Ralfe Band, The Borderline, 28/04/10

I was back at The Borderline last night to see Ralfe Band. A few weeks of heavy gig-going was beginning to take its toll so after work I headed back home for a quick 90 minute power-sleep, before returning to central London, feeling re-energised.

I made it to The Borderline in time to catch one of the support bands, Treetop Flyers, who were quite impressive with their rich, alt-country guitar sound, full of sun-kissed harmonies and strong melodies. They reminded me at times of the great Grand Drive.

I had enjoyed listening to the first two Ralfe Band albums over the days ahead of the show. I love their slightly wonky, off-kilter, folky music, with the occasional European flavourings and ramshackle quality. I had forgotten about their brilliant instrumentals also, full of elegant keyboard lines and unusual time signatures. I think they are the band that come closest to matching the music of the much-missed Gorky's Zygotic Mynci.

Tonight (amongst others) they played ‘Crow’, ‘1500 Years’, ‘Open Eye’, ‘Stumble’, ‘Attics’, ‘Ice Is On My Hands’ and finished with 'March Of The Pams'. They also played a few tracks from their soundtrack to ‘Bunny And The Bull’ (which I still haven’t got round to getting hold of yet).

Generally I thought they were pretty good although they seemed a little subdued in places and never appeared to really hit full stride. To be fair, the technical issues they experienced early in the set didn’t help, as did the fact that at times they seemed to be battling to make themselves heard against the sound of a large part of the audience talking whilst they played. Not good when their sound can sometimes be fairly quiet…

On a different subject, I am warming to the new Borderline. Maybe I was a little harsh in my earlier post….

Will Dutta, Max de Wardener & Plaid, Purcell Room, 24/04/10

I’m a little late in blogging about this but on Saturday I was at the Purcell Room at the Southbank Centre to see Will Dutta, Max de Wardener and Plaid play a show as part of the Ether Festival (my 6th concert of a very good festival). Multimedia had played quite a big role over the course of the two weeks and it did so tonight also, on this occasion Quayola providing the visual projections.

The show featured various collaborations between Dutta (piano) and de Wardener & Plaid (live electronics). The collaboration between Dutta & Plaid that closed the show was the most successful, Messiaen-like piano allied to glistening electronic chords and beats. During the collaborations various strands of colour flowed horizontally across a black screen, changing form and mutating in response to the music, eventually morphing into geometric shapes.

In between these pieces, Will Dutta also performed a series of solo piano compositions by John Adams, Olivier Messiaen and Erik Satie. The pieces by Satie were characteristically contemplative, the Messiaen typically colourful. Although undoubtedly beautiful (and played very impressively from memory by Dutta) they seemed to stand separately from the collaborations, making for a slightly fragmented, stop-start show. In the programme notes Will Dutta spoke about connecting the different genres of classical, electronic and dance music but tonights' show seemed to showcase these individually as opposed to a cohesive set. Even the visuals felt strangely separated and distant.

The evening also featured a screening of ‘Strata #3’, a collaboration between Plaid & Quayola. Visually, it was quite an interesting piece. Three-dimensional triangular shapes float inside an art gallery and then begin to interact with a painting. Gradually the shapes became part of the painting, slowly altering it before it is finally totally represented as a digital three-dimensional landscape. Plaid’s contribution was a lush, ambient electronic soundtrack.

Will Dutta came back on stage to play a sublime version of ‘Avril 14th’ by Aphex Twin as an encore.

To Rococo Rot, Gudrun Gut & Antye Greie (AGF), Vladislav Delay, Thomas Fehlmann, Queen Elizabeth Hall, Ether Festival, 23/04/10

Another day, another visit to the Queen Elizabeth Hall to see another gig as part of the Ether Festival.

This time it was an evening of contemporary German leftfield, experimental electronica, entitled 'Berlin Sounds'.

Before however, inventive modern post-jazz quintet Polar Bear played a free show in the Front Room to a large crowd. They showcased a selection from their new album 'Peepers', featuring some irregular, patterned drumming from Seb Roachford alongside powerful, broad saxophone lines from Pete Wareham. I always find them engaging whether live or on record, and they were on fine form on Friday with their headstong, loosely structured flurries of noise.

Vladislav Delay was on stage first. His set began with synthesised pulses of sound which were gradually overlaid with cut-up, jagged shards of splintered noise. It was these that increasingly rose to prominence, becoming more twisted and hard-edged. A drifting auditory skyline was present in the background throughout. By the end of his 30 minute set the disparate sounds had integrated into a cohesive body. A part-ambient, part-glitch, part-crackling static soundscape.

