After a night of exhaustive dancing at the behest of Russian superstar duo Hard Rock Sofa, only these words will be on the tip of our tongues till we recover from the awesomeness that the duo bestowed upon us! Canvas Mumbai on the 4th of May 2013, will always remember their epic set which seemed to consume the crowd into an unfettering dance frenzy.
Hard Rock Sofa is a Russian duo of electronic music founded in 2005 in Smolensk and are composed by Alexander Shapovalov & Denis Chepikov. Thier track ‘Blow up‘ featuring St. Brothers reached the 2nd spot in the Beatport Top 100 charts, all in a few days after its release. Supported by the titans of Dance music such as Tiesto, David Guetta, Pete Tong, Swedish House Mafia, Afrojack, Judge Jules, Roger Sanchez to name a few, these guys have cemented their place in the dance music scene as one of the top notch producers and DJ’s to watch out for. Collaborating with their good friends Swanky Tunes, Hard Rock Sofa released a host of dancefloor anthems such as ‘Here We Go’, ‘Feedback’, ‘Acid Trip’, ‘Select Start‘ and the YouTube sensation ‘I Wanna Be Your Dog‘, which are still crowd pullers in clubs around the world.
In 2012, they released some of their biggest tracks till date such as the mighty ‘Quasar’, ‘Kaleidoscope‘, ‘Starlight’, ‘Apogee‘ and the massive ‘Chemistry/Turn The Flame Higher‘ for which they colloaborated with Swanky Tunes and Matisse & Sadko. Hard Rock Sofa announced their India tour earlier this year, and amidst a lot of anticipation and buzz on Twitter and Facebook in the past few weeks, they landed here in Mumbai on 4th May and delivered a set of colossal proportions!
Proceedings began at around 9:30 pm with a set by domestic duo ‘One & One’. Their energetic track selection in the warm up certainly got a few people up and moving on the dancefloor! With tracks such as Fedde le Grand’s ‘So much love‘, W & W‘s remix of ‘This is what it feels like‘, and the fresh vocal edit of ‘Reload‘. Ending with David Guetta‘s recent ‘Play Hard‘ Feat. Ne-Yo & Akon, ‘One & One’ stepped away from the decks, ascertaining that they certainly have the potential to make it big in the coming years with their brand of energetic dance music.
At around 10:30 pm, the unpredictable DJ Shiva took over the decks. With a wide sparkling smile, rolled up sleeves and downing beer after another, DJ Shiva changed gears significantly as bass and beats drowned the building crowd . While we were eagerly awaiting Hard Rock Sofa, DJ Shiva did an excellent job with some innovative remixes and mashups. Adding that famous flanger effect, the acapella’s ranged from ‘Sweet Disposition‘, ‘Fade into Darkness‘, ‘Toca’s miracle’ and others while he dropped some electrohouse anthems like Deadmau5′s ‘Moar Ghosts n Stuff‘, Avicii‘s ‘Fade into Darkness‘ and Nari & Milani’s ‘Atom‘.
With one dance number after another, the crowd began to build up and before we could realize, the dancefloor was packed! Counting us down till 11:30 pm, finally, DJ Shiva announced the Russian duo as they stepped up and acknowledged the loud cheers from the crowd. Just before starting up the duo from Russia looked calm and relaxed, as they put their heads down trying to set themselves around the gear. Once Alexander pressed play, the beat slicing began followed by a prolonged stutter and a loud bass drop. The night had officially begun and Canvas was ready for an onslaught at the hands of Hard Rock Sofa!
Starting the night with their own edit of Skrillex’s ‘Park Smoke‘ while infusing it with those familiar vocals from David Guetta’s ‘Just One Last Time‘, HRS dropped the beat and the synths got the crowd instantaneously raising their arms. Next up, they began pushing the tempo with Nicky Romero’s latest ‘Symphonica‘ which was first heard at Tomorrowland 2012. It wasn’t long before they began their Mashup buffet with tracks and acapellas ranging from many genres, served on a steaming hot platter of beats and basslines, on the EDM-hungry audience of Mumbai!
Teaming up those awesome breakdowns of Andrew Bayer‘s ‘England‘ with the acapella from Swedish House Mafia’s unofficial first track featuring Laidback Luke & Deborah Cox ‘Leave The World Behind‘, Hard Rock Sofa kept their steady onslaught going in full swing as they went on to mix those two gems with Nari & Milani’s ever popular ‘Atom‘ which ensured pure madness, as the crowd refused to step down. Following that with another herculean mashup of their very recent collaboration with Dirty Shade called ‘Collapsar‘ with those resentful vocals of Gotye’s ‘Somebody That I Used To Know‘, the boys from Russia had come fully prepared and fully armed.
Attacking the crowd with turbo charged breaks, they continued to drop mashup after mashup, almost challenging the crowd and pushing the bar. The crowd, meanwhile reacted exactly as expected, begging for more as Hard Rock Sofa obliged them with a mashup of monstrous proportions when they started with the rhythmically tensed ‘Quasar‘ and good old vocals of Skylar Grey’s ‘Coming Home‘.
