Clubbing Highlights – May 2012
In 2045, when most of us will be spending our Saturday nights confined in front of the Apple iTV 7 instead of going out, BBC Four will keep us entertained by showing in-depth documentaries about the golden age of dance music, having finally exhausted every piece of known archive footage of 60s and 70s guitar bands. During these completely hypothetical shows one name that will almost certainly be dropped at some point is that of Andrew Weatherall. Whether it will be for his production work with Primal Scream, his prominence at the forefront of acid house or for the many other labels, projects and remixes he has been involved in, he has been a constant presence in the UK's electronic music scene. His new Ministry of Sound triple compilation album Masterpiece should give an indication of the unknown depths that his crate digging has taken him to and the rare gems he has uncovered in the process; his visit to The Caves on Fri 4 May should remind you not just to expect the slightly unexpected but to absolutely count on it.
The Bank Holiday weekend is a packed one already but the names don’t come much bigger than one of the most consistently brilliant DJs of our generation, Carl Cox, who plays Colours at The Arches on Sat 5 May. With Jon Rundell, Jon Mancini and Giovanni Ferri supporting him along with a clutch of other acts, this is going to be classic, storming big room stuff. While everybody knows Carl Craig, far fewer people will recognise his numerical nom de plume, ‘69’, under which he snuck out a number of records between 1991 and 1994 before hitting his stride with Innerzone Orchestra et al. Having resurrected the moniker last year for some international festivals, now comes the chance to catch his show up close as the Sub Club wrap up their 25th birthday celebrations on Sat 5 May. There is a lot of fun to be had with the ideas that are being knocked around on these early techno cuts. For Craig, backing up a few decades to return to the point where he made those records seems to have reopened a few new avenues to explore.
Finally, i AM have lined up Submerse, checking in from his European tour, and the Welsh DJ quartet C.R.S.T lending some extra weight on Tue 22 May. Submerse, or Rob Omre to be exact, creates garage and dubstep hybrids that probably bring a strange kind of pleasure to the fetishists of badly named sub-genres. The upshot of this is that he is constantly playing with forms and styles, pulling together the rhythms, sampling styles and tempos from across the genre divide. Despite the potentially bad omens brought on by the name of their headliner, i AM are also planning a pre-club boat party to kick the evening off which will also involve get you in to the Sub Club afterwards.