Event Review: Ritual London at Under the Bridge 27/04/2013

As the third Ritual event to grace the dancefloor of state-of-the-art West London venue Under the Bridge, this party upped its game once again to bring together a lineup of some of the hottest names in UK electronic music, featuring X-Press 2, Hot Since 82, Prins Thomas, Lumi and Balou & JDP.

Since Ritual London’s residency began at Chelsea’s Under the Bridge in February it has been a beacon of quality underground nightlife in a usually mainstream area renowned for its glamorous crowd and style-over-substance events. Ritual’s genre-bending music policy spans a wide scope of electronic music whilst keeping a sharp focus on both the cutting-edge and the well-established side of EDM talent, resulting in an East London-style party on the west side of town.

The swanky, 500 capacity club is relatively new and located underneath Chelsea Football Club's stadium, featuring high-end sound and a large LED screen behind the stage for visuals. The club’s superior sound and visuals were impossible to ignore throughout the night with the unique LED screen providing an impressive backdrop to the stage and elevating the clubbing experience to near-festival proportions in terms of overwhelming, intricate staging.

Topping the lineup for the night, Ritual saw legendary dance music duo X-Press 2 take to the decks. The club culture royalty and house music pioneers proved that they remain as popular and influential today as they were in the 90s, when they first broke the scene, during their euphoric, headlining set. Norwegian ‘space-disco’ DJ and record producer Prins Thomas also appeared on the bill, a purveyor of hypnotic, blissed-out beats, with Balou & JDP and live electronic act Lumi on warm-up duty, spinning their signature pounding, techno sound earlier on in the night.

Widely regarded as one of the hottest figures in the UK dance scene right now, Hot Since 82 brought his infectious, dancefloor-smashing brand of deep house to the lineup. The Leeds-based DJ and producer was at the top of his game, dropping banger after banger, with the night reaching an apex of house-induced frenzy at ‘Leave Me’, the recent Moda Black single featuring Habischman.

Ritual at Under the Bridge looks set to become a mainstay of the UK dance scene, having proven itself to be a truly unique and exciting clubbing experience.

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