I rarely see my DJ friend Andre these days. Our lives that were once so intertwined have taken on different paths, much as they started, although I understand he adopts dogs that need forever families.
Andre’s DJ sets were the best. He struck a perfact balance of house music and techno. He knew his dance floor, played it for hours on end, and developed a most loyal following. My favourite weekends were spent in London, dancing our way around the Market Tavern, Turnmills and the Royal Vauxhall Tavern until the next morning, and chilling later to recordings of Andre’s deeper personal sets that he recorded at home when no one saw him.
I witnessed Andre raid the record boxes of friends, pulling out twelve inch records that on the surface appeared main-stream, but homing in on unplayed dub mixes and remixes that strung together perfectly to make an Andre set, seemingly out of nowhere.
Years went by as I returned from London to focus on my career. I lost touch with where my friends were. When one afternoon, browsing the newly opened John Lewis store in Cardiff, I felt the deep thud of a bass drum, and I caught the flashes of bright colours coming from the lighting department. I had to investigate. The music got louder, the lights brighter, and guess who was there with a name badge behind the counter… DJ Andre, spreading some of his magic across his new path and mine.
