Review: Sven Vath at Club Bonbon

Bonbon, also known as Asia's arm of superclub Godskitchen, hosts a wide variety of electronic music every single week. Two weeks ago, local crew Phreaktion brought DJ Marky to the decks. Last week, we interviewed Arthur Baker, who was preparing to rock the place. This week, our intrepid reporter braved Bonbon's ear-piercing sound system to bring you Sven Vath.

We arrived at Bonbon to find resident DJ Gas playing to a packed house. However, at Bonbon a "packed house" doesn't mean too much - the dancefloor is pretty small. Consequently, after about 11 PM, it feels like the People's Square metro during rush hour. If you don't get there early, forget getting anywhere near the center. You're relegated to hanging around the edges and getting shoulder-bumped every ten seconds by other people scrambling one way or the other.

At about 1 AM, Vath stepped to the decks amidst wild cheering. He is known in his native Germany, and all throughout the world, as a DJ who likes to play extended sets. Urban legend has it that he used to travel with a body guard. The guard's job was not to protect him from onlookers, but to physically grab Sven and rush him to his next gig. Otherwise, Sven would have stayed and played right where he was.

Vath plays music in the style of Josh Wink, Ricardo Villalobos, and many other acid/minimal techno pioneers. This night was no different - his music was sparse and stripped-down techno. These tracks provided a stark contrast from DJ Gas, who had been playing lush progressive house just moments earlier. However, the tempo of Vath's set hovered around 130 BPM, which is faster than a typical minimal set. This fact, combined with Bonbon's clear sound system and unlimited drinks policy, kept the night lively and ensured constant movement on the dancefloor.

Well -- as much movement as possible, anyway.

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