“Nylon Club was more or less the heart & soul of the Helsinki clubbing scene during 1996-1998. It was quite small venue – taking only 200 people at time – but a place for many many memorable nights and events. Club Unity started there in October 1996 while Lil’ Tony, Eliot Ness, Chris Lindgren and Spoogy ran their house nights for years. Lil’ Tony became The Daddy of the Helsinki house scene and Eliot moved from bigger events back into a more clubby territory pretty much during those Nylon days. Mr.A and Pietari also started their Sunday night mayhem event ‘Doom’, while (in my opinion) Antti broke through especially as THE guaranteed party DJ at Sunday Schools daytime sessions, with his sound being inspired by the London Sunday daytime clubbing equivalents Trade and DTPM. At Nylon Antti was working in the bar, Wekku doing the lights, Mensonen run the front bar, Slim was stomping the floor with his bikerboots, Alimo, Control & Ivo had their drum’n’bass nights and Aki Walli did occasional photo shooting. Legendary times at a legendary venue with legendary people for sure!
Sunday School drew it’s inspiration heavily from Ibiza’s Space Club’s Sunday sessions where Nylon owner Tapio Suomi had been visiting. But of course with it’s own unique finnish twist. The party started usually around 09am and lasted until the afternoon, early evening or just non-stop until Monday morning. It’s quite a unique feeling to have a full on party going on when it’s all quiet and chilled afternoon outside. Lil’ Tony remembers one time: “It was already Monday morning with the party still going strong, when Police walked in, Maglites blazing shouting “This is police!” only to get an extatic response of hurrays and laughters until people realized it actually WAS the police. It wasn’t long until some people were taken with them…”
My first 16 hour set was at the Sunday School closing party in May of 1997. Sunday School residents were Lil’ Tony, Spoogy, Mr.A and Kai Krister K with myself and some other guesting every now and then. I rememeber the event as an amaaazing party but also as a physically very exhausting experience. For the last hour I was almost fainting but the dancing crowd just kept the energy flowing. At 04:00am I felt I couldn’t have played a single more record and on 01.01.2010 there will be seven more hours to play after 16 hours so I hope there will be lots of positive energy flowing then too! Lights were done by old school LJ pioneers Wekku (from Smile Club) and Tero (from Unity) – both keeping the spirit high throughout the day and night. Music was ranging from the traditional Nylon house sound (like Armand van Helden’s ‘Funk Phenomena’) through UK progressive house (think Underworld’s ‘Dark & Long’) to quality old school Unity trance (such as Tilt vs Paul van Dyk’s ‘Rendezvous’). Oh those were the times… but thankfully there are equally good times still happening! As a blast from the past here is the flyer of the Nylon session:”
DJ Orkidea’s Old School House Top 11 (varies every week though;)
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01. Aztec Mystic: Knights of the Jaguar
02. Klatsch!: God Save The Queer
03. DJ Sneak: You Can’t Hide From Your Bud
04. Armand van Helden: Funk Phenomena
05. Cassius: La Mouche (DJ Falcon remix)
06. Spiller: Groovejet
07. Bent: Always (Asley Beedle’s Mahavishnu remix)
08. Simon: Free At Last
09. Hott22: I Feel Love
10. Black Box: Ride On Time
11. Full Intention: America (I Love America)
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DJ Orkidea’s Current House Top 11 (varies every day though;)
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01. Underworld: Two Months Off (Pete Tong & Rogers remix)
02. Joris Voorn: We’re All Clean
03. Pitto: Feelin’ (remixes)
04. Calvin Harris: Flashback (Eric Prydz remix)
05. Simian Mobile Disco: Cruel Intentions (DJ Pierre remix)
06. Dennis Ferrer: Hey Hey
07. Röyksopp: This Must Be It
08. Omar B & LYS: One Day
09. Shonky: La Madone
10. David West & Ida Engberg: Abataka
11. Siwell: Kenya