Cork seemed unusually quite over Christmas, it was like everyone had fecked off somewhere else for the holidays or maybe it was just because Christmas fell on a Monday. Either way, there were not many people about the few nights I ventured out, which was kind of nice in some ways as places weren’t packed and things felt a little more relaxed and less hectic. Anyway, to cut a long story short, I found myself in Fast Eddies on Saturday night of Christmas week for Greg and Shane’s year end bash as I was in need of a serious bout of dancing to wipe away the cobwebs.

Greg Dowling and Shane Johnson have been playing records for the last twenty years or so and were resident dj’s at the legendary Sweat club night at Sir Henrys, which even made it onto Muzik magazine’s best club nights chart back in the day. I fondly remember dancing my butt off when Greg used to play mostly hip hop at Sir Henrys way back (so far back it’s not funny any more :-) and in fact, now that I think about it, the fecker still owes me a tape onto which he was supposed to copy EPMD’s first album, heh, I still have hope!

In more recent times, the duo have been producing their own deep house tracks that have appeared on various labels throughout the world and their most recent track, “The Cure and the Cause”, on their own label, Ork Recordings, made it into the UK chart and was actually number one (I think) on the UK dance chart. The pair now have a regular Saturday night residency in Fast Eddies, a great Friday night radio show on RedFM and spend the rest of their time travelling around the world playing records for fun... probably... the lucky bastards! :-)

Anyway, Greg got the show on the road and played some gorgeous tunes that practically dragged you onto the dance floor and literally made you want to dance. To be honest, I found it a little difficult at first and even though I’m used to dancing to regular house music, hip hop and even drum and bass, I found that the slower tempo of deep house with its less pronounced emphasis on percussion took a little getting used to, a first world problem I guess! Shane took over for the second half of the night and continued to pour out the musical goodness and everyone was in dancing heaven by the end of it all.

Finally, I’d just like to give a big shout out (yes, I know how stupid that sounds, like me and the massive, aieeeee :-) to New York Clubber and Radio Rock Girl (ok, so it’s not getting any better) whom I met on the night and who had come to Cork especially to see Greg and Shane play. Two very nice people even if they did tease me with tales of fabulous New York club nights over coffee afterwards.

Fish Go Deep Ork Recordings RedFM

Labels: DJs, House

# Forged from the fiery depths by Pure Cork Boy.