One half of the iconic Glasgow DJ duo Optimo, Keith McIvor, sadly lost his battle with a brain tumor on September 19, 2025.
What follows is a surreal and psychedelic tribute to Twitch (and Optimo & Glasgow as a whole), written from deep within their chaotic dancefloor, celebrating just a fraction of the insights and lessons Twitch shared with me.
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Photo by – Adinayev.com
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“Nausea!” we all shout in unison, an invitation in the early hours of the morning. It’s 2am somewhere in the year 2000, and I’m unexpectedly embracing a slender guy with unusual fondness. This catches us both off guard, as up until this moment, I had thought he was rather unpleasant.
The dancefloor erupts as JD Twitch, my all-time favorite DJ, unleashes a wild electro-pop track from a Detroit duo called Adult., striving to channel angry German vibes. “You don’t even know… how I feel…”
Welcome to Optimo Espacio – the ultimate club night on the planet. For an incredible 12-and-a-half years, Sunday nights in Glasgow transformed into a sweat-soaked utopian experience, a musical ritual that reshaped my tastes, career, friendships, and my methods of discovering music – more than anything else ever could.
Optimo was a duo. Twitch's rhythmic partner, JG Wilkes, known as Jonnie Wilkes, will now carry on the legacy of Optimo Espacio solo. I have no doubt he will keep exploring and mixing both new and forgotten music with the same fervor and enthusiasm, continually presenting tracks in ways that make us perceive them anew.
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“The damn thing gone wild, bam-ba-lam” It’s 2.30am somewhere in 2004. The dancefloor has spontaneously formed into a bizarre line-dance as Ram Jam’s ‘Black Betty’ crashes over us, twisted with an industrial techno evil twin. “The damn thing gone blind, bam-ba-lam / I said, oh, Black Betty, bam-ba-lam.”
This is dancefloor revelation #344. Despite the plethora of DJs and talent in the UK, Optimo Espacio could only have originated right here. It was the convergence of Keith and Jonnie as individuals, the blending of their record collections, beliefs, and values, all uniting in Glasgow at the Sub Club in 1997 – an establishment that is patient and nurturing. The audience in Glasgow is a rare gem: ready to immerse themselves in a collective moment of joy and primal expression. A motley crew eager to learn, grow, and to lose their minds at the slightest provocation.
I worked at the Sub Club sporadically from 1996 to 2009. From being a poor bartender to a bored cloakroom and toilet attendant, endlessly doing PR and plastering posters about, to later becoming a mesmerizing figure at the lights during Subculture (the Saturday residency with Harri and Domenic) for five years – and eventually hosting and performing at my own monthly club night, Kinky Afro, for a decade.
Over time, Twitch became many things for me, and the following are just the aspects I personally experienced and drew inspiration from: he was my greatest musical mentor, my guiding DJ, a freelance music writer for Clash (where I enjoyed commissioning some fantastic articles from him), a catalyst for countless friendships in the club, a peacemaker among foes, a dedicated supporter of local initiatives, a curator of sublime forest festivals… and a gracious rescuer who once saved me from an impending rave catastrophe.
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“I can’t seem to face up to the facts…” It’s 2.45am in the Subbie. Twitch has just dropped Talking Heads. My friends and I are hurriedly forming a tightly knit mini-mosh pit, clinging to each other as we prepare for the inevitable chaos slamming into us. As the chorus crashes with a heavy techno track still playing, we howl – “Psycho killer, qu’est-ce que c’est?” and bounce together, limbs entwined in ecstasy fueled by faux French lyrics and raw techno frenzy.
“I just want to say…” It’s 10.25pm. It’s very early. The club is still nearly empty. We’re nestled in a corner booth, allowing the music and casual conversation to invigorate us before the night truly unfolds. Tuxedomoon’s ‘In a Manner of Speaking’ gently reassures, “I just want to say, That I could never forget the way, You told me everything.”
Thanks to Twitch, I’ve made numerous wonderful friends on this dancefloor and significantly enhanced many existing relationships; we’ve lost our minds together, hanging on every beat of his groundbreaking DJ sets. The dancefloor WAS Optimo. Keith expressed to The Skinny: “Something we often get asked in interviews is, 'Where’s the best place to perform?'
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One half of the iconic Glaswegian DJ duo Optimo, Keith McIvor, sadly lost his life to a brain tumor on September 19, 2025. What comes next is a