Thank you to the amazing electronica bands who made up the second of our 14th Year Anniversary Celebrations. It was awesome to be able to restart the Electronica series too!
Thank you to the wonderful audience on this special night.
Thanks to our drink sponsors: Jack Daniels Cola and Singha Beer.
Thanks to our prize sponsors: Edifier, Magic Seasons Organics, Volcom & Polaroid!
Thanks to Sherman & Samjog for working hard on the sound.
Thanks to the Hub for hosting this event. Thanks to Leon for all the great photos.
To all the wonderful people who make The Underground run so smoothly, I appreciate you guys so much: lets give a big shout out to the team that night: Bun, Dicky, Holly & Raymond.
BIG LOVE to El Jay for writing reviews for each band. Thanks to Martin for the cool poster artwork.
Thanks to Laalaa & Jenna for behind-the-scenes promotions. Thanks to Vivek for looking after our website so beautifully!
感謝當晚蒞臨為我們熱烈演出的電子樂隊為我們諦造了一個美好的十四週年紀念活動！能夠再次展開 Electronica 系列的表演我們實在感到十分雀躍！
實在感謝當晚前來的表演者及所有觀眾，是你們令到這個晚上變得特別且美麗。
在此要感謝我們的贊助伙伴 Jack Daniels Cola and Singha Beer 為我們贊助飲料!
感謝 Edifier, Magic Seasons Organics, Volcom & Polaroid 贊助了豐富的禮品！
感謝 Sherman & Samjog 落力為我們控制音響！
感謝 The Hub 提供場地，感謝 Leon 拍攝了精美的圖片。
節目能夠順利舉行，當然少不了感謝一群幕後團隊 Bun, Dicky, Holly & Raymond，亦要感謝我們的樂評人 El Jay 抽出寶貴的時間為我們撰寫樂評，感謝Martin設計了精美的海報，感謝 Laalaa & Jenna 的宣傳工作，感謝 Vivek 把我們的網頁設計得十分精美！
❤️ Chris B xx
Janette Slack
1. Intro – Welcome to the Garden
2. Slave to the System
3. Girl in Black
4. Kut Me Sum
5. You Can’t Stop This
6. It’s On You
7. Take It
8. Never Enough
9. Red Ramona
10. Around the Block
11. Towards the Sun
12. Victim of Love (with Parliament-Funkadelic)
With razor sharp, incredibly layered production, superstar DJ Janette Slack got plenty of punters dancing during her set – an impressive feat for an opening act. Pounding industrial beats evoked London’s Torture Garden club, where Slack cut her teeth, while a pulsing 90s house undercurrent ensured there were no stationary limbs in the house. The sound balance was perfect as Slack bopped her way through some of her most well-known tracks, including Girl in Black and Kut Me Sum, blended into a seamless 30 minute DJ set that wove colourful samples with guest vocal melodies
One of the highlights was Victim of Love, a collaboration between Slack and the legendary Parliament-Funkadelic, who met after Clockenflap festival in 2016, and ended up creating music together. The as-yet-unreleased beats combined Slack’s signature driving rhythms with undulating funk bass and soaring, soulful vocals. Though her set would have perhaps been better suited to the closing slot, Slack raised the temperature in the room right from the get-go, elevating the crowd’s spirit for the rest of the evening.
– El Jay
Fabel
1. Teardrop (Massive Attack cover)
2. 安多酚
3. 困獸都市
4. 夢花鏡影
5. Roads (Portishead cover)
6. Earth
It’s unusual for a band to start a show with a cover, but Fabel aren’t your run-of-the-mill electronic group. At first, it wasn’t clear whether electronic duo Fabel would be simply sampling Massive Attack’s Teardrop distinctive beat and piano melody, but it was soon clear that they were performing a very faithful version of the original.
The pair then presented an original, 安多酚, a soup of soft electronica exploding into something that sounded like it could have been a Eurovision entry, with its belting lyrics and techno beats. The dynamism between singer and producer’s intricate pad work recalled the duality of fellow Hong Kong act, Deer.
A hollow, tropical drum effect gave 困獸都市 a Jasmine Sokko feel alongside singer Lolo (盧祝君)’s emotive singing. Choppy, syncopated vocals led into a pop drop that sounded like a honking goose over skittering trap beats as Lolo imbued her lyrics with an almost defiant passion.
Jimmy Fung (馮慶聰), aka the beats master, then took to the mic to reveal he studied in the UK, where he gained exposure todifferent music styles, especially drum and bass, as demonstrated on next song 夢花鏡影. High, echoey vocals over trap-inspired hi hats wove with snatches of heavier beats. When the frenetic drum and bass element came through, it sounded similar to Chase and Status’s classic track, End Credits.
