Soulwaxmas- Brixton Academy 17/12/10

I think this happened.


Like the kaleidoscopic, catch-all nature of their music taste and DJ style, Soulwax, 2ManyDJs and their various other splinter groups of remixers seem to attract a nicely diverse cross section of the public.

Or at least the public the right side of 30. Let’s have a look: tonight, stomping through a bitterly cold Brixton we have indie kids, office Christmas parties, 18th birthday parties, couples on dates, raving lunatics, casualties from a bygone era of dance, crackheads, celebrities…In other words, Soulwax and 2ManyDJs have, justifiably, gone from something of cult dance act on the margins to a bona-fide event in their own right and Soulwaxmas is the actual event’s event which has gone from strength to strength to become the larger-than-Christmas festival which runs for night upon night and attracts anyone up for a good time.

Soulwax do what nobody else really can; they manage to wear synchronising cream suits and not look like dicks; they play dutty electro on real instruments and it doesn’t suck; and they blur the borders between dance and rock, without sounding like a pastiche or cliché. Soulwax, after a long career still in momentum, are- even when playing songs five years old- perennially cutting edge.

Next Zombie Nation’s set is masterfully constructed and expertly paced. His jittery, helium powered synth lines provide a great juxtaposition to the lumpy, ballsy bassline while the percussion and beats work themselves into strange frenzies of dementia before some almighty drops. It’s all quite perverse; near panicky, quite claustrophobic and definitely disorientating- but basically fantastic when abandonment grants those beer ‘n’ beats disciples the dance floor. He might seem ever so slightly out of place in such a large auditorium but this dark tourettes-electro sure has legs. Believe.

With a linear smoothness that just oozes professionalism, there’s barely a pause for breath, a quick spec wipe or a hefty, beery shuffle to the busy bar if you’re that way inclined before Zombie’s off and 2ManyDJs are on for the main event.

From the get go, 2ManyDJs are mesmerising. It is, without much doubt, surely a form of brainwashing; The absolute sensory overload of bright flashing lights, the quick blinking images of pop culture references with machine gun velocity, the whiplash way in which the DJs throw us from one song to the next- and perhaps back again, the snippets of popular songs that trigger a feeling of recollection down your synapses before you can even figure out what it actually is…it’s all so disorientating, enveloping and goddamn fun. Add beer to the mix and the effect is like a teenaged ADHD sufferer shaking your brain really fucking hard whilst playing on his DS, surfing the internet and turning the knob of an FM radio through all the stations at the same time. Long live Soulwaxmas.