aaamusic | On 30, Sep 2010

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London, 24th September

I arrived at Counter Culture at 7pm on the dot, after firstly wondering around for about 15 minutes trying to find the entrance, after asking several strangers who had no idea, I finally found the London Bridge venue. Luckily for me they were still adding the finishing touches, so I had half an hour to find my feet, mingle with the que and also talk to the loveliest door woman I’ve ever met.

Walking through the entrance pass the smiling faces of the staff I entered into a dim lighted room, in it beheld a DJ booth, a three tier of darling mini cupcakes,a face painting corner fronted by the Wonderland Entertainers and photography Harriet Armstrong from her series ‘A Life in Music’. I passed through the first through into the back room, the blue lighting making it seem as if I were in some sort of surreal wonderful dream, then I was told it was an open bar. I didn’t stop smiling for the rest of the night. I wondered round trying to capture the essence of the club, the atmosphere was intense but calm, so welcoming,gorgeous, amazing and lovely.

The live music started an hour or so later, the first band of the night were AHUMAN, they were fresh and fun convincing me to hang about for the whole set. I could not stop smiling, even when I got a little terrified when David started to grind up against me. I then took another little wonder to the first room again, and checked out a little more of Harriet Armstrong’s photographs and also caught a little bit of the RightCLickSaveAs DJ Set and a little bit of Hatesy, whilst eating many many cupcakes before returning to the back room, to catch the second live band of the night. The second band were Viva City, these guys were awesome. They had a similar sound and perhaps even were influenced by such bands as; Adema and Placebo but with a more electronic sound overall, the keyboardist also looked a little like Noel Fielding. After this I took a few more crowd shots but I was eventually engulfed  by the night and the way of Counter Culture. I left around 1 or 2am. I would’ve stayed until 6 if I could, but unfortunately I had to leave and return to the real world.

Counter Culture is an amazing venue and project in every way, it’s only there until the 1^st of January so definitely go check it out, it’ll be the best night you’ll ever have. Even before I entered the club I had a feeling Counter Culture was going to be something special, and I was right.

Author& Photos: Khadija Pandor