This weekend The Night Light in Oakland will celebrate its first anniversary with a big party at the Jack London Square district bar/club that is situated on Broadway between 3rd and 4th Streets in the vicinity of such other watering holes as Beer Revolution and Merchant's.  At The Night Light's all day long bash on Saturday (March 9th) there'll be DJs spinning in the downstairs bar area and live bands playing in the upstairs concert space.. Artists celebrating the one-year birthday will include Warm Soda, Mahgeetah, and L3SSONS. In the twelve months since Johnny Nackley and his business partner Doug Kinsey (two vets of the local bar & restaurant and music worlds) opened The Night Light, it has built a an ever-growing, dedicated following and won many accolades.

Within a mere few months of opening it won an East Bay Express readers choice award as "Best New Bar."  Even with such a wide variety of other clubs and bars to choose from in downtown Oakland's vibrant nightlife scene, people are drawn to The Night Light's cozy bar atmosphere and its diversity of live entertainment events. There include stand up comedy nights, live bands of all genres such as punk rock and hip-hop, and themed DJ nights including yacht rock parties when folks get decked out in captains hats, Hawaiian shirts, and beards and moustaches.  On the last Friday of every month they throw hip-hop/reggae/dancehall themed DJ parties.

As anyone who has spent even a small amount of time in Daly City will confirm odds are that, regardless of whatever season of the year it might be, that the weather in this suburb south of San Francisco will  undoubtedly be foggy or overcast. But to everyone's pleasant surprise on Saturday, October 13th, seemingly in honor of the legacy of Cue's Records  the Weather Gods graciously lifted back every trace of fog and bestowed nothing but blue skies and glorious sunshine all day long!

That lucky weather break from the norm provided the perfect backdrop to the hip-hop reunion at Gellert Park in honor of Cue's Records Daly City store that closed a dozen years ago.

"I haven't seen most of these guys since the store closed back in 2000," commented Joe Quixx echoing a sentiment uttered many times on Saturday. Quixx was just one of the many Bay Area hip-hop DJs in attendance on Saturday with direct ties to the much missed record store/hip-hop meeting place. He was also just one of the countless DJs to jump on one of the four DJ set ups Saturday to spin and/or cut up some classic hip-hop.

Other DJs flexing their skills included DJ Quest (who also provided the big booming sound system), Quest's teenaged son DJ Train, Mista B, Shortkut, the Midnite Cru's DJ Chill and DJ Chino, DJ Marz, Kool DJ Rize, Myke One (Almighty DJs), DnZ, DJ Deeandroid, and VinRoc to name but some of the DJs who collectively played nothing but incredible music all day long (lots of old school electro and a sick ass Bay Area 90's set by Myke One). Add to all that great music, good food, special T-shirts for the reunion, live art by BIZR68, REBUKER, and HERMS (who did the cover art work for DJ Quest's last two albums),  and nothing but good vibes and conversation and you had one memorable Bay Area hip-hop reunion. One of the many highlights of the day was when DJ Shortkut, who later that night was DJing at Somar in Oakland to celebrate his birthday, stopped by with his young daughter in tow. Soon after arriving the Beat Junkies/Invisibl Skratch Piklz DJ proceeded to do a killer impromptu scratch routine all the while with his daughter happily sitting on his shoulders swaying back and forth to the beat. (see pic right)

The super-talented East Bay based Oakland Faders hip-hop DJ collective has grown in its ranks since founding members DJs Spair and Platurn formed the party rockin'/turntablist group, originally a DJ duo, a dozen years ago. These days Spair, while still officially a member, resides down in Las Vegas where he DJs clubs, casinos, and big parties, while back in The Town (Oakland) DJ Platurn is now flanked by such renowned fellow Oakland Faders as Joe Quixx, DJ Zeph, DJ Enki, DJ Mere, and Ammbush. Meanwhile, another Oakland Fader in exile, DJ Icewater, currently resides in Brooklyn, New York but makes regular trips back to the East Bay to collaborate with his crew. Same with DJ Spair, who was up from Nevada in the Bay two weekends ago with the crew to DJ for the monthly Fade at Era party in Oakland at Era Art Bar & Lounge.

Each DJ of the eight member Oakland Faders has his own rich Bay Area hip-hop history that collectively dates back to before the Faders formed. And if you were to round up all of the productions, remixes, records and mixtape CDs that the Oakland Faders are responsible for, both individually and as a crew, you'd fill several crates with some top quality hip-hop. At Amoeba look for these releases as well as for their PCKPR (Piece Keeper Clothing) line T's with an exclusive CD.

One thing that I have always loved about the Oakland Faders is their Oakland Raiders derived logo above, something that has evolved slightly over the years. "The first time we did the Oakland Faders logo we actually used the [Raiders] logo. That was back about ten years ago in the Stray Records days. And that was a straight rip but you can only run with that for so long," said Platurn in reference to the common knowledge of how well guarded copyrighted NFL logos can be. "So right now it's kind of a cartoon derivative of it at this stage. Basically we took the swords and made them into [turntable] tone arms, and instead of a helmet he's wearing headphones."