Tour @ The Manchester Academy 2, Thursday 26th February.
Its not often that that you get to hear a mix of polish jazz, 50's rock n' roll, Teddybears' picnic and some Outkast and White Stripes all in the same night. Its even less likely that you'd admit to being in a place that played such a mix let alone that you actually enjoyed it Well that's what the tour brought to Manchester's Accademy 2 and it was fantastic. You know there's got to be something special going on when you see a room full of hip hop headz bouncing to Tom Jones' ‘It's not unusual'.
The tour is the latest brainwave to come out of the highly acclaimed Ninjatune label. It combines the old and new with the Manchester line-up including Jon More (of Coldcuts), Kid Koala, Scapel and Blockhead, with Hexstatic and DK featuring at other dates. It marks a return to the early Ninja tactics of sending out busloads of Ninjatune artists to joining forces to represent the label. Described by its promoters as ‘an attempt for the biggest audiovisual/ musical horizontal bungee jump ever' it didn't fail to disappoint. I always struggle to describe visuals so I won't bother; it should suffice to say that they were incredible, and not too repetitive which is rare.
I'm not quite sure what I think about laptop DJs but Jon Moore certainly helped convert me to the idea. A bloke on stage fiddling with his Powerbook doesn't quite have the same appeal as a man behind decks but I soon forgot about that as Jon Moore treated us to a sample of his eclectic musical tastes. The set included a fair share of hip hop a bit of rock, funk and pop but the drum n bass tip was clearly the crowds favourite. The highlight of the night was undoubtedly Kid Koala's set; the man is a turnablist genius! The live footage of his scratching was pretty hypnotising too.
Occasionally on nights like this, with such a heavy emphasis on visuals, you get the ‘should I dance or watch problem' but there was no such dilemma here. Even for the more rhythmically challenged amongst us (of which admittedly I am one) the temptation to dance was too much, though I was sure to keep my eyes firmly fixed on the screen. The ninja crew are off to Glasgow and London next then to the rest of Europe, let's just hope they'll be putting another appearance in Manchester soon.
By Joe Kent
