Club: Music is Love presents Kerri Chandler and Move D

31st December 2014

Sankeys

8/10

Having had a pretty outrageous 2014, there was only one fitting way that it could end—a night of music and debauchery at Sankeys.
The friends I assembled to join me were two or three years above me in school respectively. They first started going to Sankeys when they were still in sixth form, before I even knew what house music was. One of them noted how the clientele has changed since then, with the crowd now being friendlier and much more diverse. On my own observations, outside term time in Manchester you seem to notice much more interesting and amusing characters in nightclubs than the standard Mk. 1 student in the denim jacket toking on a rollie. Sankeys tends be a pretty weird mix of old-school Hacienda era ravers, local boys out on the town, and tourists from Eastern Europe and Asia looking to see what Manchester nightlife can offer them. The bar staff always seem pretty happy as well, despite the 6am closing time. I wish the same could be said for the bouncers.

Move D was up first in Spektrum. Having recently been interviewed by The Mancunion‘s Music section, we’re pretty big fans. Sticking to vinyl only, the German techno impresario’s set was as good as I expected it to be. The clock struck midnight about a third of the way through, as everyone in Sankeys paused to shake hands and wish each other all the best for the New Year. At this point I shook Move D’s hand over the decks and wished him “Alles Gute im Neuen Jahr.” Personal highlights of his selections include the eclectic ‘My Soul’, ‘My Spirit’ by Mike Grant and Joey Negro’s ‘Do What You Feel’. I also never thought I’d hear ‘Everybody Dance’ by Chic in Sankeys, but Move D played it to an extremely warm reception.

Following the conclusion of Move D’s set, we moved downstairs to catch Kerri Chandler. His set was filled with old-school house classics, which were exactly what I wanted to hear as I entered into my twenty-first year. ‘Move your Body’ by Marshall Jefferson being one example. My favourite moment of the entire set came at about 3:30am when he spun Frankie Knuckles’ ‘Your Love’ on a delayed timer. As that Chicago classic echoed around the Sankeys basement, I was reminded of exactly why the ‘godfather of house’ is missed so dearly.