There weren’t any cell phones on the dance floor at Kingdom on Friday night. The absence of that ubiquitous appliance beaming LED light into the club was triumphal. For once, people busied themselves by enjoying the moment, which included dancing to samples of Melle Mel’s “White Lines.”
The official festival party called Thank You for Sweating was very well ventilated and cooled when Welshman Mial Watkins took the stage as house Doc Daneeka. Watkins sampled Daft Punk and Donnell Jones through his jacking house set. He also watched as the dance floor of 50 quickly doubled after he went on at 9:45pm, all of them dancing at the base of the elevated DJ booth.
Next up, Austin’s Capyac, who cut their teeth as a nü-disco-influenced act at local apartments and co-op parties, took two shakes to get into the booth promptly at 10:30. The pairing of Delwin Campbell and Eric Peana followed Watkins’ set in kind, with house music that shook dancers to their soles.
Co-founder of online electronic equipment venture Beatport, the Italian-born and Canada-reared John Acquaviva took the booth in a white tee with “Acid Love” in block lettering. Acquaviva, in fact, opened with acid squelches. His decades on the international DJ circuit touring and co-owning Plus 8 and Definitive Records with fellow Detroit legend Richie Hawtin worked wonders live.
Acquaviva spent 90 minutes destroying anyone’s sense of physical stillness with techno from around the world. He closed with a delicious remake of a Detroit favorite, Rolando’s “Night of the Jaguar.”
This article appears in March 16 • 2018.