Hysteria

If you look hard enough it seems like every other shop front in Dalston gives way to a dark basement club below it. Such is the frequency at which you encounter these bars you can end up lumping them all in together in some vast pit of Dalston nightlife that you don’t care to separate. But you should separate, they’re all different and Hysteria has its own take on the Dalston dive club that’s well worth checking out.

Located on Kingsland Road, a short way south of Dalston Junction, you can spot Hysteria from the smoking crowds out front. Such is the layout of the corridor-like bar on the ground floor that going outside is the only thing for it if you want some space and conversation. Since ‘outside’ isn’t really a part of Hysteria, you can hazard a guess that this venue isn’t about talking. A long bar serves questionable beers (on this occasion at least) but gets it right with a short cocktail list, which happily throws up the possibility of drinking amaretto sours all night long.

If you want an idea of the décor then we’d say that darkness is the look. The dim light is punctured by strobing from the club space at the back of the ground floor where you can usually find a soundtrack of electronica, trance and techno. If you can find the stairway down to the basement without a fuss then you’ve eaten more carrots than us. The space below is hot, sweaty brilliance. Some might baulk at the low, dripping ceiling, posing males on the edge of the dance floor (although it’s really just one big dance floor down here) and posse of DJs that do their best to outnumber actual customers, but that’s Dalston. The music policy is skewed to hip-hop and RnB with a focus on the contemporary rather than the classics. Which means the likes of 2-Chainz, Drake and Kendrick Lamar. And yes, we realize this rooted-in-2013 roster will render this review out of date in under a year probably, but hey, we’ll come back.