Saturday, May 04, 2013
Surely David Guetta’s flight to the UAE this time around was free; from all the air miles he must have collected from his previous visits to the to the country.
The French DJ was last here in December, yet a mere five months later it’s clear audiences can’t get enough of him. His ‘Live@Atlantis’ show on Friday was sold out with a rumoured crowd of 10,000 at Nasimi Beach.
Speaking to tabloid! ahead of his performance, Guetta said he had been working on new material since his last visit and was excited to see the crowd’s reaction to it.
Following long, energetic sets by DJ Smokingroove, Kaz James and Daddy’s Groove, it was clear that everyone was there to see one man. And as the clock ticked on, by 11.30pm, people were getting restless.
“We want David,” they chanted.
The lights dimmed and then the stage came to life pulsating with laser beams doing the Mexican wave. There emerged Guetta, his hair pulled back with a wide grin on his face.
“I am going to take off my jacket because this party is about to get hotter,” he yelled.
Opening his set with his hottest new single, Play Hard, a collaboration with Akon and Ne-Yo, it is easy to see why the French house music producer and DJ has been around since the 1980s. He brought the crowd alive, interacting with the audience every step of the way.
Heady light shows and fire explosions added to the party atmosphere as he mixed mainstream hits such as Bruno Mars’ Locked Out of Heaven and even the Harlem Shake with electrifying house music.
For his track One Love, he got the 10,000 strong crowd to whip out their mobile phones and hold them up in the air. The images on the giant screens were dramatic: Guetta seemed tiny on the stage but here was a man uniting people from all walks of life with a love for house music.
Joining the party midway through was yet another Dubai regular, Akon. Guetta and the Senegalese star have collaborated several times in the past and their camaraderie was evident. Guetta seemed genuinely surprised to see the R&B and hip hop star and after handshakes and hugs the party got hotter as they performed their hit Sexy Chick.
A whispered conversation later, it was decided Play Hard deserved an encore and Guetta jokingly asked the crowd to help Akon with the lyrics as it was their first time performing the hit together and he surely must have forgotten the words.
Popular hits like Wild One and Titanium rang out as the two kept the party going way into the wee hours of the morning finding time to pose for selfies too.
At 1.30am, two hours of lively beats and non-stop dancing later, it was time for Guetta to wrap things up and he did it with Without You.
“Thank you Akon for the wonderful surprise and thank you to each of the 10,000 of you,” he said, having previously acknowledged that the crowd was the largest he has seen in the Middle East.
By Yusra Farzan, Staff Reporter
Gulf News 2013. All rights reserved.
