Behind the Bass | DJ Dave Austin

DJ Dave Austin talks on his journey through the highs and lows of the nightlife scene, to becoming a key figure in Sydney’s DJ and event circuit. He shares insights on the evolution of DJing, club culture, iconic venues like DCM, and the impact of social media and COVID-19. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:05):
Approache Production. Welcome to Secrets of the Underworld. I am
Neil the Muscle Cummings, and in this episode I speak
to old school DJ legend Dave Austin. I'd try to
make heavy middle be and I couldn't get them all together.
So just turn out it was easy just to DJ
on your own.

Speaker 2 (00:25):
So I've gone toll the door.

Speaker 1 (00:26):
Guys, listen, I'm going to park my car illegally just
on that corner when the whole casheris and the cash
box and everything is put in the car. They smashed
all the cars down that street. There was houses smashed,
those windows broken on houses. It was worse when you
actually got down there. I reckon, I got knocked back
two or three times. What was the reason why you
got in my back? Probably because I'm ugly. Nah, we
would never knock you back. There was a message going

(00:47):
around there's going to be something bad game down, guns
are involved, or something like something to that effect.

Speaker 2 (00:52):
And yeah it happened.

Speaker 1 (00:57):
Let's start off before all the netty gritty of you
DJ and get up to mischief, what you did growing
up and how you actually became who you are today.

Speaker 2 (01:07):
Okay, So I used to play guitar.

Speaker 1 (01:08):
I was always in a music used to be in
a heavy metal When I turned sixteen, I left school,
so you had in a heavy metal bank. I tried
to make a heavy metal band. I couldn't get them
all together, so I ended up djaying there fifteen sixteen,
we're playing guitar, trying to get a band together. But
it just turned out it was easy just to DJ
on your own. And when I started going out clubbing,

(01:29):
that was where I sort of got the DJing bugs.
So I was going to Ruber Sales and a lot
of guys might remember this back. This is like ninety
three ninety four heart Beats. I don't know if you
remember that.

Speaker 2 (01:38):
I remember that, isn't it yea. So it's across the
road from Ruba Beach.

Speaker 1 (01:43):
The bra Boys local, so they were all sort of
in there and there at one point the ethnic sort
of overtook that and it became turning into an energy
club later on, sort of towards ninety six to twinty
seven ninety eight. But when I was going to those venues,
there was no heavy metal being played. It was all
just euro dance and the stuff coming out from the UK,
from Spain, from Netherlands from But how did you go
from heavy metal to be in a DJ mate? I

(02:05):
was gone out every Friday. It was ten dollars entry
and it was dollar drinks. I was an apprentice. I
was getting like one hundred and fifty bucks a week.
You'd go out with twenty dollars, you'd get in for
ten bucks, you'd get ten drinks. Everyone would have a
good time and it was just a cheap night out
for an apprentice. But because all the DJs were playing
that dance music, you just kept getting drilled in me.
And then the songs were always catchy, Yeah, like a
Corona Rhythm of the night, all that sort of stuff,

(02:26):
you know. So eventually I just I met another DJ
called Stand the Man. He taught a few guys and
they all ended up becoming so. Steve Vessel was another
guy that used to play in the Oxford street scene.
You know. He taught a few guys and he was
the guy that said to me, house music is going
to be the future. He said that back to me
in ninety four, and I didn't believe him. I said, nah,
I made image is the best sort of things.

Speaker 2 (02:47):
So but yeah, he was right. House music is the
dominant power.

Speaker 1 (02:50):
He taught you. Yeah, he taught me how to mix.
He gave me his decks. I took him home and
I just practiced and then he'd take Two months later
I was djaying parties for him house.

Speaker 2 (02:58):
Crazy.

Speaker 1 (02:59):
Yeah, I fucking tried, and I could never fucking do it.
I think it was just a dom cunt. I think
I think I've got a little bit of undiagnosed ADHD.
I've never gone and got myself checked out for that.
So I was very focused on I always loved music.
I appreciate all types of music, but you know, learning
the guitar sort of taught me a few things, and
then the timing side of it. So the mixing side

(03:20):
of as long as you understood how to adjust the
speed of the track, you were sweet. And then actually
with the CDs was probably like two months I was
doing parties.

Speaker 2 (03:27):
So when it came to the vinyl.

Speaker 1 (03:28):
Stuff, that took about a year and a half harder
because you can't see anything.

Speaker 2 (03:33):
It's just a noodle on a record.

Speaker 1 (03:35):
But eventually I got my own decks, and I think
about a year and a half later I was confident
in mixing vinyl and stuff. And then It was a
stage where I went overseas to Croatia. I went in
on a nightclub and these guys were all djaying and
I just said, hey, can I ever spin on from Australia?
And they were like looking at me like I was it?
I said, none, give us a crack like you know.
So I mixed the next songing for the guy and
they were all freaking out. You know that I could

(03:57):
beat match these guys weren't beat matching at all. And
what blads you were doing?

Speaker 3 (04:02):
That was it?

Speaker 1 (04:03):
Yeah? That was that was Nush. That was called Nash,
She said, see it, Yeah, that was where I was
actually born. So your croation, yes. So this is just
your DJ name that you use all the time. Dave
Austin is a stage name because if I use my
real name, no one would have bought the CDs or
booked me. So would have been if if you don't
use your real name, it would have just been DJ Dave.

(04:25):
So my real name is Dave Kvavich. That's a bit
of a handful that one who's going to book a
DJ called Dave Kvavich, who's going to buy a song
by this producer called Dave Kvavich. So I'm just going
to say this. I don't think alex Ka's surname is Kay.
I don't think Nick. I don't think Nick Skids' surname

(04:46):
is Skits. Okay, I'm not going to reveal their true identities,
but mine's definitely not Austin. But what was funny, I'll
just fast forward a little bit when I started making
music with Captain Kirk.

Speaker 2 (04:57):
Captain Kirk walks into my house.

Speaker 1 (04:59):
I'm living with your parents, and he goes up to
my mom and goes, hello, Missus Austin, and I said, Kirk,
it's not but yeah, And that was the day we
went and made there's a track that me and Captain
Kirk did everyone. It's the biggest one that I've made,
and of all the tracks that I made, this is
my biggest one.

Speaker 2 (05:17):
And I made it with Kirk, and that's called the Battle.

Speaker 1 (05:20):
That was basically had that sample in a battlest DJs
on two turntable. So that was the day we made that.
And he said, oh, Missus Austin, and I just laughed.
I thought, yeah, but you know, I don't know all
about it, but that's what it was. Was kind of
just more tickets to get it from. I was watching
w w F and I saw Steve Steve Austin, and

(05:40):
I just said, and I was at that point when
I came up. Before that it was day But when
I started playing at Woollongong, I sort of changed it
there because I wanted to get I wanted to try
to get in the Oxford streets scene. I thought, because
there was a wog name at the time, you weren't
going to get a gig.

Speaker 2 (05:53):
The DJs weren't really getting in there.

Speaker 1 (05:55):
So I thought, if I call it Dave Austin, all
these guys are going to think from overseas that was
the if you want to call it, the genius behind it.
And when they were having all the TV screens out
at waves around around the place, that'd have your DJ
name and delighting guy would program it. So I said
DJ Dave Aston, DJ Dave Aston, and I was there
for a whole twelve months as a resident, so I

(06:15):
thought it was a good market. And later on when
the music came it obviously helped so and I think
some of my vinyls got pressed up and I was
pretty big in the UK as well, Blackpool, Liverpool and
all those sort of places.

Speaker 2 (06:26):
So you know, we spoke about Lee Butler and those
guys and that.

Speaker 1 (06:29):
So they were kind of big, but they would never
look I was never Nick Skids Alex k level, but
I was always the guy that was trying to be underground,
you know, in a scene that was or wasn't underground.
So I didn't want to sell out, man like That's
what I thought at the time. So but yeah, man,
well obviously respected those guys, and you know, I saw
them take off to do massive things with their compilations

(06:50):
and that, so I was very is your first venue
that you have a played? The first venue it was
Paramatta Road, Camper Down Saloon Bar. They used to be Dodgy.

Speaker 2 (07:00):
That was called the Saloon Bar. They later on changed.

Speaker 1 (07:02):
I think it's called the Arpyr Club now, but it
was actually up like a saloon bar and they used
to have energy nights there on a Friday, but I
remember DJing for some Greek nights there on a Wednesday.

Speaker 2 (07:11):
That was the first nightclub venue.

Speaker 1 (07:12):
But the first mainstream where I started playing all the
stuff that I wanted to play was basically Waves down
at all Ono. Before that, I had carrying Ba Hotel
a few little dodgy venues here and there, But I'd
say the first main one would have been waves, where
it was like, now I'm playing all the all the
stuff from the world to few CDs, and that was
when wildfen started really taking off. So it was the
big genre, a lot of vocals. You know, it's still

(07:33):
a commercial venue, but you're playing what we call classics now.
You know, what was it like back then to compare
to now.

Speaker 3 (07:39):
Like to me, I look at now at DJs when
they're in a DJ set, and I like that it's
all computerized or laptops. Now, this was not like there's
a lot of hard work going into it.

