With our reviews in arrears, our previews hardly present, our music devotions derelict and our recommendations rusty, we have decided it is time to take time off, take time to re-charge, take time to re-focus & take time to re-energise, the announcement of our “Scene Summer Sabbatical & Service Scale Down”, deluding to the details of our decision, along with our desires & intentions for a full service resumption/return.

With 2012 already proving to be our own “annus horribilus” on a number of fronts, there can be little or no doubt that the activity that was always the core part of our existence, our reviews, has taken a direct hit, how did we out it?, “…woefully in arrears…”, while it is also true that the year so far has seen a distinct lack of the previews, both in full form & in focus/feature style, along with an absence of our much loved much now maligned recommendations newsletters, ones we used to, devotingly so, issue each |& every week, although this first half of 2012 has seen just half a dozen devotions, hardly the devoting our admiring audiences deserve or indeed expect. But the sorrowful story continues, as one of a major life loves, our music, has also been badly hit, planned special features, D.J. focuses &, yes, our music newsletters, all having pretty much ground to a halt, while there has been a ray of light in the form our newly launched “Picks” section which (well up until the middle of this month that is) has dominated our activity and has proved to be the one inspiration in a year that has been devoid of almost every intrinsic ingredient. So, whether it be recommends, focuses, features or reports, all that have formed part of our success recipe, our package, they have been alarmingly absent, while it is the one element that started it all that remains THE most alarming absentee, that element being our reviews.

So what’s been happening?, Well to put not too fine a point on it, the “Matt” in Disco Matt has been the cause, a whole host of issues that has afflicted Matt, having a knock on effect on Disco Matt (yes we are one & the same), close family illness issues back home in South Africa dominating both January & February, while it is now Matt’s health that is consuming our lives, to the extent that we, all too often, find ourselves so fatigued that there remains little or no energy or dive to pursue our postings with anywhere near the vigour & va va voom of previous times. Then, to compound the problems besieging us, a series of computer failures have influenced our interest & intent to deliver our devotions, we having lurched from one device to the next with little or no resolve or resolution and, in reality, without this essential element/tool, we have been akin to carrying a war wound, a lost limb, or a corroded cog in our writing wheel, a wheel that had become square rather than round and, as the saying goes, has fallen off!! So, those have been the causes and the effects have been plain to see, the figures speaking volumes, a lacklustre six reviews reaped when there should have been four times that, while with just two music newsletters, a handful of recommendations & no previews whatsoever, it certainly is a sad state of affairs we have found ourselves in, while on the positive, our scene step outs have been captured not just in pictures & video’s posted onto social networking sites, but our now infamous “nibble size tweets” have amassed an ever increasing following.

However, the fact remains that, with much of our core activity at a complete standstill and with the heavy weight of expectation of output laying heavily on our, what were, broad shoulders, we have had to look inwardly at the issues that are causing this collapse in our once wondrous writing and in so doing decide to relieve some of that pressure by sending ourselves on a scene summer sabbatical and also scale down our services, the summer sabbatical part of the equation allowing us to “re-charge”, the scaling down of services allowing us to “re-focus” and the two combined allowing us to re-energise & then “re-engage”, hence the title of our report. So what form will all of this take?, Well, as we have hinted, we will be stepping out of the scene spotlight for a few weeks, curtailing our commitments to expectant engagements while possibly continuing to make the odd cameo appearance here & there, these visits seeing a scaling down of our nibble size tweets, which for this summer sabbatical period, will however continue while we re-charge. And the scaling down of services will also impact (it has already) on our website which will hopefully see itself going through some re-charging, with further nip & tuck tweaks and improvements both to the layout & the look, meaning it is possible that the site may go down for this maintenance while we scale down our activity, shifting the focus in the direction of our social networking sites, Tumblr, Twitter & Facebook.

With the re-charging process in place, we will be then re-focussing, predominantly on those core aspects of our activity, so our reviews, our music posts & our regular recommendations, we having already decided to draw a line under the first six months of this “annus horribilus” part of our year and look forward to a remaining six months when we will be re-energised & re-engaged with our writing. So, with the sabbatical period relieving the pressure, the aim will be to roll all these posts back into prominent position, while not forgetting the elements of our activity that have proven quite fruitful in 2012, so our Picks posts & the D.J. focuses & podcast propulsions that have borne fruit through our Pick of The Day” & “Podcast of The Week” choices. But, as the next six months dawn arrives (its 1^st July tomorrow) we are determined to re-start all the supporting structure we have been so fervently following in the year so far, so while our website goes through its changes, we will be continuing to update all the banners in our various “Supports” sections, so clubs & events, businesses, publications & music producers, the specialist “Orange Nation” “WE Party” devotions continuing. Moreover, we have set ourselves a weekly schedule which will kick in following the end of our sabbatical which will mark the start of our re-energising & re-engagement period, elements of this beginning to bed in from as early as tomorrow, while we remain determined to under promise on our postings and so over deliver as a result.

So the question remains, when will this summer sabbatical & service scale down end?, Well, as we go to press on our decision, its remains pretty open ended, although we expect to be fully back on stream by the beginning of September, so a sabbatical period of eight or so weeks, we taking this opportunity to apologise to those clubs & club promoters for our absence from a elongated list of events, clubs included (some benefitting from a smattering of showings) being A:M, Beyond, CasaLatina, Dish, Gigolo, Hard On!, Later, Matinee, Orange, PlayTime, Room Service, Salvation, Trade & War, while to club promoters, particularly Craig Elder, Jonny Marsh, Jodie Harsh, Suzi Kruegar, David & L.a. Hart, Tom Stephan and Kris Di Angelis, we will be back supporting but more importantly, reviewing your events as it is our reviews that is the real core of our activity and what we have become famed for & are all about. In addition, to the venues, such as The Shadow Lounge, Profile & East Bloc, we will be continuing (and in places) ramping up our support & our showings from September, while some will benefit from short steps into the scene spotlight during our summer sabbatical, Beyond one such benefactor as soon as tomorrow, while we are sure others will follow.

Well, that’s where we are, while what we have also done, not least following the inspiration drawn from a recent cinema trip, is to mastermind a Disco Matt maxim, one which will underpin the re-charging, re-focusing, re-energising & re-engagement period we now find ourselves in, it seemingly appropriate to end our report by sharing it with you, it chronicling, where we have been, where we are, and where we want to be, and it goes like this

“…The person, who risks nothing, does nothing, has nothing, but nothing happens unless we first dream. So we came, we dreamed & we tried in our different ways, but now tired, we simply get up in the morning & we try, as nothing else matters. Can we be blamed for feeling too tired to change, too scared of failure to start it all again? Well the only real failure is the failure to try and the measure of our success is how we cope with our failings, as we always must. All we know about the future is that it will be different, but perhaps what we fear is that it will be the same. So we must celebrate the changes, because everything will be alright in the end, and if it’s not alright, then trust us, it’s not yet the end…”

So here’s to our summer sabbatical serenading a new & renewed enthusiasm for what we do & how we do it, here’s to the decided mobilisation of our music devotions, the resumption of our recommendations and, most importantly, the return of our reviews. (DISCO MATT)