Club review: James Blake @ The Warehouse Project

Will Orchard heads beneath the streets to see how James Blake's subtle and delicate music translates to the arched underground caverns of The Warehouse Project.

Jayne Robinson

Date published: 1st Dec 2011

Date: 26th November 2011

Words: Will Orchard

Photos: Sebastian Matthes (@manox_net)

James Blake’s last two sets in Manchester – a pair of Saturday matinee shows at Band on the Wall, on the 26th of February and March respectively – were extraordinary for their proof of the extent to which a venue can shape a performance.

The venue’s crystal-clear soundsystem – likely the best for a venue of its size in the city – strengthened, without spoiling, a set of subtle and delicate textures, and in the likes of ‘To Care (Like You)’ proved a boon for the afternoon crowd.

On a night like tonight, such luxuries are obviously absent. No matter how tight the system, the subtleties of an album such as Blake’s are impossible to transmit in the caustic acoustics of Store Street’s arched underground hall. As such, Blake and his two-piece band have to change tack somewhat, and they do so with a set that goes for the jugular, spraying vast technicolour synth washes atop Hammond organs and brittle percussion.

For a dance night, it’s extraordinary how little of Blake’s set is beat-driven – rather, the throbbing keyboards in ‘I Never Learnt To Share’, for example, takes the place both of melody and beat and sees Blake ride roughshod over his hapless drummer with a frightening, but glorious, level of bass. Tonight’s crowd – a post-dubstep one, if that’s your parlance – has a certain affinity for the swaying, pulsating rhythms that form much of Blake’s performance. Best exemplified in opener ‘Unluck’ and an extended version of ‘Limit To Your Love’, it’s an introspective, eyes-closed and head-nodding form of bass music that rewards close-listening and isn’t necessarily geared toward dancing at all (thankfully, considering the premium at which personal space comes on a cramped night like tonight).

Where Mount Kimbie before him build through swelling techno repetition (tracks like ‘Ruby’ shuffle with the same synth pad touches as The Field), Blake’s headline slot is one operating on an almost jazz level of freedom. ‘Limit To Your Love’, for one, has a breakdown of close to ten minutes, with Blake often ditching his bandmates in favour of a sultry tinkling on his keyboard. It’s evident that he has a perfect understanding of the dynamics of tonight; his set works in only two modes, a hushed single instrument or an all-out assault, forsaking the moments of filler that would otherwise sap the energy from his animated crowd.

For both, the crowd respond accordingly; silent reverence for the former, hands- aloft partying for the latter. Fortunately, there are enough moments of volume and bass to maintain momentum throughout; even in the most bar pianist moments of ‘Limit To Your Love’, Blake knows when his loucheness comes close to overstaying its welcome.

For a producer who only launched his live show at the start of this year, it’s an extraordinarily adept, confident and intuitive performance and one which – considering his collaborations with the likes of Bon Iver – is more than capable of even further evolution.

On tonight’s evidence, though, it’s exciting enough just as it is.