With DJs Roger Sanchez, Tall Sasha
Last time Roger Sanchez played Vessel it was one their best Thursday night events of all time. Packed house, great energy, a very unique and intimate show with one of longest running DJs in house music history. Roger Sanchez at Vessel, is one show that should not me be missed.
Open Svedka Bar from 9PM - 10PM = free vodka till 10pm ;)
RSVP for $10 from 9PM - 10PM Guest list: Rooz (at) djrooz (dot) com
WE ARE ALREADY SOLD OUT OF OUR $10 PRESALE TICKETS.
PURCHASE YOUR $15 PRE-SALES TICKETS AT:
http://eventvibe.com/events/sanfranciscoca/ChristianPresentsROGERSANCHEZatVessel
ROGER SANCHEZ: Whichever way you look at it, Roger Sanchez's first
album has been a long time coming. Take your pick: three years (since
it was first scheduled for release); ten (since he first released a
single) or 20 (since he spun his first DJ set). Thankfully, whichever
way you listen to it, "FIRST CONTACT" was worth the wait - and Sanchez
wouldn't have had it any other way. "I don't think I know everything
but I do know when something sounds right and basically I said, I'm
gonna stop when it feels right, when it sounds right"
There have been classic dance singles in their hundreds, and probably
thousands, since the advent of acid house but the truly classic albums
to have emerged from the genre can be counted on one hand. Given that
his yardsticks for LP excellence are the five-star likes of Basement
Jaxx's "Remedy" and Massive Attack's "Blue Lines", you can appreciate
Sanchez's insistence on getting it right. "A lot of people don't look
at house producers as artists and most house producers don't look at
albums as albums, they look at them as all these singles put together
and that?s a mistake," he argues. "You have to think of continuity and
that was the hardest thing for me to get."
In "FIRST CONTACT", that labour pays off - it's 11 tracks somehow
succeed in moving seamlessly between sleek, glacier-cool electronic
instrumentals, all-horns-blaring Latin, warm, garage-style vocal tracks
(thanks to such guests as Sharleen Spiteri, Christian Urich and N'Dea
Davenport), brash, basic electronica, the last-word in sun-kissed dawn
chillout and a future-classic forged from a soft-rock sample without
missing a beat. Showing off? No. When you take into account Sanchez's
breadth of experience and appetite for musical experimentation, it
couldn't ever have been any other way.
Roger Sanchez made DJing a career after years of never imagining it
could be more than a hobby. Though he'd run a booming club night, made
mix tapes that sold like hot potatoes and made his mark as a
breakdancer in his Queens neighbourhood (leading to dance-on cameo
roles in Eighties movies "Breakdance" and "Krush Groove"), he never
considered making a living out of music. Instead he embarked on
architecture degree in Manhattan, which he only abandoned after his
father sat him down and told him music might be a better bet. The time
wasn't wasted, though: "When I approach tracks," he says, "I always try
to work on a foundation of the drums. The skeleton frames, the beams,
are the beats and baseline and you build the music on top. I force
myself to deconstruct the way I work. I look at every song as a problem
that I have to solve."
"I grew up listening to salsa, disco, hip hop; people would cut up
blues records, rock records," he says by way of explaining his current
range of musical interests. "Anything back then was a party record."
Somehow, Sanchez has also found time to learn four languages -
"English, Spanish, some French, some Italian" I wanna learn Japanese
next." (His interest in Japan extends to a gourmet's knowledge of
sushi, almost two decades? worth of training in Shotokan Karate and a
connoisseur's eye for the sci-fi worlds of the country's manga-style
anime movies the perfect visual accompaniment to his future funk
soundscapes.)
In case you've been staying indoors for the past decade or so, you'll
know that opting to go pro as a DJ proved a wise choice. As one of the
planet's foremost house DJs, Roger Sanchez has the art of making people
feel right down to an exact science. (He's been practising since the
age of 13, when he was first asked to man the decks at a friend's
party.) He's taken his distinctively soulful, experimental sets around
the world, from low-key residencies in his native New York to the wide
open spaces of Ibiza or London's Fabric. He's brought the skills of his
hip-hop to house music DJing (the third turntable and masterly
scratching techniques being among the most famous) and now adds his own
variety of interior decoration to the job, too: "I burn incense, I
light candles, I try to make the booth a little temple, a bit more of a
home."
Back in the studio, Sanchez has worked his magic on tracks by a vast
array of acts: Underworld, The Police, Janet Jackson, Michael Jackson,
St Etienne, Texas and his friends Daft Punk. He's steered young talent
on the road to success (including Basement Jaxx and Junior Sanchez,
plus the ever-expanding roster of talent on his label, R-Senal) and
collaborated with other production heavyweights (including longtime
associate Armand Van Helden; meanwhile, a project with Nellee Hooper is
in the offing). Since his first hit the seminal, soulful "Luv' Dancin"
his work has influenced everyone from the pioneers of UK Garage to the
aforementioned Basement boys. ("I've known the Jaxx guys for years," he
recalls. "I got them to remix one of my tracks way back, I've seen them
develop; they took from me and other people and switched it and made it
their own, and they've introduced things into the UK that allow me to
do what I've done. Now people are like "It's not cheesy to have horns
and such on your record".)
But back to Sanchez, and "FIRST CONTACT", which travels from the
smooth, Christian Urich-sung hit single "I Never Knew" to the
Toto-sampling, heart-breaking summer-anthem-in-waiting "Another
Chance". From the Latin swagger of "The Partee" to the bold, old-school
synths of "Computabank". Then there's the slinky disco of "Nothing 2
Prove", featuring Sharleen Spiteri (who played Sanchez her vocals down
the phone then posted them to him in New York), the gutsy, woman-on-top
dancefloor manifesto of "You Can't Change Me", written with Armand Van
Helden and guest vocalist N'Dea Davenport and the glacier-cool
atmospherics (and jackhammer-hard beats) of "Ventura" and "Contact".
It's quite some journey ; who else could take you on a magical mystery
tour like that and have you home within the hour.
Roger Sanchez. "FIRST CONTACT". Like we said, it has most definitely been worth the wait.
