25/08/2026
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Tsuyoshi Suzuki - Art Of Sound – Part 05 - THE PARTY
We booked Tsuyoshi to play at UCT Sports Centre, a regularly used venue for music & dance events that could hold 5000 people.
I had been to music concerts there in my University days. We booked it as an Electronic Dance Music Event, I must admit that we did not mention the “Rave” word, scarred as we were by the Raver witch-hunt in the world.
In a nutshell, UCT misunderstood Electronic Music Dance event, they were think Ball Room :) Despite a signed contract & a deposit paid for the venue, chose to cancel the party, despite our threats to sue for damages.
After a call from the Dean of The Law Faculty himself, with regards our hot-air threats of legal action, we decided to rather try & find another venue.
With 10 days to go the pressure was firmly on. Luckily, we had a few contacts in the movie industry, & we managed to swing the party to the newly built Longkloof Studios. The party was reduced to the 2000 Tickets sold with no tickets available at the door.
We put up 3 linked rigs in all 3 of the studios with the DJ in one. In those days, we were just into the music & dancing, most of the parties you could not even see the DJ from middle to back of the dance-floor.
Nothing like the modern stages we see today. It made sense when we were semi-legal & underground, not to high-light the DJ but to hide him away should there be any kind of police action.
I can remember very little of the night, mostly spent in the road outside & in the parking lot. It was absolute chaos, police, law enforcement & City of Cape Town authorities helping with crowd control outside. I only got to experience the last two hours of Tsuyoshi’s set. In terms of Party Organizing, one to forget as quickly as possible.
Sadly, there were a few thousand disappointed people outside without tickets, including good friends but we were full to capacity. The night was absolute chaos & stress to be honest. Trance was officially launched in CT to a mainstream crowd.
The rest they say is history. Tsuyoshi Suzuki played every year at Vortex from 1996-2002 at all The Ostrich Farm parties on the West Coast. Tsuyoshi & his band with Nick Taylor, Prana were one of the fundamental musical inspiration of the South African scene.
Let me know about your memories of the mix-master deck-wizard & his impact on your psychedelic trance development? I would also love to hear from any who were at the party as I missed most of it. What an amazing time to be young & free in South Africa.
To be continued… Part 06
PHOTO CREDIT: Nick – Tsuyoshi Suzuki in the Mix at Longkloof Studios 1996.
Tsuyoshi returns to Africa Vortex Open Source 2026
Link in Bio & First comment.
