Darkside

Darkside’s debut (studio) album Psychic was very probably my favourite record released last year. I loved it. I love it. The experimental electronic-rock duo consists of Nicolas Jaar, one of the greatest modern producers and electronic artists, and guitarist Dave Harrington, who has played with Nico (as he is affectionately known) for years.
I’ve seen Jaar’s live show a couple of times; in fact, the last time was at the Barbican in London, where he bought out Harrington for a Darkside segment. But the first time I saw Darkside proper was at Fabric for their album launch party. The claustrophobic and dark club was an oddly perfect setting for this show, especially with the (over)use of a smoke machine. Their unique fusion of psychedelic rock and ambient minimal techno has proved sort of divisive to fans of Jaar, at least their recorded output, but live they are a totally different machine.
They mainly side-step conventional song structures to create a soundscape of growing intensity – each ‘piece of music’ starts with sporadic sound effects and echo-laden guitar noises, before Jaar slowly add layers of synth and drum patterns. Eventually, a guitar hook by Harrington or a brief snippet of live vocals from Jaar will resonate as the audience recognises a song, but then it disappears amongst a wave of layered noises more akin to a post-rock band. Darkside’s strengths as a live project lay in building tension and then stretching out ideas far beyond what is usually considered ‘music’. It’s challenging but heady stuff. When they do play their own music, such as the funky take on ‘Paper Trails’ or the extended version of ‘Heart’, they are electric, but the best moments come when they rock out and jam, such as during a mutated cover of Black Sabbath’s ‘Planet Caravan’. That Fabric show was absolutely incredible…I can’t wait to see them at Dimensions Festival in Croatia this summer.