Nostalgia Trips and Bad Dancing

Going to the arcade, trying virtual reality for the first time, spending endless nights watching Robocop and playing Mortal Kombat on Super Nintendo. Being legitimately pumped to see the live action Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles films and not being disappointed.

Geir Helgi’s montage of moody chillwavey jams triggered within me an endless stream of ’90s vignettes from my childhood.

Rollerblading. Zone 3. Baywatch. Dragonball Z. Getting the newest Air Jordans then kicking on down to Pizza Hut- the restaurant – and going to town on the all-you-can-eat dessert bar.

All this stuff, it came flooding back. It was a genuinely neat personal experience.

The room wasn’t packed, and I don’t think his music speaks to everyone. But if you were born at a certain time, probably somewhere between 1985 and 1990, and probably male, the set played out as something of a nostalgia trip. Perhaps the only other attendee who shared my enthusiasm for his vision was the audio dude, who would periodically discharge the smoke machine before abandoning his mixing desk to do the robot through the smoke.

All the while Helgi stood motionless, long black hair framing his face on either side, smiling knowingly beneath his Polaroid shades. Then he cued his closing track, a slow jam fit to soundtrack the final prom scene from any teen movie worth its crust, waved congenially to us before heading home to play some Megadrive.

DJ Plays Generic House, People Dance. Not the most grabbing headline is it.

Really not much else about the 22:00 slot by Steve Sampling.

Aside from a couple of instrumental hip hop interludes, with some awkward vocal and acoustic guitar samples, it could have been any forgettable club night, any where, with anyone DJing. And the thirty or so strong crowd grooving along probably couldn’t have cared less who was responsible for the music.

But hey, on the upside I now have a pretty comprehensive collection of thirty second videos of Icelandic guys dancing really badly on my phone. Good times.

Thomas L. Moir

Nuke Dukem know the formula well: bass that punches you in the gut, whining buzzes that feel like a dentist’s drill jabbing your skull, and some digital beeps and bloops for texture. Throw in a hyperactive fog machine and a few flashing lights, and you have yourself a party. The duo may not have been the most innovative DJs around, but they had the mostly teenage crowd dancing. A sultry chanteuse joined them halfway through the set to spice things up, but her vocals were buried so far below the beat that only her slinky dance moves added to the atmosphere. No matter. As long as you have the kids moving their feet, you’re doing your job right.

Joel Hoard

This kind of thing is for stoners, right? I’m not being judgemental, I’m just guesstimating based on the fact that it smells A LOT like weed in here and people are either doing some serious lounging on the couches in the corner, or are on the dance floor moving with more precision than my just-had-a-few-beers-and-some-carrot-cake-at-the-office little heart can bear to emulate at the moment. But it looks like DJ Hazar is in a great fucking mood tonight. He has literally been jumping up and down for twenty minutes straight. His beats are stabbing, intense, the kind of thing you fist pump to while giving the tired, red-headed girl in the corner the crazy-eye. Think DDR (not the German one, smart guys) but less poppy, with a bit more aggression. Which is cool. I mean, drugs are still a thing, right?

Valgerður Þóroddsdóttir

As the night draws on, the queues start growing outside of Faktorý while everyone is getting rather squiffy and a little unsteady on their feet. Indeed there are some casualties lying on the sofas, eyes rolling in the back of their head. It was in this environment that THOR was working his thang. A master of deep house and techno sounds since the beginning of Iceland’s electronic music scene, the man was a total pro as the heavy beats got people moving. Granted the place wasn’t completely packed (he had a little competition in the main bar with DJ Dóri), but he never put a foot wrong and it was exactly the thing that was needed to keep the party going.

Bob Cluness