After what had seemed like an eternity of waiting, Friday the 12th of March finally arrived. I had found myself in a continual state of excitement all week when thinking of the night ahead of me. Ever since receiving a facebook invite to the next Bricks event at the Bussey Building in Peckham I had been on a mental countdown.
Previously I have been to two parties at the said location and each had been pretty spectacular, the event hosted by Lucky PDF particularly so. A fantastic combination of banging dupstep, willing crowd and cheap drinks had made for a more than enjoyable evening. In the past due to the unwelcome call of work the following morning I had, had to leave earlier than I would have wanted to so in preparation for this event I decided to go all out and book that motherfucker off.
How I would love now to be able to write that it had all been worth it. How I would love to say that it had been a wonderful evening. How I would love to say that I look forward to the next with the same tingling anticipation. This I can not do.
Something, perhaps many things about this event, just did not work. Me and my friends decided to arrive early so as to avoid the queue (which we have experienced previously) so were not surprised to walk straight in and find it pretty empty. We parked ourselves up on some sofas and grabbed some drinks and waited for the evening to begin. On entry the music was pretty good a steady role of chilled dupstep. As the crowd filtered in, it became obvious that there was definitely a bigger variety of people than their had been in the past. The barely legals mingling with the mid 30s. It probably reached its most full point at around 12, though it still had a definite sense of emptiness. The music had picked up the pace but had now merged into what can only be described as drum and base. I felt myself really trying desperately to get in to the music but there was a definite lacking of atmosphere. The best part of the night was definitely MJ Cole's set where he played some of the garage tracks that I had grown up with as a teenager. I would not say that any of the other DJs however were particularly memorable.
At one point I managed to blag my way backstage and it was clear that everyone was working really hard and enjoying themselves so I am at loss to explain why it did not really work. The Bussey building has been a brilliant venue in the past but I wonder if maybe the magic has now been lost? The initial parties there had a sense of excitement about that harked back to the illegal raves of the 90's whereas now the building has almost begun to feel like a club. Perhaps the time has passed? I would be interested to attend another Bricks event possibly in a different venue to see if this is true. Unfortunately for me the past part of my night was on returning to my friends house where we had our own party.
