Judge Jules & Matt Hardwick @ Forum (29-12-07)

[TranceFusion]

When the topic about this event was opened, i was happy to see Matt Hardwick in the mix and i wanted to know who would be playing first, Judge or Matt. I was looking forward to this but, as expected, when i came to Forum i saw that at least 80% of the crowd were kids. So my first words said inside the Forum were "Welcome to kindergarten!".
The organizer of this event is new and i'm disappointed in Beyond Entertainment. Personally i couldn't see anything positive that could stay in my memory, maybe because of the many negatives. If someone noticed something good about it please say it
The opening and closing sets were played by Gunther & Stamina. I liked a bit the last 30 minutes of their opening set, a little repetitive but still could be enjoyable to some point.
During the warmup Tala, Costa and i went to the bar. We were told that we had to pay 5,000LL to get a redbull. With the Drink1 we could get whisky or vodka. With the Drink2 there was water, juice and soft drinks. I'm still unable to understand this. It must be some kind of typically Lebanese rule maybe. Weird...
Matt Hardwick came to the decks at 00:45am. The set had commercial sounds for 40 minutes for sure. Starting 1:30am we, true Trancers, could finally start enjoying real Trance music! The next 30 minutes, until 2am, were the proof that "happy moments are short". Uplifting energy was unleashed on the crowd, but on me the most i guess and i welcome this energy with open arms! The tracks played during this half hour were amazing, but the choice of tracks throughout the whole set was bad. Matt couldn't create a climate. He started with commercial, moved on to Body Of Conflict, then we heard one Tranzy track, and suddenly Smack My Bitch Up appeared. Then again Trance came back. Like Tala told me, there's a lack of coherence. There was no regularity in the set. It was going up and down until 1:30am... after 2am, when we thought Matt would be keeping the Tranzy uplifting mood, another track came up that has nothing to do with the last 30 minutes. It was a remix of Delerium - Silence... afterwards a track with vocal chops was played and Matt left the decks for Judge Jules. Also, some transitions by Matt were bad. I didn't like Matt having a gum in his mouth the whole time. Just not cool. Just like Alex Ferguson, the coach of Manchester United, chewing at every game for 90 minutes. Damn... me hates gum. Wbat i liked about Matt is that he has a good taste in Trance
Now, for the 2nd DJ, Tala and i agree on this: he is the definition of fake-ness. We enjoyed the first 30 minutes, but then it got worse for us. Judge Jules was much more hyper than Joop. It's not that bad actually. But it was like he was moving even when there was no reason to move so much... i dunno. Also another thing, his hands were too often busy with the knobs on the mixer when actually there were no effects done on the track played! Judge Jules played again Body Of Conflict. To be honest, i got seriously tired and bored of this track cuz i've been listening to End Of Year Countdown on afterhours.fm since 24 December and almost every DJ i heard played this track! :/ Dunno what's so cool about it...
The crowd? TOO MANY kids. We saw one at most 12 years old kid, another for sure not older than 15. Many were on E obviously. And some were behaving disrespectfully towards others. If a couple wants sex, get a room or go somewhere no one would see them. Right on my left, under the DJ booth, a girl was enjoying music in front of the barrier and her guy was like... seriously on fire... damn what moves he was doing on her ass! Dude chill... the girl got angry at him after like 30 seconds. Tala and i had a nice laugh about it.

I managed to ID some tracks of Matt's set, here they are:
ID
ID
Cosmic Gate - Body Of Conflict
Prodigy - Smack My Bitch Up (... Remix?)
ID
John O'Callaghan feat. Audrey Gallagher - Big Sky (Agnelli & Nelson Remix)
Tranquility Base - Oceanic (Sean Tyas Remix)
The Doppler Effect - Beauty Hides In The Deep (John O'Callaghan Remix)
Sean Tyas - Candida
ID (similar to Aly & Fila sounds, but for sure an uplifting track that i have)
Sean Tyas - One More Night Out
ID (Uplifting)
ID (Vocal Trance)
Delerium - Silence (... Remix)
ID (Vocal Trance)


Pictures coming this evening!

[Tala]

Kamil, you said everything basically.

[align=justify]Track-selection:
Matt disappointed me BIG TIME. I mean, he was alternating between commercial progressive house and progressive trance, then jumps to uplifting trance and suddenly goes back to house! That was annoying! He got us in a certain mood and level of energy and after he succeeds in this, he directly changes the style.

Judge was going TECHNO half way through his set! This was SHOCKING. I hardly believe that was him playing after I attended his gig in 2005 at St George. Well, I didn't like his set much back then but it was WAY better than yesterday's set!!


Transitions/Technical Skills:
Matt's technical skills are not remarkable. Ok, I am not a dj and I may have no clue on how to dj, but from my experience and theories I got from some friends I KNOW what is a good transition and what is not. At some points, you could easily detect the "off-beat". That was not good!

Judge's technical skills are undisputable. Full respect to him even though he was faking himself and OVER doing things all the time. Unlike Matt, you could feel the smooth transitions between tracks. But what about his "headphones"? They were like ear-phones.. too small!!!


Dj-crowd interaction:
Matt's interaction with his crowd was very natural and friendly. He, at some points clapped his hands when he saw his crowd showing they're happy. He had a smile on his face during the set.

