FABRICLIVE WINTER SEASON SHAPES UP

One of the boldest, most iconic underground club brands in the world, let alone London, Fabric's modus operandi is one that's always been hinged on evolution. A keystone building block of the UK scene, the club's onus is just as much on bringing about change as it is reacting to it — the venue's Winter Season, which continues until Friday 27th December, has edged the movement even further since kicking off on Friday 4th October.

“Music evolves in elliptical circles and, as an art-form, it seems to exist completely in cycles,” reads a recent statement from the club. “Even if those cycles prove to be slow and cavernously wide or fast and compact, burning out after the initial bubble bursts, there’s always been a unique torrent of trends/gimmicks that play out alongside the slower broiling more transient shifts in UK club music. Throughout these new and changing musical manifestations Fabric Live has always existed to simply curate and align the best of these new sounds, acting as a respected stamp of approval that unites disparate sounds and scenes under the one roof and often on the same night.”


Served up as a way of dispelling pre-conceptions cemented by a policy tilted towards the bassier end of the dance music spectrum in recent years, Fabric Live's Winter Season 2013, presented in a similar way to the seasonal programmes of The Warehouse Project, In:Motion and The Hydra, is about diversification in a world where tastes for the underground are constantly spreading.

“We have always had a wide range of programming at the club but perhaps that wasn’t coming across as well as we would have hoped,” Shaun Roberts, promotions manager for Fabric Live, tells DJ Mag. “By putting a three month season on sale all at once with a broad programme, we were able to let people digest it in one go and see the wood for the trees. It has been hard work but a lot of fun too.”

After kicking off on 4th October with an eight-hour set from Four Tet, the prestigious London institution has since played host to the likes of Black Butter, Vinyl Factory and Playaz on a Friday night, so far bringing artists such as Martyn, Gorgon City, French Fries and Taxman to three rooms of Farringdon's massive ex-meat storage facility. Punters can look forward to takeovers from Marky, Butterz and Keysound (1st November); Boyz Noize (15th November); Hessle Audio (6th December) Ram (13th December) and Rinse FM (26th December), while Playaz returns to fill its monthly slot in November (29th) and December (27th) on nights that will cross d&b with house, garage and techno, with the likes of Ben UFO and Anthony 'Shake' Shakir, Huxley and Dismantle sharing the same line-ups alongside a whole host of regular faces.

“It’s a good mix,” says Shaun. “We are still retaining some core elements of Fabric Live and that’s reflected in the three month programme, but we wanted to bring in some fresh people too. Music is consistently evolving and Fabric has always set out to be a platform from which people can share in and experience that music.”