‘AN EPIC PLEASUREHOOD EXPERIENCE WITH DIMITRI FROM PARIS’ (12/1/19)

- February 13, 2019

Pleasurehood is the new chapter in XOYO’s illustrious clubbing history. The whole new world of entertainment exists in another dimension, across both fabulous dancefloors in the club, past 9:30pm on Saturday nights. Dubbed as an immersive world of excess and hedonism – it is a place to escape your weekly troubles and be free in a world of your own. Each week, the pleasure dome hosts some of the world’s finest DJs to ignite the party atmosphere, and on the 12^th of January, disco don – Dimitri from Paris was in charge. He was joined at the pleasure party by established XOYO resident – Joshua James, and new kid on the block ‘Tech Support’ – who took control of the Green room all night long.

The XOYO doors acted as a portal to another desirable dimension. The gleaming mirror ball and giant, red illuminating sign reading ‘SEX’ upon entry, signified that pleasurehood-goers were descending into a whole world of fun. The Green room was the first pleasure zone that disco dancers could delve into. Mystic red laser beams shone through the thick green foliage hanging from the ceiling, as Tech Support kindly guided the pleasurehood disciples into their rhythm with some inviting selections. In his short career so far, the 20-year-old DJ and producer from Brighton has already supported the likes of Maurice Fulton, O’Flynn, Dan Shake and many more, and his experience at such a young age shone bright in the early stages of the night. He mixed up a concoction of downtempo, enchanting ingredients such as ‘Rain Forest’, magical, pleasing Italo house in the form of 'Paraiso 89', and a variety of uplifting disco for his dancefloor. We were dancing as a disco tribe in the green room jungle – all under the control of a very talented young DJ. He picked up the pace as the night progressed, maintaining a lively atmosphere with favourable house jams such as 'Got 2 Be Loved', and a range of other tasty selections.

Heading in further pursuit of pleasure; the dark downstairs basement was lit up by a combination of mesmerising lights, and Joshua James' sweet supply of house & disco. 3 years ago Joshua was invited to play an all night long set in room 2, and he has maintained his position as a resident DJ in the club ever since; supporting the likes of Honey Dijon, Greg Wilson, Tom Trago and many more in the process. He demonstrated his esteemed track selection talent by keeping the basement buzzing throughout the entirety of his set. By midnight, pleasurehood was full to the brim with disco energy. Joshua was reigning down euphoric belters such as ‘Here Comes That Sound Again’ and ‘Deputy of Love’ which sent pleasure levels through the roof. A stand out moment of the set was when he dropped Harry Thuman’s shrieking orchestral disco masterpiece – ‘Underwater’, before mixing straight into Patrick Cowley and Sylvester’s iconic ‘Do You Wanna Funk?’. Mr. XOYO closed out his set with Gerd Janson’s epic rework of ‘Don't Go’, and timeless classic ‘Sunny’, which perfectly paved the way for Dimitri to enter the party.

The Turkish born, French music producer and DJ of Greek descent brought New York club culture to Europe, and pioneered the re-edit, as the only French remixer in France from 1986-1990! As a young DJ, he visited New York as much as he could, to understand and expand his knowledge on house music in a club context, which didn’t exist in Europe. Dimitri wanted to DJ in his homeland, but club owners controlled the music and limited freedom and creativity. This inspired him to try his luck on the radio – where he could play records that he wanted. He managed to get shows on a couple of stations and would play unconventional records as well as his own edits. Suddenly, he became the man that anyone went to, to get a record remixed. He even got into providing soundtracks for fashion shows and ended up playing in the Playboy mansion a couple of times. When house music hit, it changed the remix game forever. Dimitri has produced countless edits – sampling his preferred 70s disco vocals over punchy house beats, which have brought him an unprecedented amount of success.

His chic, stylish, overwhelmingly cool character fits perfectly with the vibes of pleasurehood. He was the perfect headliner. From 2:30am until close, Dim successively delivered high energy disco edits. Impressive reworks of ‘Street Player’, and ‘Found A Cure’ were just some examples of the tunes which spread delight around the room. The energy didn’t drop once throughout the whole pleasurehood experience. From entering the immersive world from the get-go and experiencing Tech Support's warm up selections, there was a constant build in the atmosphere and energy throughout both floors on the night. Dimitri's record bag of brand-new edits of ‘Le Freak’ and ‘Lost in Music’ from his ‘Le Chic Remix’ album rocked la discotheque, invaded the minds of the disco dancers, and took us all to a new level on this ecstatic journey. As the pleasurehood portal began to close – the legend from Paris left us with his classic edit of Diana Ross’ ‘The Boss’ before playing one more from the new album ‘My Forbidden Lover’ when the lights came on. The world of hedonistic delight closed and chucked as back out into reality feeling wholly satisfied, but desiring another dosage of the immersive world of sex, disco, and hedonism. Luckily, we can enter this world every Saturday night for the next couple of months. Hats off to Tech Support, Joshua James, and Dimitri for an epic pleasurehood experience.