A more perfectly contrasting mashup could not be developed as these two were shortly conjoined with the Faithless’s heavenly ‘Insomnia‘ and an acapella from Temper Trap’s ‘Sweet disposition‘. Stuck in a trance thanks to the surrealistic vocals and synths of ‘Insomnia’, we crash landed straight back to Canvas, when after a stuttered break, Steve Angello’s ‘Knas‘ was thrown at us!
We also got a taste of an electro rock mashup when White Stripe’s ‘Seven Nation Army‘ was amalgamated with Justice’s ‘We are your friends‘ and Dada Life’s “Epic“. Next up was one from the duo’s own vault as they played their mashup of their own remix with Swanky Tunes of Calvin Harris feat Ne-Yo’s ‘Let’s Go‘ with their sublime remix of Alesso ft. Mathew Koma’s ‘Years‘.
Which led to one of the most unexpected mashups of the night when Dimitri Vegas, Like Mike and Moguai’s ‘Mammoth‘ was rolled up with the legendary Daft Punk‘s immortal track ‘Around the world‘. This was followed by another surprise when the duo mixed their collaboration with Matisse & Sadko & Swanky Tunes ‘Chemistry (Turn The Flame Higher)‘ with The Prodigy’s ‘Girls‘ and an acapella of Axwell & Sebastian Ingrosso’s ‘Together‘. The lovely thing about a mashup is the infinite creative possibilities in terms of mixing it offers and the Russians showed us just how creative and masterful they were!
As these mashups were being rained down on us, one after another, we were beginning to wonder if structural engineers anticipate the design of floors when Hard Rock Sofa performs; because clearly after all the endless jumping and smashing on the dancefloor, I wonder if these floors can take such impact but rather unrelentingly, the duo hit us with another stellar mashup!
What began with Axwell’s recut club version of Michael Calfan’s ‘Resurrection‘ and Steve Angello’s edit of Tim Mason’s ‘The Moment‘, took an unexpected turn when Hard Rock Sofa decided to infuse their famous collaboration with Swanky Tunes ‘Here We Go‘ with an acapella of Swedish House Mafia ft. Tinie Tempah’s ‘Miami 2 Ibiza‘. All this mashup needed was R3hab & Quintino remix of Tiesto’s ‘Chasing Summers‘, and that’s exactly what was served to us, piping hot!
Continuing the madness that had ensued, they then gave us Ellie Goulding’s ‘Lights (Feenixpawl Bootleg)‘ with Alex Guesta & Stefano Pain’s ‘Ran Tam Tam‘ and ‘The Scream‘ while Swedish House Mafia’s ‘Greyhound‘ tamed the basslines and beats!
Following that the duo gave us another tremendous mashup with Nari & Milani Vs. Maurizio Gubellini ft. Nicci’s ‘Vago‘ and the wonderful acapella of Axwell ft. Steve Edwards’s ‘Watch The Sunrise‘. At this point Alexander got hold of the mike, while Denis climbed the decks as they unleashed Swedish House Mafia’s bootleg version of a mashup of their homegrown ‘Rasputin‘ with The Aston Shuffle Vs. Tommy Trash’s ‘Sunrise (‘Won’t Get Lost’)’. Those vocals that continue to grow on you as the tailor made track for dancefloors Rasputin, sent the crowd into a tizzy of swarming synths and drops!
Yet another fine mashup was Sebastian Ingrosso & Tommy Trash’s ‘Reload’ with an acapella of the Swedish House Mafia ft. John Martin‘s anthem ‘Save The World‘. This was followed by a mashup between Alesso’s ‘Clash‘ with Eric Prydz’s ‘Proper Education‘, uniting the crowd into a rebellious mood!
Besides the plethora of mashups that were bestowed upon us, Hard Rock Sofa included plenty of their singles and releases of other artists fitted in between the mash up’s like pieces of a puzzle. These included ‘Stellar‘ by Daddy’s Groove , Alesso’s remix of One republic’s ‘If I Lose Myself‘, Gabriel & Dresden and Molly Bancroft’s revisited legend ‘Tracking Treasure down‘ , Swedish House Mafia’s final masterpiece ‘Don’t You Worry Child‘ and Deniz Koyu’s recent banger ‘Rage‘ .
Hard Rock Sofa left us at 12:30 am with acknowledgement to a thunderous cheer. We approached the duo for a Track ID (which had a blistering bassline and some tribal synths forming a concocted combination) to which Alexander simply smiled and responded, “I’m sorry…I really can’t tell you!“
The management moved the crowds away from the duo, as fans swarmed them for photographs as we left the club with our ears still ringing and in admiration of the superb mixing skills of Hard Rock Sofa and their superb set. Here’s to the next time we are united with people on the dance floor, with wide smiles planted across our faces all the while awaiting the next big drop…together!
Special Thanks to Deep Sound Entertainment, And Canvas, Mumbai for such an unforgettable night.
Stay tuned for an interview with the duo themselves!
Review By: Hamed Khalidi & Shule Puri
Edited By: Aditya Seth
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