Trance duo extraordinaire, Ralph Kyau and Steven Moebius Albert visited India and gave us more than our moneys worth recently as part of their promotional tour for their brand new album ‘Nights Awake’. On the 26th of April, Blue Frog and Mumbai got a taste of their exciting new productions as well as some trance classics which was an auditory treat for the heat sweltered crowd of Mumbai!
Working together under the moniker of Kyau & Albert, the Germans have been producing and remixing some of the best music you’ll ever hear on a regular basis for the past 16 years. Finding prominence on the trance scene in their early days, they have been praised by almost all of the industry’s leading DJ’s and have been played on all their radio shows throughout the last decade, be it Armin Van Buuren, Above & Beyond, Markus Schulz, Ferry Corsten and other dance music mainstays, all of them have played their music as part of their respective radio shows time after time. The duo themselves host a monthly radio show called Euphonic Sessions which features the latest tracks and remixes from some of the best in electronic music.
Their productions can be easily distinguished by the outstanding vocal talents of Albert, who lends his voice to nearly all of their productions. Uplifting melodies, earth shattering beats and crisp vocals are the regular characteristics of a Kyau & Albert production. Following up to their hugely successful compilation album last year entitled ’15 years’, which was inspired from their journey in dance music, their brand new album ‘Nights Awake’, launched recently which showcases their most versatile sounds till date.
Coming straight to the night, in keeping with the anticipation of the German powerhouse producers performing live, we entered the venue much earlier than the scheduled time of 10:30 pm and to our surprise we caught Ralph and Steven sitting in one of the booths, sipping on a beverage and watching a live performance!
We exchanged pleasantries and inquired on how they were finding Mumbai and performing at Blue Frog once again? Ralph simply said, “We arrived here last night, and are excited to play here again. This is the fourth time we will play here and are really looking forward to it.”
We began to speak about their new album and the versatility it contains. Albert gracefully acknowledged the praise and thanked us for listening to their latest productions. Shortly after, we politely moved away and they bid us adieu with the words, “We’ll see you on the dancefloor then!”
Proceedings began with Rishab Joshi, one half of India’s finest duos Lost Stories, warming up the crowd with some great deep house. Slowly building up the pace he shifted gears from deep house to progressive house to tech house and finally dropping some anthems from the ever popular electro house vault. The crowd was building up ever so steadily as people gradually found their way to the dancefloor through Rishab’s crafty warm-up set.
At 15 minutes to midnight, Albert began to hover around the main decks, creating a sort of tizzy and a swarm of cheers as the crowd began to realize that the anticipation of the past month was about to be rewarded. Close to midnight, Kyau & Albert walked up to the main decks, plugged in and started off their plundering set.
Starting off with their album intro version of ‘All Your Colours‘, Albert thrust the crowd right into dancefloor mood as the duo showered their familiar basslines and infamous beats on the crowd. They followed it up with “Man of the Hour” which led to Audien’s remix of Arty & Chris James’s ‘Together We Are‘, proved to be one of the defining moments of the night as almost everyone stumbling by the bar made their way inevitably towards the floor with raised arms as the vocals aptly suggested ‘..Together we are….stronger’.
Next up was Armin Van Buuren & Trevor Guthrie’s, ‘This is what it Feels Like’ remixed by recent visitors W & W.
Moving ahead our attention was drawn almost completely by the antics of Ralph Kyau who seemed to be performing a parallel gig of his own! Displaying his signature dancing skills, he seemed to be enjoying himself even more than the crowd were! His long stares, finger dancing, mid-air splits and robot like moves definitely catered to making the night all the more special.
Kyau & Albert then gave us a taste of some of the tracks from their new album which were extremely well received by the crowd. Tracks like ‘Another Time’, ‘We Own the Night’, ‘ This Love’, ‘The One’, ‘Robotron’, ‘Euphonia’ and more were thrown at us and all of them made the crowd roar louder and louder.
About an hour into the set we were left wondering when would the duo drop their anthemic track, ‘A Night Like this‘ and just about then we were greeted with the familiar basslines and the unforgettable melody before the incredible vocals of Albert uplifted the crowd a few feet above the ground and sending us into a tizzy!
Just when we had gradually made our way back to our senses, Albert grabbed the headphones and kept the nostalgia high, as the duo dropped the evergreen Solarstone’s ‘Seven Cities’, recently curated by electrohouse masterminds Antilas & Dankan. The familiar uplifting melody was sure to elevate us and keep us raving for more! After all the sweet sounds that Albert bestowed, you’d imagine Kyau would give us a moment to compose ourselves. Alas, that was not to be! In came the familiar vocals from the dutch mastermind Ferry Corsten’s ‘Punk‘. An intense half an hour was culminated by the equally-intense ‘Ten‘ by the legendary paring of Sander Van Doorn, Mark Knight and Underworld. The heavy riff’s and fat basslines ensured the crowd continued to spin, scream and jump with whatever energy was left in them!
Another special moment was when Kyau & Albert lined up ‘Love will bring it all Around‘ by Giuseppe Ottaviani and Eric Lumiere. A silent moment passed as the sweet melody and charming vocals caused people in the audience to grab hold of their better (or bitter) halves! Light DJ’s lifted the mood with low lighting and soft colurs. A signature moment ensured by the Love Specialists!
Other anthems that Kyau & Albert dropped in the course of the night was the massive collaboration between Armin Van Buuren and W & W simply entitled ‘D# Fat‘. Albert briefly caused the likes of some of us to dance in slow motion when they dropped New World Punx duo Markus Schulz & Ferry Corsten’s ‘Loops and Tings’. The infamous melody inspired by yesteryear artist Jens, Loops and Tings shows why it still deserves to conquer dance clubs all around the world. A familiar dancefloor breakdown took place when Above and Beyond’s ‘Thing Called Love’ was dropped.
Despite showering the crowd with many anthems and electro trance productions, Kyau & Albert time and again released some familiar tunes from their own backyard on the dancefloor, providing us with a timely sense of nostalgia and reminding us why we fell in love with this duo! Classics such as ‘Kiksu’ and ‘Anphonic’ would slow things down for the crowd. Epic remixes such as Kyau & Albert’s own remix to the track ‘Out of the Sky’ by Lange vs Sarah Howells elevated that nostalgic feeling.
Special tracks of the night would also include the massive Ronski speed remix of ‘Megashira‘, which is a union of poundering basslines and uplifting melodies delivered to enthusiasts by the superb pairing of Marc Marberg and Kyau & Albert but the track that was just a sensory treat for the people who recognized the original was Stoneface and Terminal’s epic remix of ‘Made of Sun‘. Released last year, and played in all major clubs and festivals around the world, this track was just waiting to be dropped tonight!
An unintentional glance of the watch told us that the time was well over 2:40 am in the morning, already an hour and 10 mins more than the scheduled time! Kyau & Albert definitely more than made up for beginning at midnight as the night came to a close soon after at about 3 am.
As we made our way outside, it took us a few moments to compose ourselves to mentally summarize how the night had passed. The set was technically spot on but what made the journey so exciting was the unpredictable nature in which tracks were presented. All though the set was well balanced with intelligently composed uplifting tracks along with some anthems, there was always a surprise around the corner! Absolutely spell bound, we made our way towards our homes, with a wide smile across our faces and with Love in our hearts!
A very special thank you to Blue Frog, Mumbai!
Review By: Hamed Khalidi
Edited By: Aditya Seth
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