Friday- April 1st, 2005
Club Triangle, Osaka, Japan

The time is 4:35 AM as I approach the Shinsaibashi train station entrance. My pants are black on the bottoms and my shirt is still wet from the events that took place the previous night. I haven’t slept in over 24 hours and my body is completely spent, but I am happy because I just left the club after seeing Bristol’s own music sensation Roni Size, live at Club Triangle in the heart of downtown Osaka, Japan. The trains don’t start running for another 30 minutes so I sit by the train station entrance, put on my iPod, and get some shut eye while I wait. As my eyes close I begin to remember where this night truly began, when I was a freshman in college over seven years ago. My friend Jay first handed me this album with a really cool gray cover called New Forms, which is said to be Roni Size’s masterpiece. New Forms was my introduction to the sub-genre of electronic music called drum and bass. Before this album, The Chemical Brothers, Orbital, and The Future Sound of London were the only electronic music artists in my stereo. Back then those were the artists thought to be at the cutting edge of music, but when I came across New Forms, my perspective on music changed. For the first time music became more than just entertainment, but it became the soundtrack of life. I started to think in beats and every outside sound I heard began to form rhythm. Rolling Stone Magazine called New Forms the Sgt. Pepper of the 90’s because of its “shape-shifting” qualities, but for 18-year-old ravers, such as myself at the time, it was something fresh and innovative to bounce to. Not only that, but it was cool.

It wasn’t until I saw a live show from London drum and bass prodigy, Aphrodite that I began to understand the strength and depth of this music. According to Philosopher, Friedrich Nietzsche, “We hear music with our whole body, and we are within the music when we enjoy a great performance,” and for those few hours everyone was within Aphrodite’s music, dancing uncontrollably to the sounds of the self-proclaimed “King of the Beats.” After witnessing the ultimate power Aphrodite held over his audience I was immediately hooked, and I searched high and low, no pun intended, for drum and bass shows, but to my surprise they were scarce. As time went on I was fortunate enough to see amazing DJs such as Dieselboy, DJ Dara, and a number of locals, but the guy I really wanted to see live was Roni Size. People at various drum and bass shows would tell me how seeing Roni Size live was like a spiritual experience, and if I ever got the chance I should take it without hesitation.

It’s now 5:10 AM and the train station’s entrance has just opened up. As I buy my train ticket I see a group of young Japanese college guys with sweat soaked shirts and dirty pants. It was obvious they had also just come from the Roni Size show, and just like me, they were all smiling. Looking at those guys I can’t help but think how much the scene has evolved since I was their age listening to drum and bass. Drum and bass now can be heard almost anywhere around the world. It’s been in blockbuster movies such as The Matrix, Memento, Spawn, and can also be heard at the beginning of various news programs around the world. One can also find drum and bass in a number of video games such as Grand Theft Auto 3, Frequency, MTV Music Generation 3, and Amplitude.

A lot of this worldwide recognition is largely due to the success of New Forms, but since that release Roni Size has continued to make groundbreaking albums and has collaborated with a number of famous musicians such as Wu-tang clan member Method Man and former Rage Against The Machine lead singer Zack De La Rocha. He has also contributed to major motion picture soundtracks such as The Avengers and Blade 2. In 2004, Roni Size released his latest album to date, Return to V, which according Jive Magazine, “Shows every side of Roni Size’s talent, and is the album he has wanted to do for a very long time.” Keeping all this in mind, when the opportunity to see him live arose, I jumped on it immediately.

My train finally arrived at 5:23 AM and to my surprise it was jammed packed. Wall to wall people everywhere and I could barely move: just like when Roni Size made his way to the stage not more than 4 hours earlier.

Club Triangle was at full capacity by the time Roni Size started his set. Before his performance was a slew of artists including the underground California-based dynamic duo of Deuce Eclipse and Zion-I, that got the crowd’s attention with their witty lyricism and awesome sound. After Deuce Eclipse and Zion-I tore the roof off, it came time for Roni Size to rebuild it. The stage was finally set, and by the look of the hundreds of people in attendance, everyone was ready for the storm to begin. Roni Size, with his long dreads tied back and his sunglasses dark enough to hide his eyes, puts his Macintosh laptop between the two turntables and opens it. While the computer is loading he changes the needles on the left turntable. As his preparations continue the crowd is constantly shifting, trying to catch a glimpse at the phenomenon that has helped spread drum and bass to the ears of millions across the world. Flashes from cameras are going off, including my own, as if royalty had entered the building. Then the first record hits the table, and once the special needle touches the wax all hell breaks loose. The first layer of hyper-speed beats commence and is soon followed by another layer, and then another, each layer faster then its predecessor until finally we reach warp speed.

BOOM!!!! We are in the mix and Roni Size proceeds to take the audience with him on his mystic voyage through the boom. Within the first 10 minutes the music had already totally taken control of every body in the audience including my own. People are hopping up, down, sideways, every which way but upside down. Just when you thought the beats couldn’t get much faster Roni strips away a few layers and raises his finger. One, two, three……then in a split second reintroduces those layers with beats twice as fast, my guess would be over 200 something beats per minute. Just to compare, the average heartbeat of an adult ranges between 60 to 80 beats per minute, a child’s heartbeat rate ranges from 80 to 120 beats per minute, and 50 cent’s hit single, Candy Shop feat Olivia has 96 beats per minute. In the background of this controlled beat-crazy chaos are a slew of stringed instrument samples .

He had the audience at his fingertips and whenever the sound changed, the crowd responded almost instantly, as if he was controlling them like puppets. Roni Size was touching everyone in the audience with his music, like a laser firing uncontrollably and hitting everything and anything in its path. Nietzsche states that in music, “there is the aspect of intoxication and self-forgetfulness,” and as Roni Size’s sound intoxicated my body I forgot that I was there to cover Roni Size in Japan, but felt like I was that college kid once again being amazed just like when I first saw Aphrodite over six years earlier. After two hours of pounding the night away Roni Size’s set had to come to a close, but the audience wasn’t having any of that so, in that instant, Japanese, British, Australian, American, and every other kind of people in the audience, put their voices together to start a chant consisting of only two words that everyone understood, ”One more!” Roni told the audience the club would only allow him to play one more record, but he promised everyone a four-hour set next time. After he finished his set, Roni was swarmed by fans with cell phone cameras, all trying to get their picture with or of him. In true international fashion, people congratulated him in at least three different languages, which was truly an amazing sight to witness. He took all the attention with grace and managed to smile for everyone’s picture.

I finally got to see Roni Size live, and it truly was a spiritual experience for me. I have seen hundreds of concerts throughout my life, ranging a span of musical genres, but drum and bass is the only genre that can touch my soul through its sound alone. It translates into any language around the world, and when witnessed live, can reach out to anyone. In a recent interview with Urb magazine Roni Size said, “Somehow, someway, we’re going to make it, and I speak on behalf of my friends and I – like Krust and Die, Suv, and Dynamite [all DJ’s from Roni Size’s crew called Reprazent] – we are a family of people with goals. We represent Full Cycle [Roni Size’s label]. We represent Bristol. We represent the sound of drum and bass.” The time is now 4:35 AM, and as I walk towards the train station I wonder how in the hell am I going to share this experience with the world.