Sometimes when assembling the pieces of a jigsaw you’re not entirely sure what you’re looking for until the very last piece is put in place. This is possibly the best way I can describe my experience at Trinity Bar on the first Saturday of this month. Frittering away yet another stagnant weekend in Canberra, I forcibly drag my best friend to a techno gig: Tekno Prisoners Vol. 3 ft. Mikah Freeman. I’ll be honest, this was a definite Facebook stumble upon, the kind when a distant acquaintance hits going on a fb event they probably won’t show up at anyway and it invariably shows up on your newsfeed. “Ah!” you think to yourself, “this could be fun”.

Expecting nothing short of a good night (ruckus makers as we are) we make the trek all the way to Dickson. Taking in the rhythmic waves reverberating through the closet-like space, we find ourselves making some good banter with two relatively attractive, alty looking guys who, choose to describe themselves as “public servant douche bags”.  Looking around there’s a private function being held – a 30^th Birthday party to be precise – and in the far corner bunch of ladies are standing in their 10-inch heels.  Their dance moves have probably been honed by years at Moose and the new music is not to their liking. They leave – poor birthday girl. Later we discover that the “public servant douchebags” are housemates with the guy that has been drooping beats for the past half hour, Kylie Minotaur. Someone in the audience describes the manipulated sounds as heart-touching but sadly they came nowhere near to touching my soul.

Following Kylie, the Parasite Warriors hit the stage. Taking it up a notch, they pump out immaculately crafted and mixed techno.  At this point, I’ve accepted the sloppy vibe and turn to pay attention to the music. Once again, I am disappointed, this time by the visuals displayed on the screen behind the duo. There is a repeated image of a topless women dancing around. Normally, I’d have no particular issue with nudity however I did take exception to the dolphins she had instead of breasts. This image slowly crosses over to stick figures killing each other, which soon changes over to an absurd scene from The Simpsons.

When we got back home later that night, I did a bit of Facebook stalking and it became clear to me that Monsieur Ben Gogh and his man TimTulip of the Parasite warriors – who just so happen to be the organisers of Tekno Prisoners – are not all they talk themselves up to be.  And so the last piece of the puzzle was put in and the image became instantly clear – I had wasted both mine and my friend’s Saturday night hanging out with a disinterested crowd supporting wanna be techno DJs. Perhaps the problem lies with the genre of music which can be easily composed given the right contraption.  Lesson learned – stay at home and do an actual jigsaw puzzle while listening to something quiet.