Live: The Resurrection of Warehouse Project

Jamie Jones, Carl Craig, Julio Bashmore, Maya Jane Coles and Scuba
8th April
5 stars

Unless you’re a devout Catholic, it’s quite a rare occurrence to find yourself more excited by the prospect of Easter Sunday than Christmas Day.  And, Jesus Christ, I’m very sorry but the title of this year’s ‘Most Anticipated Resurrection’ must go to the revival of Warehouse Project. Following its hiatus from the start of January, Warehouse has evolved, becoming bigger and louder in the process. The rooms are huge, there’s a shitload more people and they do manage to recreate the lovely seedy ambience of Store Street.
Unfortunately, the intimate feeling of the car park under Piccadilly Station will take time to develop in the new venue. It looks like some kind of urban farm arena, complete with familiar bricks, familiar scaffolding, familiar arches and familiar cattle. And a lot more mud.

Given the sheer volume of artists, I’ll start with Julio Bashmore. He was on fairly early but his blend of stompy beats and simple melodies proved to be the perfect entrance music for the gathering mass of people. ‘Around’ went down well, and the only reason I left his set early was to catch Maya Jane Coles in one of the other rooms. I’d say that she took the cake in terms of flawless mixing, every drop was calculated to perfection and when the breakdown of ‘Little One’ kicked in, it felt like Warehouse had never been away at all. Scuba went with the usual mix of deep techno which served well to reinforce the murky atmosphere as the night moved into its early hours. Carl Craig and Jamie Jones capped off the night with some relentlessly hummable grooves and infectious bass. One of them dropped FCL’s ‘Let’s Go’ which is what I was humming all the way in the taxi home.

Overall, Warehouse Project has made a transition to the next level. A few more trips may be required in order to build up the same affection for the new venue, but that’s not a real issue as it’s now the biggest and loudest place in Manchester for fans of any type of electronic music. Easter marked the return of an institution and nobody can doubt the excitement for festivity involving this particular resurrection. Jesus who?