From: PLANET E HQ <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Wednesday, June 07, 2000 7:10 PM
Subject: Just another weekend in Detroit?
3 DAYS
4 STAGES
1.5 MILLION PEOPLE
1 HELL OF A PARTY
For all of you who couldn't make it to the first annual
Detroit Electronic Music Festival, here's the scoop...
THE BIGGEST...
...event ever in Detroit.
...free dance music event in the U.S.
...smiles on the faces of all who attended and everyone behind
the scenes.
The City of Detroit and the Detroit Police announced on Tuesday 30th May,
an estimated 1.5 million people attended this three day event (May
27th-29th).
Planet E's own Carl Craig chose 70 performers from Detroit legends to
unknowns and international artists,
covering all spectrums of the electronic genre. From Hip Hop to House to
Techno and way
beyond they came and played to a packed Hart Plaza, in the sun and the rain.
To get a rather pixilated and errrrr abstract view of some of the festival,
check out the real audio* on
http://www.groovetech.com/demf/
*Richie Hawtin + Rolando are not shown on the real audio website as they
chose not to be broadcast.
Planet E Artist's and DJ's on real audio:
Jason Hogans - debuted his live show on the Underground Stage (a concrete
bunker space below
the main plaza) - spotlighting his sensitively diverse music, Hogans
surprised us all by not only
having rappers Deity and greenSKY featured on the set, but he also got on
the mic and did a little flowin'
himself!
Check out the closing number, a beautiful impromptu jam with Ray Brim, Tony
Benko, Randy Chandler
and River on drums + percussion, Caleb Grayson on guitar and vocal
weirdness and Tony Benko again
on acoustic guitar. Young Detroit talent at its best.
Recloose (5pm Saturday) - came out of his dining room to dj to a packed
Undergound Stage, bringing
them a slice of Rec'funk. From the first cheer as he came on, a very
excited local crowd break-danced and
grooved to the kid they have followed since his first record for Planet E...
an emotional time was had by all.
Kenny Dixon Jnr aka Moodymann (6pm Sunday) - In an unannounced special
performance (Carl Craig
likes to surprise), the elusive Moodymann rocked the main DEMF Stage for 2
hours. Joined by Umar Bin
Hassan, from The Last Poets, he took the sea of sun baked bodies through a
lesson in house music Kenny
Dixon Jnr style.
Making a bold statement about the importance of this festival happening at
this time in this city, he broke it
down to us and played the hauntingly beautiful "We Almost Lost Detroit" by
Gill Scott-Heron, and we must
say we had to fight back the tears! The genius that is Kenny Dixon marches
on.
Mike 'AGENT X' Clark (4pm Saturday) - battled with the wind on the CPOP
Stage (needles jumping).
Bringing a full Detroit band to play along with him - Jerry The Cat +
Sundiata on percussion, Malik on
keyboards and Myon singing... and the crowd went wild, hands in the air, as
young and old got down to
Detroit House ala Agent X. As he looked out across the diverse array of
people gigging to his beats, Clark
exclaimed "I can't believe I am listening to the music I love, towering over
us is the Renaissance center, and there
are people I haven't seen since high school smiling up at me!"
Hannah (Midday Saturday) - struggled to smile while the wind and rain threw
the needles westwards on the
opening set for the CPOP stage on the first day. A rather wet, shy and
small crowd bobbed in the distance
while she scolded the weathermakers with "Give Me The Sunshine" by Leo's
Sunshipp and "Wind Parade" by
Donald Byrd. Soldiering on through frustrations she warmed up the growing
crowd with some soulful
globe-trotting freestyle sounds. And then there was sun!!!!
****************************************************************************
********
But to give you an idea of what happened to rest of The Planet E Crew, where
we
went and what we saw, here's a excerpt from our secret diary entries for the
festival period.
(We would like to apologize to any artists that we did not mention, that did
perform,
we simply could not get to see everybody)
Saturday 27th May
Woke up too early thinking about the weekend ahead, couldn't sleep last
night. Filled the van with Planet E
t'shirts, cd's and vinyl to take down to our booth at the festival and The
Planet E Crew was off in full force with
nervous tummies and dreams of hot coffee.
The rain was unforgiving, so trying to find our designated stall in a
pre-festival panicked Hart Plaza
was difficult to say the least... OK, Planet E Crew now positioned and ready
to strike!
