THE WAREHOUSE PROJECT: CURATED BY FOUR TET + CARIBOU
Victoria Warehouse, Manchester | November 2nd
Pissing wet, drunk and cold, our night begins standing in a carpark, being sniffed at by dogs (who were, admittedly, pretty cute) and tossed around by men who could have knocked out Stone Cold Steve Austin while fighting off loved-up dudes in Only NY snapbacks. But once we’d negotiated our way inside the Victoria Warehouse, Crack got down to the sounds of small town trainee teacher-turned-rap beat pioneer Evian Christ. As Christ climaxes a high octane set with Kanye’s Bound 2, the ‘Testudo’ – a behemoth metallic light installation hanging from the ceiling – illuminates the room, bathing the entire crowd in a golden glow. Not bad.
Next up, Thom Yorke arrives behind the decks with a miscellaneous pal to help him out. Wait – shit – isn’t that Nigel Godrich?! This can only mean one thing. The pair run through an emotive, rhythmically intricate (albeit haphazardly mixed) tune selection, before Yorke produces a microphone and proceeds to perform live vocals on Atoms For Peace’s Default as well as a beat-infused rendition of Radiohead’s Reckoner. We nearly cried. While alt-hip-hop legend Madlib would have provided the perfect warm up for DOOM, unfortunately the masked enigma found the prospect of performing at his own gig too challenging once again. But Madlib has the rap nerds’ mouths watering by showcasing tracks from his highly anticipated joint album with Freddie Gibbs, and any feelings of disappointment are soon blown away by the satisfyingly hard techno blaring out of Room Two’s Berghain-style speaker set-up during Ben UFO and Pearson Sound’s b2b set.
Back in Room One, Four Tet confirms his evolution from bedroom-focused experimentalist to forward-thinking club DJ during what feels like a headline set. While decorating a techno pulse with drum and vocal sounds plucked from all over the globe, Kieran Hebden throws out contemporary bangers (Orbison’s Big Room Tech House DJ Tool), crowd pleasing garage (T2’s Heartbroken) and – to a particularly rapturous response – The Bug’s radioactive dancehall/dub classic Skeng. He then passes the baton to Dan Snaith, who as Daphni, revs up a set of chugging afro-house for the victory lap to one of the most exciting events in the UK’s most important dance series.
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Words: Darren Pearson
Photo: Sebastian Matthes
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