Thanks to everyone for their feedback. I think most people understand that this was a learning experience for us and I do think we have created a good foundation to build on.
The whole concept was to encourage more people who only like main room music to try the full, slower UTOPIA experience - and likewise we also hoped to give a more varied evening to our usual UTOPIANs, many of whom I know still love to shake it a little.
I'm sure you can imagine that with all that to bear in mind the DJ logistics were a nightmare! Vince, Val and me spent over 2 weeks going backwards and forwards with tracks and concepts; should we play mostly known freestyle tracks, or should we try to encompass a much broader concept? Should we remain all up-tempo for the first section, or should we go for more light and shade? In the UTOPIA section, should we lighten the difficulty of tracks so that we don't frighten newbies we've been aiming to encourage too much, or should we throw them in at the deep end?
And then as regards structure; we were uncertain about start times for both the workshop and the freestyle, we were uncertain about whether to include a class or not, and we were also uncertain about the length of each section within the TWISTED format. We made decisons on all of these and now we have experienced an actual event, like many of you, we can see that it all needs tweaking a little.
We'll be meeting this week and hopefully by the end of the week will be able to tell you about all the changes we will be making.
Just in the meantime: As regards the next event at The Colosseum in Dec, it is currently undecided on whether it will be a full UTOPIA Xmas night or still have some element of TWISTED - but we will let everyone know the decision very soon. Also, the NYE event will not be run by UTOPIA, but will be run by the same team who gave you The Black & White Ball and is, in effect, the Ashtons replacement (I don't know where the cost of £40 a ticket came from as a price hasn't been decided yet).
Thanks again, and we're glad so many of you enjoyed it and enjoyed the new venue. The venue managers are fantastic and as everyone said the bar was great and so was the food.
Just as a final point: We all felt it was important to announce the change at midnight and to explain about what was going to happen to anyone who had never been to one of our events. The announcement was also a logistical segue to allow all the lights to change over, as some weren't on the DMX panel. The announcement was made over a small piece of atmospheric music before the first track began, and not over the track itself, and lasted precisely 56 secs. Given that, I do think this comment is a little harsh..
'The woman I was dancing with said something like "Play the *** music!!"
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