The rain stopped at midday, just after opening and the crowds started to
grow. Our hot sales team
were driven hard by a constant stream of eager shoppers, who couldn't get
enough of the treasures
on offer - shall we just say there were certain 69 + Designer Music releases
spotted in the racks -
but every now and then one of us would run around soaking up the atmosphere
on each of the 4 stages,
we only got to see a few performances...
Craig Taborn (Innerzone Orchestra's pianist) taught the main stage about the
history of one-man electronic
possibilities, with his excursion into (dare we try to describe) Herbie
Hancock/John Hassell/Keith Jarrett-esque
experimental jazz - and the crowds kept coming - Scion + Tikiman expanded
some heads with the Chain
Reaction crew in a King Tubby-stylee . Theo Parrish brought the spirit of
Ron Hardy to the exploding
CPOP stage and played the Intruders "I'll Always Love My Momma" for his
family who were proudly present - still more people piled onto the site -
demo competition winners represented too, Bill Van Loo chilled'em out with
his melodic-dubbedout-techno and DYKEHOUSE played everything from
"Old-MacDonald-had-a-farm Electro" to soulful synth lines, for those who
love it eclectic.
Then darkness fell and the main stage lit up, sounds and smells swelled
across the submerged bowl of the
auditorium filled with smiling faces - that's when we first realized what
was really happening - looking out from
the huge stage across thousands of people as far as the eye could see, we
knew that Detroit and the world had
come to pay respect to a wealth of music that this city has produced in the
past 2 decades. Everybody was
speechless, no-one could believe it, Carl Craig's dream was finally
reality... and then Stacey Pullen + Kenny Larkin came on a rocked the hell
out of all of us! The Planet E Crew went home tired, elated and looking
forward to the next day.
Sunday 28th May
Planet E Crew spent most of the day setting up for the Planet E/Exclusive
Productions after-festival party and
keeping the Planet E booth together (the girls seem to like the new
Paperclip People T's and we're hoping the
'gooderthanamuthefucka' T's didn't offend too many people).
We thought today was going to be a big turn out, because of the Hip-Hop
acts, but nobody expected 500,000
people, this is really getting a bit silly. The rain was considerate again
and disappeared just after lunch time,
though while it poured for the first acts, it didn't stop them giving all
they had to the people dancing with
umbrellas. Double Helix's singer Rebecca Anderson, filled the DEMF Stage
auditorium with her beautiful, powerful voice. John Arnold's band, seven
strong with three dancers, gave an amazing show, fusing latin percussion
with computer rhythms. Carlos Souffront set the Underground Stage perfectly
with stunning electronic sounds, ready for ADULT., Godfather, Ectomoph and
Dj Assault to each deliver stellar performances, one after another.. there
were so many people trying to fit in this stage during these acts, that they
had to close the entrances, they could fit no more in! Eddie Folkes took us
back and turned us out with Bill Beaver+ Boots on vocals at the CPOP Stage.
The new home town Hip Hop crews were rockin
the Motor Stage all day, from Detroit's infamous DJ Houseshoes to
Lacksidaisical + Montana (from Antidote Music Systems) who came with
underground gems charged with the one-day-we'll-make-it energy of early NAS,
they took a loyal crowd through a journey in real HipHop culture. Joined by
Shyena (local poet) and the rest of their collective crew The Breakfast Club
they churned out musical bullets!
Nighttime at the main DEMF Stage was a site for sore eyes, so many heads and
all of them rockin'... Slum
Village (dispelled worries that they might do there usual no show) to play a
rare home town live set to a huge
crowd that thought they had struck gold... then The Roots, who never fail to
deliver, kept us singing along
for two hours!.. "Detroit's #1 DJ"Gary Chandler was up next, cutting the
hell out of "Rock The Bells" by
LLCool J and finally late but never the less DOPE, MOS DEF closed the show.
The back stage smiles
were wide again as we all continued on to party elsewhere...
That night Planet E + Exclusive Productions threw an off the hook
after-festival party INTIMATE
APPAREL, too many people packed into a bumping coffee shop on Woodward
Ave... heaven. Everyone was
there drinking up the free beer (thanks chaps we ran out before most Planet
E Crew could get any). Theo
Parrish and Mike Clark played a legendary deep house and classics melt down
in the first room and in the
upstairs Tony Ollivierra had a marathon set until Dego came on and funked us
up with his London Freestyle
Boogie (we wish we knew what the hell most of his tunes were).
