Dave Curtis - My Year In Hard Dance

What's been your biggest achievement of the year?

Yea gods. I couldn't narrow it down to one... Becoming the MixMag Hard Dance reviewer, playing for Frantic, Tidy and Storm, starting up Caterpillar Trax with my mates Batten and Brow, and keeping Requiem consistently a great night for the clubbers are all up there... Most recently though for Andy Whitby to ask me to manage AWsum Hard for him as a recognition of my productions was a great accolade, one which he may well come to regret when he realises how difficult I can be. The whole year has been wicked though!

What moments will you never forget?

Playing on my own in the filth foyer of Hard House Academy and watching it fill up with people absolutely loving it... Making new and reinforcing old friendships on a weekly basis... Having my narrow-minded barriers completely overturned by simply outstanding music from other genres from hardcore to hardstyle... Seeing Brow dressed as a Tennis player at Twist and not even recognising him... Seeing Tom Basquil dressed as a Snooker player at Twist and not even realising he was in fancy dress... And playing the classics set at Requiem will be with me for a long time. I loved it.

Who's been your favourite newcomer of the year?

As MixMag reviewer I see a lot of music from every sub-genre from artists new and old, and there are a number of Hard House producers who have really come through this year who I should choose for loyalty to 'my sound'. But the one person who has cut themselves a niche with their own definitive (Tech Dance) style which I can guarantee will be huge internationally in 2010 has to be Neal Thomas.

Who's been the artist of the year for you?

Defective Audio/Base Graffiti/Tomcat/ElDurangoz/etc etc AKA the legend that is Dom Sweeten. No offence to any other producer (and there are some great ones - you know who you are!) but there is no-one that churns out anthem after anthem in any corner of the scene like Dom does. It is just that simple. My favourite artist since Ingo turned to House, and even then it was a tie.

What's been your favourite label of the year?

Objectively, it has to be Tidy. For: covering all bases, keeping as many people as possible happy, providing a massive diversity of music, and for giving us some of the biggest tunes of the year, no-one has done a better job than Sam Townend and the Tidy camp. Ideally I'd like a few more proper 'ard Hard House tracks scattered about, but that's just being picky.

What do you think has been the best track of the year?

Ilogik & Dave Owens - Feel The Pressure. A sublime throwback to the days of old where a track didn't need to be either un-listenably hard or self-indulgently trancey.

What's been your favourite event of the year?

The Insomniacz Reunion at The Corporation in Sheffield. I was there 'back in the day' (from the old Corporation at least) and to see the event come back to its hey dey pretty much (although there were one or two more tired faces) was just a brilliant experience. Amazing music, amazing fun, absolutely rammed, and to recognise tunes I hadn't heard for years and people I hadn't seen for years who I didn't even know was wicked.

What's the funniest thing that's happened to you?

It's a good job meeting Michael Barrymore at Insekt @ Heaven isn't eligible, or falling down an entire flight of stairs on to my forehead... A friend of mine throwing a tin of Vaseline lip salve at another friends head, hitting him in the eye, and him looking like he'd had an aneurysm was pretty funny... But really, the fact I haven't been sacked yet is a constant source of amusement.

What do you have planned for the next year?

Plough on with everything... Keep building my night Requiem up as the only regular Hard House night in London, make a huge success of AWsum Hard for Mr Whitby (and hearing what he's done for the label it can only go that way), take Caterpillar Trax up to the next level, keep doing the business working for FlashPoint Records, produce ever better tracks and finally get my own skills down properly, DJ at as many events as I can, get the AWsum Hard tour on to the road... I could go on!

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