Simian Mobile Disco presents Delicatessen feat. Chic & Nile Rogers – Warehouse Project, Shore Street, Manchester – 12/11/11
4/5
The final round of the Warehouse Project’s Store Street sessions has bludgeoned punters into submission with a quite frankly obscene number of a-list names for the past couple of months. The whole ruckus kicked off on 17th September, and clubbers have been treated to the various and varied likes of DJ Shadow, Skream, Hudson Mohawke, Four Tet, Seth Troxler, Annie Mac and Ms Dynamite – in the opening week. However, even by the series’ obscenely high standards, a line-up boasting Chic and Nile Rodgers – that’s right, CHIC AND NILE FRICKIN’ RODGERS – was quite the eye-catcher. When you factor in support from techno legend Jeff Mills and those boys Simian Mobile Disco overseeing the whole shebang, there was quite frankly no other place I was going to be on the night of the 12th November 2011 than a spooky cave-cum-rave underneath Manchester Piccadilly station.
Do I even need to say that Chic were fantastic? Because they were fantastic. Obviously, when one finds oneself planning a setlist and one is called Nile Rodgers, one can cherry-pick from pretty much every pop song ever written because one has had a hand in about 87% of them. Both effervescent and effortless, the group shimmied through all the obvious classics in a 90-minute disco master-class – and then, because they’re Chic and they can, they brought out Johnny Marr to encore with ‘Le Freak’ (what else?). Rodgers, still every inch the showman, conducted proceedings from the front while his group jived like 1976 never died, emanating an energy and exuberance that made him seem half his 59 years. ‘Everybody Dance’, ‘Dance Dance Dance’, ‘I Want Your Love’ et al were all run through with consummate musicianship, and despite probably being a good few hours past his bedtime, Rodgers appeared genuinely sad to depart when the last bass-lick twanged into nothing at 1:30 AM.
As the roadies carried away the last of the band’s set-up, the focus of the night switched to the decks. Unfortunately, a great deal were saddened to learn that, only a few hours before the show, Jeff Mills had pulled out of the line-up, providing no explanation for his decision and unable to be contacted by Warehouse staff. For many in the crowd, Mills would have been just as big a pull as Chic or SMD, and his decision both baffled and angered many who had forked out £20+ to attend. Replacement act Space Dimension Controller, a high-profile booking in his own right, managed to pacify some of the dissenters with his wobbly and wacky sci-funk, but many will still have left feeling short-changed by both event and act.
Simian Mobile Disco themselves churned out an hour and a half of high-calibre beats, keeping the crowd moving until the wee small ones. Though a little thin on the ground hits-wise, the set borrowed from their latest and most idiosyncratic LP Delicacies as well as their vast pool of electro knowledge to pleasingly tub-thumping effect. Warehouse resident Krysko served up some tasty cuts of deep house in the second room, while up-and-coming Irishmen Bicep produced a set as muscular as their name. Despite the Jeff Mills saga, Warehouse covered their backs well with a stellar backlist of bookings, as one would expect. In the words of Nile himself, these are the good times.
Artists in this article: Chic, Simian Mobile Disco
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