Speaker 1 (07:48):
Look if you've got one set of decks at home,
that's like a DJ controller compared to back then, there
was no DJ controllers, so you either had CDs which
would play button stop button. That's pretty much doing the
same thing now as what you were back then. It's
just you're not using a CD. You're using a b
stick and obviously you don't even see a turntable in
the market. There there'd be some songs you couldn't get

(08:12):
on CD. You'd have to buy the vinyl, And back
then vinyl was like eighteen dollars ninety dollars for one
track Central Station Records. So this before I got licensed
Central Station Records. When I've got a record, I got
a three year record deal with them at one point,
which extended to four and a half years because I
were releasing all the world CDs. They were getting like
they were lasting all the awesome songs that we all
know from now that that are massive. The best one

(08:36):
it was called Central Cuts, So a lot of those
songs on Central Cuts were from the World the MCD,
so people already knew them. But you'd get four tracks
on one for twenty bucks. It's like five bucks of tracks.
That's like, oh, how good is this? And then you
build your collection, so you go from Central Cuts one, two, three,
and four stevb and Chris Creator At that time, I
remember we're working at Central Station Records. Just uqba there,

(08:57):
do you remember that record? I remember that you have
to go there and one Stop. Captain Kirk and Cadell
worked at One Stop, and between them, these guys were
in our circles. I think knew what we wanted, so
that was always good. At that point, we could just
start recording from vinyl into your computer and then burning
it onto a CD.

Speaker 2 (09:14):
That was the start of that era.

Speaker 1 (09:15):
But yeah, trying to get those tracks on vinyl to
mix it technically speaking, you got to just have an
ear for it, you know, you gotta have a love
for it, like you got to.

Speaker 2 (09:23):
It's not something that you can just rock up and do.

Speaker 1 (09:24):
Like if you put a turntable in front of me now,
I'd probably double beat it and i'd stuff up the mix,
you know, because I haven't done it for so long
and I don't have more turntable set up at home.
So what did you prefer doing? What did you fair
like that there were knights, there were nights only used
to do vinyl only. Yeah, I did enjoy that. And
we're not talking one hour sets. Waves started at eight
and finished the three. It was a seven hour set

(09:45):
back then, yeah, yeah, and it was a journey. And
even the DCM guys their sets were like two. I
think it was like ten to twelve, twelve to three, three,
three hour clothes and that was it started getting shorter
and shorter. And I think that's why night clubs are struggling. Now.
You've just got the nightclubs that seem to be doing
well because my young My young blokes just turned out
in and I'm sort of watching where he goes.

Speaker 2 (10:04):
And you've got these thing is Rouse Hill.

Speaker 1 (10:06):
They're basically commercial venues and the DJ's are probably doing
two or three hour sets, and I think they seem
to be getting all the numbers. If you look at
cargo Bar, just mainstream, open format type of music, they
seem to be getting all the numbers because the DJs
do play longer sets.

Speaker 2 (10:22):
These are the nightclubs.

Speaker 1 (10:23):
I seem to sort of get six DJs to do
a one hour set each. I think it's just all
over the place. You know, there's no the journey's got
to come back those journey sets. Like my first set
at DCM on a Saturday night was three o'clock till close,
and it was six o'clock, seven o'clock, but I went
till nine that first one, but I was.

Speaker 2 (10:39):
Used to a six hour set.

Speaker 1 (10:40):
I think I walked into the place at like ten o'clock,
so I was there for the whole I nearly did
a twelve hour shift there, but I was just hanging
out listening to what the other DJs were playing because
all my idols were there, you know what I mean.
So I'd watch them anyway. But I don't know if
these young guys can do a three or a four
hour set. The house party DJs probably can, I.

Speaker 3 (10:57):
Better think from what I look at now, a lot
of DJs, especially the young ones who are trying to
put an em out there, argent too much.

Speaker 1 (11:05):
Now. Everyone's charging a bit over the top. But it's
always if you're known.

Speaker 3 (11:10):
But there's the I think every DJ now is just
up their price a little bit.

Speaker 1 (11:14):
So my son's started djaying. His name's Kovak. He doesn't
really like energy, but he will play it, you know
what I mean. He likes his house stuff and odd
marble do. I love everything, honest I love everything. I
love energy, and itage's always got a special spot. There's
so much good music being played. And that's another thing.
There's just so much musical content out there that you

(11:35):
can't really compete.

Speaker 3 (11:36):
But I don't think now if you got back to
the nineties what you were saying before, and you had
you know, rhythm as a dancer and all them kind
of stuff and snap and you don't see that kind
of music anymore.

Speaker 2 (11:45):
Yeah, but they're all remakes, there's all remixes.

Speaker 1 (11:48):
But I don't like the remakes of them.

Speaker 2 (11:50):
It's very hard.

Speaker 1 (11:51):
Yeah, it's very hard to beat a good original because
I do do covers of classic songs. Yeah, but coming
back to what they're charging. Look, let's just say they
get one hundred dollars for an hour. That's a basic rate.
Guys need more than they One hundred dollars gets you
nothing these days. So if they're coming out from the
western suburbs, it's thirty dollars in tolls, it's fifteen dollars
to park their car. You know, they might want to

(12:12):
spend a couple of bucks on drinks or whatever. They're
not walking away with much, and then they've got to
pay tax on that. So you know, yeah, they might
need two hundred dollars. But I just think it's better
to give a guy four hundred bucks and give him
a three hour set or something, you know, and the
least is going to hang out there and he might
bring his mates. But the guys that are charging more,
they've got bills to pay, and the venues have got
bills to pay as well. The rents expensive, the foot

(12:34):
traffics down, it's just even an uba ride. It's like
you but you think now the nate life scene for
night clubs has died, and now it's more people want
to go to festivals with these DJs. I think the
people that want to go at regularly will go to
places like Cargo Bar, those sort of open format and
those DJs, those residents that you've never heard their names.
You know, a lot of these venues don't even put
DJs on the fly out, like they don't say who's

(12:55):
DJing that not or anything, but the fact that they've
got a consistent turnover of music that's for media that's
popular class and two thousand or the eighteen year old kids.
They all love the two things music now and the
late nineties. So you know, these guys know how to
mix that perfectly and it's a hard job. But coming
back to like genre specific venues like the house ones,
they're struggling, I believe just because of the cost of

(13:17):
living and the music's not what would you call it,
There's not as much variety. You know, some people go
to a house club and they just want to hear
Barbie Girl or something, you know what I mean, like whatever,
and then these guys don't have it. I've recently, just
I've been talking with c deck. At the moment, it
looks like I'm going to get some regular work there.
And one of their things was when we get our
DJs up. They're basically house DJs and they're not open

(13:38):
format enough where me I can play absolutely everything because
I've got I can go from the seventies right through
to the twenties now right, so I can go way back.
So if they've got a crowd of over fifty year olds,
I can cater for them. I like the commercial house music.

Speaker 3 (13:52):
I'm more commercial where you've your hair on the media,
in your hair back in the I don't like these ones.

Speaker 1 (13:57):
I was mixed and I've never fucking had it before.
I think as we get older, we're always going to
prefer the older stuff as well. Look I'll do an
eighteenth birthday and they'll give me a playlist like of
what they want, and a lot of it's like from
the two thousands. Yes, Alex k there's always an Alex
Kane a Sunset Brothers track on there, like or a
couple of tracks from him. So the energy is a

(14:17):
very Sydney specific thing.

Speaker 2 (14:19):
But DJ's charging too much.

Speaker 1 (14:20):
I think it's you know, there's not as much work
out there if there's more work, then you can potentially changing.
A lot of DJs have moved to festivals.

Speaker 3 (14:27):
The one that you used to see in the club's
regulars as a resident now have moved on and they've
got they've gone well.

Speaker 1 (14:32):
I remember a story about Timmy Trumpet asking Chris Creator.
Chris Creator told me that, like Timmy Trumpet was doing
his trumpet things, so he was, you know, a regular
sort of appearance all around city. I think just their
popularity has got you know, you've got to have the
popularity there there to back up. But I think a
lot of these guys are also got twenty thousand follows
on Instagram and even they do a post and they
do a post and there's like thirty likes on it

(14:52):
and stuff, and it's like, sorry, you're not fooling me.
I don't know if you're falling the venue owners and
stuff for the promoters, you can see who the authentic
guys are there. I think they're trying to fake it
till they make it. But City has delivered Sydney and
Melbourne of live with some good talent internationally and Queensland
with Fisher and all that, So I think there is
a first for those Australia DJs if they want to
make it. But I think they got to produce. If

(15:13):
they're not producing good music, there's stuff basically, So Timmy
Trump's got a whole team of people that he makes
music with everyone. I think. Don do you look back
fifteen years ago?

Speaker 3 (15:23):
Would you see a DJ that was a residence in
Sydney going there on a private plane around the fucking world, like,
come on, many maybe finding commercial.

Speaker 2 (15:32):
I'll tell you what.

