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Happy Birthday KinetiK

Author: Katie Elles
Thursday, May 8, 2003
It started out as an intimate affair in a back street pub called The Royston Hotel, then Alia, A Bar Called Barry and The International. Now Kinetik is celebrating 2 years of wicked underground partying and 1 year of being at Deep 11 at the Mercat Cross Hotel, where it is renowned for its broad minded, cross-genre approach encompassing breaks, house, tek-house, progressive, techno, electro, ambient, psy trance.

Kinetik continues the Birthday Breakz tradition, joining with AKA Ltd on the night to launch local breaks CD compilation sequel "If It Aint Broke Don't Fix It…Too." Residents Heath Myers, Aaron Smiles and Shane Ford will be joined by Phil K, Brewster B and Keltec vs Mangan & Jono Fernandez, all of which have break beat productions featured on the album.

The brainchild behind Kinetik is resident DJ Heath who's career begins in the warehouse at Shock Records 8 years ago where he gradually worked his way up through a number of jobs into the position of Product and Label Manager.

"I was around DJ's and looking after labels like Wet Musik and Central Station. I guess the reason why I focused my efforts on getting into the music industry was because I've been going to raves and clubs for about 12 years now so it was an extra curricula interest and hobby that I wanted to transpose at a business level."

Heath's hobby developed into more than just a business venture and after spending much time with DJ's and collecting a considerable amount of music he decided to try out mixing himself.

"I wasn't a regular punter who went along just to bop to the music, I was into it technically and appreciated what they were doing so, there was an interest and a knowledge into what was going on simultaneously. One day it got the point where I thought 'you know some people do it and some people don't' so, I just got out there and artistically it ended up being a really good avenue for me and something I had a good affiliation with."

It was a smooth transition for Heath who, had been running Kintetik basically for free, without any cover charge. Being the business minded person that he is, Heath saw his new role as a form of publicity.

"I guess it was conceptual from a marketing point of view so, the application was something I welcomed because the reason I swapped through so many roles while working at Shock was because I wanted to gain more knowledge and it just seemed like a natural progression. I threw a few parties and had people tell me what great parties they were and so I thought it was something I could I do and it's fun and it's different so, it was a welcome transition."

Since then Heath has developed what he calls "a thirst for putting on parties."

"You don't see me doing huge parties, I do smaller things, like admin deals or what I call a co-op deal. For instance I launched Click at Freebases third birthday, and looked after their lounge room, where I threw a concept night in there. I've got Fraktured vs. Kinetik coming up on the 30th of May at Seven and of course Sunday School which we've just kicked back into action as well with a new line-up and venue so, the party details announced the next few weeks."

Heath's theory around co-op deals is ingrained in a "no competition policy" where from a business perspective Heath says it is better for players in the industry to be part of a support network rather than trying to cut each other throats

"We're all putting something into a scene and inevitably our nights will overlap and there's only so much disposable income that you can drag out of people for your events so, at the end of the day it all works better when we help each other and I've found in the promotions game more so than in the records industry, that strategic alliances with people are a lot more helpful."

Although it may seem Heath's no competition policy is little more than a clever business strategy, it actually has its roots in the original party culture that started the whole scene<
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