After checking out a good chunk of Morgan Geist’s set at 285 Kent, I hopped into a cab and ventured over to House of Yes for Sound Noir’s party with DJ Sprinkles. I was looking forward to checking out a Sound Noir party, having unfortunately missed their 3 year anniversary when they brought Maurice Fulton to the Morgan (for which I dont think I’ll ever forgive myself).

I’d never been to House of Yes but it’s reputation preceded itself as one of the best underground venues for dance music in Brooklyn. I was not disappointed. The space itself is exceptional, at once feeling intimate and cavernous. Thankfully the sound wasn’t boomy at all considering how high the ceilings were in the main room.

DJ Sprinkles was incredible. He presided over the room with moving, at times haunting, hypnotic house music. Analog drum machines, human hand claps, bottles and cans percussion and swelling jazz lines hung densely in the air. He also used some really interesting panning effects, something you don’t hear many DJs use. Many of the tracks reminded me of blues and jazz, more in vibe and tone rather than in structure and instrumentation. It wasn’t necessarily happy music yet still uplifting in a way. It made me think of the intro to his album Midtown 120 Blues:

The contexts from which the deep house sound emerged are forgotten: sexual and gender crises, transgendered sex work, black-market hormones, drug and alcohol addiction, loneliness, racism, HIV, ACT-UP, Tompkins Square Park, police brutality, queer-bashing, underpayment, unemployment, and censorship―all at 120 beats per minute.

These are the Midtown 120 Blues.

If you ever get the chance to see him, please do.