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Build it and they will come: Spencer & Hill at Fortune Sound Club

April 4, 2012

 

Us Wet Coasters are pretty fortunate: we live in a region of stunning natural beauty, our hockey team is good and the local dance music scene continues to evolve. While proximity to the ocean, mountains and the Stanley Cup are due to geographical luck and the Sedin twins; the constantly improving scene, on the other hand, is the direct result of hard work and clear vision. Throughout the past decade, promoters, venues and fans have tirelessly contributed in their own important way, and have effectively put Vancouver on the map as a true dance music centre.

At no place is this truer than at Fortune Sound Club. It is by definition a sound club—a rare venue where you can come listen to music played by top local and international acts over a state-of-the-art Funktion One sound system. With the club linking up with regional promoter MSH Sessions, revelers are consistently exposed to quality dance and hip-hop artists. Plus, Fortune doesn’t enforce insignificant things like restrictive dress codes nor does it cater only to high rollers like so many other boring Vancouver clubs. But most importantly, it feels great to be a part of Fortune’s audience—an audience that is clearly ‘in the know’ when it comes to dance music.

Fortune’s sultry, medium-sized room played host to electro-house producers Spencer & Hill on March 29, which was, as usual, an MSH Sessions show. Upon entering, resident Ben Chan could be heard pounding out crowd-pleasers like Chuckie and Gregor Salto’s What Happens In Vegas and Afrojack and Steve Aoki’s No Beef.  Soon after, Ishiyama jumped on the decks and continued to lay down deadly electro house, which included an awesome mash-up of Avicii’s Levels (Accapella) played over Seb Ingrosso’s Laktos. The relentless pace created the ideal set-up for headliners Spencer & Hill, who started off with pure energy: a remix of Duck Sauce’s Big Bad Wolf.

The German duo began by trading places on the decks, but eventually settled into a groove that saw them tag-team the sound system, even throwing down their tune Dance, which was recently signed to Steve Aoki’s Dim Mak label, and the killer Beatrocka, which is signed to Afrojack’s Wall Recordings. Moving on—and much to the delight of the packed crowd—they played well-known big tracks, such as David Guetta and Nicky Romero’s Wild One and Afrojack’s Take Over Control. At this point the crowd had moved from anticipating to awestruck—clearly the result of Spencer & Hill’s mastery of the pulsating Funktion One dance stacks.

Pumping out their trademark heavy bass and sticky vocals, Spencer & Hill’s energy flawlessly dominated the room, and truly shaped the entire party. When mixing in each new track, the increasingly sweaty-but-still-sexy crowd whistled and cheered, with the most enthusiastic response garnered by Dada Life’s heavy tune Fight Club is Closed. The set’s finale was the cherry on top though, as the headliner ended just as they started: with a bang. Combining ferocious bass with clean drum kicks, Spencer & Hill’s top-notch performance simply reinforced what we already knew: that at Fortune Sound Club, it’s all about the music.

 

Alex MacLachlan