here goes
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The event was planned for Tuesday 24 March at Club Vivendi in Nicosia (Cyprus) starting at 10h30pm. Johnny, Khalil (Beavis) and i arrived to the island on Monday morning and the director of MixFM took us to his office. Dinos is a very nice and hospitable guy! Around noon we went to the club to check the sound system. It is a nice club really! There can be inside around 1000 people. The DJ booth is in the middle. There are 2 bars on the left and on the right of the booth. There are sofas along the wall behind the booth and on the opposite side as well. On Monday it still looked empty though. Johnny, Dinos and the technicians were working to make the sound clear around the club. Khalil was checking the clarity of the sound. When this was done, they reached the conclusion that the sound would be better with the club full of people. Then we went to the hotel around 2h30 and we could finally get the rest we deserved! While Khalil and i slept the whole afternoon, Johnny went back to MixFM station to work on an ad. In the evening Dinos took us to a restaurant for a tasty dinner. On Tuesday we had a few free hours so we went for a bit of sightseeing in the surroundings of the hotel.
Around 6pm Johnny was checking what to play during his set and made a special intro. At 8h30pm Deep Impact (one of the 2 Cypriots for the opening set) came to the hotel to take us for a dinner before the event. Kyriakos (the real name of Deep Impact) is a nice guy and it was fun chatting with him! We arrived at a Mexican restaurant and we waited for the 2nd DJ (Shadow) who had to get the Maltese duo Tenishia. When they arrived we could order whatever we wanted and meanwhile we chatted. Joven and Cyprian aka Tenishia are really amazing mates!! They have this party animal gene in their DNA no doubt!! Very friendly, down to earth and really great sense of humor! When we finished eating, we had to hurry to the club because we got a tiny bit late. So when we arrived to the club finding a place to park was a problem. It took us 10 minutes to find a place as near as possible to the club. It was around 10h40pm and people were waiting in line at the 2 entrances. Inside there was already a big group of clubbers waiting for the DJs. Deep Impact and Shadow headed straight away to the DJ booth that had 3 Pioneers CDJ-800. When we got in, we realized how different and amazing the club looked with all the lights, the screen, the ads (Carlsberg mainly)! We and the DJs were behind the DJ booth in an area separated from the rest of the club. Ferry arrived around 10pm to Cyprus and was taken by Haris C to the hotel and for a dinner. Meanwhile, Deep Impact and Shadow were playing a really beautiful set of Progressive House during 1 hour! We all liked it and people kept on coming and enjoying the music as well.
Then it was Johnny’s turn to kick off his set at 11h45pm! I mentioned earlier that he made a special intro which was a combination of 2 versions of Off The World
when he started his warm-up set the club was already literally full! He played mostly Progressive and Tech stuff; and the Cypriot clubbers were going crazy, dancing to every beat every breakdown and singing tracks that aren’t played on the radio. Johnny also interacted very well with them and they responded positively in return! The VJ was doing a really good job with the visual effects. 3 projectors (left, middle and right) were showing beautiful trancy graphics on the wall facing the DJ booth. A 4th projector was showing the ad about the event (warm-up DJs, main DJ, sponsor) on the club’s wall by the stairs. Joven and Cyprian also enjoyed Johnny’s set! After 1 hour, at 12h45am, it was their turn to play for the Cypriot clubbers. The duo used a jingle “this is Tenishia in the mix” every couple of tracks during their set. To be honest, i was shocked by their track selection! They were the guests of my online event TranCentral on Saturday 21 March and their guestmix was more Progressive House with relaxing melodies, perfect for a beach party. On that night, Tenishia played more techy and the clubbers were loving it! Their interaction and skills were simply perfect!
Ferry Corsten really deserves to be called a legend! He arrived with Haris C 5 minutes before his set. The Dutch legend was happy to see Johnny, exchanged a couple of words with us and went directly to the DJ booth. The way Johnny and Tenishia played was a sign that Ferry would take all of us to a climax. So was the case when Ferry kicked off his set with Adagio For Strings (JJE Progressive Mix)! The clubbers rarely stopped dancing and were so happy to see Ferry! In the first hour he played more techy stuff. We were all enjoying every moment of it, and if you could see how Johnny was happy! The last time i saw him so happy was when Markus Schulz played at Sunrise Festival! But this time he was undoubtedly happier since he got the chance to play with the legend!
in the second hour, Ferry played more melodic tracks and that made me just happier haha! His interaction with the clubbers was perfect, his transitions flawless (for sure i didn’t notice anything wrong, maybe Johnny can tell if he noticed something). Ferry also always smiled. During his set the VJ used really really beautiful multi-color lasers that were placed on top of the screen for ads (wall near the entrance, left side of the DJ booth). Haris C told Ferry at 3h10am that he has to end the set in 20 minutes because such is the law. So the set ended at that time, but the crowd asked for more! And Ferry played one more track (Punk) that drove the clubbers just mad! At 3h40am the music stopped, the clubbers again asked for more but Ferry couldn’t play any additional track. So Tenishia, Haris C, Ferry, Johnny, Khalil and i went to the office of the club where we could all talk normally. Also 4 other guys were inside and the VJ came in to say hi, Ferry thanked him for the good work. It was great to be with Ferry there! A really special moment for me! very nice guy, down to earth, always smiling. After 20 minutes of talking, taking pics and signing autographs he left and we left. Outside Khalil, Tenishia and i chatted probably 30 minutes while waiting for Johnny. Then Deep Impact took us back to the hotel and we could take a rest after a wonderful night with wonderful DJs and wonderful clubbers! On Wednesday we woke up at 2pm, had a quick lunch and went to Starbucks where we spent around 2 hours with Tenishia, Dinos, Haris C, Deep Impact and Shadow. Then we had to go back to the hotel to get ready to leave to the airport. The Tenishia duo went back to Malta on Thursday.
The sound system could be a bit better and there could also be a bit more light on the DJ, like something above him/them.
To finish this review, i want to say a few things about the Cypriot crowd. In the club there were no weird looking people at all! All were decent and musically educated. They weren’t waiting to get in just for the main DJ, they weren’t waiting to dance only when Ferry started to play. They enjoyed every track of every DJ, and since Johnny is our personal hero here they showed a lot of respect to him and loved him! Johnny and i both agreed that such support by local clubbers to their local DJs doesn’t exist in Lebanon. The club was between ½ and ¾ full when the locals Deep Impact and Shadow played and they had positive response from the clubbers. I remember Johnny’s event with Leon Bolier and Joop, when our local DJ A-Cube played no one came to the club. That’s a shame! When Johnny played the warm-up it was far from being ½ full! Also, the Cypriot clubbers don’t look for trouble. Whenever the security guys asked them not to enter the private area for the DJs or asked to go back to the dancefloor (when a girl danced right in front of Ferry and another guy hugged him during the set), they politely respected that and didn’t fight with the security. Really, KUDOS to the Cypriots! \o/
5 videos that i took with my camera (soon more videos of Johnny’s set):
Tenishia kicking off their set (just a moment before recording they used the jingle)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q5HBPKEUE2c
Tenishia in the mix
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QK4Su5kghpI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5gPw8L8NPN4
Ferry Corsten starting his set
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rriHinpNVpA
Ferry Corsten playing with the mixer and dancing
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_HrB6USu8AE
Sorry for not recording more videos, i was focusing more on pics with my Olympus and the one disadvantage that this digital camera has is its short-life battery (not really short, but for sure shorter than the Sony i had before). In other 3 topics: some pics of the event!
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