yours faithfully Werner Griese (CEO Dancefield)

There have been two more statements today, one from both PL & ATB, once again both contradictory. There's obviously something much deeper going on with all of this & I think that the promoters only responded as ATB took it into the public domain by posting on twitter. I can appreciate him wanting to convey to fans his lack of an appearance but really there are ways to do things & definately (as used in this example) ways of not doing things. Even if he is telling the 100% defining truth his rep has taken a real knock due to all of this anyway. I don't see what he could gain from any of it

I'm extremely dissapointed in you Quaders, where's Swordfish? Possibly the finest fish ever & it's not on the list. I do enjoy fish, I eat a lot of tuna & salmon (high in protein don't you know) & obviously Cod

Southbank mate (Jack Harris)

Neil Collins has gone out on loan to Preston, with a view to a permanent move. I can't say I'll miss him He'll do a job for a championship team but he has too many mistakes in him & in general is not good enough with the ball at his feet to adapt to the prem. I've got a 100% record with Wolves this season so far, I haven't missed a single game, that includes the dire league cup match at home to Swindon & all away games. I'm quite proud of myself haha

I'd agree with the Tiesto shout, I can see why he's massive though. He's marketted himself quite brilliantly & really made something out of the Number 1 slot in a way that no-one else had done before. He's a pioneer really, everyone has tried to copy his arena shows & he simply sells places out which is all he & most promoters care about. I've seen plenty of DJs that I don't rate highly & I have to say the majority of over-rated DJs are just producers who took it up as a means of selling more records & making a living. Usually the best DJs are guys who got into production later on once they had established something of a DJing portfolio. I'm not bitching about it as it's the way of the world right now but it does kind of annoy.

I still use this board a lot, I've got my biggest post count on here by miles & I get on well with pretty much everyone on here. I think as there is a slightly smaller user base you can actually get to know people a bit better on here. I really like the Hardwick board, I've met a good number of people from there & really get on well with a lot of the members. I also use anjuna & have got talking to some really cool people from there but there are some members on that board that instantly rebel against anything the least bit detrimental to anjuna, it appears to be their religion a lot of the time. I use tranceaddict for tracklistings & to check out new reviews & use the Markus Schulz forum occasionally too. I've begun using the new PaSSion forum since it's relaunch, mainly as I play there so often & thought I'd better get in touch with people. The old GK board was fun until it got taken over by over-zelous mods & got shut down.

I agree on the point that trance has slowed right down. I've significantly dropped the speed I play at now but that's primarily as there's a lot more tech-house & out & out progressive house in my sets now. A few years ago I played progressive trance around 135 as it flowed better into the trance sets which went from 135 up to 140. Now apart from the real bosh tracks nothing is faster than 137 or so. It's all about finding music you're into, that does change. The sets I play now bare very little resemblance to the ones I used to play but I probably enjoy the music more now. As for your style Briggs I don't really see anyone out there banging it out anymore, Kearney still tanks it but his sets are chocked full of his own edits & productions & no-one can really bowl up & play a set like that. Even people like Halliwell & John Askew have slowed down, maybe not to the extent of Armin & co but still noticably.

Look forward to it

I've truly wasted the day, woke up around 11 & have been nackered all day long, think Friday night coupled with consecutive nights out on Saturday & Sunday have caught up with me

01. Eric Prydz The guy is an absolute genius, think I've played pretty much everything he's released these past two years & he shows no signs of slowing down. The new Pryda EP out today is fantastic & the Cirez D stuff this year is mind-blowing. 02. Jerome Isma-ae Endless supply of quality & keeps churning out good stuff without it becomming stale. 03. Russell G I know Russ reasonably well (as he's from my neck of the woods) but regardless of that he's been amazing this year, his work with Steve Haines is fantastic & I'd say he's probably been my most playlisted producer. 04. Markus Schulz Not too keen on his latest release but the Dakota stuff is exceptional. 05. Blake Jarrell He's come on so much as a producer in the past couple of years & everything he's done so far in 2009 has been terrific.

Never really liked vonyc, mainly for the reasons Jason mentioned. It was really annoying when they had an exclusive & you had to use paypal

Only other one I have used in the past is DJTunes.com it's not the best but sometimes it allows you to buy tunes which are territory restricted elsewhere

I used to use Audiojelly more than anywhere else but they gradually increased their prices & started charging for using a debit card. I avoid them at all costs now. Their only saving grace is they sometimes get the Armada exclusives but they rip you off for those too. I know beatport can seem a little pricey sometimes but at least they don't hike up prices to £2.39 for exclusives

CDJShop is pretty good, I used to hate shopping there but the use of loyallty points is a nice touch

DJDownload are awesome, easily the best player & their customer service is magnificent. Definately the winner imo. I do like beatport but today I'm having real trouble as the audio clips won't work on the site.

Great to see Jules really supportiung David's (Murtagh) tune, also amazed to see him playlist a track from Harem, such an underrated label

I hate to say it but I feel there are a few tracks there that, while they were ok at the time, have aged terribly. On the other hand some absolute belters in there aswell

That set looks magnificent

Three classics in there

Any downloads I grab I always make time to comment, good or bad. Only trouble I have is with all the mp3 downloads I have to purchase for my own sets I don't have the disc space to download as many sets anymore without compromising performance

Disc Two owns virtually every other compilation CD ever, every track on there is fantastic. 'Bulgarian' 'Luvstruck' & 'Violin de la Nuit' are my picks from disc one

Definately see what you're saying mate & i think you've hit the nail on the head with the part of your statement about songs being catchy, Pearce's audience lust for cathy throw-away pop dance songs, they don't wana have to pay attention to a record for 10misn they just want a radio edit that they can have on in their car with some drunken scouse bird saying what a great night out she had in Oceana

I think that there are very credible artists that have made cheesy tunes, Kyau vs Albert 'Walk Down' for me was a very cheesy tune, that vocal was pure cheese! I don't discriminate between pidgeonholing things as chees, commercial etc really. I think that DJ Sammy etc is just sh*t, tunes like those don't even come into my thinking when categorising dance music, that stuff is just pop