Evian Christ

Last November, Evian Christ hosted a self-curated ‘Trance Party’ (a reference to a bizarre Dipset mixtape of the same name), harnessing the likes of TriAngle labelmates Holy Other and Vessel as well Arca, another artist who’d been dragged up from the underground and recruited for the supergroup of producers behind the unhinged masterpiece that is Yeezus. It was celebratory in spirit, an end-of-year victory lap for a young, relatively naive former trainee-teacher from Ellesmere Port who was catapulted towards mainstream recognition despite showing no intention of compromising his sound.

Fast forward a few months and Evian Christ has assembled a line-up to launch his first ‘official’ solo release, the Waterfall EP. The record sees him intensify his ambient/contemporary hip-hop formula into something abrasive and extreme, a move inspired by the pulverising noise experiments of Vatican Shadow and Pete Swanson. It’s a sound that makes Millie & Andrea’s appearance on tonight’s bill a fitting choice. A few weeks ago, the duo – compromised of Andy Stott and Demdike Stare’s Miles Whitaker – dropped Corrosive from their forthcoming album, a track that fuses hyperactive trap beats, murky jungle and derelict warehouse drones. The pair are clearly having fun on stage, hopping between genres while unleashing crowd-pleasing chunks of bass and chipmunked diva vocals. But maybe the rhythmic switches are too abrupt to sustain the dancefloor, or maybe it’s just that everyone is saving their energy for tonight’s biggest talking point: the flamboyant, Kanye-affiliated Houston rapper Travi$ Scott.

Scott’s set is probably the most balls-out crazy rap show we’ve ever seen. After a disconcertingly long wait, he arrives on stage with DJ Semtex, glaring into the crowd with an expression that makes us wonder if he’s just ingested London’s entire supply of cocaine. “I need to see niggas crowdsurfing, I wanna see niggas throwing their motherfucking shoes!”, he yells. And while we see no one part with their footwear, Scott’s unhinged charisma is certainly contagious. He climbs the stage’s platforms, stage diving repeatedly, and ordering Semtex to wheel the track every time he’s dissatisfied with the sweat-drenched crowd’s energy levels. He does, however, fail to actually rap much amidst all the chaos, often only executing the first few syllables of each bar.

Evian Christ, who’s been grinning by the side of the stage during Scott’s set and patiently waiting his turn, eventually gets to start his set. While he’s wise not to try and match the insanity levels of what’s just been – something which Lil Silva and the following DJs later revive by dropping high-octane rap bangers like Bugatti, Move That Dope and I Don’t Like – there’s a palpable sense of excitement in the crowd. The tracks from 2012’s Kings and Them are settling as classics, and nearly every audience member can be seen mouthing the Tyga vocal sample of Fuck It None Of Ya’ll Don’t Rap. By the time Evian Christ climaxes his set, he’s fully loosing his shit, headbanging behind his desk to the lightning bolt synth stabs of Salt Carousel. Gone is the modest, spotlight-reluctant producer who’d rather be teaching primary school kids. Evian Christ is now a boundary-pushing, big time artist, and he knows he has the power to summon artists from the most distant margins to gather under one roof.