Credit: Found On Internet

New Raw, Nu-Rave, Nue-Rave, however you choose to spell it, is sitting on a knife edge. On one side there’s ignominious self-implosion, as a scene constructed merely between the pages of music commentary, on the other, a chance to creep off the page and into the record collections of the buying public.

With the growing success of the Insomniac’s Balls, kids with glowsticks queuing round the block to see the Klaxons at Koko, and sales of white cowboy boots and skinny grey hoodies going through the roof, it’s almost, almost made it. And Kill All Hippies has been blurring the boundaries between records with beats and post-Britpop guitars at its clubnights since 2001. Now they’ve moved from the home of their weekly Friday residency, Shoreditch’s 333, to the bigger stages and safer stylings of the Islington Academy, and it seems the nu-ravers have followed right along with them for a night of beats mixed up between a clutch of bands.

A few weeks ago at the Artrocker club, Bolt Action Five performed using What Would Jesus Drive’s (now departed) drummer filling in on drums. Now they’ve lost any pretence of having a live drummer in favour of chunky, unwieldy drum machines as they try to surf the nu-rave wave like an S Club Junior’s version of Sh!t Disco. And despite having stated at previous gigs that they weren’t going to play their cover of Bowie’s “Dance Magic”, they still wheel it out, jerking like stripey-jumpered marionettes while a ponderous abortion of a downtuned guitar grunts over the beats.

You almost wanted to shin up the hanging amps and scream, “this is the Emperor’s new clothes! Why are you cheering this bilge?” But considering there’s a trio of girls lurking near the bar are wearing hats made of tin foil, I doubt anyone in this crowd would be listening.

At their worst, Deaf Stereo come across like a poor man’s Kasabian, which is either their greatest flaw or biggest boon, depending on your perspective of Tom Meighan’s swaggering gang. But after standing through Bolt Action Five’s musical terrorism, it’s positively indulgent in its level of refreshment.