Speaker 1 (15:33):
I never used to get too many interstate bookings. Okay,
let's go back to two thousand and four, and every
time I used to do an interstate booking, I'd go
to the airport and I only did it maybe four
or five times. I didn't get that many interstate bookings
were at to fly. But every time I went to
the I saw Nick Skids there. Nick Kiss was on
a flight ready to go to Adelaide or something. Nick
Kids was consistently booked interstate. But no, I don't think

(15:55):
these guys that are going internationally. I wouldn't have seen
someone like a Timmy Trumpet being as big as what
he used. I wouldn't have imagined that.

Speaker 2 (16:02):
At the time.

Speaker 1 (16:03):
And you know, when you're saying of the festival sort
of taken away from it. Yeah, they have because it's fireworks,
it's poro techniques, there's flames.

Speaker 3 (16:11):
It's a big production show rather than it's ten hours
of dance music. Fucking you know what I mean? Where
do you just get it in the make club?

Speaker 1 (16:16):
And it's it's amazing. It's amazing that it's so expensive.
And the thing is, I was looking at this the
other day stereo Sonic. You'll see these things pop up
videos from Stereosonic back in the two thousands, and you
look at the lineup in this, every banger of the
DJ is on that, and then you look at something
like tomorrow Lean now are Ultra and there's like three
names there right, and it's like, I think the heartstyle

(16:37):
thingms massive.

Speaker 3 (16:39):
Because I used to like the ARA when the Ministery
of Sound had all the DJs involved.

Speaker 1 (16:42):
I said Carl Cox and all like that, you know
what I mean? I heard he lives somewhere around could
you or something? Or it was it's interesting yourself and him.
Why would you choose to live in Sydney as opposed
to the UK? Is there a fucking shit? Ah, it's
fucking dirty, like if you're from there, you look at
it and you just go, oh, really it's dirty, depressing,
Like it's outside here it's great every fucking day there

(17:05):
get fucking six days of the week and fucking every
year it's fucking nice. Well, I mean that it's expensive, crime,
fucking everything.

Speaker 3 (17:11):
Shit, I know every country's got that, but least you've
got a vibe here, beaches, weather, and it looks attractive.

Speaker 1 (17:19):
So have you looked at Queensland, Melbourne and Sydney, like
have you compared the three and you find Sidney better?
Not anymore?

Speaker 2 (17:27):
Not anymore.

Speaker 1 (17:28):
Used to Sydney was the place to be. And now
I love Gold Coaster and Melbourne.

Speaker 3 (17:32):
You know, Melbourne for a partying because Melbourne's never change
to me, Melbourne's just like Europe. It's like, fucking yeah,
Gold Coast is fun to me. Gold Coast reminds me
of what Sydney used to be, like bouncing off clubs.

Speaker 2 (17:44):
I agree with you one hundred percent.

Speaker 1 (17:45):
If I had someone to live and it wasn't for
work and that, I'd probably go up to the Gold Coast.
I'd retire. It's the fucking best. I've got about ten
years to go I'll probably be going up there, whether
my wife likes it or not. I think we'll be
gone up there if I can make it happen. But
Sydney was a good place. I remember running Trademark when
John literally running the promotions was there, was promoting events

(18:06):
like one off events and stuff.

Speaker 2 (18:07):
So I was runing these Croatian nights.

Speaker 1 (18:08):
I remember we took a Saturday, the Saturday between Christmas
and Years Eve, and I sort of said to him, listen,
you guys aren't going to get any numbers because Christmas
a few days before, and you got New Years Eve,
and then you've got the week after Year's Eve. So
let me bring in a whole bunch of alcoholic Croatians
to boost your numbers a bit and that'll carry over
to the middle of January. And so I got the

(18:28):
venue and John actually came that night, I remember, and
he was there with Popaarti as well. I remember him
walking through the door, and we did a big night there.
I remember thinking like, I didn't think we're going to
do big numbers because that was probably one of the
hardest nights to run of the year, and people just
kept coming in. People like we thought we'd end up
with three or four, and we ended up with closer

(18:49):
nine hundred or one thousand. And at one point, I
remember the deal was that we would get the door, and.

Speaker 2 (18:57):
Here we go, here we go.

Speaker 1 (18:58):
I remember what you're going to say that the deal
was we're going to get the door, that I'm going
to get the bar. And then there was a bit
of a dispute about them saying, what about you guys
get the door to one and then we'll get it
after and I said, no, no, no, the door's mine
or night I'm going to bring you is like, you know,
eighty ninety grand on the bar right, and we did.

Speaker 2 (19:13):
We got I think we got up to eighty or grand,
whatever it was.

Speaker 1 (19:16):
And what was funny is I kind of thought I'd
been out of the scene for a while and I'd
come back into it and I'm just looking. There was
a line, and the line would get shorter, and the
next thing you look, five minutes later, there's another line
up around that lane. Way. So I had a family
friend on the door with his girlfriend and I had
a look at a cash box and.

Speaker 2 (19:33):
It was full.

Speaker 1 (19:33):
It was overflowing. The cash d just was full. And
I thought to myself, John's just walked up with his muscle.
If he says give us the cash red, just we're gone.

Speaker 2 (19:44):
That's right. That's what I remember thinking. I thought, so
you empty d.

Speaker 1 (19:48):
I went up. I didn't. That was one thing. I thought,
How am I going to get my car? How am
I going to get out of you? Whatever? I had
a sort of So I went up to the manager
and I said, listen, O go look, we've done all right,
and we did. We did fine. I didn't think we'd
do that well. I said, listen, mate, we've done a
ride on the bar. How about you get your cloak
room girl, get your float ready in the cash register,
bring it downstairs and we'll swap the door over and

(20:09):
we're finished, and you guys can have the rest of
the door. And he looked at me like I'm I mad,
And it's like I said, no, man, we've done good.
Everyone's got to make money. Let's go. So I've gone
toll the door. Guys, listen, I'm going to park my
car illegally just on that corner. As soon as I
come down, you just bring the whole casheris of the
cash box and everything is put in the car.

Speaker 2 (20:26):
And I'm just driving home.

Speaker 1 (20:27):
Didn't worry about the dejails or nothing, not that they
were going to do it. But if he says we
want that, starts thinking that it was too much. It
was honestly too much money. There he goes, if we
want that, we're getting that at the end of day.
We would have given it to him if you asked
for it. So but I thought, let's just give him this, like,
let's talk it this way. So I gave them the door.
They swapped over. I've jumped out of your car, ran up,

(20:48):
got the cashers, I've got the bag cash box, shucked
it in the car right and I drove and as
I was putting in the car, they swapped over. And know, Jake,
there was about one hundred and fifty people in the line,
all willing to pay thirty five dollars to go in
and keep going right. And you know, at the end
of the day you've got to make when as a promoter,
you've got to make the venue money. There's no point
bringing in eighteen year olds that aren't going to spend

(21:09):
any money, right, There's no point. There's got to be
something for everyone. So Croatians tend to drink a lot
on these what we call wog nights. Yeah, and you
got the Crown nights to Serbian knights and all this
sort of stuff. The Greek take a night massive nights, correct,
So you know, when you do all that, you've got
to make them money. That's part of the responsibility. And
the next days we went Dave thanks man like say,
when you want to do another event, and I've got

(21:30):
and I know, I know that they would have done
a huge bar, like that's none of my business what
you make, but they just do all right because yeah,
and I'll think you threw that eighty four thousand dollars
bar that he took that night, and everyone made some
money and it was a good time to be alive.
But I just remember looking at everything and thinking this
was a really big night because the cross was actually
quite that night, but people just kept coming, like I

(21:51):
think when everything else was quiet, we were busy, and
Trademark was such a good venue. It was a shame
to sort of lose it as well. But you can't
go wrong on them log notes. They always used to
be fucking intense. They have their phases, yeah, but they're
big again now. Yeah, start I'm doing one with a
guy called Danilo. I'm helping him run his night at Arcade,
and the ticket sales are really going really well for

(22:12):
that one. So that's on the June Long weekend. He's
even got Sea Deck booked in for October, so I'm
looking at that. And the ticket sales speak from salves,
people booking tables, you know, people dropping five grand, six
grand on tables and stuff. So there's a lot of
spending there. And that's the thing, Like I said, when
I go in to a venue, you know, I may
not be the most flashiest dress bloke there, but you
know you're going to hear if I'm going to tell

(22:32):
you they're not going to drink, they're not going to drink.
But basically speak, when you've got people over twenty five
or thirty, a lot of these older this older market
wants to go out. I did Mark Cooney with Rob
Brizzy and Mitchell I DJ at an event there that
was entertainer. They sold out within a day. Couldn't get
tickets for my friends or anything, so and that was
a really good night. So I think I think the
older people want to party more than the younger people.

Speaker 2 (22:52):
I think we can go longer.

Speaker 1 (22:54):
The older party. As I said, the old crew, old
school crew.

Speaker 3 (22:57):
They want to party like they because they know that
they miss them days, you know what I mean. So
they want to keep going. They want to keep going.
But that's why I've stopped going to these reunions because
it's not the same. It's not the same, the same vibe.
And you get a mixture of the young people coming
with the old school and that ruins it to me.

