World Unknown – A Preview

 
Art & Culture

Arguably one of the last proper raves in the UK.
A big claim? If ‘proper’ means no guest DJs, no connection to the music biz, no connect at all to dance music at large, no hipsters, no tourists and absolutely in a dingy illegal hole filled with smoke, oil wheel psychedelics and genuinely lovely people then yeah… it’s proper.

Beavering away in South London for 3 years tonight finds it in a new home a hop and a skip from Peckham and it’s spiritual home of Brixton it’s fast becoming the not-so-secret southern secret that is dominating the nascent scene emerging there. The new space is a direct result of the overflow from it’s last venue in a Brixtonian railway arch being something of a roadblock, quite literally in the sense of stopping traffic. It’s jolly hard to get involved too, no Facebook pages or much indeed beyond a minimalistic website and an email you get on the Friday. That’s a big factor too. The southern scene is all about Fridays, these kids are making their own rules and it’s smaller contemporaries like Peckham’s Rhythm Section and others are making Friday the big night of the week again.

You’ll note the lack of booziness and aggression too at World Unknown or WU-pronounced-‘Woo’ as it is known. As it’s own site rather grandly proclaims it has a “crowd that reminds you that humanity can be a force for good” , we can in fact attest it’s a very pleasant bunch. Testament to that is the way people politely get out of the way when you move through them, unless we were sweating CS gas that night. Above all the music is just brilliant. Just Joe Hart and Andy Blake all night, both veteran vinyl lovers and spinners of things much cosmic and unusual. Think Optimo and ALFOS in a dark smokey bunker full of flower children.

Go to the site, log on the mailing list and check it out. It won’t be a secret much longer.

World Unknown