Lapalux @ Broadcast, 28 March

After a DJ set from Mirrors and a live set from Edward Organ, covering bases from garage and house to electro, Stuart Howard aka Lapalux takes the stage in the intimate basement environs of Broadcast. Starting out his set with Nostalchic opener IAMSYS, he then segues into the mental Forlorn, his juke-derived collaboration with rapper Busdriver, and then on to material from his frist two EPs for Brainfeeder and the preceding release on Pictures Music.

Cue a large slice of dubstep and trap-influenced beats, whipping the crowd into delirium with whooshing static and white noise-filled drops, chopped and filtered R&B samples, and luscious, organic sounds. Each drop is twisted and tweaked by Howard into a brain-melting sonic whirlwind, before plummeting back down into weighty, stuttering rhythms. 

As the set progresses, Howard begins to usher in highlights form his excellent debut album Nostalchic, causing pants to moisten and jaws to drop with the improbably sexy GUUURL. As the mellower, more house and R&B-flavoured cuts from the album come to a close, he flips the rhythm again, dropping everything from driving, rhythmic dubstep to crunchy, linear 8-bit techno.

The divinely chilled Without You feels like moving through slow, warm treacle towards a point of distant light, while Swallowing Smoke is a widescreen, psychedelic haze backed by thumping multicoloured future-disco, which Howard then mutates into a crisp, Dilla-like hip-hop beat. After delivering an object lesson in how to turn an album which works perfectly as bedroom music into a diverse live electronic performace, Lapalux blows us a kiss, and is gone. [Bram E. Gieben]