I know its been a long time since I logged and blogged about the dance music scene in NYC!!  The launch of Clubbersguidenewyork - our sister site (big ups to Gar) has kept me busy but not as busy as seeing all the wonderful artists who've come to NYC of late.

Most memorable gigs for me  have been James Holden who was here in July and rarely ever tours America. He played Cielo with local DJ Anthony Parasole opening for him. A magical 3 or 4 hour set. I was having so much fun I lost track.

Last Friday I caught Marcel Dettmann at The Bunker in Brooklyn - definitely a contender for party of the year along with Pan Pot. Sebo K and Anja Schneider, Blk Markets do up in March.  Dettmann is a driving force in that beautiful droney, endless techno that I love and he never let the energy dip for even a minute over his 5 hours and change set.  Local talent Brian Kasenic aka Spinoza also played some lovely music for openers.

It's easy to have club nights become a blur when you go out as much as I do!  So much good music and artists to check out. But now and again you hit a night or two that stays with you for a long time to come. Such was the case with the Perc vs Sleaze trax party in Miami in March.  And fortunately, one of the artists on that party played here in NYC last week. The Dog and Pony Show presented Tony Rohr with Dustin Zahn. Tony lives in New York but rarely plays here - his style being more appreciated overseas in Germany and other parts of Europe although the hardcore techno fans showed up in full force last week.  He collaborates with many artists including Alexi Delano (playing here next week) and I absolutely adore his style and music.  LOVE was the venue and it was a very nice chill crowd. A.b Fredericks opened up- whom I had not heard before and he was a perfect opener for Rohr who kicked out some amazing stuff including the fab remix by Dave Shokh of "Push it" (Salt n'Pepa") It's hard to improve on such a classic tune but this is surely one of my fave remixes ever.  Heard it first when Tony played it on his CLR podcast - check it out here...www.soundcloud.com/shokhinger

Zahn from Minneapolis, I know from his wonderful Stranger to Stability tune.  He played an awesome set too! I couldn't stay til the very end - being a Thursday - had an early start next day but it was a great event. Well done to the Dog and Pony people and hope they bring those guys back soon!

And then just when I thought it couldn't get any better, I went to see Steve Aoki and Benny Benassi next night at Pacha.  I caught Aoki last year at Electric Zoo and he was so good and such a high energy performer. You really forget for a bit that he's a DJ/producer and that you're not at a rock concert. His energy is amazing.  He climbs all over the DJ booth, uses a mic and screams into it all while blending his signature style of HOT electro-house.  Aoki sent the crowd into a frenzy especially when he played WARP! He even repeated a few tunes but it didn't matter. By that time the crowd was so worked up we wanted to hear them again. Then Benassi came on and kicked it up another notch!! He is surely one of the biggest crowd pullers on the circuit - his last gig a few months ago at Pacha was jammed and sold out and it was similar on Friday.  I loved him but could have listened to Aoki all night. I did get to say hi to Steve on the way out which was neat. And a special treat of the night was that my friend Angie recognized superstar DJ/producer Armand van Helden hanging out and we grabbed him for a photo opp! Super nice guy too!! We closed Pacha at 6am!! What a wonderful weekend.

Phew - a lot to catch up on.  Quickly, April 16 was Wobble music at Cielo with my friend Niki McNally and Michael Arana. Great house and tech house.

Sat 17th - Deepak Sharma's label party/residency at Bar 13 with some talent new to me including Jubilee Mo from DC (http://www.facebook.com/people/Jubilee-Mo/533432586 ) and Noah Pred from Toronto. Great night of minimal techno.

Following weekend I went to check out my first psy-trance event in NYC. It's rare to come across psy-trance in NYC- being a particular taste but having said that I've discovered an definite underground psy-trance scene here. While its not my favorite EDM, I can certainly give it a spin every so often. I love the visuals that go with it - and some very cool music was played. I met the organizer Kaliptus whose art I've come across before. Cool crowd so I hope to catch more of those parties.

Friday, and a very Good Friday it was too, I got to check out Armin van Buuren at Roseland Ballroom. Armin was celebrating ASOT 450, his weekly broadcast featuring the best of trance around the world.  This was a 2 day event but I went on Friday only. the line up included local DJ Eco, Rank 1, Armin and Menno de Jong.  There is surely no one with more vibrant energy behind the decks than Armin - he really knows how to get the crowd going which he did. But I found his set a little bit too short to fully get into - which was a pity. I really wanted him to play Tuvan - one of my fave tracks of his :( . Still a superb night of trance. Armin is back this year on Day 2 of Electric Zoo Festival.

On Saturday/Sunday I attended my second Blk Market Membership party and this was probably the best pure techno party I've been at to date.  First off, a really cool underground venue ( a secret location only emailed to attendees, day of, a huge warehouse in Brooklyn and the possibility of being busted at any minute!). Secondly an amazing line up, kicking off with Taimur and Fahad, the organizers followed up by 3 of the best in German techno acts around; Anja Schneider, Sebo K (pronounced Ka as told to me by a German!) and Pan-Pot, two amazingly hot German boys.  Each act topped itself and I thought I could not last given the fact that I'd had about 3 hours sleep but the music would not let me quit!! I finally gave up after a brutal telling-off from my feet at 10am on Sunday morning.  Simply put a techno marathon and given the fact that the space was not set up as a club, amazing lights and cheap drinks and great bar staff. All in all one of the highlights for me so far.  Of course I couldn't do this every weekend as Sunday was a wash-out, conked out til 5pm! But for occasional techno treat, nothing better!!

Up this weekend- the Martinez Bros at Pacha. Been a while since I've been and have not seen these brothers before but love their music!

Well after almost 6 months of thinking and planning,  I made it to the Winter Music Conference in Miami this year! I had heard a lot of great things about this event and so my expectations were high! Fortunately for the most part, it lived up to its reputation. I'm only now beginning to process how fun it was!

Myself and my meetup gang arrived on Thursday. Our first party was Hard Miami at the Fontainebleu at 4pm- a beautiful pool party.  Nothing beats great music outdoors! The line up was amazing and included Erol Alkan, Boyz Noise, Busy P and Annie Mac and others playing super electro.  The downside - 36 dollars for two vodka tonics!! Needless to say we didn't drink too much which was maybe a good thing! We stayed for about 4 hours then headed back to our hotel for a quick bite, change and then onto Space Miami.  This is a multi- story event space that we had pre-purchased tickets for so basically we could go anywhere in the club.  First time and I have to say I liked it - easy to wonder around and check out different rooms. We ended up in the room where Tiefschwarz, Timo Maas and Matthias Tanzmann were playing. Really great clubbing. Stayed til about 5 or so.

Then home for a quick kip. I had a radio interview scheduled for 1.20pm at the W Hotel with Boston born DJ Steve Porter (airing this Wednesday on RTE Pulse during Jason Dee's show).  Unknown to me this was a private Sirius XM party sponsored by Belvedere vodka and many artists were there just to hang out!! I met and interviewed Steve, Solarstone (a great trance producer and DJ who was born in Dublin!) and Ferry Corsten. Also Deadmau5 and Tommy Lee (who was drumming for him at Ultra) were there taking pics.  The wonderful Crystal Method played a set too.