4.23.2004Last dance @ Centro-Fly with Laurent Garnier This is the weekend of last dances. Out of nowhere Centro-Fly has announced that after Saturday night it will shutter its dancefloor forever. A couple months ago, we had heard that the club was on the market and the Miami proprietors of BED and a similiarly linked NYC club owner MADE an offer and that a deal was being inked. Apparently, the deal fell through but again we heard that Centro kept the rather large deposit and was planning on forging ahead with the newly renovated Centro-Fly with new investors. Sadly, the club never seemed to take off again since its Fall 2003 round of renovations and failed to replicate their earlier success with Subliminal Sessions and GBH in its hey day. Now, curiously enough they've chosen ARC's closing party weekend to hype their own demise. Centro is even offering a 3am-4am OPEN BAR on Saturday night with Fatboy Slim AKA Norman Cook [we've loved him since his days in the HouseMartins] on deck duties. Coincidence or is it one last stab at a deal gone awry? Regardless, we went to dance and we did to "The Don" also known to the uneducated as Laurent Garnier. One of the world's most respected and talented DJs. His last two gigs in NYC were aborted due to visa issues. Once due to a passport hijacking and another as a casualty of the war on Iraq during the whole "freedom fries" episode. It was a spectacular night with friends and industry surprisingly in abundance. I stopped to chat with Layo Paskin - co-owner of The End nightclub and 1/2 of superb production duo Layo & Bushwacka! He's in town for a gig at Crash Mansion tonight and has been studiously working on a new L&B! album for release this Autumn. Their last artist album Night Works was a brillant display of quality electronic music made for complete listening from beginning to end. [Of course, I'm not just saying that because I worked on the press campaign ;) I actually give out copies of the album to budding EDM producers for inspiration and as an example of a quality album done right.] Back to Laurent, quality music and his specialty - the ability to play across every genre seamlessly. My dance floor moment was the segue from White Stripe "Seven Army Nation" to Nirvana "Lithium" - new classics and old merged for the dancefloor. Mental note to self: do not ever miss Laurent when he's spinning in town. So it was - our last dance at Centro. Now we're off to ARC for the long weekend...but first Layo & Bushwacka! next. posted on 2:06 PM |