Yeah you nailed it. I agree with all that you have written, and I was there for alot of the events, it was hard to goto them all or you'd burn out, but me and friends kept going most weekends for almost 10 yrs, if we didn't go, we heard all about it from other friends who did or we'd read the reviews in mags such as 3d and halleluja (sp?) and juicy red apple. Hearing alot of the music for the first time was wicked, as we didnt have the net, and we shared things thru tapes, dj mixes and recording off dj radio (nik fish's musiquarium, patrick haf (hard as fuck) on 2ser, hi shock, gemma, acid ant, loads more did radio spots on certain stations that often went for 3 hrs or so of tunes and promos for parties, usually in the middle of the night.
Back in the early 90's everyone was accepted, it didn't matter what you wore, some people would rock up in heavy metal t shirts, or leather jackets, or suits, or whatever, and no one would care, there was a certain era around the early to mid 90's when i remember alot ravers wore baggy keppa style jeans, trainers and flano shirts, you could be trying to find a venue off a 0055 number out in some industrial area in the middle of the night and you would start to see groups around the area or at servos dressed this way hanging out or walking and you'd know you were getting close. But still once inside the event it really didn't matter what you were wearing or how you danced and what u looked like etc, or your age.
Later on more 'out there' stuff got more and more common too clothing wise, what is referred to as kandi ravers or kandi kids, in fluffy leg warmers, with elmo back packs and other kids style stuff, like pacifiers and all sorts of stuff.
It's funny how the scene changed so quickly really, my first raves when me and friends were 16 and 17, we were all the youngest there and the older crews of mainly english ravers would joke to us about how young we were and 'do your parents know where you are' etc (as the kick ass rave by Krackerjack productions called 'Does Your Mother Know' played on, promotion teams and dj's were predominately English as well, Sydney rave promoters like The Welsh Embassy, E productions, Krackerjack, Sweet Science, Tribal, were all english or had some english members as far as I recall - This vid which I posted up above was the first sweet science party and it shows how much older and how English based the scene was back then - This is around the time I first started going to events. I recall one of their next ones was dead as, hardly anyone went as another crew put on a big even on the same night and got all the numbers.
Sweet Science - 28/4/1991 - Full Video
http://youtu.be/UpxTpt-kMRc
It's worth a watch, as there's not much footage from back then really as far as i can find. Alot of these promotors and dj's and ravers from england stopped going and putting on events by the mid 90's and more and more scammers joined in to try and promote large scale events and make a killing, sometimes there would be upto 3 events on the same night, often 2 large ones and a smaller hardcore one, and some of them started calling the cops on the others if they found out where the venue was prior and other politics and dirty tricks came into play. Some events advertised certain live acts and dj's and they never showed and ravers would just have to put up with what went down.
But on a whole those kind of things were minimal, it was pretty amazing how consistent the events were, and every weekend without fail, there was always something on, and as I said sometimes 2 or 3 (especially on long weekends) often we would go from one to the other to find out where all our new mates were, and which ones had the big crowd and best vibe. The drugs were expensive, with pills often being flogged for $60 but duds were rare and they were often very strong, ticket prices were pretty low compared to today and the production on some of these events was awesome, Prodigy had one event with fake snow inside the warehouse from big snow machines, EON i think it was (or beyond?) had the ticket on a pair of 3d glasses that you could keep and wear inside the venue and trip out at the lasers and lights, some events would have 2 or 3 or more rooms of differing style with major set ups, and also chill out rooms from punos become legendary (punos upside down b2f being sound) punos started out doing warehouse raves, i recall a pretty killer party they did in mascot or botany back in the early 90's before they got known as the chill out people. A few events had hard core rooms in shipping containers and all sorts of things. Centrepoint tower got used, the international shipping terminal got used, glebe wheat silos, redfern rail yards, one of the old pitt st cinemas, the list goes on and on.
There seemed to be alot of freedom for promoters to find really amazing venues before anna woods death in '95, but even after that some still found good ones, but I think it became harder and harder, and most the english had left the scene, and the adults became less and less and young kids became more and more common (even 12, 13 and 14 yr olds)..
J&S ride in the night -
http://youtu.be/3Y7MgeHg0C8
Happy times. Peace
