A forum for ‘danceable experiments in band/ DJ electronica crossover’ in fine fettle
Fields' mission statement is charmingly grandiose. Its organisers aim to realise “London's suck-it-and-see approach writ large, grabbing the best of disparate styles and distilling them into a single electronic moment”. On the basis of the event’s first outing I would say this vision is far from flawed.
Not since the days of early '90s punkish rave has it been common for performers of technological dance music to embrace live instrumentation. There are important exceptions – Squarepusher’s virtuoso live bass performances spring immediately to mind – but in general dance has been the domain of the disc jockey, armed with turntables and mixer in one or other of their myriad forms, with the capacities to select and to blend records foremost in the performer’s arsenal.
But with the rise in the potential for, and the popularity of, phenomena of showmanship of the order of the live Ableton set (during which material is produced live), there's also been, in certain circles, a shift away from the restrictive notion of the dance music performance as exclusively a mode of presenting different musical artefacts, and towards one inclusive of the on-stage manual (re)production of these artefacts. Fields is one such circle.
The mode of presentation approach inevitably enforces a degree of separation between the experiencer and the material being experienced – one that is not present when this material is performed by live musicians. It is like the difference between the experience of taking in a masterfully curated art exhibition and that of observing the process of a skilled artist producing works of art before one’s eyes. Both experiences are enjoyable, but they are essentially different.
The Fields project is curiously unique in recognising that these experiences are complementary rather than antagonistic to one another. Arriving on stage just after 2am, Ghosting Season are prime exponents of the latter approach. To call them the Mancunian Moderat is to do a great disservice to the originality of the English double act, but hopefully not to the quality.
With a laptop and a guitar apiece, an array of digital drum pads and a horse-hair bow all in use, the choreography is fragile but pristine. It looks like the whole ensemble could fall apart in a second if the drummer missed a beat, or one of the two laptops was to become unseated, their lids flapping either side of perpendicularity in time to their operators’ stomps, like tree branches in the wind.
But it never does. From the opening bars of ‘Dead Man’s Switch’ to their climactic rendition of ‘Far End of the Graveyard’, Ghosting Season’s sound is maximal, unfathomably multi-layered and expansive of consciousness. Mounting tension is sustained throughout by an under-girding of mechanistic percussion that calls to mind the industry of a titanic automaton establishing the structural foundations for a new civilisation on a planet far away. Live instrumentation serves as a comforting umbilical cord to the terrestrial, anchoring against surrender to disconnection anxiety. Lines of communication with Major Tom remain open.
Combining the on-stage theatrics of the live band performance with the trance-like states and will to dance cultivated by beat-natured techno makes for an absorbing experience, whilst the sight of the two multi-instrumentalists on stage palpitating and perspiring enriches the intimacy of the floor’s relation to the sounds in session. The usual barrier between the audience and the techno-musical subject-matter of the performance has been eroded.
That the night takes place within a single, compact room adds to the blurring of the lines between club night and gig. In due course headliner Max Cooper brings the night to a close with a three-hour propellant tech house set that extols the virtues of the dance music performer as exhibitor, in this instance curating a collection composed largely of his own works. We hear tasters from his imminent debut full length mashed together with favourites from his output over the last year, the sinister ‘Darkroom’ proving an understated highlight. But it is Ghosting Season whose sound haunts my journey home.
Words by Alex Martin
Photos by Bartek Szadura
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