Speaker 1 (23:16):
Yes, you know what I mean. Look, I think a
reunion is a reunion, but when you've got too many
of them happening at the ya with a short space
of time, it takes something away from it, you know,
Like a reunion needs to be at.

Speaker 2 (23:26):
Least a year apart from each other, I think.

Speaker 1 (23:29):
But then you've got these other promoters, other DJs all
sort of put them together, and it does, say, not
affect the numbers. But there's about six reunions for DCMS
out there, you know what I mean? How many one?
But the thing is, how can you have it?

Speaker 2 (23:39):
To me?

Speaker 1 (23:40):
I went to one live and not long ago last year.
It was like DCMS at the old DCMS venue. But
the thing is, when you walk up, it's not DCMS anymore.
It's a white wall, it's fucking curtains everywhere. So it's
not to me, that's not a reunion. It's not I'm
not visualizing the old dcs. So you just remind me
saying about d CM. Then I was listening to your
podcast with Mickey D. You ask the question. I want

(24:01):
you to ask me the same question you're asking why
do they talk more about DCM and not the other clubs?

Speaker 2 (24:08):
You remember that question?

Speaker 1 (24:09):
Yeah, yeah, so you can formally ask you that question.
Why would they talk about DCM so much but not
the other venues? What was so fucking good about DCMS.
DCM is a venue where if you're the DJ and
there's no one in that room, the acoustics in that
room are incredible, meaning that basically if there's no one

(24:31):
in the room, it still feels like there's people dancing
in there. So even when I used to do the
early sets, you'd get five people walk in and they
straight away start dancing, they start bopping. This is ten
point thirty. The doors are just open, they start walking
through a slow and what it is, it's the vibration
in the echo that it doesn't have. It's just got
a real warm sound. And it's like you feel comfortable

(24:53):
in there. So the same thing can be applied to
all these big rock bands from back in the seventies
and the eighties and all that that come to Sydney
and what are the venues they all want to play,
not because it holds more people, but in more theater
is known like in that music industry, in that rock
sort of music industry, as having really good acoustics where
these bands want to actually play. So it only holds
a couple of thousand people, and these guys can actually

(25:15):
sell out an arena or whatever, but they prefer to
play there because of the ambience and the acoustics in
the room. So you know, I don't think they did
it intentionally, and that's why the music never sounded as
good anywhere else other than DCM.

Speaker 2 (25:27):
That's what I think Mickey might not have picked up on.

Speaker 1 (25:30):
And I noticed that because I was a producer and
I was always trying to get my room. You know,
I'll put my mattress up on against the window to
stop the eka coming through and stuff like that. So
when you got in there with a full room, now
there's more people whobsorbing the sound and you hear and everything.
And you can go into a venue like Rugues and
you had the brick walls, and yet music always sounded
good there. But DCM had that special thing. And then
it was the shape of the room. It was where

(25:51):
the DJ was, it's where you look down, it's the podiums.
And then when you just look back on it, it
was just black with lasers and fucking lights going on.
And that's what other venue was it you put the
lights on, you go, well, that fucking dumped. This place
is per you know what I mean. It's probably rats
behind the bar, but it was just it was it
was just it was a it was a ship off.

Speaker 3 (26:12):
But the thing is when you dim the lights off
and put all the fucking their night club lights on
and the fucking lasers going and you pumped that base,
you could think you were overseas.

Speaker 2 (26:20):
One hundred percent.

Speaker 1 (26:21):
And that's what it was. It was the ambiance in
the room, the feeling that it gave you. And it's
very hard to actually design that. Okay, So he had
Envy down the road, Ye okay, So I remember playing
at Envy and it was a great room, all right.
But if you have to compare the two d CM
was the king of all energy clubs.

Speaker 3 (26:36):
Yeah, well, I remember we used to get Home nightclub
coming up to check us out all the time because
at the time they were playing and High Energy too.

Speaker 1 (26:43):
Always used to come to the door and nicely asked
can we go inside? And I knew who they work,
so they used to work for them, and they just
wanted they'd stay there for an hour to check out.
What was so popular about this fucking place? One hundred percent?
It was always busier on a Saturday night than a Friday. Yeah, okay,
so Friday nights were quite I remember doing Did you
ever meet Justin Niker? Yes, yes, yes, yeah, you know Justin. Yes,
he he booked me because Envy was doing these free

(27:06):
entry Friday nights which totally obliterated Rogues and then DC's
were going to even though John owned both venues, they're
competing against each other. We try to get a Friday
night going there, and then eventually from that I ended
up getting the Saurday nights, so I remember helping him
out with that.

Speaker 2 (27:21):
Georgie j was playing on that one as well.

Speaker 1 (27:23):
Didn't really work on a Friday night, but Envy was
always busy on the Friday night.

Speaker 2 (27:27):
And then it kind of just turned into R and B.

Speaker 1 (27:29):
He went R and B on Fridays at DC's okay,
But before that, I think they went to Envy first,
and then eventually that was two thousand and two. Yeah,
so two thousand and two kind of energy just dropped
R and B and hip Hop, eminem fifty cent and
all those guys came out because they took it over.
Remember to Friday nights was always called, you know, for
R and B, and then Saturdays was just kept for
Hay Energy. Well, at this point in time, this is

(27:51):
probably two thousand and one, and DCM were doing the
Energy thing. So you had astro Cadell, you had all
these DJs playing York. But like it's sort of turned
into thing you go to Envy on a Friday and
DCM on the Saturday night, and that's how it just became.
But at one point, I remember, if you go back further,
like if you go to ninety six, I remember driving
through every nightclub and they'd be playing Amen Passion like

(28:12):
in every club, like Energy was being played. Ever and
eventually it fizzled out and it sort of just got
stuck to that started becoming more niche and then I
can't remember what was happening roads because I wasn't going there,
but I think Rogues was sort of struggling.

Speaker 2 (28:24):
People were struggling.

Speaker 1 (28:25):
Cost of living was a thing back then too, you know,
so a free enter on a Friday, and it was
pretty appealing to you if you liked energy, and you've
got to see good DJs like Steven b Astro, Mickey
Dal I think even played there. It was a good
crew of guys and the music was familiar and consistent.
But once again, man just coming back to the music,
DCM had that sound that you know, no one talks

(28:46):
about envy that much.

Speaker 3 (28:48):
I still got people arguing, like if I bring some
of them about DCMS, and it's not the old school people,
it's the new generation or someone who didn't get into
DCS because I didn't let him in. It's like, what's
the big thing, what's the bigger Let's get over your
fucking high horse and up DCMS.

Speaker 1 (29:01):
But even though I'll say this, and I've said it
a lot of times before I worked there, I hated
the fucking venue. I hated it all right.

Speaker 3 (29:09):
I fucking I used to fucking sack dormant from other venues.
I worked that if they worked there, because I didn't
like it, and it was nothing to do with who
owned it.

Speaker 1 (29:17):
I didn't have a fucking clue at the time. Well,
we were frowned upon as DJs for playing energy and
playing at DCM was like all the house DJs, they
frowned upon us, and I was like, what's the problem,
Like these are the best place. And I went to
other nightclubs, like I gave vis at all venues and
party or whatever, but none of them held the candle
to DCM made. And I don't think there will be
a nightclub that can have that long lasting effect. I

(29:40):
remember the un era coming in two thousand and six.

Speaker 2 (29:44):
Is that where that?

Speaker 1 (29:45):
Yeah, maybe a bit before, a little bit before, yeah,
because I rememb two thousand and four. I think it
was six started kicking in, you know.

Speaker 2 (29:50):
I remember.

Speaker 1 (29:51):
I remember I released a kicking hard mixed CD and
they did a CD launch there for it, and I
was I remember playing and they moved the DJ booth
to the other side. There was a different crowd and
I wore that Sunset Brothers than Alex Case sort of
crowd like. And now Alex k went back further like
that new era sort of came in. I sort of
moved out of the scene. It's just started making music
at that point. But I had a bit of a break,

(30:12):
but there was a different market. I just sort of thought, yeah,
this isn't isn't the same, And it's not because I
was much older.

Speaker 2 (30:18):
I think now I'll look at it to those people.

Speaker 1 (30:20):
They'd appreciate it for us because it was the best
that they had, but we had a better back then
before then They've got nothing else to compare it to. Basically, Yeah,
that's why I think they still talk about it. And
once again, the music sounds the best in that room.
It's the room, it's the acoustics in that room, it's
the lighting, it's everything, and you can't create that space.
It's funny that you say that, because when you were

(30:41):
in DC's and you have the main room for high energy,
but then you had the house room, you could never
hear the high energy. It was like it was like
you could hear it, but not hear it, you know
what I mean. It was just shut off. Yeah, it
was a uniquely designed room. And I remember sort of
running a few parties a couple of years ago now,
but just going in there when it was empty, and
you just sort of do a sound check and I'd

(31:02):
sit there and because you're sort of looking at it
from a from a technical point of view, and you
sort of start realizing, hey, like there's not really much
echoing here, and you can see why you get that
warmth sound.

Speaker 2 (31:13):
It's look put it this way.

