Hybrid

Without wanting to sound like a 'back in my day' clubbing dinosaur whose best bar-hopping years are well past them, remember when dance music was made to invigorate the mind and stir the soul rather than providing a loose platform for laptop superstars to have a crack at music television? In those days of absolute dance floor utopia, we were given HYBRID, and now they are back after their performance at the 2008 Warehouse Winter Music Festival to show a whole new generation of music fans what they have sorely been missing.

Their fusion of stirring string-laden breakbeat and tech house has birthed two albums - 2000's seminal Wide Angle and the 2003 follow up Morning Sci-Fi. The latter surprised many by progressing their already futuristic sounds even further, and now once again it's time for a new direction.

"We have loads of new material on the way!" reveals Chris Healings, one half of the duo. "We're in the studio as we speak working on our fourth album, whittling down the number of tracks and feverishly getting different mixes polished off. We're in the final stages so it's not far off completion. [We're] dead excited...This time we're working with our live band who've been playing with us for years - no guests, just the band as you'd see us live."

With the ease at which the duo manages to manufacture such a relative symphony of sound that would be as at home under a pulsing strobe light as it would soundtracking a science fiction space battle, it's no surprise that Chris and the pairing's other half, Mike Truman, have used their skills to work on different kinds of media over the last few years.

"Our approach to making music has altered because of the diversity of the work we've been involved in," Chris says. "Each style of writing has had some impact on our overall sound. The band material has a more eclectic edge thanks to a lot of the film sound design we do. They all draw off each other, really. For us it's all about using the right instrument for the job and making it sound as vibrant as possible."

Chris explains that he is looking forward to a more intimate club show this time around, following Hybrid's epic performance in 2003 at Lot 33 which many labelled as the best DJ set of all time.

"[I remember] playing for a very, very long time and also some people crying when we played Symphony," he reminisces. "Last time we loved the Warehouse Festival but what with it being a big warehouse you can't get close enough to your audience. I like to see the whites of their eyes and be with them as one right down on the dancefloor. It's gonna be a killer and I just can't wait to play some of the new Hybrid album 4 tracks and see what happens close up."

Hybrid will play their intimate show at Lot 33 on Saturday August 8.