Coming off the back of his well-received ‘Devil’s Advocate’ and ‘Live’ albums and recent remixes for DJ Hell and Terence Fixmer, Dave Clarke is on blistering form with this sequel to 2001’s opening salvo of ‘World Service’. As with the original ‘World Service’, which sold over 70,000 copies across the globe, Clarke raises the bar for techno and electro DJs everywhere. Completely mixed on his beloved Technics DZ 1200 CD decks, ‘World Service 2’ is chopped, scratched and cut up with devastating hip hop-influenced panache. Clarke is at the top of his game. Wowing crowds internationally, from 25,000 ravers in Brazil to ever-welcoming fans packing Belgium’s FUSE Club, his knowledge of cutting edge music remains honed and tight, his attitude as invigoratingly enthused as ever.
“Techno and electro isn’t just dance music,” he says, “It’s a challenging alternative to all the music that bleeds kids dry and doesn’t progress anything, the music I call opium music. I don’t want my albums to be racked in shops next to all that - I’ve got absolutely no respect for it whatsoever; I want to be the alternative.”
On these two CDs he lives up to such fighting talk. The Electro mix starts out twisting through tracks by his old International Deejay Gigolo muckers David Caretta and the Hacker before diving into tough British grit represented by the likes of Chris McCormack and The Advent from Billy Nasty’s Electrix label. Naturally there’s the requisite dose of sex’n’sleazing on board right from the very start when Kim Peers requires a motherlode of rude lovin’, as does the equally lewd Junesex on ‘Fast Food Messiahs’. Clarke also throws in a surprises which hark back to his post-punk roots on tracks such as GDX’s version of ‘This Corrosion’ (originally by iconic goth band the Sisters Of Mercy), or the closing hip-as-fuck punk-funk of New Yorkers Silicone Soul asking a question relevant to many who’ve taken to the dancefloor as Clarke performs a peak-time DJ set – ‘Who Needs Sleep Tonight?’
Clarke’s take on techno is no less refreshing. Over 26 tracks he journeys through a huge variety of styles, embracing the dark rude humour of Detroit’s booty-tek but never losing sight of a thread of crunching four-to-the-floor dynamism. The pace seldom lets up from the opening demands by Underground Resistance’s Mad Mike Banks to “find your strength in the sound and make your transition” to the echoing outer space robot fade-out of AJ McGhee’s ‘Octapie at the CD’s close. Along the way DJ Rush asks us to ‘Sex Me All Night Long’, DJ Funk wants you to ‘Put Yo’ Back N 2 It’ and there’s even a track from 1980 by Japanese electronic legend Ryuchi Sakamoto. “The majority of techno DJs have an unbridled passion for it,” says Clarke by way of explanation, “and they also have technical skills that are way above other genre DJs.” His underground techno selection throbs with restless adrenalin, not concerned with titles or individual artists, it does what techno does best – gives computer music a raw funk and contagious punch that hauls listeners and dancers in.
“If I don’t do this,” says Dave Clarke of his music and DJing, “I can’t even judge myself as a human being – it’s in my blood and bones.”
One listen to these two energy-jammed CDs and it will be in yours too.

review by: Danchi