This weekend was the anniversary of the IRA bomb in manchester so there was
lots of extra stuff going on, including DJs at 4 venues in Castlefield.
Preponderance of cheesy house and dnb of course but not entirely without
merit. As someone said it was odd seeing people completely off their mash
in the afternoon.
A chance flyer episode led me to attend Prescription on Saturday. Quite
good electro-ish DJing by Matt Thompson (who can't mix for toffee) but then
a live appearance by the Jedi Knights.
During the course of the set Tom (I think it was Tom - the one with the
goatee anyway) (we'll call him Tom for the purposes of this message) said
this was the only time the Jedi Knights would perform live.
Very minimal equipment, including a fine VP330 complete with wooden
cabinet. Now I didn't bet New School Science as I heard it wasn't too good
and an extended listen in Virgin didn't disconfirm that view. However,
this was one of the best performances I've seen in ages. Tom really seemed
to be enjoying himself, reflecting the crowd's evident pleasure. Lots of
cartoon samples in mid-track as well as inbetween, and much vocoder usage.
At one point he theatrically hit some bloke on the head with his microphone
and triggered a Popeye style hitting-noise in synchrony. Sounds lame but
it was hilarious at the time. I can't tell you which tracks were
performed, for reasons you should be able to divine. The last track was a
very fine tech-ish dnb monster, which earned an extended rewind.
Recently I'd begun to think that Middleton and Pritchard had completely
'lost it' and would never produce anything worthwhile again. A recent
re-evaluation of The Way The Deep made me reconsider slightly. Saturday's
performance makes me think they're indispensable.
People looking for mask 002 might like to note that I was able to buy a
copy for a friend from Piccadilly Records on Saturday. They do mail order
- there is an advert in the back of The Wire.
At this juncture I'd like to mention that I bought Seasons Greetings:
Winter at the weekend after nearly two years searching. Yes and to that
extent yes.
Sunday night was the Skam 0161 launch soiree at the Night and Day bar.
When I arrived Rob Brown was spinning, Keynell 1 being the next tune he
span. What little I heard was excellent of course.
First live performer (I think) was Datathief, using just a laptop and an
02R. Nice chunky stuff, with lots of thips and a few more melodic numbers
which were really quite affecting.
Then more DJs (don't know who) who didn't cause offence. A rather odd live
thing from two blokes, one of whom ostentatiously strummed a bass guitar to
no discernible effect. Too Chem. Bros.-like for my taste.
Rob Hall span next, with a bit of LFO, the best tune from mask 002 and a
lot of retro stuff. 'Nice'.
The final performance was by V/Vm (as a collective?).
Hmmm. I think they were going for the musique concrete angle (sorry for
the missing grave accent there). Mostly noise punctuated by bursts of
sustained rhythm and the occasional melody. Nnnng. Not noisy enough for
Merzbow fans, too noisy for the more refined listener. Not enough
structure to the noise either. All similarities to the music from the
'cake' sequence in Brass Eye (and the bit where da kids are subjected to
the 'extremely mond music' in the dark room) were presumably intentional.
Finally Rob Brown span for another fifteen minutes, finishing on The
Scientist's The Bee, which I haven't heard in a long time.
Nice to see some Manchester people doing something other than trying to be
Oasis.
adam