autechre @ sub club, 16th march

Sean Booth and Rob Brown aren’t ones to bask in limelight. As they are frequently wont to do, tonight they perform in darkness, turning the Sub Club into a serrated cocoon; a jagged womb that shudders and trembles with bass and beats. They’re the anti-Daft Punk, Autechre’s light-show the sole low glow of LED ‘on’ switches. Deprived of visual stimulus and intoxicated by the jarring, erratic rhythms, patrons try to find a bodily equivalent and settle on a mix of mismatched convulsions (predominantly from those with a ‘lost in the moment’ glaze to the eyes) and thoughtful head-nodding (from those more into the ‘I’ than the ‘D’ of IDM). Autechre satisfy cerebrally and viscerally, the mind sated by the intricate motifs and the body by the pounding palpitations. Their intense set is an exhausting eye-opener, even if your widened peepers see nowt but the sweat on the dancer beside you.