Justice

Dance ‘gigs’ used to be like spot the difference, chasing a rainbow of a reality which drags along behind you, trying to get away from it all as your brain swayed like an Etch-a-Sketch from offensive blur to apocalyptic swathes of light; bad funk basslines met trance or chill out. Things, now, have changed; or at least for me they have. Now it's like post-Fabric - post-Franz - scraggy speed kids who've discovered coke and champagne, still tribal, still desperately ahead of the curve or Madonna/Moss. Everyone is primed, dressed for All Bar One or Wacaday. The dirty pills have been pulverised and baggy has become slick-cut and skinny-jeaned; The Prodigy are an absent memory and Sonic and Nintendo are back. Past tense, tension and history are denied; every moment from birth until now is forgotten in the blink of a beat.

Indie is currently all over the radio or too busy moaning on Facebook.
Rock is still dead.
Art-rock is cork-tar.
Dance is currently in third-person status, dangling from the ceiling for your pleasure... Allow. Bare. Brrrap.

Escapism is here. Safe.

Klaxons’ DJ set spirals onwards like climbing winding steps, slowly ploughing a furrow to a climax. Then the lights dip and the † starts to flash a gash in the depths of craning craniums. Static gushes forth. There are no graphics – if you wanna flow down a pixelated flume, you need imagination. There's no façade, just post-womb men and machines.

Vroom-vroom-voom-vroom... The following pulse of beats grabs you by the ass cheeks and take the lead. Whips of noise hook every other member of the crowd’s heads, flinging them around bends and over jumps on Mario Kart. For some it's too much – fists pulsate and limbs dip and twist. Go with the flow, down pipes. Pop-up: welcome to the modern mosh-pit, the last bastion of alternative culture, the place where the crossover blurring is finally complete, lost in the whirring and squelching of Justice. The fresh bounce of technology reigned and honed into shape. Beats that are washing machined, hoovered, scientifically clean, with no air of loathing. Twenty or so Marshall stacks line the stage to ensure you don’t miss a volume tweak or singed beat.

It's hard to avoid religious imagery when faced with a throbbing cross, but for many tonight is a pilgrimage to give thanks for making house parties shake. Why else would they all be straight outta Essex ‘n’ Hoxton, here, to watch two men, French men at that, in leather jackets, flicking switches? To “‘av it”, in short. Louder than headphones or speakers could ever go; faster, stronger, harder, better, x-x-etc...

This is how we do it. It's Thursday night and the dance floor is confused, pulsating, waiting for The Hit. Dance junkies, salivating like alkies. The towering balcony, however, is suffering subdued waves of disconnect, pointing out guys gyrating like gurning nodding donkeys. My number depletes and I shuffle off, talking plans to squeeze between the scene of chaos, as previously seen (televised, of course) at bullfights and protests. Koko (née The Palace) is humid but hopeful, and after a few album tracks they dump the first big 'un. Deeaayennnsee-eee-ee won-two-free-for-feist... 'D.A.N.C.E.', and we do. Lost in our imagery. Crawling up ladders or spray painting concrete playgrounds with joy; all of us losing moments that splinter into the night.

Feel-good hit complete and it is back to the dark brood of cyc' themes, building back up and dropping down only to crescendo. Patterns, patter-patter… Writing about dancing is like wanking about paedophilia.

Breathe under-ah pressure-ah-ah. It's hard to escape those familiar moments, similar to the moments before Daft Punk’s rapid-fire neon bombs (or any of them clichés), and whether this is the modern equivalent of a 'sound' or whether it’s some clever interpretation of a classical movement is unclear to these untrained ears. It's not pillaging, just giving the people what they want. A sample of Klaxons, a rewind back to something from just before, tease after tease, all leading up to BLLLLAAAMMM. 'Cus, we, ahh, your friends, yule, never be alone, again, so c'mon... COME ON!

Right about now, you can try to imagine what happened. Predict the predictable. Close your eyes and you’ll catch a glimpse of some Sting Quadrophenia dancefloor scene or a frat / block / rap party / Nazi rally memory… but yes, it's a certifiably rapturous reply. A call for arms. Raise ‘em, higher, hiiigher. This is what 80 per cent of the room has been waiting for all night and they get what they want. They get it good and grab it by the earrings and shake it like a psychedelic snow dome.

Job done. You came, you made the night for yourself, away from the impress-me crowd, now gazing around the room in search of someone to undress them. The party is over. Accountants try to snap the dying moments with their firefly-eyed mobile phones. Sweaty art student girls shriek for more beside their nu rave boyfriends in x-ray specs, their mouths left ajar, gasping for more.

Two more phat ones and that's yer lot. But they don't have two more of those, yet. Give them time; album two will do the do.