After a long pause caused by technical problems, the duo presented their second cover of the night: Portishead’s Roads, before closing with the pacey, dramatic Earth. Filled with different textures and influences, Fabel’s set exhibited the chemistry and creative flair between Lolo and Jimmy, who will be an interesting act to keep an eye on as they continue to develop their own sound.
– El Jay
Yeung Tung 楊 彤
1. Monday
2. Breaking
3. Poison
4. Backseat Driver
5. Mumble
6. Marks on My Skin
7. Unthinkable
The mellow mood after Fabel’s set continued as Yeung Tung took to the stage. On slow and slinking opening track Monday, the local producer sang soulful R&B-inspired lyrics. While her vocals were loud enough, the beats occasionally struggled to compete in the mix – and it didn’t help that there was a lot of chatter in the room.
Second track Breaking drew from iamamiwhoami’s dense palette, with deep, dark bass, chilly, echoed rhythms and laguid vocals. It was very emotive – if not a little too loud and distorted. Over a trap beat, came the repeated refrain “Beating for you”. Midway through the set, the energy peaked with Underworld-esque, synth-led, lowkey trance rhythms.
The performer kept the atmosphere deep and moody, combining spare, sad piano chords with a husky vocal style for a trip-hop aesthetic that led on well from the preceding act. While the music was distant and icy, Yeung’s voice recalled Lana Del Rey in its lows, and Chvrches’ Lauren Mayberry when it climbed to spine-tingling highs. An outro drew from Massive Attack’s lugubrious, pensive playbook alongside the lyrics, “Ever since the day I met you…”
Yeung’s set closed with Unthinkable, a calming, invigorating bath of sound underpinned by maudlin melodies, crowning a set that took the room to shadowy and thoughtful places and established the artist as an enigmatic new figure on the local electronica scene.
– El Jay
JUNK!
1. Not Today
2. Everything Is Amazing
3. Fertiliza
4. Leave It Alone
5. I Remember
6. Matzo Ball Soup
7. 8-Bit Killah
9. The Ballad of Tommy Wiseau
10. Stop Biting Your Nails
11. Fuck You, You Fuckin’ Fuck
12. Tug a Little Love
13. Get Naked
14. (I’ve Had) The Time Of My Life
Spirits were high for one-man-band JUNK!’s headline return to The Underground. Producer, singer and, more recently, stripper Glen Lloyd was on top form, buoyed by the recent release of his third full-length album, Hot Mess. With a sound that can loosely be described as comedy electronica, or “performance art”, as Lloyd prefers, JUNK!, a familiar and welcome sight on Hong Kong stages, never fails to deliver a rowdy, fun-filled show.
A collage of photos tracing Lloyd’s existence from nappies to life as a 30-something opened Junk!’s performance, while the wistful accompanying track, Not Today, pondered the passing of time (“Maybe it’s true what they say, the time just flies away/ You wake up old and grey, and then you pass away”). It was a sobering start to the show, but signposted Lloyd’s evolution into an articulate songwriter capable of attaining great depth and incisiveness in his lyrics without sacrificing any of his signature playfulness.
The theme continued to Everything Is Amazing: on first look, an ode to the connectedness and technological privileges of modern life, until lines about being able to eat meat every day without having to kill an animal and having the luxury of being able to look away from the world’s atrocities really kicked in. The increasingly dark lyrics juxtaposed with the ebullient music, a party parade of congos, layered vocals and high-pitched keyboard stabs.
Similarly, Leave It Alone, saw Lloyd getting his rant on about the ubiquity of mobile phones and society’s addiction to checking for social media updates and taking selfies, slickly rapped over 90s hip hop beats and samples. Fertiliza, a song about how babies are made, which drew some of the biggest laughs of the night, featured a rapped verse by Lloyd’s wife, Christelle, amid a sex ed-style animated video that left little to the imagination.
Old favourite tracks followed, including tear-jerker I Remember, the Fiddler on the Roof-sampling recipe rap Matzo Ball Soup, and 8-Bit Killah, an ode to retro video gaming replete with nostalgic Nintendo effects.
Swapping from keytar to mic to laptop, Lloyd swept through the shouty, co-worker hate anthem, Fuck You, You Fuckin’ Fuck, the hilarious Tug a Little Love, which could have been an early 90s TV theme, and Get Naked, a rapid-fire celebration of bodies of all shapes and sizes – ending with Lloyd stripping down to just a novelty elephant trunk thong to whoops and cheers from the sweaty crowd. Final song, an excellent, down tempo cover of (I’ve Had) The Time of My Life showed there’s always surprises with this kaleidoscopic and endlessly creative performer.
– El Jay
Photos by Leon Che’ Clark.
由Leon Che’ Clark攝影。
Poster by Martin Ng
海報由 Martin Ng。
