L.I.E.S.

Berghain/Panorama Bar | 19 September

In a recent conversation with longtime collaborator, Eric Copeland, Ron Morelli said, ‘running a record label is a thankless endeavour…for the most part’. It’s that kind of ascetic no bullshit thinking that has enabled L.I.E.S. Records to mushroom from the festered stools of modern electronics. Over the past four years, Morelli and his roster of heterogenous oddities have made themselves one of the most disruptive platforms to drop from. But innovators they are not. Though the label gathered a reputation as being ‘outsider music’, artists like Legowelt, like Terekke, like Maximillion Dunbar, like Morelli, are not the outsiders but the guys on the inside, sheerly not giving a fuck about whatever else is going on. They do what is right for their aesthetic at that particular moment, nothing else really matters. And that is what makes this showcase at Panorama Bar so important.

Tonight, Morelli has a Low Jack/ Vereker tag team, a live performance (and first EU appearance) by Beau Wanzer, Traxx, and a closing set from Marcos Cabral as his reserves. Cerulean blue LEDs drip and discolour above a room of endless moving. Faces fix on spots of darkness; the ceiling, the floor, glimpses of the night outside. Everything, from the vacant bodies to the abounding sounds Morelli’s line-up produce, is non-linear. The scuzzy, almost slo-mo industrial cranks of Vereker alongside Low Key establish the night as being ineffably combative. Everyone almost looks afraid to stare anywhere other than where the music is stemming from; as if it would ensnarl us between its jaws if we were to retreat.

The noise succeeding the duo is severe. Beau Wanzer’s set is fire and brimstone. It’s fucking barbarous. One unhinged crowd member in oversized clothing begins rolling over the backs of those surrounding. He starts acting as though he’s run out of breath, blowing out the air from his lungs before tumbling in a circle again. Some smile, other’s are totally oblivious. No one is still. Wanzer’s show ends with klaxons, seemingly confirming this will not be the last time we will hear his glitchy face-melters overseas.

At first, Traxx’s change of pace seems to soften Beau Wanzer’s blows. But the dysfunctional mesh of his selections and his atypical transition style is like someone pulling the cushion away as you fall to the floor. Refined Jackbeat sweeping into lucid Depeche Mode cuts sees everyone jerking and wrenching at those in front of them. Tempos change constantly. In an age so dependent on technology, Traxx is the analogue purist that highlights the inertia of today’s digital spinners and clickers.

Morelli plays as the sun begins to rise and filter through Panorama Bar’s windows. He is the reason everyone is together tonight. Much like his debut, Spit, it’s unconventional and alienating in the most staggering form. Playing everything and anything that he knows and loves – techno, house, ambient, acid, sub-genres of sub-genres of sub-genres – nothing else really complies, and as Marcos Cabral sees us into midday, we walk away bruised. Tonight reinforced L.I.E.S. as the modern day interpreters of borderless music, moving our perennial senses straight into an inferno. Europe’s most notorious club was left scarred while L.I.E.S. Records’ burning urge seemed bottomless.

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Words: Tom Watson

Ron Morelli, Terekke and Svengalisghost play as part of a L.I.E.S. showcase at Bristol’s Simple Things festival on 25 October