After Floating Points’ groovy house and disco set, Darkside took to the Red Marquee stage at 2AM. Electronic musician Nicolas Jaar and guitarist Dave Harrington switched the mood immediately, dragging the audience into the dark side.

The duo’s album “Psychic” received critical acclaim last year for its textured mixture of dance, ambient and rock influences. The spaced out reverb of Harrington’s guitar combined with the duo’s name, “Darkside”, might remind some listeners of Pink Floyd.

From the beginning of their set it was clear that Darkside were using their time on stage with a lot of care and intention; they built up the intro to their first track until there was no trace of disco happiness left in the tent. The duo’s music was translated well into a live performance, with Harrington’s improvisations adding color to the dark haze. Nicolas Jaar delivered an impression completely different from their recorded music as well with his vocals, sounding like a British darkwave band frontman rather than an electronic producer.

Placing Darkside in between DJ acts like Floating Points and Jacques Greene was probably not the best decision in terms of stylistic transitions. However, the time of night and the cool breeze couldn’t have made a better environment for their moody music to echo through.