Speaker 1 (31:14):
The biggest thing people complain about a nightclub when it's busy,
it's two packed. You couldn't move, and it was too
sweaty or was too hot. They didn't turn the air
conditions off. Right, Okay, what's the opposite of that? Completely
enter him. There's only five people in the old shit like,
we don't want to gather anymore.

Speaker 2 (31:28):
I can tell you right now. As a promata, I
used to love hearing.

Speaker 1 (31:31):
The complaints about it's two packed, their condition who's not
turning their conditioning on it?

Speaker 2 (31:35):
Like come on, like seriously.

Speaker 1 (31:36):
But what happens is the conditioning can't keep up because
people throw off heat. And that was part of the
other thing with DC Man. It will say good when
the bass used to vibrate really loud song from Memory
Nick Skis's remix of Faith. There's a big drone like
a sub base that just go like and a vibbrates
and I just remember the sweat coming down from the ceiling.

Speaker 2 (31:55):
But it was like, you can't beat that. You cannot
beat that.

Speaker 1 (31:59):
And their conditioning is on full blast, but people are
generating so much e because they're dancing that the air
conditioning can't keep up. So then they tend to drink more.
The nightclub owners. Everyone makes money, everyone enjoys themselves, everyone's happy.
But I remember we used to pull like two thousand
people at ruber Seals. I was running a night called
Eurosuperclub in two thousand and four and we had the
same problems, like the air conditioning couldn't keep up, and

(32:20):
they actually ended up upgrading the air conditioning because of
that problem that they had.

Speaker 2 (32:25):
And we're running for about two years.

Speaker 1 (32:27):
If I can go on a different tangent, why that
nightclub stuffed up? Why so we're running a night called
euro Superclub at rub Seals. Okay. So I'm thinking it's
two thousand and five now, okay, And what happened was
there was a little bit of a beach fight at Cronulla.
So on the news, race flars are going on, right,

(32:48):
So we're maubra Ossi sat Area Brah Boys sort of
home turf and all that. The fights happened, and then
there was the revenge attacks. Yeah, okay, so we're running
every fortnight and we're fifty grand budget. We'll running these nights,
four of us running it. We're from big money. It
used to get the big numbers. And anyway, so we've
gone to book the guy from Big Brother. I think
we booked Bessie Bardow. She was a radio personality. She

(33:10):
was a ready personality. And then this race war happens.
And then on the Tuesday or the Wednesday night after it,
the guys had come through Maruba, that road that leads
down in Rubra yep, and they went through and they
smashed all the cars. Do you remember that, the revenge attacks?

Speaker 2 (33:24):
Yeah?

Speaker 1 (33:25):
Remember that? Okay, So they did on the Wednesday, and
our night is on the Saturday, three days later, and
it's called euro Superclub. All right.

Speaker 2 (33:34):
So every wog that would.

Speaker 1 (33:35):
Have gone was thinking, now the Libs had just smashed
this place up when I go, and so we went
from like I think at that point we were like
sixteen seventeen hundred payers to two hundred and thirty. Wow,
all right, and we had Big Brother and that was
what basically killed it so and it wasn't so much
what had happened. It was more the way that the
media had hyped it up into our trying to make
it bigger than what it was and you know, obviously

(33:56):
get more ratings and stuff. So that was one of
the big things. And I've seen some interesting stuff over
the years. That was probably the worst on That one
hit me hard financially, but that's the game we play.
You know, if you're not a business is going to
take a couple of risks. But that was a Yeah,
that was a pretty interesting sort of time. I'm going
to ask you, what's the worst thing you've ever seen
being a promoter or in the clubs. They smashed all

(34:16):
the cars down that street. When I saw that, I said, shit,
we've got euro on this weekend. And I drove down
there and it was glass and every car down the road.
There was houses smashed, there's windows broken on houses everything.
I don't even think the news covered it as bad
as it was, and it looked bad on the news,
it was worse when you actually got down there. And

(34:37):
then this even the manager from Ruber seals because it
was sort of more like an rsl clop but they
had this big room upstairs. He said, are you guys
still going to run? And everyone's like, yeah, what's the problem.
And I'm going, guys, this is a massive problem here.
We've got to sort this out. But I think now
that whole era of because look, once again, you'd go
to a nightclub it was full of Anglos Australians and
then eventually the wags would come and the stranger will

(34:58):
stopped going, and then the legs would come, and then
it'd be like that and then after twelve months it'll
fizzle off and they move on to the next best thing.

Speaker 2 (35:05):
Now I think it's a little bit more.

Speaker 1 (35:06):
Everyone's more integrated, more sort of socially accepting, which is
why you'll see Alex play his that Lebanese track that
he plays and that so and everyone gets into it.
So it's a bit more, you know, it was kind
of a thing that had to sort of erupt to
sort of get to where it is now. And I
think everyone's a little bit more accepting of each other
in that aspect. So you said, you said that to me,

(35:26):
d CMS is the ultimate energy venue. So what's the
ultimate house music venue that you've that you would say
that's really took control of Sydney.

Speaker 2 (35:37):
IVY.

Speaker 1 (35:38):
You think IVY, Wow, that's start. I wouldn't Ivy. IVY
and Marquee they raised the bar after that era of
d C M and that sod When did IVY start
two thousand and seven? DC is closed by well two
thousand and nine. Was it to the eighth Yeah, but
I think I'VEY opened around two thousand and seven, I
think from memory. And then also you had a Marquee
coming around the same time. Okay, so what happened with Marquee.

(36:01):
This is one of the reasons why people wonder why.
I think there's a lot of reasons why Sydney sort
of struggling at the moment. One of the reasons was,
you know, I heard from my business dealing is basically
trying to book DJs that they had a contract Marque
would hold them to a contract that they weren't so
to be a twelve month contract. You might get four
bookings a year, but you're not allowed to play in
any other Sydney venues.

Speaker 2 (36:20):
So that now dominates.

Speaker 1 (36:21):
The better DJ in is the drawer cart and they
give them they're obviously compensated, you know, you'd have to
agree to the deal. But who's not going to want
to play at Marque, right, they're going to guarantee you
four or five or six bookings a year. I also
think the resident DJs weren't allowed to djingwhere else either. Wow,
So that now puts a stranglehold on all the good DJs,
all the talent out there. Everyone else was left sort
of struggling. So I think because they had so much

(36:42):
money to play with. You know, rent, gets expensive insurances,
get expensive stock staff, all the costs start rising and
everyone else is left sort of struggling. So I think
this is not a thing that happened overnight. This has
been ongoing. Then you chuck COVID into the mix. Transport
parking parking is another issue, but generally speaking, those nightclubs

(37:03):
had a stranglehold on the entertainment. So if you're playing
regularly at IVY, what would you play an urals? You know,
if that's your standard. So for a house venu, I'd
say definitely Ivy. Wow, I didn't expect that. What do
you think it would be? Have you had the biggest Yeah,
I'm not looking at the biggest, I'm all looking at
like would I say house like me, I remember, like

(37:25):
Soho that to me, Soho was a fucking pure house
it was.

Speaker 2 (37:29):
It was a great venue for house music.

Speaker 1 (37:31):
Yeah, I just feel like that that Ivy just attracted
a whole nother generation of people.

Speaker 2 (37:37):
I remember that that was the area.

Speaker 3 (37:38):
To me, Ivy attracted and same with Trademark attracted the
same people who went to d C's. But they just
put fucking long pants on and fucking the ship.

Speaker 2 (37:48):
I think that grew up.

Speaker 1 (37:48):
Yeah, yeah, look, Soho was a good club man like
that was a great club. I wish I never got
the DJ that I wish I did, but I was
playing at EP one EP one they changed it to
the Tunnel because of the TV show.

Speaker 2 (38:00):
Remember that was the TV show.

Speaker 1 (38:02):
Underbelly, remember under And then they brought that in because
they were talking about the tunnel, and then they renamed
it to the Tunnel again. But when it was e
P one ninety six era, when you see that, that's
the dragon Fly was fucking known as a good.

Speaker 2 (38:17):
As Actually that was a good house club too. I
forgot about it.

Speaker 1 (38:20):
Yeah, so you guys would have got people from Dragonfly,
so they would have been club you know. When I
was at DJing. I was club hopping. I'd end up
at one end from Oxes Street to the Cross to
you know, down there as well. So you'reck and sojo
Is You're you're not so to me. But then again,
I look, crowd was like the crowd was the crowd
was very sexy.

Speaker 2 (38:36):
Yeah it was.

Speaker 1 (38:37):
There was a better looking crowd, and but I think
ivy in terms of if I'm looking at it from
a promoter's perspective, they were probably massive numbers, you know,
and then they're pulling the massive entertainment. And also Marquee
was as well, that's what the Marquee. I wasn't a
fan of it either, but that's you know. I was also,
these guys are all a generation behind me, you know,

(38:57):
as I sort of come through like nothing, I'm still
in d CM phase, you know, like DCM's are the best,
you know, but I was look d CM. It was
one of the best places to play. You know, they
had this shocking mixer there. I remember this mixer was
from ancient times, right, like it was just a mess.
But when they changed that mixer, you put up with
that just because it was such a good crowd to play.
It's such a good room to play in, but as

(39:18):
a house thing, you you see, you can't do the
same thing with house music at DC, and they tried
house nights. It didn't really work, which is interesting, you
know what I mean. And then EP one the house
music at that time. I see two thousand and six.
From two thousand and two to two thousand and six,
I remember R and B and hip hop being massive,
Eminem fifty cent, all that sort of stuff was huge.

