Total eclipse of the SAT

>> Who loves the sun? Neerav and the Passage.2 crew, that’s who

byRUPERT BOTTENBERG

Here’s some accessories to grab before Passage.2, the trance party at SAT this Friday which doubles as a benefit/launch for the free Trance 5000 zine: dancing shoes, tanning butter and a pair of those snappy goggles that prevent eclipses from roasting your retinas. As Neerav—DJ, Passage promoter and T5K commander-in-chief—puts it, the eclipse is the central metaphor for the event.
“I use the metaphor of a total eclipse, also known as a solar eclipse, because it’s the greatest show on Earth, nature’s greatest visual show—and it just lasts for a few minutes. There’s this totality to it, this darkness that comes over the Earth during the day. All the animals get confused and become really quiet, and this breeze comes rushing across the Earth. People travel from all over the world to be in the location that has the best line of sight for this rare event, to be there and feel that as it takes place.

“The reason I use that metaphor is because the VJs will be the stars of the night, which they’re normally not. Also, there’s an alignment of soundwaves and lightwaves. When things are aligned, there’s a certain power to them, as opposed to randomness.”
What Neerav’s getting at is that VJs—visual jockeys—will be getting a little love ’n’ equity this time around. Second-class citizens of the rave nation no more! “The VJ, up until now, has been decoration, providing eye candy. There’s a lot of frustration among them—even getting the chance to be just decoration is difficult, never mind being part of something as complete as what we’re doing.”

Ordinarily, VJs arrive with a bank of visual samples and play catch-up all night, trying to guess the DJ’s next move and freestyling the flow of images. For Passage.2, VJs and DJs have been buddied up and prepared collaborative audio-visual jams far tighter and more interconnected than what we’re used to. In the case of Purform, which is VJ Yan Breuleux and soundsmith Alain Thibault, that relationship has always been there. For the other DJs (Delage, Tao-Nhan, Mana-7, Gordon Field and Neerav) and VJs (Johnny Ranger, Phosphene, Hypnotica, View-Zik and Exp3, who’s “going for the old-school scratch video approach”), it’s a fresh, if work-intensive, take on the previously held two solitudes.

Sol shakedown

The Passage.2 package doesn’t end there, though. Live music will filter into the mix, what with percussionist Félix, violinist Sophie and the duo Sitarissimo on hand. Modern dancers Martin Bélanger, Anne-Marie Boisvert, Lyne Nault and Roboten Ballet’s Jacques Moisan will be letting their backbones slide—in a professional fashion—and Val & Clau and les Têtes en l’air will be busting the circus antics as well. So what’s up with all that?
“It’s very tempting to use technology because we’re living in 2002,” says Neerav. “I think a lot of people forget that we’re in the future right now. It just kind of crept up on us. Me, personally, I like to keep things grounded in tradition and in the here and now. That means honouring where we’re coming from. I don’t want to get into the whole thing about how this is extrapolation of our tribal ancestors dancing around the fire. It’s been talked about too much. But I think it’s important to have grounding, and the live elements do that for me. You can have all the technology you want, but it’s a means, not an end.”
One tradition Neerav won’t be upholding, and an aspect of this particular party that’s appealing to those of us who have, you know, jobs and stuff, is the early start and finish—things kick off at 7 p.m. and wrap up at 3 a.m. “We felt bad because we’re so strongly rooted in the rave tradition. We felt we had to almost apologize. But we realized that, hey, it’s not so bad after all. You’ll get the same number of hours of partying and you won’t be trashed the next day.”

As for the event’s sunny vibe, looks like you’ll be able to take it home with you. The latest issue of Trance 5000 will be there for the taking, and this one gives mad props to everyone’s favourite ball of seething, white-hot gas.

“I chose the theme of the sun—excuse me, Sol—for a number of reasons. I’d been reading a lot Native American literature, which talked a lot about the sun dance. So I got that theme in my mind, especially since we’re in the middle of winter. Then I got this article, submitted by a couple of friends in Toronto. I’d given them carte blanche, and they’d written about the sun. Everything, technically, about the sun—and its relationship to psy-trance. I basically ran with that. I wanted to remind people that even though it’s winter right now, that too will pass and summer will be back again.” :

At SAT on Friday, Feb. 1, 7pm, $15