REVIEW | Klangkarussell @ The Nest
Austrian house duo Klangkarussell showcase an impressive ability to mesh thrusting bass lines with electronica and jazz-infused house.
You’re in a dry, dust infused desert with nothing but the hot hot sun beating down on your neck, a lost cause, clinging onto the visions of a river that once flowed; breathing, meandering, in and out and you’re tired. Your mouth is dry, your feet blistered and you need water.
And then suddenly, as if burst forth from your own teardrops, you see a cloud. Its drops of rain hit you like stones to water and you feel graced, graced by the reassuring sensation that is life. Living. Water never tasted so good.
Put that feeling into a song and you get ‘Netzwerk’ by Austrian house duo Klangkarussell (Tobias Rieser and Adrian Held) who showcase an impressive ability to mesh thrusting bass lines with electronica and jazz-infused house.
Following on from the release of their hugely successful single ‘Sonnentanz’, their new album in 2014 stood out for its jolting pulses of twisted beats and synth driven bass lines that propelled the tracks forward to culminate in a fusion of beatific synths, vocals and sunny melodies. What made this album so special was its ability to evolve so steadily, each track effortlessly combined like the sequence to a good film. The intoxicating beats of Sternenkinder for example, climaxing in a meticulously edited patchwork of African chants and tribal baselines. These are tracks that would erupt even in the biggest of venues, so when Klangkarrussell announced a set at Dalston’s intimate venue, The Nest, I was beyond excited.
Truth be told, few of the album’s tracks were played, but I took comfort in the fact that it is not always the technical skill of the performer, explicitly, that makes a performance. Often the energy that fills the room is of utmost importance and Klangkarussell did well to prove exactly that. And when they did play some of their better-known tracks, Dalston’s dark cavern of a venue erupted within seconds, the crowd’s energy in complete symbiosis with the duo’s, feeding off of one another to ensure the extremely up-tempo, infectious layers of electronic house were kept going up until the early hours.
Their set marked an album that few will grow tired of and a combination of tracks that are only going to get bigger and better.
Catch them next at London’s XOYO, Sunday 3rd May