(39:39):
And then two thousand and six, and I remember saying
this at Ruber's sALS, what we'll do in You're two
thousand and four, I said, the next big genre is
going to be electro. I said this before and I'll
say it again here. Another year or two you're going
to start hearing this word electro. Electro is going to
come back. Okay, So I'll come back to this podcast
after you placed it, and I've said it today, right, So,
but I reckon another year or two we'll get electro

(40:00):
coming back. So, but if you go back to two
thousand and six, TV rock came out with Floor Yes,
all right, I.

Speaker 3 (40:06):
Was I was the first one to put TV rock
and this is this is back when I was a
promoter at Milk Lounge. Oh okay, so I went to
open that. I got to run that as a promoter,
so I used to I I got them to play
their first gig in Sydney.

Speaker 1 (40:22):
At that place.

Speaker 2 (40:23):
Well, I've worked for him at Envy.

Speaker 1 (40:25):
Yeah yeah, back at everyone was running it. Remember something
happened to his knee on the night that I was
space to DJ, I've rocked up. There's a copperate the
door saying you're not I'm supposed to be doing to said,
he goes not tonight or not? And then I heard
you in the work I on a phone call Monday,
Yeah that happened, and I thought, wow, I've seen a
lot of stuff go down.

Speaker 2 (40:44):
It's like it's you know, you want to talk about it,
but you can't.

Speaker 3 (40:46):
Where's one for you? And you're probably I don't know
if you'll name it. What's the worst venue you've ever
fucking been at? The worst venue? Worst venue where you
just think, fact, this has got no fucking vibe. It's
fucking not happening. The crowds fucking terrible and it's not
what it's made up to be. I don't think there's
such a thing as a bad crowd. I think there's
more like just an empty room. I've seen some boy.

Speaker 1 (41:12):
Yeah, but you're you're so you probably would have knocked
me back in when I was trying to get into
the side. I remember there was someone that knocked me back. Really,
What what year were you working?

Speaker 3 (41:20):
I was so from two thousand to two thousand and two,
maybe even gone three.

Speaker 1 (41:24):
Okay, say two thousand. I reckon I got knocked back
two or three times. What was the reason why you
got my back?

Speaker 2 (41:28):
Probably because I'm ugly.

Speaker 1 (41:30):
Nah, we would never knock your back. There wouldn't be
ugly if you look like it.

Speaker 2 (41:34):
You haven't said only I would let you win.

Speaker 1 (41:36):
I would let you win if you were I think
there was a few times I was trying to be
uh and and I'll get it. That's the d c
M was a selective crowd in ninety seven. I was selecting.
You know, hey, if you didn't look the part, you're
out of these sort of thing. Yeah, And there was
a bit of that still going on in two thousand.
But I did get knocked back two or three times,
but I didn't get in a more times than a show.

Speaker 3 (41:55):
It wasn't so ho, so you would have got knocked back,
why you I was I wasn't so bad because I
run the door at.

Speaker 1 (42:00):
YU Yeah, okay, so yeah, they were very It was
definitely host Yeah, and they were a bit selective, and
I get it. I didn't fit the parts, like okay,
no worries like don't take my money. But you know,
there was always something good to go. But I think
it was a good club. Do you remember the venue
they had on the wharves Was it Periode or something? Warfate?
Was that what they called it? Down there at Darling

(42:21):
Harbor they used to have the YUZ festivals. Well, I
don't know.

Speaker 3 (42:24):
I think we used to go. It's had a lot
of festivals. I went a field day a lot, but
that was it. There's anything else. It didn't really fruscinate
me that much. There was one of them that they
over sold it. It was an eight thousand capacity venue.
They saw twelve thousand tickets, and the argument from the
promoter was you get people coming and people going, so
we've over sold it. To do that, that was a
pretty good excuse, to be fair. Whether it's true or not,

(42:45):
it's a different story.

Speaker 1 (42:46):
But the problem was everyone wanted to be there for
the fireworks at midnight and then there was just people
who bought tickets and that to refund people and stuff.
So there was one of those ones there at war
Fate there at Darling Harbor. There was a few big
names playing on that one. But you say, even that year,
I remember that all that I'm saying, I remember thinking
to myself, this is going to affect the nightclub industry.
As a promoter, You're looking at us like, man, these

(43:07):
guys are you know, they're paying one hundred bucks a
ticket and there's you know, ten thousand people going. You know. Meanwhile,
these guys are trying to touch fifty but the fireworks
are over there.

Speaker 2 (43:15):
What would they be here at midnight? You know what
I mean?

Speaker 1 (43:17):
So having said that, there was some massive nights at
DCM on un Seve. Yeah. Dcms used to have massive nights.
They did. Yeah, I must have met that. What about
black Market? Black Market? I DJ they're probably three or
four times every other time I went there. I loved it,
but it was full of characters at that time of
the morning, the day, the day clubs. I'd love to
bring those day clubs back, though, I don't think. I

(43:39):
don't think people know at a party like We used
to party at day clubs. I think they start they'd
start at midday and they just go out till ten
o'clock and then go home and go to work the
next d I think that's how they do it now,
and that's why Couldgie's so popular at the moment as well.
Black Market DJ, there are a few times, and they
were good. The Thursday nights were the better nights I remember,
But I remember I used to go there to watch

(44:00):
stev B play. Stevie B was a legend. It was
like my idol. At one point, I could never get
into Black Market. I went twice and I thought was
enough for me. I never went back. You had to
really appreciate the music, and I was. I was more
or less looking at the decks and watch what these
guys were doing. Because I was a big fan of TVB,
you know Captain Kirk. We ended up making music together
later on. I became good mates with all these guys,

(44:22):
you know, like Chris Creator as well. But yeah, they
looked the music there when I was making my music.
But then I locked it a little bit harder than
what the normal level of energy was, which is why
probably my music was a bit more popular in the
UK than it was in Sydney. And what ended up happening,
like you know, you hear and play your songs like
you know, it was pretty good, so that's why I
was sort of going there. But I just remember not

(44:44):
too many times that I get booked for that one, unfortunately,
But I do remember getting an SMS on one particular
day saying not to go to the day club. There
was a message going around on the SUN on the
Saturday night Sunday, don't go to Black Market, like for
your information, there's going to be something bad gay down

(45:04):
and you know guns are involved or something like something
to that effect. And yeah, it happened, and we didn't go,
and we saw it on the news the next night,
and I think a lot of that is really sort
of ruined that club, but it did set a set
a spot in that in that energy scene, you know,
for a while there prior to closing. But good club,

(45:25):
but it was a darker venue.

Speaker 2 (45:27):
It was a really dark venue, not.

Speaker 1 (45:29):
Just because the walls were black, but it was a
dark crowd, dark vibes and if you like that seedy
sort of stuff. At nine o'clock on a Sunday morning,
I got a bit. I love the music. The music
was driving in there as well.

Speaker 3 (45:41):
I tried going out, even off my head, and I
still didn't like it.

Speaker 1 (45:46):
I remember seeing Asian guys with mohawks, like massive high
mohawks in there with the one time I went. It
was a crazy crowd and I was a bit more
of a I guess, a normal guy. But yeah, and
I never really got into the drugs. I was too scared.
I was too scared to take drugs because I heard stuff,
and I guess that's that's why I sort of stayed
away from I just used to drink a lot, you know.
So one of the reasons why I never took drugs.

(46:07):
Coming into ninety five ninety six, there was a girl
and a wood. There was a big famous case and
she'd take an ecstasy at some party. She had died
of an over there still lose this whole big thing
on the news, on the media, drugs are bad.

Speaker 2 (46:18):
They were trying to kill all the rave scene.

Speaker 1 (46:20):
The rave scene was going crazy, and it seemed legit
to me that you know, that happened as we got
a bit older. I remember being we're going to go
to Envy or bib Loss. One night and I'm with
a group of guys and one of them pulls out
a bag, right, and at all these pills in it,
they're like with a yellow with Yeah, that's all I
was going to say, Right, so this is the thing

(46:41):
because I'm a bit of an entrepreneur, as you as
old mate over he said, I'm a bit of an entrepreneur,
I kind of. I'm not a successful entrepreneur, just unemployed.
So I saw the Mitsubishi symbol and I not even
know what Mitsubishes were. I heard everyone talking about at
work and stuff. They'll talk about mitsa bishes and I
didn't really pay too much attention.

Speaker 2 (46:59):
I'm going, what are they? Like, you know, what's going on?
Like he had like.

