WEEK ENDING 22/11/03

On Sunday 23rd of November 2003 I was up at 5:30am to catch a flight from Manchester to London Heathrow for a connecting flight at 11:30am to Bangkok in Thailand, after finishing at the Syndicate on Saturday night with guest dj Smokin Jo taking over the decks. The BA flight from Manchester is quite quick and I was there within about 40 minutes. I was flying my long haul section of my journey on Thai Airways who always provide a great service whichever class you fly. On this occasion I had booked an economy class seat and used my Air miles with Star Alliance to upgrade to Business Class as I had done so much flying with Thai the year before when I was based in Bangkok at the Ministry Of Sound.

I had one of the best surprises yet in my travels when I arrived at the departure gate I was upgraded to 1st class for the first time ever. Most people who do long haul flights regularly will know that economy is a very tiresome exercise and I had mostly only ever gone by economy. With being in Asia last year, flights in Business class are very much cheaper than in the UK and I had flown Business class on almost every flight in 2002. The difference between Business class and 1st class is quite dramatic.

On boarding the plane I found my seat to be a fully reclining bed with ample room for all 6 foot 2 inches of me and as I sat down and got comfortable the air hosts offered me Dom Perignon champagne or vintage wine so it was rude not to go for the Dom!

The flight to Bangkok is around 10 to 11 hours from London and on this occasion seemed to be very quick due to the levels of comfort and great service I was experiencing. The meal was outstanding with Lobster Thermidor being the main preference.

I arrived in Bangkok early morning on Monday 24th and headed straight for the 5* Landmark hotel on Sukhumvit road. My stay in Bangkok was a short one as I had a connecting flight to Calcutta in India at 11:30pm. In my short time there I hooked up with a couple of friends for a drink and went for a very relaxing 2 hour oil massage at my favourite massage & Spa – The King & I on Sukhumvit Soi 12 (Same road that Ministry of Sound was on)

I walked past the former Ministry of Sound with a reminiscent glaze in my eyes as it is now called DBLO or double O Disco. The Police had put an end to any success that Ministry could have had in Bangkok and im very glad that I had the better year there before it sadly changed companies and names.

In the evening I was back to Bangkok International airport and on my way to Calcutta in Eastern India via another Thai Airways flight. In Calcutta I met up with my Indian Agent Anindasil and I had very little time there before we were on a connecting flight on Jet Airways to Mumbai (Formerly Bombay) with two very nice English ladies from Essex who was also out on the tour to offer visual support as dancers.
We arrived into Mumbai on Tuesday 25th in the evening and I had a couple of hours in our hotel before I had to go and pick up Judge Jules and his wife Amanda (who you might know more popular as the singer Angelic - Amanda had a top 10 hit in 2000 with “Its My Turn” incidentally wrote by Jules & Darren Tate.) Jules & Amanda had just flown in from a gig in Singapore and were obviously quite tired when one of the most unusual assaults came in from TV companies and press to try and get them to do interviews at a club 40 minutes away which was crazy considering in was around 12:30 at night! Jules reluctantly gave an interview at the hotel which should have taken 15-20 minutes but ended up being 2 hours! I think as it was Jules’s 1st time in India the press were very keen to find out more about him.
During this time I had left the hotel with the girls to go and do a “pre” or “night before” show at a small club called “Rock Bottom” in the city. The place was packed as im sure they were waiting for the arrival of Judge Jules which was never going to happen as nothing had been arranged through either myself or Jules’s management company Serious. The crowd was quite a trendy cosmopolitan crowd and I played at about 1am till 3am. They really got into my music which surprised me greatly as usually the night before the big shows are very quiet but this club was rammed and I played a mainly funky & Tribal House set.

After the gig I retired to my hotel room for some much needed sleep.

On Wednesday 26th after sleeping in till about 2pm I joined Jules & Amanda for a great Indian Lunch in the hotel before getting in the car and heading off to the site of the nights gig.

We did a quick sound check and I gave them the Syndicate Banners and Visuals for the gig. The venue was a converted Bollywood studio called “The Famous Studios” I have been told that many cult Indian films have been shot here and the size of the place was very impressive, about 4 to 5000 capacity.

After the sound check it was time to take in some of the Shopping and site seeing with Jules & Amanda along the seafront of Mumbai. We didn’t really stop for very long just quickly jumping out of the car on the bay to get some Sunset pictures and a small bit of shopping in the district of Bandra. We returned to the hotel for a catnap before the night’s main event at the Famous Studios, The Bacardi Blast & Syndicate Superclub World tour.

I got to the gig early as I was doing an 11 till 1 set before Jules. On my arrival the place was packed to the rafters and I was straight on the decks to a fantastic response from the crowd. This was my 2nd gig in Mumbai having played at the Fire & ice club in 2002. This gig was very special though and they were so responsive to whatever I played. In the middle of my set I dropped Punjabi MC’s popular UK hit and the place went mental. I played more pumping as my set went on which led perfectly into the arrival of Judge Jules at 1am.
This was Jules’s 1st ever set in India and the place went mad for him although the event organisers were trying to get him to go into the huge mirrored rotating sphere to do his entrance as Indians haven’t quite got to grips with dj introductions yet! Jules rocked the place and it was a fantastic gig. I must have made a good impression as well as they asked me to go back on after Jules which I dually accepted for another 30 minute set. I went back to my hotel at around 5am ready for another early rise for a flight to Delhi the next day.

We all were on the same 13:30 flight from Mumbai to Delhi and arrived in Delhi at around 4pm.

