20/03/2026
There’s got to be an off switch for my horrid buzzing brain, right?
Meditation. Walking. Exercising. Singing bowls. Cleaning the oven to Relaxing Rainforest Sounds on loop.
This week I tried every relaxation method going, to the point even ChatGPT said, ‘girl, you’re doing too much’ (true story).
Still, the frenetic Space Invaders anxiety could not be blasted away.
I knew Kibosh were hosting a free gig in Withington on Friday, so I got ready after a deeply depressing four-minute shower, trying to keep the water bill under three grand.
Shivering in the bedroom and questioning my life choices, I promptly had a full tantrum. Sat on the bed, arms folded, bottom lip sticking like the continental shelf.
Torn between staying in and ‘being a good girl’, I see-sawed from choosing another Friday night on the couch doing half-arsed meditation doodles, and going out for a verrrry late one.
The boyfriend eventually cajoled me out into the sheety-sleety rain, telling me, ‘we can have just a quick dance and if we don’t like it we can go home.’
No chance. We’re going to Kibosh, and we know it’s always going to be excellent.
Ten minutes later we hopped off the bus and alighted right outside Sandbar Withington. Gotta love living on the busiest bus route in Europe. The bus shelter leads straight into the doorway of the venue, which meant I only had to get wet for two seconds between bus and bar. So totally drenched then.
The instant I got inside, my bottom lip retracted, and I started dancing, wrapped in several large scarves and a winter coat, slopping icy drinks up my arm. The magic was working; my feet were already on fire.
A gaggle of clubbing mates were there to greet us, and I fell straight into them, greeted with bear hugs that could crack a grizzly’s ribs. Weekday blues evaporating like the steam coming off my sodden coat.
I’ve been back in Manchester for four years now, and with every club night the friendships get deeper, the hugs get longer, and the emotional Velcro gets stronger.
This is why I came back to Manchester in the first place. Globetrotting can be a lonely business.
Kibosh are a DJ collective who rotate round funky city venues, hosting free parties and ‘playing chuggy psychedelic euphoria and wonky acid disco.’
On the line-up, we had Bongo Bill (William Meadowcroft), Alex Gaskill, Dan Williamson, Rob Hall (Measures), Hunterbrau, and Jack Moss.
I’m only just getting to know their names, but I do know the DJs change over quite rapidly, so each time you look up from your frenzied dancing, you’ll see a new acid smiley face on the decks.
If you’ve not heard acid house before, it’s a sweeping, heady mix of hypnotic rhythms and warped, squelchy bleeps that soothe and realign one’s mangled mental state. Well, I can't imagine my mum liking it (she has a Subo CD in her glovebox) but it does the trick for me.
I’m usually a pure house head, but as I get older and more aware of the neuroscience of music, I’ve realised those relentless acid beats synchronise your brain waves, quiet the overactive prefrontal cortex, and flood you with dopamine and endorphins, turning frenetic chaos into a trance-like flow. In effect, the flow state I was chasing when cleaning the oven earlier in the week.
The more I indulge in acid house, the more it feels like a carwash for the mind, and one with a deluxe hot wax at that.
The fuzzy-buzzy rapid-fire frequencies must resonate at a similar level to the chaos in my own brain, and like destructive interference in a wave tank, they cancel each other out.
And acid house makes you dance. Endlessly. I busted moves more serious than Alan Sugar in the Apprentice final and put my shoulder out trying freaky new moves that would embarrass Bez.
There are two things I love in life: a decent soundsystem and glitterballs. Kibosh had both - their own system, recently tweaked and on its second outing, and an enormous glitter ball the size of the Death Star that belongs to Sandbar, although I definitely think Kibosh should kidnap it.
As unofficial health and safety inspector of disco rigs (I go around gigs with a dB meter, because I’m keen on not losing my hearing, and you should be too), the rig was very pleasing: loud enough to not vapourise delicate cochlear hairs, but still warm and mellow. And my bat-like hearing was still able to detect moths over the soaring pulses. Good stuff.
One friend said to me, ‘I didn’t want to come out either, but I knew Kibosh would make me feel loads better.’
Hard agree.
And I’m pleased to say, I was last on the dance floor, along with Alex, one of the organisers. As the lights came on around us and the Death Star stopped rotating, I called out for more. Much more! Much more Kibosh! Thankfully the next free gig is Friday 3rd April, 2026 at the Carlton Club. Yep, Good Friday is going to be a very good Friday.
When the confusion of the modern world gets too much, and you want to bless your brain, body and bones with healing vibrations from a world-class system, all you need to do is have a depressing four-minute shower, throw a bedroom tantrum, jump feet first into your finest psychedelic trousers, and get along to Kibosh.
After all, we’re all just little apes who want to dance with the tribe, in the dark, to pounding drums and mind-entrancing tunes.
Kibosh takes you right back to the primal state. Just with better lasers.
Vicky Video,
Withington TV