Speaker 1 (47:02):
Twenty of them or something on it, right, and it
was fascinating to me, right, like are you going to
take all of them? Like what was the situation? And
they go no, And I go all right, say hang on,
how much do you pay for him? And he's telling
me fifty bucks or whatever? So where does it come from?
Like who makes this out? As you know, we're like

(47:22):
you go to death, that's why that's why to put
you off. Well, I'm looking at I'm going like, yeah,
I've heard that one girl to one pill, and like
and then how are these people selling that many to
one bloke? And you might share one or two of
them with your bas I don't know. I'm going, you're
fucking mad. You're off your head, like literally off your head, right.
And then he said to me, goes, they're making them
out west. I go where he goes, like in bathtubs, right,

(47:46):
And I went, and you're buying it and you're going
to put it again your nuts, right. These guys would
probably now be anti vaxxes and that, but they would
have no hesitation in that stuff.

Speaker 2 (47:56):
And I just said, you're mad.

Speaker 1 (47:57):
And then anyway, I was talking to a guy at
work who's kind of into that whole scene. It was
a bit of a character as well, and he said,
he goes, yeah, he goes that, and I was telling
him like, yeah, man, he had you know, that many
pills on him whatever. Yeah, they had the miss A
Bishi logo on it like it's it looked weird, it
look like legit like you know. And he goes, yeah,
he goes, they're making him out west in bath tubs
and he goes, they're putting crushed glass inside them. Yeah,

(48:17):
I had that too, and here's the thing, and I thought,
what would they do that for, becaus it sounds stupid.
He goes, because it tears the lining of your stomach
and you absorb it like it absorbs in your body quicker.
And I sort of didn't really believe that at the time,
but years later there was at our work a drug
guy came in and he told me that it's legitimate
because that's how it gets quicker, and then when it

(48:40):
wears off, they buy more and stuff sort of. So
that was just enough to scare me straight off the bat,
like to even put it in my mouth.

Speaker 2 (48:47):
So that was one time.

Speaker 1 (48:48):
There was another time had a mate. He was a
bit of a lazy guy. I didn't want to have
a job, and you know, come out, it's time to
start working, mate. You know, you got bills to pee.
You can't scap off your parents forever. And we're going out.
So we've gone to I was a very named sort
of club. First he goes like, let's stop pass, I've
got to pick up something off of mate, So drop

(49:09):
him off. Gets to the car and he pulls out
a bag and there's fifty pills in it. And I said, mate,
get that fucking thing out of my car. I'm not
going to get a rest for you. Like, what are
you doing? And where'd you get the money to buy it?
He goes, no, no, no, he's given it to me. I'm
going to sell them. He's got our tick. So I
don't know how all this stuff works right, And I'm going, listen,
you're not hard enough to be a dealer, Like, just

(49:31):
just go and give him back to him and just
write it off, mate, like you're gonna end up in trouble.
And I was saying it genuinely. I was genuinely concerned
this and that he's going to do it. I said, well,
you're not walking in with me. So I walked in
to do my set. So he's hanging off you like
what you're doing your set? Yeah, he's walking around. I said,
you're not walking in with me. So he's walked in
like half an hour add and I'm something I see
you walk past because I don't want to be involved.

(49:52):
It's got nothing to do with me. And we're arguing
all the way there. And I'll tell you what. He's
moving them. He's moving them. He's blake this, blake this Blake,
and I'm like, okay, he must have made it, you know,
at least a grand by now. Right. Anyway, I'm thinking
he's he's going to and I thought to myself, he's
going to get himself in trouble. He's not the sort
of bloke that could do this successfully as his own

(50:13):
sort of sight hustle or business. So anyway, he disappears
for a bit and he comes up to me and
he's got this look on his face and he's like
this and okay, what happened? And he goes, I got bustard, okay,
bought the cops. Goes no, by the owner and when
you're joking, get the fuck out of you go you
know you're gonna get me sacked.

Speaker 2 (50:33):
And he goes no, he goes, I went down there.

Speaker 1 (50:35):
This guy that we both knew came up and said, hey,
have you got any pills?

Speaker 2 (50:39):
He goes, yeah it guys come around here.

Speaker 1 (50:40):
Took him straight to the nightclub owner, right, he goes.

Speaker 2 (50:43):
This guy's selling.

Speaker 1 (50:43):
Drugs in un right, and then he's come to me, goes,
I've got no money like your ma a lift time.
So he took everything toward it and I just said mate,
and I never hung out with him again, and that
was and he just disappeared because he got threatened. Basically,
we used to do that all the time. We should
do it all the time.

Speaker 3 (51:03):
You throw it out the back now, dcs we say
we used to find the dealers and fucking yeah, take
overyth and go confiscate them all.

Speaker 1 (51:09):
Yeah, yeah, yeah. That was one of the things where
I sort of realized that side of the scene isn't
for me.

Speaker 3 (51:15):
I don't get me wrong, I could have gone through
it them years of partying. But the thing is, I
think I partied so well taking the pills, but when
I did, and I don't regret it because it was
an experience. But the thing is, back in that era,
I was coming over from the UK and it was
massive in the UK. I mean, you couldn't go out
in UK without having a fucking pill.

Speaker 1 (51:35):
That was the other thing when I heard my mates
sort of when i'd seen Take one or two, they
couldn't go out again. Yeah, And I never wanted to
lose that love for the music. And I saw them say, oh,
I can't be I gotta find onne like they needed
they needed that to enjoy the music.

Speaker 2 (51:49):
Sorry, but yeah, but.

Speaker 3 (51:50):
That's how that's how I got with me, you know
what I mean, because I went to I came from
the UK, and that's what all my mates did back then,
and you come over here, they're weren't as strong as
the UK. Then you get on the fucking coke and
it's not as strong as the UK, but you get addicted.

Speaker 1 (52:03):
To go and partying.

Speaker 3 (52:05):
And I must admit, even though people might say, oh,
you took pills and coke, but the thing is.

Speaker 1 (52:10):
I didn't drink as much they need to do. I
drink a lot. I'd be spending four five hundred dollars
on the bar. They'd offered me free drinks, and I'd
say that's embarrassing. I'd rather pay for it, like a
lot of the time. And basically the only time I'd
take a free drink is if it was non alcoholic,
like a soft drink if I was driving, because I'd
never drink and drive, but I would drink more. So
that's the other the flip. So that's why I could.

(52:30):
And I wasn't just the you gott to enjoy yourself
a bit. But I did like a drink one hundred percent.
And I don't drink anything now so things like you
though I was weary.

Speaker 3 (52:37):
I was always anti drugs, was very anti drugs til
I got to eighteen nineteen.

Speaker 2 (52:43):
I was very anti drugs.

Speaker 1 (52:44):
Yeah, and then all of a sudden you just meet
that one person you go out with and when you say,
it's actually when I see my best mate. Actually, because
I went back to the UK, and that's what stopped
me my best mate for the like since I was
five years old. We went out for drinking in ukn
because it's fucking you know, you're pumped up your back
and seeing all your mates again. And he pulled out
pills in a bag of coke and it's like, what's

(53:05):
going on? And then he goes, yeah, like let's do this, Neil.
You think, well, if he's doing it, I can do it. Yeah,
And you don't think anything like touch you. I've never
had anything and I don't do it anymore. But like never,
nothing ever happened to me, you know what I mean?

Speaker 2 (53:17):
Yeah, And that's the thing.

Speaker 1 (53:19):
It's always what if you say, like I said, the
crushed glass in them was enough to scare me. That
girl dying and it wood was a big story that
was enough to sort of scare me. I got told
you a mixing it with fucking bleach and fucking.

Speaker 2 (53:31):
That's what I heard.

Speaker 1 (53:32):
Yeah, and the people that were kind of making it's like,
why would you trust these people and just put it
like you know, and then look, it.

Speaker 2 (53:40):
Was all around me.

Speaker 1 (53:41):
I'm not gonna lie, And I think that there was
a lot of bad stuff going on, Like you know,
I saw some after effects of people in other venues
and that they're out on the street that it had
something that didn't wash off well with them, and you've
got to be really careful with that stuff. And I'd
sort of say, yeah, best off not to do it.

Speaker 3 (53:58):
You know, if you could go back in time for
one more fucking number, what would you Where did you
go and what era.

Speaker 1 (54:06):
Would you do it? What year would you do it?
I'd go back to probably nineteen ninety seven DCM when
it was still the number in the top ten clubs
in the world, because it was ninety eight where that
donk sort of came in that started. It was probably
around in ninety seven, but we didn't hear it here
and that's where the music. That's another thing that shaped

(54:27):
them used That ninety six to ninety seven era shaped
the energy sound of Sydney in a big way because
we'll get music from everywhere. So we're in Australia, there's
no internet whatever, but you're getting it from Netherlands, Germany, Spain, Italy, UK.
Then it forges the same little sort of it's say,
little sort of thing. And that's why so i'd probably
go back to that ninety seven era because that's what

(54:48):
to find the music for me and DCM. The DJ's
in there, say, before I started making music, that would
definitely be the place that i'd go. And I wouldn't
touch the decks. I wouldn't want touch the decks. I
just want to enjoy it from a crowd's perspective. That's
another thing too, right, I don't like playing there when
everyone's there looking at me. In a nightclub, it's like
guys dance with each other like this is your night, right,

(55:09):
that's a big thing. But that's what I just wanted
to watch the DJ. No, No, it wasn't like that
when I was going there, before I started DJing there,
they were all dancing amongst each other and just enjoying themselves.
And that's what I loved. You guys enjoy sols. I'm
enjoying myself.