We headed straight for the Radisson Hotel for a chill and a bite to eat at a fabulous Chinese Restaurant which served the most amazing King Prawns I think Myself, Jules & Amanda had ever had! Jules did a quick interview at the meal before we were headed off to our gig at the Bristol Hotel in Delhi. The gig had originally been planned for a different location, but due to demand for tickets they had to relocate to a bigger venue. This was an out door event in a huge Marquee which held around 3 to 4000. Jules was on 1st as he was going straight from the gig to the airport for his flight to London. Due to the nature of the introductions the night before I decided I was going to introduce Jules myself tonight as they even asked if they could drop him in from a crane!! Naturally he declined and his reception was very good. I thought the crowd in Delhi were very subdued from the crowd in Mumbai and having played in Delhi 3 times before I have always found this to be the case. The crowd was mainly the upper class Indians and there were a lot of posers at the front and very few who were there for the real understanding of the music. Things soon changed though as Jules took the crowd on a rollercoaster ride from Funky House to full on pumping house & Trance. During his set he played an ironic 118, 118 mix which was a subliminal dig at the service whose call centre is in Delhi and im sure for anyone who has tried to call that service will find out that they are not quite on the mark when it comes to directory assistance. Jules pointed out that if you call them and ask for the number of Manchester United arguably the worlds most popular Football team you will get a reply asking “is this a business or residential number you are asking for! Case rested!
Jules dually delivered a great set with my often drunken rapping, Singing and doing his Radio 1 strap lines through his set to quite a good response and he had to dash for his flight to London. I took over the decks and was advised that if I played Punjabi MC as I had the previous night that it would be greeted with even more response than last night so I dually obliged and they were right, the place went bananas! I started with the original radio mix and then went into the dance mix to get my set going. As Jules played a more diverse set I decided to stick with the funky, Tribal & Twisted set and the crowd rocked until just after 3am when the event halted to an end. Feeling great and very drunk by this stage I had a quick bite to eat with Anindasil my agent and Vicki & Jo the dancers before heading off to my hotel for a good nights sleep. I had most of Friday the 28th in bed except to pick up my tickets for my flight tonight to Bangkok and checked in for my Air India flight at 18:30.
This was my 1st time flying with Air India and judging by the age of the Boeing 747 (about 15-20 year old plane!) I was a little apprehensive about the prospect of my 3 & a half hour flight back to Bangkok, however it was quite alright on the top deck in 1st class for the 2nd time in less than a week, but no reclining bed on this flight, just plenty of booze and good food!

I arrived into Bangkok on Friday night - Saturday morning of the 29th November at 12:30am and headed straight for my hotel. As I didn’t have a gig tonight I met up with an old pal and former work colleague Steve Shepherd (Shep) we went for a drink and a bite to eat before I got a good nights sleep.
The next day I decided to get a lot of my Xmas shopping out of the way and headed for the popular markets of MBK in Siam and also to the computer centre called Pantip Plaza. Now anyone who has been to Bangkok will know that it is a haven for fake clothes, DVD’s, Watches & software. As I am setting up a new studio very soon I decided to take advantage of some great new software and bought loads of new clothes and presents for my friends also taking time out to get some tailored suits measured up.

Thailand is a fantastic place and I decided on this trip to stay in Bangkok even though I had 5 days here.

After plenty of shopping I went back to the hotel to freshen up and get ready for dinner with my old dj friends from Ministry of Sound. I met up with DJ Sunzone and some other friends from MOS and we went for some dinner before my last gig of the tour at Lucille Disco TK on RCA road in Bangkok.

After dinner I met up with my old sparring & football partner Danny Poole who works for a Asian removal company. Danny used to be a Porn Star in a previous occupation so when I first arrived in Thailand we got on very well! We had a few quick drinks before meeting up with Shep and a few other mates then it was in a cab and up to RCA for the gig. When I arrived at the club the manager was out front waiting for me but didn’t look too happy. He said that there was a huge police presence around that night and that most clubbers were scared away from all the clubs due to the past urine testing that goes on whenever there is a big event. This happened in Ministry Of Sound when I was there around Chinese New Year in 2002 the night after we had Judge Jules at the club and this affectedly ended the huge success that the club would have had. With this in mind I entered the club and to my dismay found it quite empty, however I think there was more than met the eye. I asked how the event had been publicised and the manager had told me that he had only done “in-house” publicity and no marketing around Bangkok.
I was very disappointed to say the least as my time here in Bangkok was excellent and I had attracted a huge following in the city when I was at Ministry of Sound. It was simply a case of no one knew I was here! I even bumped into some old friends the day after in a pub who didn’t know I was here and would have loved to have come to the gig. Anyway it turned out not too bad in the end, my mates who were with me together with a small select crowd really got into it and I really loved playing to a small crowd who were really in front of the dj box getting in to what I was playing. I kept to a musical formula which I played the previous year at MOS playing mainly Tribal house and they loved it! It was a bit of an anticlimax after the fantastic success of the India dates, but I had a great time anyway. After the gig I went to DJ Sunzone’s new bar around the corner called “Downtempo” which is very modern in style and I would definitely recommend to anyone on a visit to RCA and after a few more JD & Cokes I was off to bed.

Sunday to Wednesday was much of the same with shopping in mind plus a few relaxing massages and another unannounced small gig at Sunzone’s bar Downtempo on Monday night. I was sad to leave again as I boarded my flight back to London on Wednesday night Thursday morning. As daft as it sounds after travelling 1st class on the way out, Business Class seemed very ordinary, but then again I have to be thankful of the position I am in that affords me the luxury of such benefits (even if the gigs pay for the flights!!) I arrived back into the UK at about 6am on Thursday morning, the 4th of December and after a quick flight connection up to Manchester I was back in Blackpool Thursday afternoon.

With a small catnap it was back to normality with my usual Thursday night set at The Syndicate. God I wished all sound systems were as good as The Syndicate’s.

More Diary action from other exotic locations to come soon………….