Josh Davis, a.k.a. DJ Shadow, could easily turn up at venues these days and simply play a recording of Endtroducing….. in its entirety and still sell out every time to rapturous acclaim. In a recent interview with Rolling Stone, he expressed gratitude that his seminal debut album had endured so well and connected with so many people in the 21 years since its release. Since then, he has continually pushed against the limits of his comfort zone with every album, rather than simply rehashing what worked so well before. Whereas Endtroducing….. was famously the first album to be completely comprised of samples, The Mountain Will Fall was majorly comprised of his own compositions. That instinct to explore, create and challenge also resonates with his live performances, and tonight – the first of two consecutive shows at Concorde 2 – was a perfect example of a musical dynamo still in the prime of his creative career.

After an impressive set from Brighton rapper Bobbie Johnson, which culminated in a storming performance of ‘Bang’, the atmosphere (and heat) in the venue rose like a pressure cooker as a pre-show playlist of impossibly cool soul and funk classics loosened the limbs. Finally, the stage lights dimmed and the unassuming Davis took to the stage. He greeted the Brighton crowd like old friends, reminiscing about his first show here back in 1994 on a bill with RPM and DJ Krush. “I was young then, now I’m fucking old…” he laughed, before announcing that everything played tonight would be his own work – a different approach to other shows in the past. As he began with ‘The Mountain Will Fall’, computerised images of space travel appeared on a wraparound screen behind him. It can be a cliché to describe a show as ‘a rollercoaster ride’, but sometimes clichés are true – as the sub-bass reverberated out of the stage, the safety barriers at the front of the venue literally shook and vibrated with the sheer force of it. The sensation was incredibly powerful, and it was a physical jolt to the system whenever the bass dropped.

Moving smoothly into ‘I Gotta Rokk', alternating between drum machine and scratching turntables, the crowd was given a real masterclass by undoubtedly one of the world’s leading DJ’s. Occasionally just pointing a finger in the air to mark a specific beat, Davis was lost in his own world of electronic creativity. His instinctive control of the audience and his mastery of the mood was stunning to watch, using the inimitable knowledge of how and when to deliver highs and lows that only the very best DJ’s possess. Rather than just being there to spin the decks, Davis was playing live just as much as any other musician. Each piece moved in new directions, with effects added here or drum machines and scratches added there. As much of a sensation in the hip-hop community as the electronic world, the early part of the set was a show reel of his work in that genre. A rare performance of the almost militaristic ‘March of Death’, part of his 2003 collaboration with Zack de la Rocha was dropped in, as well as cuts and cameos from Q-Tip and Danny Brown. Following that, and with prescient timing on a day where the President of the United States was revealed as a neo-Nazi sympathiser, images of the 1960s Civil Rights movement and Native Americans were on screen alongside ‘Systematic’, his recent track with Nas.

Visually, each piece had its own personality and the images changed into a full 3D effect as the set progressed. Stunning in how it made the complex look very simple, it helped to alleviate a slight lull in proceedings as he played some of his more obscure work. While the room showed a good reaction to everything tonight, they were definitely more attuned to the hip-hop material and the biggest reaction was reserved for his work with Run The Jewels. As that intro to ‘Nobody Speak’ blasted out it couldn't have been received any better if El-P and Killer Mike were there in person. Massive as it is on record, live it became something else entirely as the pressure cooker was released alongside every pent-up emotion in the audience. The night then reached its climax with a crowd-pleasing rendition of ‘Building Steam with a Grain of Salt’, before a short encore. As he waved the crowd into the warm summer night, a whole new set of connections had been made with the experience of a sensational night with an exceptional artist. This mountain isn’t falling any time soon.

Jamie MacMillan