Laurent Garnier has been having a tough time playing his live set in London.
It's now over a year since his Unreasonable Behaviour album hit the record shops and his first attempt to appear here, at the Forum, was mysteriously cancelled at the last minute.
Tonight the guest list queue is disproportionately heavy. As a scrum of media and industry types squeeze through the Astoria's doors, the paying entrance is void of punters.
Garnier is well known for being reluctant to play anywhere else but the End club when he's in London. Indeed the End is so far the only London venue that's seen Garnier perform any of new(ish) material. It's beginning to look like his apprehension about other venues is justified.
But Garnier is also keen to develop and has opted deliberately to play in a traditional rock venue rather than club setting.
Inside the venue's upstairs balcony has been closed off for VIPs, but the downstairs is thankfully packed and Garnier begins his set to a rapturous reception. Within a song another hitch has emerged. This time it's his old adversary, the computer, that's causing the problem. After half a track he breaks his set to repair a fault.
"Give me five minutes," he says, before looking at the problem and returning to say "in fact give me ten minutes."
Whereas other artists of Garnier's status would by now have been surrounded by roadies desperately trying to resolve the problem, Garnier gets down to fixing the problem himself.
A further ten minutes and the house sound system kicks in. Garnier continues to wrestle with the equipment and some people begin to drift towards the upstairs bar.
When the gig pounds back into action again Garnier triggers a sample that sets his theme for the night. "It's a battle for the soul of music", it states over a backdrop that flashes up binary code in first generation, green computer type. As the earlier breakdown graphically illustrated, computers are Garnier's friends and his worst enemy.
By this time Garnier and his keyboard player have been joined by his saxophonist. But unlike earlier Paris sets, which featured dancers, the stage set up is relatively simple. Garnier is one of the few producers who can project a stage presence and deliver a performance while stuck behind a bank of sequencers. The simplicity of a three piece band suits him.
As the spluttering high hats of 'The Man With The Red Face' begin to gather pace the crowd predictably explodes and a percussionist joins them on stage to add Arfican dums to the track. The crowd literally jumps with appreciation. "I only met this guy this afternoon," Garnier enthuses.
Having built the euphoria Garnier drops the beats back to industrial, clip edged 909 sounds and the visuals kick back in with a nova implosion.
It's not Paris, it's not even Garnier's London home crowd, he came on late and was dogged by technical problems, but none of it's made any difference. When 'The Sound of The Big Babou' kicks in everyone's too happy to care.