Another famous Planet E party, when we are old we''ll bore a bunch more
people with our reminiscing!
Monday 29th May
Two hours sleep is never enough, but for some reason we woke up with a small
spring in our steps. We didn't
want this weekend to end, Monday had come too soon but with the heat rising
on our hang-overs, we were off
to make the most of the last day in the blazing sun.
Caught Clark Warner warming up the die hard train-spotters at the main DEMF
Stage with a bit of E2E4.
Derek Plaslaiko, Mike Huckaby and DJ BONE known locally for wrecking the
party, played back to back
and turned out the whole day at the CPOP Stage. The Underground Stage was
host to another list of
legendary names, the Direct Beat Assassins + RX7 The Electro Elite both
exercised their individual
art of electro mind control, then a rare appearance from Urban Tribe brought
his unique
anti-social-experimental-electro-trip hop to the concrete space, Shake
played a DJ set of
all things electronically good.
The Motor Stage was bouncing to the D'Jungle sounds of Lauren Flax, then the
darkly freaky
Detroit Grand Pu Bahs shocked an elderly couple who were happily grooving,
when Paris The Black Fu
"LET US SEE THAT THONG". We missed A Guy Called Gerald, but the UK flavor
was still in the
house when Dego turned the beat around... again.
The last night, behind main satge was packed with local heads from the
electronic scene and security was not
letting any more back, no matter who you were. Pride and emotion was
running high as people anticipated the
climax to the weekend.
Headliners tonight: Techno founding fathers Derrick May, Kevin Saunderson
and youngsters in the
family tree, Richie Hawtin + Rolando. We imagined May + Saunderson thinking
back to the early
days of Techno, looking now at downtown in the city that untill this moment
has never acnowledged
a world changing artform created with its walls.
Saunderson stared at the pulsating view out from the stage, and exclaimed
"ITS LIKE A DREAM", May
took the dancers back to the Music Institute and there wasn't a dry eye in
the house, Rolando cunjured up
memories with Pepe Bradock's "Burning" and Hawtin, who was moved beyond
belief, tore heads off with his
infamous DECKS, EFFECTS + 909 show.
To round up, Carol Marin (events producer), thanked everyone involved and
Carl Craig read out the list of all
who had played this prestigious weekend, to cheers, screams and hugs... yes
hugs. Then Kenny Larkin ran up
and grabbed the microphone and shouted for everyone to thank Craig for all
he had done!
Everone who came made history, thankyou all for supporting this event.
We can only look forward to next year and bask in the afterglow....
****************************************************************************
********
Planet E Staff and artists would like to thank: Tim Price, Jonny O, Korie,
Eric, Daniel, Ian, Jen, Nate, Jake, Jim Gibbons and all at the sound
company, Tiffany, Lynne, Dave Toorongian, Scott Mahalski for hooking up the
T's, Krazy Dave (for drinking all the beer), Chris Chung, Dego, Theo, and
Jefferey Jones for all their support and help with the Planet E booth and
party during this weekend.
****************************************************************************
********
Planet E Artists
Upcoming gigs:
# = confirmed
PAPERCLIP PEOPLE AUS TOUR
(NZ was cancelled)
Jun 9 - Melbourne Aus #
Jun 10 - Sydney Aus #
Jun 11 - Adelaide Aus #
Jun 14 - Brisbane Aus #
HANNAH DJ sets
June 7th - TONIGHT. Chicago @ ENCORE 171 W. RANDOLPH. Hotel Alegro #
June 9th - Motor. Detroit
CARL CRAIG DJ sets
Jun17- FUSE. Belgium #
July 7th - Love Parade. Berlin #
--
-----------------------------------------------
Planet E Communications Inc.
Detroit Office: New York Office:
P O Box 27218 25 Washington St
Detroit Third Floor
MI Brooklyn
48227 NY 11201
USA USA
313 831 8775 fax 718 923 9021 fax
email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
-YOU CAN ONLY PLEASE SOME OF THE PEOPLE, SOME OF THE TIME-
