- Six years ago, the Housework crew began throwing intimate parties in Bristol. These days, three of the four members live in Berlin, so it made sense for them to host their first international edition at grubby local spot Sameheads in February. As resident Gramrcy told me during their most recent session, which went down in Bristol on April 8th, the Berlin party was great, but he always particularly looks forward to the homecoming shows among old friends.
Housework has always lived a nomadic life in Bristol, and this time they occupied an auditorium within The Arnolfini, the city's flagship contemporary arts centre. It's a curious space for a club night, with tall ceilings and a boxy layout that gives it the feel of a school hall. To combat this, the party took place in almost total darkness, with just a dim red light beaming from a corner behind the decks. The simple visuals, projected onto a huge screen that dominated one side of the room, were enough to disguise the space's cold angles and create an atmosphere.
Gramrcy and Golesworthy were already in full flow when I walked in, moving through a variety of tougher-edged sounds somewhere between techno and electro. It was a fluid and dynamic set, though as soon as Shanti Celeste and Daisy Moon took over, feeding in some warm, vocal-smattered house music, the vibe instantly became more relaxed, as if a weight had been lifted. Their hour-long performance was just what was needed to soften the edges of the room.
This more approachable sound set the stage for the night's headliner, Fit Siegel, who made a strong first impression with a Juan Atkins white label from the early '90s. Its subby bass and twinkling synths sounded more like an early UK bleep record, a style he revisited later in his set with Sweet Exorcist's evergreen "Testone." In the meantime, Siegel projected his Detroit heritage with a wide-ranging and decades-spanning selection of future-minded body music and machine soul. He swerved between acidic beatdowns and synth pop with a confidence that matched his laid-back demeanour behind the decks. Shep Pettibone's razor-sharp remix of Depeche Mode's "Behind The Wheel" was a highlight, the vitality of the '80s production standing up to more modern fare with ease.
Such was the quality of Siegel's set that an abrupt finish, bang on 4:30 AM, felt like a jolt to the system, with none of the usual "one more tune" fanfare that helps bring dance floors back to earth. For his first outing in Bristol, the Detroiter did his city proud. As for the Housework crew, they proved that even though most of them are living overseas, they haven't lost their knack for pulling off killer parties on home turf.
Photo credit /
Nic Kane