- I was excited about this set for three different reasons. Firstly the chance to James Zabiela again; the only other time had been one hell of a night at Room mid last year. The second reason was a chance to see Jono Fernandez play his live set. I’d heard only good things about the young man, and was interested to see what he could do with his laptop. With only a few days to go I learnt of the addition of Phil K to the bill. Having heard him in top form over the New Years period my anticipation rose just little more.
The night for me started off a little inauspiciously. A large early crowd (as is usually the case at Room) was enjoying the early sounds of Mark James. Massive prog tunes were in order, perhaps a little early but the crowd didn’t seem to mind.
Jono Fernandez stepped up not long after 12am and immediately taught the crowd a lesson in big beats. Riding the fine line between dark and vocal prog as well as breakbeat, Jono kept the crowd in its toes with a very enjoyable set, including a cheeky Destiny’s Child mix, his own edit of Before You Break My Poison and PQM's Aenema. Definitely looking forward to getting to hear more of him in the not too distant future.
After Jono the two Pioneer Maestros stepped up to the decks. While technical difficulties may have marred the planned intro by James and Phil, the two remained undeterred, showing off their skills on the D-VJs the self coined Jedi Zabiela and Phil K Kenobi proceeded to chop up effects for the fun of it as the breakbeat slowly crept in to a very enthusiastic crowd. The entire set had the atmosphere of unplanned mayhem, and even with a few little hiccups the crowd kept cheering.
It was definitely an eye-opener getting to see the two of them enjoying themselves playing with their equipment. The major gripe for the whole evening was the god-awful sound system at Room…the first ten minutes of their set was inaudible, the next hour far too soft, and when it finally kicked in problems with the levels left some top end sounds distorted. Despite this James and Phil put on a show like only they could. Dropping tracks from the likes of Andy Page and Habersham, the mix of heavy four-four beats and crisp breakbeats kept the punters shaking, lapping up every little scratch or edit from the two.
The set by the two wont go down as the best flowing, or planned by any stretch (JZ was laid up for a few days and couldn’t get any practice in with Phil!!); though each of them seemed almost in awe of each others skill as the crowd were, letting each other tear the place apart for a bit before jumping on for their own turn.
One can only hope that the two get together again down here and give us another opportunity to rock out with two of the most unbelievable DJs on the planet.