To kick off the celebrations of the long weekend, my friends and I rented a limo from Orange Country and made the trip to Hollywood. Control Fridays has had a long tradition of bringing some of the best electronic talent to Los Angeles. We arrived around 10:30 just as the place began to fill up and a few minutes into the set of the first act, Black Boots. I didn’t know anything about this act until I arrived and judging by the way their hypnotizing crowd control, I gauged they must be a solid act.
Black Boots consists of LightKnife and Mikey Francis. Apart from their punk-rock rebel personas, they’re live performances really stand out. Lightknife orchestrates the production and DJing with midi controllers, sequencers and synthesizers while Mikey sings. Recently signed with Ultra Music, their sound consists of big room anthems and massive pop melodies with trippy visuals to go with. They dropped crowd favorites like Justice, Daft Punk and Dada Life. Mikey’s ability to keep the crowd moving all night was commendable.
It’s been about two years since I last saw Congorock so I wasn’t sure what to expect. Like most of us out there, I was introduced to Rocco Rambino’s tribal electro sound when I heard “Babylon”. Since then, the Italian has gained a huge fan base out here in North America. With collaborations with Sean Paul, already under his belt, Congorock looks set for a dynamic year ahead of him.
At the Avalon, he delivered a wide array of electro sounds intermixed with that tribal 808 bounce. His track list seemed to consist of the electro-bangers of the day but what really amazed me were his DJing skills. When I first saw Rocco two years ago, I was still a budding amateur in the art of DJing. Now, I have a better understanding of what makes a good DJ. Rocco’s superior transitions and mixing skills shows why the Italian is such a big player in the EDM game today.
