Picture the scene. One rather rotund Badly Drawn Boy lookalike American, a laptop computer and a pint of lager and you have got Hrvatski at the White Horse.

The prince of the self-styled laptop breakbeat Keith Fullerton Whitman, aka Hrvatski, flew over to High Wycombe for a gig last Wednesday and the town had seen nothing like it before.

The set-up was simple Whitman basically sits at a table on the stage with his computer and reams of cables and bangs out his unique 200 mph toytown, hardstep, splatterbreak, base-loaded dance music. Phew!

A hush fell over somewhat sparse White Horse crowd as Whitman lumbered, pint in hand, onto the stage and sat down at his laptop.

What proceeded was Whitman flitting back and forth from keyboard to pint, to guitar, back to keyboard and invariably back to the pint again in a musical melee of movement.

He kicked off with a droning low-toned hum of a tune that that was more for atmospheric value than anything else.

It threw a strange hush around the venue you could have cut the expectant atmosphere with a wet cardboard spatula.

When his first song was over, Whitman kicked in his more recognisable bass-ridden high tempo breakbeat but it just didn't hit the mark.

Whitman sounded more concerned with self-indulgence on his machinery than dropping the big beat that would have really got the crowd going.

Every time he got the set pumping he cut in another sample or drum loop that slowed everything down.

A handful of hardcore drum and base fans appreciated the night and inexplicably found something to dance to.

The rest of us spent the evening hoping by one unfortunate slip of the hand Keith's pint would go flying over his laptop and bring it all to an amusing end.

March 11, 2003 17:30