Rarely are abstract electronic acts as well known for their live sets as for their recorded output. Given such a heavy reliance on sequencing and studio edits, one could be forgiven for getting bored watching someone noodle around with pre-recorded tracks on a laptop. Autechre, on the other hand, have taken a very different approach, eschewing laptops for their live performance, and instead working with a mix and match of sequences, almost all of them unreleased, for a live show that is intense and unforgettable.

Rob Hall started the night off with a DJ set, his first of three. Setting an appropriate mood for the evening, Hall incorporated classic tracks from the Halcyon days of Warp and Skam, including choice cuts by Aphex Twin, Seefeel, and, of course, Autechre. Unfortunately, as I discovered soon after arriving, this crowd wasn’t much at all for dancing. The sold-out show was packed to the brim with mainly student/fanboy types, none of whom could muster a squiggly body movement, even when Hall busted out with A Tribe Called Quest.

Excitement brewed as Graham Massey humbly took the stage to finish setting up for his set as Massonix. Standing at the front (did I mention this crowd was also unusually polite to people trying to push their way up?), I was gripped by the feeling of being in the presence of a landmark figure in electronic dance music history. Here was the man who wrote “Cübik”, but there was no nostalgia to be found in his Massonix performance. Starting off with some of the sub-heavy sea noises that swam through the Massonix album, Subtracks (and would be a motif for the night), Massey was quick to demonstrate his versatility as a musician. Through the course of his hour-long set, Massey manned two laptops, a synthesizer, a guitar, and a soprano saxophone. Seeing him whip out the saxophone again brought back some excellent memories of “Pacific”, and his playing sat somewhere in between jazzy and dreamy.

The Massonix set also featured some dynamite polyrhythms, as Massey delighted in toying with the audience as to just where the “1” was on any given beat pastiche. Unfortunately, for all the brilliance in the composition of the music, Massey’s performance was set back some by technical difficulties, ranging from uneven levels between tracks, to a guitar that he had to tune in the middle of the set. With Massonix, Massey has brought forth some truly enjoyable ideas, but it might be a good idea for him to have another person for live performance, as the Massonix ship is perhaps a bit too complex for a captain without a crew.

Following another pleasant, but, unfortunately, once again dance-less DJ set from Rob Hall, it was time for the main event. I’d been told to expect a number of different things about Autechre sets – they’ll go on quite late, they might be laughably stoned, they play in the dark, it’s a full-on beat assault. Perhaps due to the strict 1 AM closing curfew of the Middle East, Autechre started their set promptly at 11, looking sober and serious. Darkness was the preferred atmosphere, as all the lights went down, leaving the audience to squint at Rob Brown’s white Hieroglyphics t-shirt, or Sean Booth’s face, illuminated by the red LEDs on his gear.

Autechre wasted no time in cutting straight to the rhythmic assault I’d heard on countless bootlegs. Performing, to my great surprise, with nary a laptop in sight, Booth and Brown focused instead on manipulating hardware sequences and synths, resulting in a multi-tiered, seamless set. Already, they’d skipped from pounding, 16th-note bass drums, to more ambient FM synths with squelchy percussion, to – oh my, had it really only been five minutes? Autechre played for one hour, but it surely felt like four.

Autechre apparently have their live sets down to a pretty exact science; either that or they’re figured out telepathy. Through the entire night, Brown leaned over to whisper something brief to Booth three times (not an exaggeration – I counted), and given the noises going off, I’d be amazed if he could hear it. Despite this lack of human communication, Autechre’s set was perfectly patched together. It was also largely composed of unreleased material. I have Autechre’s entire catalogue (along with the releases from Gescom, their more hip-hop oriented side project), and throughout the whole performance, I picked up on two familiar sounds: one was a series of echoing snare hits from the latter half of LCC, while another was a synth pattern I’d heard as “Untitled Track 10” from a bootleg. There was also some great mystery in the “who is doing what?” department. Through some staring and squinting, I deduced that Booth was working primarily on the rhythm tracks, as the LEDS on his gear flickered in time to the drums; meanwhile, Brown appeared to be working more on the dense synth sounds bouncing through the set

Autechre have repeatedly rejected the idea of releasing a live album, perhaps because they see their shows as uniquely bonded to the spaces and times of their performances, or perhaps because it’s kind of a prog-rock thing to do. Either way, it’s a shame that so much of this excellent material has never been heard by those who can’t see Autechre live / don’t download the bootlegs. There’s a boxset worth of smashing material crammed into these performances, cutting frenetically from one layered progression to another in a matter of minutes, and sometimes seconds. It looks like I’ll be processing this one for weeks to come.

 Autechre (MySpace) | Massonix (MySpace) | Rob Hall