Whereas Judge's interaction was not friendly at all! I mean he way too fake. Just like Kamil said, he was pretending adding some effects when actually there were none! He was too pushy in his approach; doing gestures that are a bit "weird"! I did not like that at all!


Organization:
Bad! there was no lazer show!! And what's with the poor decoration?
The bar? Ouch, do I have to even talk about that?? Kamil said it all!!
Well, one good thing is that the sound system was very good.[/align]

The crowd was pathetic. That's all what I can say.

[TranceFusion]

Oops... forgot to say something about the setup. Yea... not cool :/ there were only lights above the DJ booth.
The visual effects? Nah... there were 2 big screens, one on the left, the other on the right. There were problems with displaying on the first one at the beginning. So i have the feeling that the organizers didn't check correctly before the gig if everything would work fine.

I never was a fan of Judge Jules and now for sure i'll never see him again. Not my sound, not the kind of DJ i'd enjoy seeing in the mix. As for Matt, he was natural and that's a good thing

[A-Cube]

Apparently the night was not much of a success unfortunately...I myself expected a better review about Matt Hardwick...and concerning Judge Jules it's just his sound...nothing surprising about it...as for the organization I believe every promoter needs some time to set his feet and I hope Beyond Entertainment will takes notes of the peoples' remarks and work on them for their upcoming events...

[DJ_TRACID]

[Housezone]

[Trancelvania]

[Fawzi]

[TranceFusion]

[Icepick]

[A-Cube]

[jackbeans]

For all those who couldn't make it:

A detailed review in the coming few hours...

[Fawzi]

[jackbeans]

JUDGE JULES & MATT HARDWICK LIVE AT FORUM DE BEIRUT - 29 DEC. 2007 - LEBANON

Venue

The venue was simple, maybe too simple.
1/4 of the forum space was used, a little rectangular area used, a little stage in the middle front, the VIP section at the right a little higher than ground level and on your left a "so-called" bar: probably a couple of plastic tables aligned with a cover and the beverages.
Very preliminary, basic venue.
Nevertheless the organizers knew what volume of people they'd expect perfectly and designed the venue accordingly.
Hence it looked poor.. More decoration was needed...
Looked like some dirty private little rave, unfortunately didn't look too dirty nor spectacular...
More could have been done, much more...

Lights/Sound

Lighting was simply a joke.
Nothing much to say other than the ridiculous blue/red spots on the truss above the crowd and a few lighting fixtures distributed randomly and absolutely not being of any significance.
Laser, strobs, projectors, whatever.....NONE...Shameful...

Sound system was weak especially when the place got packed...
From the start, half of the venue had power. You could have a proper conversation and discuss the Middle East conflict in the other second half backwards...
In addition from the start, bass was too high, destroying all other pitches, worse, became disturbing for most clubbers... This was obvious starting from G&S opening set.
Sound lacked power and clarity.

Organization/Management

Very good management at the entrance. No queues or significant ones, even for those who were willing to buy their tickets at the door.
Security check was acceptable.
Service at the bar was fast, bartenders being more than friendly and responsive.
Drink prices were acceptable. Alcoholic drinks, Soft drinks and Red Bull were the corresponding divisions.
Using the restrooms was again, as usual, one harsh experience but a less harsher one. A little effort has been done but still more is expected...

Opening/Closing Set: G&S

A good set, good tracklist, medium performance.
Nothing extraordinary... The crowd didn't respond properly at first but then a few tracks later on triggered enthusiasm...
The closing set was well thought of... Although some tracks sounded boring and monotonous, all in all, it gave the expected effect & outcome.

Act I: Matt Hardwick

Describing his set: It's a season salad but without sauce.
From trance, to progressive house to....anything...He played them all... All styles mixed one in another in a very clumsy way.
Matt couldn't really get the crowd's attention although he tried to desperately... At a few times, some euphoria was set but short and later on, unnoticed...
No flavor, no color to his set with abrupt, painful mixing. Nothing except skipping, ridiculous & predictable effects and bad transitions...
Matt didn't leave any impression nor impact on the Lebanese crowd.

Act II: Judge Jules

The big man reached the decks and started immediately hammering everyone around. Very agressive opening tune followed up by very techy Trance and even harsher sounds.
Very dynamic and vibrant physically, his music wasn't...
Jules was just playing "banging" tunes left and right probably trying to create something, something that wasn't there...
Connecting to the crowd was hard, although his body language wanted to but probably not sincerely...
In addition, two (or more) tracks were played by both DJs and at a very short intervals. Unacceptable.
Mixing was very basic; smooth transitions, predictable effects, nothing spectacular or worth to mention..

A musical set should be a story, a story told through out the night...
Judge Jules definately had nothing to tell us that night...

+ Good organization/management
+ Good opening & closing set
+ Effort concerning restrooms hygiene

- Ridiculous lighting
- Ridiculous decoration
- Pathetic sound system
- Dull, colorless Matt Hardwick
- Hasty, flavorless Judge Jules

04/10
MEDIOCRE

[kevo21]

listen man let me tell u this!why do u go 2 events answer my question!dude just listen 2 the music children not children no one is makin u 2stay there!everytime i open TH on every review every1 says CHILDREN CHILDREN !another question when u were a kid didnt u use 2 go 2 events we all were on there age so wht enjoy the music!i want an answer on my questions plz and thanks