Mike Skinner Shatters The Exeter Phoenix (Almost)

For those who of you who missed out on Skinner’s Exeter debut, you should feel extremely upset right now. To summarise, his one hour slot was the kind of set that turns people into hardcore house heads. I have never seen a DJ set with such passion, determination and energy in my twenty years of life. Although, I would expect nothing less from Ex-Streets’ man Skinner!

When I heard Skinner was coming to Exeter, I was physically shocked. I mean, we would all expect him to arrive in Bristol, yes, but Exeter? This just highlights the increasing diversity and passion of the music community in this town - and thank he produced an astronomical, and almost earth-shattering musical experience.

As a reviewer, you try to be impartial to the hype surrounding an artist. It’s all about immersing yourself in the experience completely and utterly whole heartedly. It was clear to see his experience as a performer, producer and music obsessive in the *cough* blinding lights *cough*. Skinner’s DJ-ing style is, admittedly, all about the hype, flicking style and tracks almost consistently every four minutes, keeping the beats intense and the crowd dancing. Highlights from his set included live remixes of R Kelly’s Ignition, a very heavily amped Beyonce track to some of his own back catalogue– and of course, a lot of grime lyrics splattered throughout. His skills as a producer have to be praised, though his ability to interweave genres and tracks so effortless, especially since he does not see himself a “traditional DJ”.

His experience as a performer really allowed the audience to emerge into his musical world. One of the joys about Mike Skinner’s set was intense energy. The pure passion that Skinner possesses was on full show, which as a live music fan I appreciated, having seen some rather lacklustre and rather depressed DJ’s performing earlier in the evening. Skinner’s ability to interact with the crowd must also be commented upon– from asking where all the fit birds in Exeter were (since it was Saturday, I’m placing my bets on the Lemmy), to asking a random audience member about curry, Skinner did not ignore his legion of house heads.

The whole experience that Mike Skinner produced felt completely organic. Yes, I used the word organic, but bear with me of this one. The seamless ability of Mike Skinner to create an one hour DJ seem like so much more than just a run of the mill DJ set stands to prove his abilities as an artist. I cannot emphasis enough how beautiful his set was, how energising a performance it was. God, It sounds like I was drunk off my face – but I promise I wasn’t. Mike Skinner was just that good.

Please come back soon Mike Skinner!