DJ Kentaro & Anchorsong @ XOYO

Chris Airplays reviews the latest Soundcrash night, featuring Dj Kentaro and Anchorsong amongst others.

I’m gonna have to start this write up with an apology. I don’t have a digital camera; pretty much a crime in this day and age. The one on my phone is crap (and doesn’t count) and I’ve lost the flash for my ‘proper’ camera. And despite the fact I gave my card to a photographer at the event and told him I’d give him credit and a link to his website he hasn’t got back to me. This is why I’m very sorry Tim Ferguson but I’ve gone and nicked your pics, oops!

I’d never been to XOYO before but had heard good things. We turned up just after 10 and had a couple of drinks in the bar upstairs to the sounds of DJ Irk. Plenty of Hip Hop, mainly on the electronic side, which kept us happy while sipping on rum & ginger. The decor in the bar and the whole venue is excellent; myself and the missus spent some time admiring the custom curtains. This is all well and good but when you mount speakers on a high ceiling in a relatively small space it doesn’t sound great. And lets face it, the sound is more important than curtains!

Thankfully the sound in the main venue downstairs was a lot better and we enjoyed a little dance to the sounds of Reso. DJ Woody did his AV thing which personally I didn’t really rate. A lot of DJs have jumped on the AV wagon but I don’t think that many realise that putting together a well thought out and constructed visual show takes lots of skill and literally years of training. Having said this it was all good fun and everybody was thoroughly enjoying themselves.

Next up was Anchorsong. I’d heard a little about the Japanese electronic wizard recently and had checked out some of his tracks. They didn’t really grab my attention but in a live setting they really work. Using an MPC to perform live has been done a lot but is having a resurgence. People seem to be trying to out do each other with how fast they can move their fingers but luckily Anchorsong sticks to considering the music and moving his fingers at the right time.

Last up was the ‘big’ man Kentaro. I’ve seen Kentaro before about 5/6 years a go and they had to bring in breeze blocks for him to stand on so he could reach the decks (he didn’t need them in the end). I spent most of that night standing behind the booth watching what he was doing. Despite being a DJ and having a good understanding of turntablism I couldn’t work out how he was creating the sounds that were coming out of the speakers. I’m still pretty ignorant to his techniques but there’s a certain allure to not knowing and I’m happy to keep things that way. All I need say is that he expertly scratched and mixed his way through a grand selection of block rocking beats. If you want to get an understanding of how good this guy is then youtube is your friend; you’ll get hooked though!