Friday nights at The Cellar are hotly becoming the place to be if you want decent underground music in Oxford, with Blunted catering for Hip-Hop in all its diversity, Bossaphonic’s latin sounds, and HQ delivering drum and bass for all tastes.

During a single calendar month The Cellar can serve up something to suit pretty much anyone’s taste. Tonight being the last Friday of the month it was time to delve into the more deep and funky side of Drum and Bass with the HQ Collective.

HQ has been at The Cellar for two and a half years now, catering for the more headzy type side of Drum and Bass, it has seen such artists as Marcus Intalex, Bailey, Flight, Teebee, D Bridge, DJ Lee, Total Science, Nookie, Loxy, Dylan and Keaton. But tonight was the Christmas party and the line up was keeping it local with two of the residents from Oxford biggest and longest running Drum and Bass night Source featuring on the line up, namely Jay Jay and DJ Fu. Alongside residents DJ Chemical, Azonica and MC Mantmast it was set to be a night of high quality beats.

Setting of proceedings was HQ’s newest resident, DJ Indecision, playing a mixture of Hip Hop, Funk and Soul to keep the early arrivals’ heads bobbing. At 10pm, Chemical and Azonica stepped up to the decks for a two-hour set, which was to start old skool and gradually blend into more upfront tracks. Dropping timeless tracks such as LTJ Bukem’s Atlantis, Pascal’s P Funk Era, Dillinja’s Angels Fell and Photek’s The Rain, the two HQ main men managed to get a few early comers onto the dance floor, as well as making some of Oxford’s older junglists slightly misty-eyed.

After an hour, Azonica and Chemical switched to a more contemporary set, spinning the latest efforts from producers such as Noisia, Ill Logic & Raf, D Kay and Martyn, as well as forthcoming ones from Q Project, Logistics, Sub Focus, Total Science and Tactile.

By midnight, when DJ Fu took over the decks, warming the busy crowd on the dance-floor. One of the busiest DJs in the Oxford scene, Fu was recently been dubbed as ‘One to Watch’ in 2006 by Knowledge Magazine. Fu started off his set on a more liquid tip, dropping some older classics alongside some of 2005’s most memorable tracks. After about 45 minutes Fu started to switch things up with tracks from Hazard, Sub Focus and Shy FX.

By now The Cellar was full and the dance floor was packed with people brocking hard to Fu’s selection. One of Source’s oldest residents, Jay Jay, stepped up next. Starting with Fresh’s new stormer Immortality, he proceeded to tear up the dance floor for the next 90 minutes, dropping some of the freshest tunes alongside well-known favourites, to the satisfaction of the crowd. At 3am Jay Jay finished with Noisia’s latest offering, Moonway Renegade forthcoming on Ram Records, drawing the night to a close. The crowd poured out of the club, no doubt having enjoyed HQ’s nice diverse mix of what modern day Drum and Bass has to offer.