Greg Bowes CD of the week
As a nightspot, 206 remains one of the better reasons to stay in Orange Grove. Its most important contribution to Gauteng nightlife has probably been as a middle ground for the live rock crowd and the funky techno and trip-hop kids. I mean, where else can you see a decent live band (Original Evergreen, Emaho, Scooters Union, Birdtribes, Plum or Wendy Oldfield to name but a few) and then lie back to some dope old-skool hip-hop or move your feet to some contagious jungle rhythms? This diversity has undoubtedly prolonged the club’s lifespan and led to this superb collection 206 Mix: Phat, Fast and Phurious Feets, mixed by Pierre Dane, which works very well at tramelling this rock/techno axis.
It does this primarily by being a big-beat bonanza. Rock-the-House-pioneers like The Chemical Brothers, Bentley Rhythm Ace and Fatboy Slim are here, with their vicious breakbeats and screechingly loud guitars, alongside a few underground classics like the Soul Brothers’ That Elvis Track, Midfield General’s Go Off and Ceasefire’s Trickshot. From there it does the scratchadelic James Brown-sampling thang with Coldcut’s freestylin’ More Beats and The Herbaliser, before mellowing out with Morphine’s bluesy Early to Bed.
The 206 CD also includes the only local release of Roni Size’s UK top 20 hit Brown Paper Bag, which is the incarnation of dance floor devastation, as well as genuinely groundbreaking fare from The Sabres Of Paradise. The mixing is spot-on despite vast tempo differences and the selection generally speaks for itself, which, in a market where compilations usually stick to the lowest common “in-your-face” denominator, is something special.