WIRE05 @ YOKOHAMA ARENA
DATE : 16th July, 2005 (Sat)
PHOTOGRAPHER : Kazuhiro Kitaoka & Tsukasa Miyoshi
TEXT : Nick Lawrence
The time of year had arrived for the annual pilgrimage to Wire. Thousands upon thousands of Tokyo techno kids boarded the train bound for Yokohama Arena where they would dance until the early hours of the morning wearing their newly purchased event merchandise. With two arenas, one the size of a small African nation, and an area showing off the latest DJ technology from electronics giants Pioneer, there was plenty to keep the Wire devotees entertained for the entire night. | |
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One of the most anticipated DJs of the night was surely Ellen Allien. As the crowd recognised track after track off Allien's new album the momentum of the set and the energy of the dance floor continued to rise despite the fact that much of the music Ellen played on the night was perhaps harder than anyone who had listened to her productions may've expected. Once Ellen Allien had finished much of the large gathering headed towards the second floor to give themselves plenty of time to work their way to the front of the stage for the start of Joris Voorn's set. However, those in the know decided to head to the other end of the main arena to catch an extremely brief live set by Berlin duo Tok Tok. Despite being on stage for a mere thirty minutes, Tok Tok managed to whip the swarm into an absolute frenzy. A brilliant blend of house and techno was exactly what the main room needed and exactly what Tok Tok managed to provide. As DJ Hell commenced at the other end of the room the population of the giant arena instantly doubled. It was almost as if the Tokyo technoites already knew that DJ Hell would supply the highlight of the night. This soon to be realized fact was not immediately obvious, with Hell initially opting for an oddly ambient synth driven opening track. After this false start it was full steam ahead into some much appreciated German electro house. DJ Hell's set brought much goodness with a littering of electro clash vocals and many a dirty dirty bassline. Play Paul's cover of Green Velvet's 2001 massive hit 'La la land' was all that was needed to have the dancefloor surrender complete control to the man from Munich. Just to seal the deal Hell played a bootleg of Bloc Party's 'Like eating glass' which no sane person could resist madly throwing their body around the dancefloor to. From this point on the trend continued and the remainder of the set was equally as brilliant as what had already passed. Kagami took to the stage next and successfully sent the entire crowd running for the exits with an interesting disco tune that was anything but predictable. While some retreated to the sanctum that was the World Caf with its mouth watering Thai Ramen, others made the trek upstairs to check out what was on offer by live act the Modernist. Listeners were treated to a minimal techno groove that flowed seamlessly into the DJ set of Japan's own Fumiya Tanaka. Not even being aware of Tanaka's existence before this event, after hearing his set it wasn't a surprise to discover that he is one of Japan's biggest techno player. | |
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By the time acid house pioneers 808 State took to the live stage the venue was beginning to become quite full. Those who had been enjoying a power nap before tackling the night's entertainment had arrived and were making their way to their chosen arenas. The music of 808 State was probably the least inline with Wire's techno image. However, the trio from Manchester managed to remind everyone at Wire that the 90's were in fact not all bad. Reinhard Voigt's live act saw house, electro and techno pass through a meat grinder to ultimately produce some twisted beats that left the throng of techno kids screaming for more. But at only thirty minutes long his set was nothing more than a teaser and a warmup for South American born Abe Duque. In the past Abe has worked with DJ Hell which didn't come as a shock considering they both provided the Wire faithful with some extremely aurally satisfying tunes. A bit more eclectic than Hell, Abe Duque took us on a journey through the gamut of dance music. However, unlike some DJs out there Duque managed to bind the tracks together tightly and mould them into a single dance inducing entity. Secret Cinema aka Jeroen Verheij took the stage next to offer up what was no doubt exactly inline with what the masses expected from this famous techno event. His set can be best described with six letters, T.E.C.H.N.O. Secret Cinema managed to remind those who make the journey to Wire every year exactly why they headed out of their comfortable Tokyo pads to the remote Yokohama. The energy of the set was carried over into the live set of Joey Beltram. His hard style techno drove many in the arena ever onwards towards the morning while those of us with more delicate ears were scared off to other areas of the complex where we could test out the latest and greatest DJ equipment from Pioneer. Luke Slater had the task of taking over from lively Joey Beltram, and decided to steer the techno massive on a similar course. Slater dug deep into his record bag, dusted off some cobwebs and played some old school techno effectively injecting enough adrenaline into the crowd to keep them going until it was time to head home. | |
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The journey to Yokohama was long but held many rewards. Techno of all kinds was brought together under one roof and the many Wire addicts were granted the opportunity to celebrate the long weekend in style. The only black mark against Wire's name could be the all too common curse of the big event, a string of exceptionally short sets. Tokyo's reserved younger brother had definitely done its best to keep up with its more famous sibling on this Saturday night in dishing up a world class event. | |
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PHOTO CREDIT TSUKASA MIYOSHI FRANK MULLER / SHIN NISHIMURA / JORIS VOORN / THE MODERNIST / FUMIYA TANAKA / REINHARD VOIGT / WESTBAM / VANGUARD / BAD BOY BILL / JOEY BELTRAM / LUKE SLATER / CHRIS LIEBING KAZUHIRO KITAOKA DJ TASAKA / HATIRAS / RYUKYUDISKO / ELLEN ALLIEN / TOKTOK / HELL / TAKKYU ISHINO / 808 STATE / KAGAMI / ABE DUQUE / SECRET CINEMA / RENATO COHEN / TOBY & ALL THE OTHER PHOTOS | |
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