Speaker 2 (55:23):
Let's go.

Speaker 1 (55:23):
But when they're all sitting there sort of like I
call it, like it's a false idol thing. Maybe it's
my religious my Catholic belief or whatever, but hey, man,
just enjoy each other, you know. Like, and I'm not
going to say that I hate it, but it's like comfortable.
I prefer it more when they're just amongst each other dancing.
That's what it's all about, you know, Like just.

Speaker 3 (55:41):
See, I don't remember that every venue I've done, it's
let's just watch the fucking DJ.

Speaker 1 (55:46):
And I used to think, see it must be off putting,
like just staring at some I don't think I'm better
than anybody else in the place, Like honestly don't. I
Just are you enjoying the music? Because I am, you know.

Speaker 3 (55:55):
But the thing is, it's not that you're better than
any it's the fact of what you're making them feel
like while you're playing there.

Speaker 1 (56:01):
I can respect the fact that they're respecting what I'm doing.
But man, it's like I just prefer a room where
everyone's just dancing with each other. That's just always been
my case, and it's like the only place you're going
to get that was the fucking old retro. No, we're
getting it all the other clubs are doing that. There
wasn't anything that once, not even when it was it
so who make one?

Speaker 3 (56:19):
But it was always watched the fucking DJ pee week
faris let's watch him, you know what I mean?

Speaker 1 (56:24):
Like it's just like no one ever just looked at
that side of you. It was all where's the DJ? Yeah,
and we're just standing in front of them hopefully you
look at me, you know what I mean.

Speaker 2 (56:32):
I don't know.

Speaker 1 (56:32):
It's just not my thing. A what's your biggest regret?
Biggest regret? Yeah, not enjoying the time while it was happening,
not enjoying it as much and thinking of what there
was a stage there where I had a massive ego,
but a massive ego to work with other DJs to
bring everyone up. But at the same time, Hey, I'm
Dave Olson, I'm a DJ, I'm releasing music. These guys
are buying my vinyls in the UK. I had that

(56:54):
bit of an ego. I regret that a bit, but yeah,
and not enjoying it while it was happening, not sort
of absorbing it enough and sort of is there anything
you wish you could have you should have done, but
you can't step back.

Speaker 2 (57:06):
I don't know if he's going to the UK.

Speaker 1 (57:08):
I really I got you probably know the guy and
Drew Farrell, Oh yeah, yeah, Okay, So first of all,
I don't regret when he asked me in two thousand
and seven and two thousand and nine. I don't regret
those two times because my wife was seven babies at
the same time, so he did ask me twice. But
prior to that, when the energy seene had died off,
Alex went over there and killed it.

Speaker 2 (57:29):
That was like two thousand and four or whatever.

Speaker 1 (57:31):
I wish I would have gone over it like before that,
but I had no idea how big the scene was.
We didn't have the internet to see what was going on,
so basically just traveling to the UK and just seeing
what was going on and maybe trying to build something
bigger there. But having said that, I ended up getting married,
having kids and awesome family. Can't ask for anything more
than that. But in the nightclub Seen, it would have
been nice just to play once in the UK, just once,

(57:53):
and Andy asked me the first time, booked the date.

Speaker 2 (57:56):
Look, my missus just had a baby.

Speaker 1 (57:58):
Can't go two thousand and nine, he's asked again, and
my daughter was being born. I was like, anyway, so
all these years go past. He asked me again in
twenty nineteen, could you want to come over next year?
Would you have another kid? What happened in twenty nineteen
He booked, He transferred the money and he goes, what

(58:18):
date do you want? He picked the date and it
was the day where Croatia was playing England for a
euro qualifier or something that was. I can't remember it was,
but basically it was a three hour train ride. And
I thought, well, if I DJ and I'll go and
watch the game, like this is a mad holiday, and
we'll do it and say he's transferred. You know, this
is like my first international booking. I thought this is

(58:38):
going to be also, and he was going to be
like an old school sort of night. And a day later,
two days later, I get a guy asking me to
go DJ for his fortieth birthday in Croatia. On there's
an island called it's called Hvar. We call it fart
in Croatian. Right, It's like a pretty it's a party island. Yeah,
and he's going to have Nadi RL performing And I
was going to go there, and we start talking about

(59:00):
this and I said, well, what date is it?

Speaker 2 (59:01):
And it was the week after? How good is this?

Speaker 1 (59:04):
Right? So now it's got to the point where we're
going to make enough money I could take the family
for a holiday and start planning everything. And then all
of a sudden, you know, you're hearing about this this
COVID and these bats and it's getting pretty serious. And
then and I rang, I remembering my brother, and I
told him iad listen. I go, I've scored this gig
and going to be playing the UK and then I'm
going to go watch the England play Croatia. And my

(59:25):
brother says, I'm going to that too. Wait really, I go, sweet,
we'll meet up like end of coincidence. I guess what.
The week after, I'm going to go to Croatia on
FAD and I'm going to be DJN there for this
guy's fortieth And he goes, I'm going to be there too,
on the same island. And I've said to my wife,
this is not a coincidence, Okay, this is something bad

(59:46):
is going to happen, Like this is not really it's not.

Speaker 2 (59:49):
Really a good aim.

Speaker 1 (59:49):
And and anyway, and then I think it was like
the next day after that, I heard that the NBA
shut down, and then that was it. The whole world
just went. But anyway, that's what happened to me.

Speaker 2 (59:59):
So that was the end.

Speaker 1 (01:00:00):
That was a third chance. But all times from dy
Pharaoh say, if you know him, tell him, I'm still keen.
I've messaged him a couple of times there, you know,
but I think it's still get he's not even replying.
He's too he's too good. But he like, so, how
do you know Andy, I've known for ages man.

Speaker 2 (01:00:17):
Yeah, a big promoter.

Speaker 1 (01:00:19):
You know, he gets all the big acts.

Speaker 2 (01:00:22):
He's the first guy the book Alex k Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:00:24):
Because because when my dad had, you know, CLUBO five one,
which was a rival to the to the club with
fucking where Alex was like, I used to be there
and see everybody and get to know everybody, and so yeah,
my dad had for fucking seven years.

Speaker 2 (01:00:37):
They're doing No.

Speaker 1 (01:00:37):
Five to one and you know what, So there's a
guy I've been talking with the guys from five to one. Yeah. Okay,
so someone's messaged me Paul, oh h O, don't okay.
I think he's got something to do. He's one of
the promoters there and I was talking. I said, look,
I don't think it's going to happen, but I've been
sort of put the like I'd like to just.

Speaker 2 (01:00:57):
Do it once.

Speaker 1 (01:00:57):
Well, Butler's got that place now, That's what I'm saying.
I think I think they're doing it together.

Speaker 3 (01:01:01):
So because he reopened that place in the state, so
he owns Yeah, he keeps talking about Yeah, he got
a refurbished team and they'd been closed down for over
fucking five or six years.

Speaker 1 (01:01:10):
They've done it all up and fucking yet it's reopened again.

Speaker 2 (01:01:13):
Lee.

Speaker 1 (01:01:14):
Butler, like he pressed one of my finals as well
when they had a label called b C D and
they released some songs for me. But he used to
play my tracks back in the day as well. Well.

Speaker 3 (01:01:23):
I tried to get him out of you so when
I was at d CMS, Yeah, I tried to get
him out to play at DCMS, but he just couldn't
do it because he was going from UK to I
Beefer at the time and I Beef it was building
up at the time, so he was working at Garlands too,
and Garlands had just started at I be Fair, they
just opened up a nightclub and a boat at I
be fair and he was doing that.

Speaker 1 (01:01:42):
Wow. Interesting, man, I'd love to I'd love to meet
those guys. There's another guy, Rob Kne.

Speaker 2 (01:01:47):
You know Rob Kane.

Speaker 1 (01:01:47):
No, I don't know. Rob Kines are pretty solid DJ
as well, I mean out there he probably they've Lee Baller,
Lee Butler talk about Dave Graham. He's one of that
that weld together.

Speaker 3 (01:01:58):
They were together, there were a duo, and then they
separated them with their different ways to do different things.

Speaker 1 (01:02:02):
But I think they're still like, mate, what would you
would you? Would you say? Okay, describe yourself in what world? Talkative?
I don't stop. I don't you know what people told me.
I'll talk a lot. I get it, I'm aware of it,
and I just can't stop sometimes.

Speaker 2 (01:02:19):
I don't know why. It must be the Croatian in me.

Speaker 1 (01:02:21):
So well. I want to say thank you for coming on, bro,
because I've loved this one. This is being so relaxing
and it's been a laugh and it's been in down
memory lane. I fucking loved it. I think, don't what
I'm going to do though, when I promote you.

Speaker 2 (01:02:35):
I'm going to promote your croation today. Please don't keep
that one undercover.

Speaker 1 (01:02:41):
I think yeah, Otherwise none will.

Speaker 2 (01:02:44):
Listen to it. If you don't want anyone to listen
to or watch them, Yeah, use my real name.

Speaker 1 (01:02:48):
I think Dave Oston is more marketable.