MMNLS2E12.Djrum@Holocene, Portland, May 2025
Hardcore, Turntabilism & the UI of ships in Andor
This may or may not have been sitting in my drafts. (oops)
After last months review of Djrum, I wasn't going to miss him play, even on a Sunday at Holocene. Spend the Night continue to bring incredible UK and European artists over here for smaller nights in smaller venues.
It’s Sunday night in Portland and Holocene was warming up. Usual crowd of west coast older ravers, shadows drifting across the walls, lasers coiling in star wars blues and reds.
Djrum (aka Felix Manuel) has long sat at the edge of club music’s more linear tendencies. His records unravel, essays filled with footnotes, diversions, long-form thinking, narrative arcs between dubstep, broken beat, techno, ambient, and jazz. Seeing him live offers a different experience more like watching someone score a film in real time. He dropped samples and dialogue, and rather than build momentum in a traditional “DJ” sense, it felt like he was creating rave space.
The first half of the set felt pretty cinematic. Then he shifted. About an hour in, the bass got real deep, and the tempo was jacked right up, the crowd began to really move. You could feel his love of jungle and UK garage in the way he layered percussion, skittering, and overwhelming. A Villalobos edit I think into old Shackleton and some hard to place 170 BPM burner. No one was on their phone. The whole room was locked in.
As the lights came up and the echo of the final track faded, there wasn’t really a roar or a cheer, we felt satisfied. A shared understanding of UK Jungle. For a Sunday in May, that kind of magic felt rare, and strangely necessary.
Peace, more soon.
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