The underground scene of Australia in the 1980s was made up of artists such as Soho, Planet Patrol, Yaz, and Serious Intention. Many of which were producing a combination of electro, disco and funk. A popular form of dance called the Melbourne shuffle came out of this era. It was a fast heel-toe action that incorporated body movements suitable for underground dance music.
Melbourne becamse a haven for large-scale raves in the nineties era. In 1992 a crew known as the Melbourne Underground Development (MUD) began a series of parties called Every Picture Tells a Story. The parties were held in the Global Village warehouse complex in Footscray, Melbourne and drew crowds by the thousands.
Outside of Melbourne in the Bushland areas, production crews were hosting "doof" parties. Doofs were essentially outdoor festivals held in remote country areas. The most popular area for this type of partying was around Mt. Disappointment for parties such as Earthcore and Kryal Castle.
Across the country, Perth developed it's rave roots when dj's like Roy Jopson, Colin Clarke and Dave Jackson were mixing Detroit and German techno into their dj sets at the Limbos nightclub in 1990. On October 13, 1990 the first official rave was held in Perth that was titled NRG and held at the Network Dance Club on James Street Northbridge.
By 1999 there was a plethora of production companies hosting events anywhere they could get their hands on. Sydney primarily held down a warehouse scene and focused on house music. Perth production crews mainly used nightclubs as their rave havens but catered more towards a hardcore, drum & bass, and trance crowd.
Popular crews in the Perth region were Storm Productions, Bass Agenda Crew, Raggabone, and Technotainment. Some of the venues used by these crews in 1999 were The Factory Nightclub, the warehouse at 65 Edward St, Belmont Park, Osborne Park warehouse (Hutton St), Greenwich Bar, and a "superclub" called Redheads.
The featured mix is a selection from my deep house archives from 1999. During this time much of the dance scene to me had become all about hard trance, hard house, hardcore, hardstep, hard this & hard that. However during that time I always enjoyed taking a step back and going deep & groovy. The majority of these kinds of sets were never played out since it was almost taboo to spin anything deep with the current influx of ravers that had popped up around that time.
Romanthony & DJ Predator - Clap Ya Handz
Joshua - Remember
Miguel Migs - Easy Does It (Discoteque Mix)
Aka Electric - My Sweet Meat
Brooks - Inside the Heads
Petalpusher - Breakin It Down (Migs Dub)
Atjazz - Come & Play
Kerri Chandler - I Know
Blaze - Lovelee Dae (Primitive Dub)
Romanthony & DJ Predator - Music Mind
