Having earned almost universal rave reviews on both sides of the Atlantic for his first Memory Tapes album, Seek Magic, Dayve Hawk’s reputation preceded him as he arrived in Manchester to find a sold-out crowd awaiting the band’s very first live show.
A young father based in rural New Jersey, Hawk has played in various groups before, as well as remixing an impressive range of artists from the Horrors to Britney Spears. But Memory Tapes is his new home-studio electropop project, uniting two of his previous musical alter egos, Weird Tapes and Memory Cassette, fusing both names into a Brangelina-style hybrid.
Kicking off their introductory British mini-tour, Memory Tapes made their live debut in a makeshift performance space at the back of a rammed, grungy-cool Manchester bar in the heart of the student quarter. An oddly obscure choice, but perhaps this was Hawk’s indirect way of paying homage to the local heroes New Order, whose influence reverberates throughout Seek Magic.
Packed to capacity, this long and narrow venue was hardly ideal. Hunched over his guitar, accompanied only by a drummer and preprogrammed electronics, Hawk was barely visible beyond the tight scrum of bodies in the first few rows. But however uncomfortable, this carnal, crammed atmosphere ultimately added to the charged party mood. As the duo launched into an almost seamless procession of hedonistic machine beats and lush psychedelic melodies, this show felt more like a rave than a rock gig.
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Hawk’s fragile vocals provided a pleasingly human counterpoint to the artfully synthetic technopop that shuddered and shimmered all around him. Plain Material, the most conventional guitar ballad on the album, received a dreamy digital overhaul, while several tracks mimicked the glistening cubist geometry of Kraftwerk. New Order’s influence became most brazen on Bicycle, which surfaced twice in the set, adorned with softly plucked guitar lines that sounded like the high-pitched, cascading cadences of Peter Hook’s bass guitar.
It would be unfair to gauge Hawk’s potential on such shaky beginnings and chaotic circumstances, but Memory Tapes already sound as if they belong in much bigger venues. Even after Hawk had left the stage, his drummer joined the crowd for a euphoric dance session while the electronic instruments continued their shiny, steady throb. Humans may grow tired, but machines keep partying.
The Social, W1 (020-7636 4992), tonight; Luminaire, NW6 (020-7372 7123), tomorrow