BOF’s Adelaide: From Heaven’s Thursday Nights to Dance Floor Heretics
Nathan Hughes laughs when I ask about his DJ name origins, and we end up talking about everything from prison time to cancer scares
“BOF? Yeah, that’s just been my nickname forever,” Nathan Hughes chuckles down the phone line. “But honestly, the scene’s changed so much since I started, sometimes I feel like I’m explaining ancient history to people.”
We’re talking because Hughes - better known as BOF to Adelaide’s electronic music community - has one of those stories that zigzags through decades in ways that mirror the scene itself: explosive growth, sudden stops, unexpected comebacks.
Picture this: it’s 1994, and an 18-year-old BOF lands a Thursday night residency at Heaven. “That was huge for me. Heaven was the place.” But rewind a bit - his entry into dance music wasn’t through some legendary rave revelation. “I was recording JJJ’s Club Escape with Scott T on cassette. Me and my mates would play those tapes to death.”
The path from bedroom tape-trading to Heaven residency went through those early Pulse parties. “First DJs I ever heard were locals - Ezee G, Gravity. You’d collect mixtapes like trading cards back then.”
By the late ’90s, BOF had scored what he calls “the dream gig” - Floor Manager at Central Station Records. Imagine being surrounded by the latest imports, helping shape what Adelaide was hearing. “Planet, Synagogue, Rise, Elysium - I was playing all these venues while working at the record shop. It felt like everything was connected.”
Then came the plot twist nobody saw coming.
“2001, I went to prison for a year.” He drops this into conversation like mentioning a holiday. “When I got out, I walked away completely. Just… done. I needed to build something stable, you know? House, career, met my wife - proper grown-up stuff.”
For over a decade, one of Adelaide’s familiar faces vanished from the scene entirely. “I didn’t even go out as a punter. Complete break.”
What brought him back? “Around 2016, started going to reunion-type events. Heaven Final Reunion, stuff like that. The itch was returning.” But the real catalyst was darker. “Post-COVID, I got misdiagnosed with cancer. False alarm, but that scare made me quit corporate life. Life’s too short to waste time not doing what you love.”
Enter Dance Floor Heretics - BOF’s current project with Chad Bergman. “We’re doing everything - DJing, producing, promoting, even got a clothing label.” Their debut EP just dropped on Urban Kicks Records, and BOF’s back playing events like Reunion Festival and Underground Sessions.
“The weird thing is, some relationships never died,” he reflects. “Still working with Paul Hamon on Continuous Flow events. That connection goes back decades.”
But what’s different about Adelaide’s scene now versus his ’90s heyday? “Everything’s more professional but somehow more scattered. Back then, everyone knew everyone. You’d see the same faces everywhere. Now it’s more fragmented - different crews, different venues, different sounds.”
He pauses, considering. “Maybe that’s healthier though. More room for different approaches.”
These days, BOF runs weekly Dance Floor Heretics livestreams and appears regularly on Evolution with DT. “I’m nearly 50, still DJing, still promoting. Some people think that’s weird, but this music - it gets in your blood.”
The conversation winds down with BOF reflecting on Adelaide’s resilience. “This scene survives everything - venue closures, lockout laws, COVID, people coming and going. There’s something special about that. We keep adapting.”
It’s a fitting observation from someone whose own story embodies that adaptability - from teenage record collector to Heaven resident to record shop worker to complete scene exile to cancer scare survivor to Dance Floor Heretics founder. Sometimes the most interesting dance music stories aren’t about the music at all, but about how life and music intersect in unexpected ways.