Club Previews @ Pressure

Len Faki’s slick, thunderous techno is the sound that sums up Berlin. It’s not just that it’s the literal noise that emanates from Berghain, where Faki is a longtime resident - it’s complex, modern and slightly menacing; a summation of the city itself. This instalment of Pressure has the German selector headlining, with Karenn backing him up in a quite stunning double billing. Otherwise known as British DJs Blawan and Pariah, Karenn forge raw, relentless beats live from a strictly analogue setup. The result is as organic and atmospheric as techno gets, piling dense layers of blistering noise on the crowd until it reaches breaking point. New Yorker Matthew Dear and Frankfurters Karotte complete the lineup, and as always Slam will be there to dish out some of their customary “absolutely full-knacker proper panel-beaters-from-Prague-’ere-we-go techno” sets, as the legendary Andrew Weatherall recently described them.

Before that, Saturday sees the Finnieston warehouse taken over by Marc “MK” Kinchen, the Detroit remix specialist who has been chopping and improving tunes since the early ‘90s. He found fame with his bassline-propelled mix of The Nightcrawlers’ Push the Feeling On, before a stints as Will Smith’s in-house producer. He was more recently called upon to remix Lana Del Rey, Sam Smith and Rudimental, leading to a resurgent interest in his solo work. “It’s impossible to go out now without hearing MK’s Burnin’ or his remix of Nightcrawlers wherever you go,” said Mixmag editor Duncan Dick last year, almost as if it were a bad thing. If you’re lucky enough to get your hands on a ticket for this, there’ll be no avoiding them – MK goes hard on his own material, so hardcore fans are in for a treat. Support comes from the German producer Oliver Dollar, who could probably sell out this venue on his own.

• Pressure with Len Faki, Sunday, SWG3, 9pm – 3am, £24

• Love Action presents MK, Saturday, SWG3, 9pm – 3am, £19.50

Armin Van Buuren

The sight of legendary trance DJ Armin Van Buuren teaming up with the Belgian EDM buffoons Dimitri Vegas and Like Mike in December proved too much for some of the Dutchman’s loyal fans. “This is beyond disgusting,” said one typical Facebook comment. Sentiments like “RIP Trance 1993- 2015 Thanks for Killing Armin,” and “I’m so sorry about what happened to you Armin. I’ll remember you like the trance legend you were,” were common too. It was like a death in the family for trance obsessives everywhere.

While the veteran Dutchman won’t be collaborating with the duo on this tour, don’t rule out the possibility of a foray into their brand of popular big-room EDM, as well as all the trance bangers you’ve come to know and love over the years.

• Armin Van Buuren, tomorrow, O2 Academy, 9pm – 3am, £40.00

Sensu

Seth Troxler is a man of the world. The Michigan-born house DJ has lived in Detroit, London and Berlin, and fancies himself as a champion of authentic dance music in an age of profit-driven EDM nonsense. "Keeping it real depends on the moral weight of your character,” he said last year. “If you take success in the right way and use success to further the ideals for which you stand for, it can be a good change." Alongside The Martinez Brothers, Troxler brings good change to St Lukes’ and the Sub Club tomorrow with an all-day party and afterparty. Tuskegee, his project which features the Bronx-born brothers, is all about big acid house jams, bleepy, minimal beats, and changing the world.

"We're (Tuskegee) just trying to come up with some ideas that mean at least something in the mass monotony of everything meaning nothing,” Troxler told The Independent in 2014. “What does Katy Perry’s new album mean? Nothing. None of this means anything. There's no stance in art or anything, it's just garbage.” Witness the outspoken house star in action tomorrow night when he hits up the Subbie – just don’t request any Katy Perry remixes. The pre-party at Saint Luke’s features residents from Sensu like Barry Price, Junior and Alan Belshow pumping out high-quality, cutting-edge beats from the unseemly hour of 4pm.

And on Sunday,

• All-Day Pre-Party, tomorrow, St Luke’s, 4pm – 11pm,

• Sensu with Seth Troxler, tomorrow, Sub Club, 11pm – 3am, sold out

Night Moves

24/03/2016

Juicy Tuesday at Kushion

We already know what goes on in Kushion, down in that bustling, brick-walled Bath Street basement. It’s like the club in a late-noughties dance music video: all glamorous groups of girls pouting and teams of hench Lad Bible followers knocking back Jägerbombs. The club bills itself as “the forefront of student clubbing” and in that sense it is right. There are a lot of students here, all of them wrecked, and waiting to get in is a chittering queue reaching halfway to Charing Cross.

It’s easy to look down your nose at a place like Kushion: it puts up a sophisticated front while playing big-room EDM tunes and selling cheap drinks to students. But to sneer is to ignore the club’s vital contribution to Glasgow’s appeal as a capital of student clubbing.

There are unfortunate undergraduates in other towns and cities whose only options are a Yates’ and a club that closes at two o’clock. Take Lincoln, for example, where I spent last weekend. It’s a quaint city in middle England, about the size of Paisley. It has a good university and a lovely cobbled high street with a Nando’s and a modern craft beer bar called The Strait and Narrow, where you can sip Berliner Pilsner and listen to groups of lairy, stereotypically English guys shout about their coupons.

The thing is, it’s just about the only place to go drinking that isn’t a traditional British boozer or a chain pub. And while the pace of life is undoubtedly peaceful compared to Glasgow, I found myself thinking that if I had to spend four years studying there I would have gone insane. There are students there who would do unspeakable things for a Kushion, while we take it for granted that our nightlife is the best in the country. Which, when you think about it, isn’t a bad problem to have.

Night Moves

Kushion

Q: Who inspires you most?

1. Rosie McLellan, 19, Greenock, Beyoncé

Hope Donnachie, 18, Greenock, Zac Efron

2. Evie Semple, 18, Gourock, Drake

Laura MacFarlane, 19, Greenock, Me

Nial Quigg, 18, Gourock, Ben McFadden

3. Daragh Cuddihy, 18, Gourock, Jack Warren Ballard

Matthew Steele, 18, Greenock, Johnny Steele

4. Gillian Black, 18, Gourock, Kanye West

Lewis Shearer, 18, Gourock, Cristiano Ronaldo

5. Nathan Feeney, 18, Colston, “My Da”

Scott Crawford, 18, Lyndale, Tupac or Biggie because they inspire me every day.

Adam McMahon, 18, Lyndale, Snoop Dogg.

6. Nicola Pew, 19, South Side

Favourite Club? El Barrio

Favourite Bar? O’Neills

Favourite DJ? Tiesto

Favourite Band? Unspoken

First Club? Bamboo

What You Drinking? Vodka & Diet Coke

Describe Your Dancing? Terrible

7. Rachel Dolan, 19, Hampden, Hillary Clinton

Andrew McLeish, 19, South Side, Barack Obama.