- Few club events are afforded the fanfare that Sven Vath's Cocoon night is given when it rolls into town. Whether at the club's summer habitat of Amnesia or at Cocoon Club in Frankfurt; Vath's parties have constantly pushed the envelope when it comes to production and forward thinking music policy.
Previous Cocoon visits to London, which were held at The End prior to its closure, always proved to be stupidly in-demand affairs where the club's claustrophobic atmosphere was often key to fuelling Sven's show-stealing marathon sets. As such, the switch from The End to the much larger matter was initially met with a degree of scepticism from some diehard Cocoon fans—most bemoaning the club's rotational music policy and penchant for funky and electro house nights. However this failed to quell pre-sale demand. The party remained number one on RA's event list for around a month, while tickets changed hands outside the club for £60+—almost unprecedented for a club night in London.
Photo credit: Vickie Parker
matter's main room, probably just as much as any other club I have visited, has the air of a "super club." Everywhere state of the art lighting glints off the walls, bar staff wear branded Cocoon T-shirts and, on this particular night, professional dancers pack the stage wielding glow in the dark light-sabres. You could not get further away from the barren interior of matter's sister club, Fabric.
By 11pm the club was already full. With bar areas, toilets and seating all situated far away from the DJ booth, matter's design means that most people naturally gravitate towards the centre of the club's unique hydraulic dance floor. This certainly had an effect on Chris Tietjen, who played much harder than he usually does when setting the scene at Cocoon in Amnesia. House-influenced grooves were largely shunned in favour of tough techno which not just sounded bouncy, but also felt it thanks to matter's unique dance floor set-up. Of course, no complaints were heard from the crowd, the bulk of which seemed to be much younger than The End's Cocoon clique and a high proportion of which were wearing luminous sunglasses.
A quick switch into room two threw up the pleasant surprise of Jamie Jones, covering for the absent Onur Özer, who plied the crowd with his own brand of relentlessly stripped down house. Finding a space and settling in on the smaller dance floor, I couldn't help feel more at home here than in the fevered main room where the crowd demanded music that was higher in tempo and much more involved. Luckily, Hamburg's Extrawelt were on hand to deliver just such music. Appearing theatrically from behind a curtain opposite the main DJ booth after Sven's first set, Extrawelt dutifully supplied a laptop set full of electronic growls and bleepy acid menace. Despite being a live performance, Extrawelt kept the momentum of the night rolling admirably as the duo manically tapped away at their MIDI controllers to create definite musical "moments" with live effects and switches in tempo.
Photo credit: Vickie Parker
Next came the moment most were waiting for; an extended set from Cocoon ringleader, Sven Väth. Starting off with a menacing techno groove around 132 BPM, Sven quickly settled in peppering his sets with favourites such as Robert Babicz's "Dark Flower" and, surprisingly, Aphex Twin's "Windowlicker." The aforementioned track actually a signalled a moment for Sven to go up a gear around 5 AM, making the beats harder, darker and gradually more mechanical. As the advertised closing time of 7:30 neared the crowd gradually filtered out safe in the knowledge that they had experienced a night that lived up to the huge expectation placed upon it. Those who stayed past 7:30 were treated to a surprise after party in Matter's VIP room that went on to the ungodly hour of 2 PM—a surprisingly cool move for a venue that sits inside the spectacularly corporate O2 Arena.
Cocoon's opening night at Matter proves that the event is likely to be success wherever it decides to pitch up. Importantly for matter, who also recently added drum & bass night Ram after The End's closure, residencies like this could help cement the club's reputation and allow it to write its own chapter in London night life.