Live Review: Animaux

Animaux operates under a simple yet promising premise of combining visuals and music. It joins a host of successful student nights, focusing on alternative music, such as Milli Vanilli, Bangers and Mash and Dub Lounge. I was initially quite sceptical about if Animaux was going to contribute anything new or interesting to an already very full York house scene.

The 1^st and 2^nd sets by Theo and Clifford’s Tower respectively, were a relatively slow start to the affair. They were obviously very well delivered and well-rehearsed sets, if not a little by the book and with few truly memorable moments. The crowds slowly poured in. Though the numbers were very good for a night of its relative newness, it never fully made use of Mansion’s labyrinthine capacity. The crowd was relatively close knit and probably heavily populated by friends of the DJ’s and organisers, the vibe was friendly and easy-going and the audience seemed to be genuinely interested in the music, at least compared to the mainstream post-fresher’s crowds of Tokyo or Kuda.

The 3^nd DJ Endeser’s set was interesting. In a town where house is becoming increasing mainstream, he placed House back in firmly alternative territory. The energy of his set peaked and troughed; playing the crowd like an instrument. There were some technical difficulties mid-way through his set but they were effectively handled, and the music came back hard, giving a very effective drop like effect, however unintentional it might have been.

Kineza delivered a strong final offering. In a genre frequently lacking in any individual personalities, her set delivered it in droves. Playing Groove Armada’s “I see you baby” both lightened the mood and incorporated well into her set as a whole, combining elements of both mainstream and underground. It was generally crowd pleasing with the sped up version of Daniel Avery’s “Drone Logic” being a particular highlight. The most memorable moment of the night however was not masterful drop or cut between tracks, but the relatively sudden addition of “My Milkshake” by Kelis. The forceful rhythms and harsh sine bass line kicked the dance floor into action and displayed an almost childlike delight in music.

On the subject of the visuals, they were undoubtedly interesting; however, for a night entitled “Animaux” they were hardly the central focus. Due to the positioning of the dance floor, people were in general not in the line of sight of the visuals. They were uniformly well made, and were definitely rewarding for anyone who took the time to follow them, if little of it was particularly memorable.

All in all I found the night very enjoyable, both musically interesting and diverse, but yet still very accessible. It managed to toe the line between house by numbers and some of the more obscure moments of nights like “Freakin.” It is a welcome, if not ground-breaking addition to York’s nightlife. I hope it is successful enough to become a reoccurring fixture.