Review: Carl Cox Float Your Boat + Space, August 4th 2015

Carl’s yearly rave up on waters.

Once a year, Carl Cox graces boat party Float Your Boat with his presence and extensive music collection. The festivities begin on the boat party each Tuesday all before heading to Space for a shindig at Carl's Music Is Revolution residency. Not wanting to miss the rare treat of Carl taking to the decks on waters we headed down to the pre-party spot, Plastik. Seeking shade for the moment inside the bar, wristband-donning holidaymakers were getting into the mood with Alex Di Stefano's I've Got The Power.

A mini trek along the promenade saw us climb onto the boat Carl was promised to board. Once we left the bay the knots, tempo, and volume was upped accordingly and the party vibes were in full swing instantaneously. After taking in the spectacular horizon view of the ocean ahead of us, and getting down to the club tracks Jason Bye was dishing out for a solid hour we stopped beside a cliff. My suspicions that a Carl Cox was about to join us were proved right as a speedboat approached us.

The excitement was contagious as he set foot on the boat and zoomed down the starboard. Once he took the headphones and had his first spin of the CDJ, he eagerly whipped the faders up and down with an energy he had saved up all year for the boat. Giving us a taster of things to come later on at Space, the rave up resulted in a commotion of jammed bodies around the decks, in a jovial and carefree mood. The grinding basslines stirred us to two-step to our heart's content.

In Space my disappointment in missing the majority of Matthias Tanzmann's set faded as I took comfort from Eats Everything in the Discoteca. Lashing out his brand of bouncy dance in a style upfront as ever, Eats worked as a complimentary foreword to Carl. The acute vocal sample on Bjarki's cut on Nina Kraviz's label I Wanna Go Bang giving the set a menacing aspect.

It was terraza time where Sasha suavely played an unbroken selection of groove-ridden tracks which escalated into a trance-like, acid gurgling climax, paving the way for Monika Kruse to take over, coming in with the bassline loop on Kydus' Transatlantic. Back in the discoteca Carl was still going full speed ahead, again playing Format:B – Chunky, working just as well at 5am as 8pm, finishing off the days steady onslaught of beats.


WORDS | Emma Gillett PHOTOGRAPHY | FYB

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