Lee Coomb’s was here in Perth last week to promote his new album “Light & Dark” and what better location to do so than at Ambar Nightclub. The entire club was packed thick with party goers by 11am all of which seemed ready for a big night.

Prizzy was behind the decks from 11:30 – 1:00am warming up the crowd nicely with mostly chart topping progressive house. Then Lee stepped up to the eager crowd only to start his first 15 minutes with a collection of somewhat monogamous progressive tech-funk beats. Maybe he was having an ‘off ‘day or maybe performing just isn’t his thing but Lee appeared to lack authentic crowd interaction and this was not helped by turning his back to the crowd during break downs to shuffle through his crate. This changed after he moved into a few chunky break-beats 20 minutes in, one of which was NAPT’s latest single ‘Fuck Critics’. This song was the highlight of the night and the entire club erupted following and cheering throughout NAPT’s dynamic and impressive production work. The change into breaks was well welcomed by the crowd but he failed to realise this and moved back into the progressive-tech sound. His set remained quite progressive and tech orientated, a direction I think should have been tweaked for the Breaks loving Ambar scene. I expected more from Lee considering his 20year experience of producing great music and being signed to one of the best break’s labels (lot49). He is well connected with the other headliners currently doing big things for the breaks scene; Meat Katie, Dylan Rhymes and Elite Force but decided to steer clear of their influences trying for his own new direction which is also reflected throughout his latest ‘Light & Dark’ album.

Established local Ben Mac kept things moving in a broken beat/electro house direction from 3-4:30am and Kill Dyl cleaned up the rest of the dancefloor until close. All In all I was a little disappointed with the night considering the potential the place had with a fully charged venue. His set had people dancing but didn’t have people screaming for more.

5/10

A few crowd responses during Lee’s set;

“Not playing classic breaks which was what I came here for & fingers crossed he will deliver a little later” (5/10) – James

“This place is a sausage fest and needs more women! Last year’s lead-up was heaps better aswell. (6.5/10) – Simon

“Perth wants more drum and bass, none of this pussy shit!” – The question I couldn’t help but asking myself was “why are you at a breaks night, complaining about the lack of dnb? Especially when shape is running a dubstep n dnb night just down the road at the same time…”