Techno is a vast genre, and in many ways, Leeds is obsessed with it. Nonetheless, there is a certain sound of the techno world that has yet to wholly break through into the Leeds club scene. Perhaps it never will. It is a sound synonymous with Berlin, dominated by deep, pounding, tripped out techno beats rolling into one long fluctuating continuum. It was this that Berghain resident Anthony Parasole channelled for the majority of his time behind the decks and for most of the night, the crowd stood mildly perplexed.

Sheffield’s Pretty Pretty Good have been hosting events in Wire for well over a year now, having continually blessed Leeds with an ever growing list of genre-defining artists from Palms Trax to Hodge to Pangea. For the start of PPG’s night, Mor Elien took the floor through a perfectly mixed array of electro, techno, and acid. The crowd certainly enjoyed Mor Elien’s set, and yet a distinct lack of movement from the crowd indicated a degree of alienation to her choice of various broken beat techno tracks.

At half two Anthony Parasole took to the decks and instantly a darker, harder tone entered the fray. After a frantic mix of some 10 tracks within the first 30 minutes, the tunes lengthened and Anthony began his hypnosis. By 4am half the crowd had left. The relentless pounding seemed to wash over a good majority of the audience whilst Anthony Parasole, a usually lively and animated character in the booth looked concentrated and unresponsive. Then the magic happened. Just past 4am the crowd began to feel it and finally during the last hour of the whole night, the party felt real. Anthony’s smile could be seen from the back of the room.

Hopefully Leeds shall learn to really admire the deeper, darker sounds of the techno genre and having seen the growing popularity of this genre across Europe (particularly Eastern Europe), this could well happen. Leeds certainly holds an interest in heavy and mysterious sounds (how could you not when hearing the deepest of kick drums through Wire’s sound system), but currently it lies in the periphery.

Thomas Bennett

Image credits: Youtube