Club: Zutekh present Martyn

5th December

Soup Kitchen

7/10

With Zutekh amongst Manchester’s best promoters and Soup Kitchen being the city’s best club, a monthly residency combining the two is guaranteed to be first-rate. This was affirmed with the debut Manchester booking of elusive Berlin trio Italojohnson for a 4 hour set in November, the first in what is set to be an undoubtedly hot streak of bookings that continues tonight with 3024 boss Martyn.

Martyn’s move away from dubstep and dnb production into house-ier straight up club records in the latter half of his output channels excellently into his DJing. Hi hats and kick drums abound throughout the set of dance floor primed tracks to get the packed out Soup Kitchen crowd dancing vibrantly all night.

His selection of fine club tools is typified with the dropping of Joy Orbison’s wryly titled ‘Big Room Tech House DJ Tool – TIP!’, the track working successfully in a small basement. The intensity lets up slightly with the airing of Martyn’s collaboration with Four Tet ‘Glassbeadgames’, the atmospheric vocal cuts flood the room whilst the synth stabs build to a euphoric climax until he barrels fiercely into another club wrecker – Special Request’s remix of ‘Hackney Parrot’.

This blending continues successfully throughout Martyn’s two hours, keeping the energy in the room high throughout. Four Tet’s ‘Love Cry’ provides another high point before he closes triumphantly on Wookie’s garage classic ‘Battle’ – an ideal ending to a set punctuated by club focused anthems.