Live Review: Totally Enormous Extinct Dinosaurs & City Calm Down

After a welcomed set of deep, dubby house from the resident slingers, City Calm Down cruise out on stage and deliver some dark post-disco that's not bad, not astounding and overall pretty forgettable, sadly. The Melbourne four-piece are capable, sure, but with a glut of young bands delivering this guitar-driven dance music it takes something pretty special to rise above the pack. Stay is the high point of their set, with passionate frontman Jack Bourke getting his Editors on, evoking all kinds of late night imagery.

The room then continues to fill and fill until it's so skanky and hot that all sorts of startling odours are merely formality. As such, it's no surprise that Totally Enormous Extinct Dinosaurs has pared his outfit back to a more 'low-key' American-Indian-meets-Fred-Flintstone type get-up; thankfully the tunes remain as colourful as anticipated, though. Orlando Higginbottom, the Oxford chap they call TEED, starts off as politely as his conversational voice suggests, with Promises shimmering through the speakers as the Brit takes the microphone, closes his eyes and loses himself in the drift as all sorts of beats bubble around him. Waulking Song soon emerges naturally from the wash and sets a hypnotic rhythm. Late into the track TEED lets off a confetti gun and looks quite chuffed with himself, probably the closest thing we see to a smile all night. Even with all the magic flowing from the speakers some absolute crumbs still manage to have a dust up in the middle of the dancefloor, however, the Jurassic one retrains his concentration, letting Stronger get a full listening before suckering us into Garden. There are people hectically jumping about and now there are two minx dancers in bodysuits on stage. They continue to move all slippery-like as Higginbottom puts his foot down, leading the crowd into the wild jungle of his formative years – it's fucking intense. Then just when you feel the need to come up for air, TEED hammers it home further, the razor sharp Detroit tech of American Dream Part II practically screaming at your fists to pump hard and high. A headpiece appears and is fitted snugly onto the Dino boy's melon, the black and white of the feathers a reflection of the two distinct shades that bring it all home. First, Tapes And Money squelches out in all its compressed glory, the LED poles behind the tech rig flickering violently in approval; then as expected Household Goods is just unloaded onto the dancefloor and it's utter jubilation among the sonic armageddon, rabid punters resembling the dogs to TEED's bone... or something. Electronic hedonism of the highest order.