DJ sets these days put an emphasis on trippy graphics, big drops and instagrammable moments. Jamie XX, born James Thomas Smith, played at the Concourse project in Austin last Monday and abandoned the expectations to perform along mesmerizing visuals. Instead, he shifted our attention to what matters most.
The music.
Producer of indie rock trio the XX, Jame XX’s “In Waves” brought a pool of his European influences to American ears. The album’s bassy UK garage dance album was one many have been yearning for. It chased feelings we’ve only heard about on those legendary 90s dance floors – hedonistic, collective and free.
Many dancefloors today lack the liberation that the 90s were known for, but you can hear the echoes of ‘PLUR’ (Peace, Love, Unity, Respect) in Jamie’s music as it humbly secures the foundation of today’s dance ethos. His Monday night performance took a risk to create an environment that the album dreams of, but that unconditional, collectivist love is rare. Many attribute its endangerment to accessible distractions and surveillance provided by phones.
Artists, venues and dancers have all spoken about the disrupters of the dance floor.
The number one club in the world rated by DJ Magazine implemented club room phone bans. Dua Lipa has asked audiences to put phones away during shows. Club Dancers even speak up about phone issues.
Electronic music concerts place high priority on big moments that are almost begging to be recorded. Social media conflates the dance scene with explosive drops, extreme visuals and FOMO. So how did it feel when Jamie XX performed without visuals satisfying our eyes?
The bass was so deep you can feel the air vibrating. The setlist brought a mix of eclectic genres you wouldn’t get from any other artist. It was unapologetically Jamie, but the lack of stimulation left out the desires an attention economy tells us we want.
Audiences might not be ready to embrace the music forward dancefloors of the past.
Award winning British artist, Bambii began the night with American influenced drops and at 9 p.m. Jamie XX quietly entered the DJ booth without any introduction. Just a seamless musical transition into “Wanna”, the first track of “In Waves” that fans have waited nine years for.
Crowd cheers queued phone screens to lite up and capture the dimly lit Jamie Thomas Smith waving back to a sold out 18,000 square foot dance floor.
The sea rectangular phone screens disappeared one by one as people swayed to the next song, Treat Each Other Right, chatting and waiting for the next capturable moment.
It was strange to be at a DJ set with minimal crowd dancing. Club hit “Baddie on the Floor” produced with house music legend and Beyonce collaborator, Honey Dijon, inspired little more than left-to-right swaying around me. The Monday night crowd felt more like a listening session than the raves Jamie XX typically headlines.
About halfway through the two-hour set, the venue screen lit up with a live camera feed of the crowd. The packed, but modest crowd was set to accompany creative remixes. Romy’s “Loud Places”, a Spanish Flamenco mashup with “Life” featuring Robyn and the collective release that “All You Children” sets itself out to be — left dancers sustaining their left-to-right swaying.
Many sang the catchy choruses and enjoyed unexpected musical moments, but I kept asking, what was going on? Why weren’t people dancing?
Jamie ended the set with a mashup of Daffodil and its source material, J.J. Barnes’ 1973 track “I Just Make Believe”. In the show’s finale, the camera live feed cut from the crowd to Jamie’s DJ deck, revealing a record player left spinning. Playing vinyl in this setting comes with great challenges.
Jamie told music podcaster Derrick Gee that he brought along an personal sound engineer to seamlessly blend quieter antique records with modern music that’s engineered to feel like the inside of a booster rocket. Jamie’s performance made musical considerations for a DJ set many other DJ’s ignore. The show was an extension of the album’s ode to club culture that the audience preached, but not practiced.
Maybe it was the Monday night time slot or maybe it’s social media’s hyper sensationalism of dance music, but the rave scene’s collective catharsis was not in the room that night.
512 Observer 
Leave a comment