1995 Part 2 – Ray’s Reviews

Emagine

Location: 4 Canley Vale Rd, Wetherill Park

Date: 13th May, 1995

Rating: 6/10

Situated in a warehouse, this rave was truly great. Unfortunately however it was not long after the double shooting at a rave, and so the amount of people that turned up was not anywhere near what it should have been. The promoters actually ended up loosing money from this party because of the amount of people. Despite this, the rave was really good. There were two rooms, one a trance room which had incredible lasers all night, and the other the main room. There were tonnes of lasers at this party and the atmosphere was great. Considering the incidents of the previous week, the turnout was also reasonably good, with a few hundred ravers making a wicked party. There was lots of smoke and lights galore. The music was quite good too. A great party spoiled slightly by things out of the promoters hands.

Dumbo

Location: 56 Camden Valley Rd, Prestons

Date: 27th May, 1995

Rating: 7/10

An absolutely freezing night! It would have been about 5 degrees celcius and it was painful to your skin. This place was situated basically in the middle of nowhere. A really strange setting, it was next to an ice rink and a couple of other buildings, but there were no homes for many kilometres. The road out the front was a 110kph road just to give you an idea of how remote it was. The rave was held in a small building that from the outside just looked like a public toilet block. The music was pumping loud all night and it was really great. The DJ’s were awesome and everyone was having the time of their lives.

Only about two hundred people at the most turned up for this event, just as well because of the size of the room. This was mainly because there was another huge event (Space Cadet IV) on at the same time, which turned out to be a disappointment from what I have heard. There were lasers, the strobe was going berserk, and lots of colourful lights. The police showed up to turn the sound down, but as soon as they left it went back up to full blast again. There were also jugglers, acrobats and fire breathers to add atmosphere to this small, but wicked party. A couple of tiny hiccups throughout the night including the whole sound system dying a couple of times did not affect the mood of the party, everyone just threw balloons around instead! A memorable party, for the cold, the music and the atmosphere.

Brave New World

Location: Barnes Rd, Central Mangrove

Date: 25th November, 1995

Rating: 7/10

This rave was outdoors on a property near Gosford. It was miles away from anything and heaps of people had turned up for this event. A huge stage had been set up, with a couple of lasers which shone over the outdoor sky. Even though it was outdoors, the smoke seemed to stay around, and the lasers went for about a hundred metres before the smoke ran out. This was a pretty spectacular event in a really great outdoor setting. Sequential One was the live act that was playing there, and they were quite good – hyping up the crowd all the time, and giving out free CD’s and other stuff. The music was good, and so was the sound quality. Throughout the night, two bonfires had been lit, the media didn’t like the idea of this and this would get into the newspapers the next week. The vibe was good and a lot of people stayed to watch the sunrise. Overall this rave was really good, except for the fact that there was tonnes of cow crap everywhere and lots of spiders! My first outdoor rave away from the city.

Eclipse ’95

Location: Centennial Stadium, Redfern Rd, Minto

Date: 9th December, 1995

Rating: 7/10

This was a pretty new and cool venue (at the time) and it suited the massive act that was to perform live. Ultrasonic, the worlds greatest techno act (as some say) were going to make the dancefloor explode with their live performance. The stadium was packed with thousands of people, and the music was great. At around 2:30 am Ultrasonic came on stage to the cheer of the crowd. They played a couple of hours of hi-nrg music while ravers were partying hard (well those that could move). I was at the front of the crowd, and it was so packed that it was very difficult to move around. Standing right next to a speaker during a live act with the high frequencies turned up loud is not advisable, so I found out during the next week, when my hearing was affected for the whole week, and I had ringing ears for 3 days afterwards! The crowd was pumping, and the whole night turned out to be very good. A mean way to grab money off innocent ravers was used by the organisers. Just before the main act, they shut off the water supply so that everyone had to buy drinks or die of thirst. The only other option was to go outside and drink, but have to wait in a queue of people that would take longer than Ultrasonics act to get back in. A great night that made ravers rip up the carpet sheets like the world would end the next day.