AE @ Indigo: DJ HELL

The AE residency at Indigo got off to an interesting start with DJ HELL. After finally getting our projectors hung at the last minute before the doors opened, Todd and Michael began the night with some ambient visuals of red, blue, and green squares created live in cosmic painter for the opening DJ, Onur Özer, who was playing a set of minimal techno and IDM (intelligent dance music). By the time that HELL came on at 1 AM, the club was packed to the rafters, and Todd and Michael were geared up to rock a set of trashy electroclash visuals comprised of cult films and downmarket strippers from a NYC cable channel, which they had selected carefully to go with HELL's "gigolo" schtick. The crowd went crazy with each new clip up on the screens, and the vibe seemed like it would be a rocking gig. 20 minutes into the set, one of Indigo's managers showed up in the booth to say that HELL was complaining that the stage was too bright, and didnt want any more visuals, so Michael put up a black screen, and one could noticeably feel the dissapointment in the crowd when the screen behind HELL went dark. It became clear at that moment why fALk had refused to play the opening gig with HELL, who he has studiously avoided in Germany. If we had had the second projector hung in time for the side wall, we could have continued, but since there was only the one beamer on stage, it didnt leave us with much choice, So we packed up the gear and spent the rest of the night hanging out with friends in the booth.The managers of Indigo were good natured about the hassle and didnt give out any bad vibes. Todd took the opportunity to shoot some closeup flash photos of the star DJ to grace the blog. We recorded a live dvd of the 20 minute set as well as some live camera footage and edited it together, so you too can be "blinded by the light." Make sure you turn the brightness down on your monitor, and the sound way up.