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Salon Wanderlust | Raving in Goa
by Lost at 9:01 pm EST, Jan 7, 2005 |
] Rave season in Goa lasts from September to March, and for
] much of that stretch there are parties every other night.
] The locales vary -- Ajuna, Disco Valley, Japora or Badam
] are the most frequent venues -- depending on which police
] official or civil servant can be bribed at the lowest
] price; baksheesh (bribery) is an Indian institution. The
] organizers are ad hoc consortiums of chai-mat vendors,
] bar owners, drug dealers and land-owners looking for a
] quick rupee. At every one of these affairs you see the
] same old Crown or Macintosh amplifiers and beat-up
] Ritchie mixing boards; the output, a meaty 5,000 watts,
] is usually doubled by BGW preamps. No one uses
] turntables. (If you've ever had to haul hundreds of
] pounds of vinyl to a club or a friend's house, then you
] understand the impracticality of lugging albums around
] the world, not to mention the excess baggage surcharges
] airlines will impose.) The DJs who work the Goa raves do
] so with cassette or digital audio tape. A trio of Sony
] Professional Walkmans or Sony or Aiwa digital audio tape
] players are the Goan equivalent to the twin direct-drive
] Technics turntables ubiquitous to most nightclubs in the
] Western world. Goa is good. |
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RE: Salon Wanderlust | Raving in Goa
by Hijexx at 1:14 pm EST, Jan 8, 2005 |
Jello wrote: ] ] is usually doubled by BGW preamps. No one uses
] ] turntables. (If you've ever had to haul hundreds of
] ] pounds of vinyl to a club or a friend's house, then you
] ] understand the impracticality of lugging albums around
] ] the world, not to mention the excess baggage surcharges
] ] airlines will impose.) The DJs who work the Goa raves do
] ] so with cassette or digital audio tape. A trio of Sony
] ] Professional Walkmans or Sony or Aiwa digital audio tape
] ] players are the Goan equivalent to the twin direct-drive
] ] Technics turntables ubiquitous to most nightclubs in the
] ] Western world.
]
] Goa is good Goa is okay in moderation. I don't know if I could take 8 hours of 4/4 909 kick drum anymore though. You definately need to be stimulated or just plain hyper to dance to it with any longevity. I seem to gravitate towards Breaks these days. A little slower, chunkier and funkier. Maybe that's an artifact of choosing to maintain a natural chemically balanced nervous system these days :) Or I'm getting old... I find it interesting they use cassettes. A laptop with a 60 gig harddrive could easily store 500 CD's worth of music in MP3 format (taking out about 10 gig for OS and the one app needed, Traktor.) It also seems like beatmatching would be more of a pain with reels of tape. I'm sure the decks have some sort of variable pitch control and they know what #### to FF or RR to though. Then again they could just be playing mix tapes. If you don't want to lug vinyl and you don't want to play MP3s with their sonic degredation amplified 1000x over, playing WAV's off a hard drive with Traktor seems to be the logical choice. You could still get away with about 80 hours of tracks. |
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RE: Salon Wanderlust | Raving in Goa
by Lost at 1:39 pm EST, Jan 9, 2005 |
Hijexx wrote:
] Jello wrote:
]
] ] ] is usually doubled by BGW preamps. No one uses
] ] ] turntables. (If you've ever had to haul hundreds of
] ] ] pounds of vinyl to a club or a friend's house, then you
] ] ] understand the impracticality of lugging albums around
] ] ] the world, not to mention the excess baggage surcharges
] ] ] airlines will impose.) The DJs who work the Goa raves do
] ] ] so with cassette or digital audio tape. A trio of Sony
] ] ] Professional Walkmans or Sony or Aiwa digital audio tape
] ] ] players are the Goan equivalent to the twin direct-drive
] ] ] Technics turntables ubiquitous to most nightclubs in the
] ] ] Western world.
] ]
] ] Goa is good
]
] Goa is okay in moderation. I don't know if I could take 8
] hours of 4/4 909 kick drum anymore though. You definately
] need to be stimulated or just plain hyper to dance to it with
] any longevity. I seem to gravitate towards Breaks these days.
] A little slower, chunkier and funkier. Maybe that's an
] artifact of choosing to maintain a natural chemically balanced
] nervous system these days :) Or I'm getting old...
]
] I find it interesting they use cassettes. A laptop with a 60
] gig harddrive could easily store 500 CD's worth of music in
] MP3 format (taking out about 10 gig for OS and the one app
] needed, Traktor.) It also seems like beatmatching would be
] more of a pain with reels of tape. I'm sure the decks have
] some sort of variable pitch control and they know what #### to
] FF or RR to though. Then again they could just be playing mix
] tapes.
]
] If you don't want to lug vinyl and you don't want to play MP3s
] with their sonic degredation amplified 1000x over, playing
] WAV's off a hard drive with Traktor seems to be the logical
] choice. You could still get away with about 80 hours of
] tracks. I've been in Benaulim, Salcete (south) Goa for 2 months now... and although the tourist season is over and this is by NO means party central (thats the north), the place I went to parties at had a Rastafarian from London with a computer, mixing software, an amp and some speakers. And... bad news: they OUTLAWED raves. If a single person complains, or a cop hears... bye bye party. Actually last week someone complained that a Catholic church festival was a rave when they heard the music at around 11PM... the police came and shut it down. All the good Catholics marched to the police station, and threatened to riot if they didn't tell the name of the person responsible for the complaint. The telephone receptionist gave it up, and the police only narrowly avoided the lynching of the complainer. I found this entire thing HILARIOUS. Bardez people are crazy? Except at state-run clubs... Paradiso up north, etc. I think the rave is dying in Goa, and the package tourist (Indian/American pop parties)/long term hippie/retiree relaxing residents are taking over permanently. |
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