Alexandra Palace, London
“This is your moment to let go.”
The dance-inspired producer returns for yet another string of holistic shows at London’s prestigious Alexandra Palace, igniting an infectiously groove-felt evening amidst the act of letting go.
Through the last 15 years, Jamie xx has embedded himself into the entrenched grooves of electronic’s wielding house, albeit through an indie-focused lens. Utilising a softer, subtler approach, one which caresses the listener’s ears rather than stifling, the producer has since undergone a more forthright, dancehall-leaning approach with his latest solo LP, In Waves. Across the record, an invitational layering of numerous genres and their subdivisions enmesh; across the wider corners of Northern soul, disco, garage, acid house, techno, tropicalia, hip-hop, and funk.
The twinkling, shimmering keys of the LP’s opener, ‘Wanna’, ignite this wide-armed invitation tonight, simmering with holistic, ethereal beginnings, before transcending into the righteously-upbeat call ("All we have to do is treat each other right.”) From here, an impending crescendo reaches fever pitch: booming 808s and shuffling rhythms ignite a seemingly interminable dance-off for the remainder of the evening; reverberating through the venue’s capacious walls.
As we venture further into Jamie xx’s deeper catalogue, ‘Kill Dem’ and ‘Idontknow’ further this voracious euphoria amassed by tonight’s crowd; a true accentuation of the producer’s knack for conspiring dance-inflected sampling with brimming crescendos and devastating drops. For it’s these tropes which have seen the recent blaze across the wider dance-cum-pop spheres, none better than Charli XCX, where such rhythmic vibrations and magnanimous drops are ubiquitous across hedonistic club nights teeming with a youthful carelessness and untamed vibrancy.
Tonight’s true apex, however, comes at one of the producer’s biggest dance hits to date, ‘Baddy on the Floor’. Offering a unique blend of refurbished dancehall and disco, ripened with an upbeat modern twist and an explosively fervent refrain, Jamie xx sets alight tonight’s crowd underneath the omnipresent disco ball in a mastery of dance-inspired crossover. A further dive into the producer’s debut LP from 2015, In Colour, plunges us into a more ambient aura; reminiscent of the ethereal spaces carved out by the likes of Oneohtrix Point Never or Aphex Twin. ‘Gosh’ and ‘Obvs’ reveal themselves as true stand-outs from this evening’s glowing set, vibrating to the softened steel pan drums and slower-paced rhythms across their comparatively languid trajectories.
To the disappointment of some, these tropes permeate through the set’s finale, offering some questionable choices within the home-stretch. Whilst ‘I Know There's Gonna Be (Good Times)’ brightly sparks into action with an alternative dance-pop sheen of a decade ago, the rock n’ roll sampling of Led Zeppelin’s ‘Whole Lotta Love’ stagnated an otherwise vibrantly dance-fuelled experience. Tonight’s concluder ‘Girl’ dampens this once-voraciously upbeat crowd with an insatiable appetite for dancing, now lost within the more perplexingly ethereal realms, signalling the downbeat closure of one’s party rather than tail-spinning into engrossing highs.
Needless to say, Jamie xx’s latest, and greatest, material to date ultimately fared better in this shimmeringly groove-infested, disco-inspired set. Whilst Alexandra Palace remained adorned with strobe lighting, animated backdrops and an aloft disco ball, the producer perhaps failed to pull out enough stops to fully galvanise this throwback-disco evening, mere days beyond the release of his latest LP. Yet little else can be stricken away from this impressively vibrant producer; urging us to revel amongst the upbeat qualities of life and let go of the rest.
7.5/10
Jamie xx's latest LP, In Waves, is out now via Young and can be found below.
Photo is courtesy of Natasha Moustache whose work can be found here.
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