"This is the sound of what you don't know killing you!" barked El-P at the top of the set. A warning to the uninitiated, perhaps, as had any unknowing audience member been lured to this gig by the support - internet sensations du jour Dan Le Sac vs Scroobious Pip - and stuck around, they could have been forgiven for wondering what all the noise was, and why that man was shouting at them. An understandable response, given how the Brooklyn-based rapper/producer chose to announce his entrance. The gentle tinkling of Gary Jules' cover of Mad World was an incongruous choice for an artist whose jagged, abstract production techniques and acerbic vocal delivery with Company Flow and Cannibal Ox have left an indelible mark on underground hip-hop.
Abnormal service was quickly resumed, however, as El-P, accompanied by a DJ, bass and keyboards, did his best to relay the black-hole density of his most recent album, I'll Sleep When You're Dead. It was a big ask: four years in the making, the record is an irresistible force, like tectonic plates colliding to provide the rhythm for a soundtrack that matches John Carpenter at his most apocalyptic. But, channelled through a club PA, the earth just didn't quite move enough.
Older material like Deep Space 9mm and Stepfather Factory fared better, and with the crowd in raucous mood, El-P eschewed subtleties in favour of the tiresome call-and-response games that feature all too often at hip-hop gigs. That said, leading a chant of "I found love on a prison ship" is a welcome departure from the normal b-boy rabble-rousing.
In the minefield of live hip-hop - where no-shows and by-the-numbers playbacks are rife - this was an undeniably solid performance. But the failure to fully realise on stage the fantastically high standard of his recorded output was a disappointment.
