Reports from a sick night in Metric... no, seriously

See photos of the night here

Don’t let anyone convince you to put on a music event. It’ll stress you out, distract you from your degree, and worst of all, when it comes off, the feeling of satisfaction will make you forget all the shit and make you think about doing it all again.

Last Saturday was KABLAAM, the first Felix Music Night of the year. The idea of bringing Felix, Jazz & Rock and Music Tech together to take advantage of Metric’s uber-expensive sound system was concocted by Imperial graduate Greg Power, last year. When he left, he looked in me in the eye and said, “Kadhim, you must now carry the flame. Bring music to the people.” (Ok, he may not have used those exact words, but you get the jist). What he didn’t say, however, is, “Kadhim, you’ll be so worried about the night being a total flop that your balls are going to crawl back up inside you and start punching you in the gut”.

Which brings us to around 7:30 on Saturday night. lo. batt. / algo ritmico is still sound checking even though SMB was meant to have started DJing 30 minutes ago (algo ritmico is dragging on so much I’m beginning to suspect that he’s just playing his set. Oh god, he is…) I’m already three beers and one straight spiced rum down and only about 30 people have shown up; I’m going to need another beer.

I head to the door to check ticket sales: 35 people… I walk back into Metric. It’s almost 8pm and SMB has finally got started. He’s playing chilled out, groovy house music. He’s obscenely good but people are avoiding the dance floor like Greeks avoid taxes. This is going to change: I drag a friend onto the dancefloor and start chatting to her, casually dancing. Set an example, I tell myself, everyone else will follow… This isn’t working, I walk back out of Metric, I’m just walking around for the sake of it at this point; I’m going to need another beer.

8:20pm. lo. batt. / algo ritmico is back on stage for his set. There’s a bit of a crowd now, ok, cool. Is that his mum filming? … His music is dreamy and spaced out in a completely surreal way. Kind of like listening to alien beeps coming from outer space. He’s got a laptop, a guitar, a delay pedal and... an ironing board? I’m going to need another beer.

About half an hour later, Black Sands are on stage; we’re back on schedule. I relax a little bit; well, either I’m relaxing or I’m too drunk to care any more. Oh shit, I have to go introduce them. I’ve got no idea what to say and end up doing a boxing announcer-style, “BLACK. SAAAAAAANDS!” People cheer, ok that didn’t go too badly. There’s a decent number of people dancing along to them. They play pretty straightforward indie music but they do it bloody well.

I ask the lovely chaps on the door what our ticket sales are like. We’re edging slowly towards 100. We’re out of disaster territory but not quite into success territory yet.

Operation Midnight Climax up next. I clamber on stage again and, in addition to my boxing announcer-style, “OPERATION MIDNIGHT CLIMAAAAAAAX”, I also crack a few jokes; I think I heard a bit of laughter, but it may just be the beer. They turn up the rock a few notches and blow a few minds with their cover of t.A.T.u. ‘All the Things She Said’. It’s getting towards ten and the headliner Mikill Pane should be arriving soon. Metric is rapidly filling up and though the guys at the door have lost count, they reckon there are another 30/40 people now.

When Mikill Pane arrives at the union I go into full-blown happy butler mode. “Hi there, how you doing? Yep come this way, certainly, ok, cool. Yep a couple of drinks, ok, one second … *sprint to the bar *sprint back with drinks … here you go.” He’s at least 6ft 4 and towers over me, and he’s got an entourage – I wish I had an entourage – including a Pete Doherty lookalike with little brown hat with a huge wide brim.

Operation Midnight Climax finish their set. The equipment is cleared away and for about 40 minutes the plug for the mixer screws with the sound and I’m running back and forth apologizing for the delay; several more beers follow.

Felix Music Night - KABLAAM from Jeremiah Vocaturo on Vimeo.

But finally, I get on stage to announce Mikill Pane. I can see people streaming through the door as I speak and Metric’s looking pretty packed now. I retreat to the bar and when Mikill Pane gets on the mic, everyone cheers and my balls finally stop punching me in the gut. His DJ is mashing together classic hip-hop dancefloor tunes to get everyone warmed up; everyone’s getting down so it seems to be working. Mikill Pane knows how to work the crowd. He’s got everyone chanting “FUCK!” in time with the music every few rhymes and for the whole of his 45 minute set, he’s got the crowd dancing and bouncing. I ask the chaps at the door to count the takings and see how many people have turned up; it’s around 200.

The rest of the night was a bit of a blur. Monsk and Niceberg DJed out the night until 1am, but I was a bit far gone and forgot to introduce them (sorry guys!) Looking back at the photos, I realised that Mikill Pane had posed for photos with a big crowd of people; respect for that. As everyone filtered out at 1am, and we sorted out the money and concluded that it had been a success, lo. batt. /algo ritmico (a.k.a Íñigo the Felix Music Editor) comes up to me and says, “Cool, shall we start organizing the next one?”

I just want to say thanks to all the acts who performed and to Will, Chrissy, Íñigo, Greg, Luke, and Deepka for their help organising the night.