Oneohtrix Point Never at London RFH, 5/4/24 – in pictures | Juno Daily
The Brooklyn cult hero in the flesh
A live performance in the UK from Brooklyn cult electronic hero Oneohtrix Point Never is a rare treat indeed. The last time we remember him headlining a show in the capital was way back in 2018, when he played the Barbican centre in support of his Age Of album.
That gig saw him flanked by a pianist, percussionist and other musicians. This time round, despite the fact that he’s taken a step up in the municipal arts venue league, now filling the Royal Festival Hall on London’s South Bank, he goes for the more traditional electronic music format of ‘shadowy figure fiddling with technology in front of a huge screen’.
Not that he was completely on his lonesome – he brought his regular collaborator and video director Nate Boyce to handle the visuals, more than ten years on from the pair’s first London show together in 2013.
But any concerns that the meaning behind the ever mysterious sounds of Lapotin’s current album Again might be spelt out in prosaic logic were unfounded – gorgeous eye candy the visuals were, but give or take the odd image (we liked the ‘tinnitus’ screen in particular), they were as scrambled and impressionistic as the music they were illustrating.
Not that that was a problem – Lapotin’s music has always been cinematic, with or without a screen, and the ecastatic response from the RFH show at the climax of the album’s performance showed he’d staged a proper blockbuster. Next time, Brixton Academy? As they almost said in Jaws – we’re gonna need a bigger screen.