Wax for the Soul

The first time I was supposed to hear Belgium's 2ManyDJ's was at the old SAT, back in the good old days when it was located on Ste-Catherine West, in front of the Spectrum and the "Vieille 300", a pub where we used to go to drink big bottle of Laurentide or Labatt 50 while waiting for the line-up to start moving.


The drinks were cheaper there than at the SAT, and on this particular evening we were most inebriated when we entered the room.

I was excited - there was quite a buzz going on for these guys at the time, the mash-up genre was at its very start, and Tiga was opening for them. However, my destiny decided that it wasn't my time to hear their delicious sounds, as I was thrown out of the venue shortly after Tiga played Vostok's "Airplanes" in the middle of his set. My very good friend, extremely drunk, banged my then girlfriend's head on the wall, and I couldn't help but do the same to him, a couple of times, something that didn't go unnoticed by security. Ahem.

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Soulwax, for those of you wondering, are a rock band. Their third album, "Any Minute Now" (after 1996's "Leave the Story Untold" and 1998's "Much Against Everyone's Advice"), is one hell of a ride, with loud guitars & melodies, but you can't shake the dancey feeling off their tracks : "E Talking", "Another Excuse", "NY Excuse", "Miserable Girl"... Most of these tracks were remixed to maximum effect on the dancefloor (Tiga singing "E Talking", anyone ?). And then they did the unthinkable.


They released a monster "remix" album, but didn't ask anyone to rework their songs : they're pretty much capable of doing that themselves. The production team extraordinaire - mainly brothers David & Stephen Deweale, also known to be the driving force behind Tiga's smash hit "You Gonna Want Me" - tweaked their keyboards and distorted their guitars and recorded a dark, visceral & essential collection of reinterpretations of the "Any Minute Now" songs, twisting them into something that can hardly be described. The guitars sound like loud basslines, the keyboards sound like guitars, and the body reacts strangely to this wicked assemblage : it dances by itself !



Live, they're even crazier, and Daft Punk's "Teachers" is apparently not the only song they cover.

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The Deweale brothers are not only rockers, they're also DJ's, and just like the A Touch of Class guys, they got their recipe straight : rapid-fire mixing, audacious selection, and a delicate balance between outrageous pop & obscure underground hits.

Tiga, a guy I know you heard about, hasn't been playing gigs in his hometown a lot, lately. He teamed up with 2ManyDJ's quite often in the recent past across Europe, and he'll do it again this Tuesday Sept. 19th, at SAT. Fireworks are to be expected. Tuesdays are turning out to be the new Fridays for scenesters. And when you know that Jordan Dare is opening, and that NYC's JDH & Dave - who did a good job at setting the SAT on fire a few months ago at NYC Invasion - are also part of the bill, it feels like a special night, no ?

2ManyDJ's, Soulwax, Tiga, JDH, Dave & Jordan Dare, SAT, Tuesday Sept. 19th, 21h-3h30, 20-25$ at the door.