Female duo Gudrun Gut and Antye Greie (AGF) took to the stage next, immediately launching into a piece called 'Baustelle' (which translates as 'Construction Site'). It is dark, noisy and industrial - replicating the sounds found on a construction site while a film is projected on to the screen at the back of the stage. Their laptops and other electronic devices are placed on a desk at the front of the stage which is wrapped with plastic security tape which extends to the adjacent step ladders. The film itself ranges from esoteric, blurry shapes to images from construction sites and the associated materials, machinery etc. At one point the film shows ghostly black and white images of human figures chainsawing trees. 

Sharp blasts of white noise are deployed alongside electronically simulated drilling sounds to create deep sonic excavations. It all ends in a tremendous climax of crunching beats and techno rhythms. Half way through they wear construction site hard hats as if to protect themselves from sustaining injury from the surrounding mechancial noise and a part-whispered, part-spoken, part-sung vocal narrative surfaces, AGF singing lines such as "You bring the water, I make the mortar" and "You give me stone, I give you sand". An excellent show.

All desks and construction site paraphernalia are cleared from the stage for the second half which features German trio To Rococo Rot playing tracks from their new album 'Speculation'. After seeing two acts appear earlier using exclusively laptops & electronic equipment to produce their music it does take a little time to adjust to the sight of To Rococo Rot who line up in a more traditional style with live drums, bass and keyboards/synthesisers. They start with a series of discreet, bass-led workouts helped along by some tight, motorik drumming. It is all executed in a clinical, slightly cold, dispassionate fashion and after a while I thought it came close to being a little one-paced.

Faust member Hans Joachim Irmler is introduced on stage and he takes up a position behind what looks to be a small bank of keyboards/synthesisers. Whatever it is, he has an immediate impact, introducing harsher, more abrasive sounds to the show, totally altering the dynamic away from the bass grooves and punching holes through the dense fog of sound that we had previously. Irmler conjures squalls of electronic noise which invigorate the performance and results in a much improved, stronger second half to the show.

After leaving the QEH auditorium I spent some time back in the Front Room listening Thomas Fehlmann lay down some textured soothing minimlaist techno.

After crossing the Thames I noticed the London Eye lit up for St. George's Day...

'River Sounding', Bill Fontana, Somerset House

A new sound installation by artist Bill Fontana opened at Somerset House last week. It is called ‘River Sounding’ and is the culmination of Fontana painstakingly collecting sounds and images along the entire length of the river Thames. Somerset House’s long relationship with the river Thames makes this an ideal setting for the installation and it all takes place down in the lower levels below the courtyard, usually not open to the public.

Sounds are played via speakers and images are projected onto walls of adjoining rooms. It is a great chance to explore the underground lightwells of Somerset House. I later learned that these small rooms leading off from the lightwells (that currently house the visuals) were originally used to store coal. The lightwells were created to allow natural light to reach the rooms of the lower levels. The centrally located Dead House contains the most atmospheric part of the installation, quiet, darker with water dripping from overhead pipework.

The sounds range from bubbling, rushing water to bassy rumbles and low, hissing hums. Occasionally a bell chimes. A layer of extraneous surface noise sits on top of everything else. A free-flowing, aquatic soundtrack to accompany a visit to one of London's most beautiful buildings.

Broadcast & Oliver Coates/Anna Meredith, Ether Festival, Queen Elizabeth Hall, 21/04/10

I was back at the Queen Elizabeth Hall last night for another concert in what is proving to be an excellent Ether Festival. Broadcast played a rare comeback gig of sorts, with support from Oliver Coates & Anna Meredith. Micachu & The Shapes weren’t able to make it due to the ongoing flight disruption caused by the Icelandic volcano ash cloud.

Oliver Coates (cello/laptop) & Anna Meredith (laptop) opened up, beginning with some still, solo cello (in some ways not dissimilar to Danny Norbury, who I saw at Union Chapel earlier in the month). Roughly textured, processed laptop soundscapes soon took over, sounding close to a scaled down Murcof or possibly Hecq (in his modern classical guise). As their set progressed, the two bodies of sound slowly merged to form an excellent amalgam of minimalist modern classical and ambient experimental electronica.

I have loved Broadcast since first getting to know them courtesy of John Peel in the mid 1990s. My first experience of seeing them play live was at the Sheffield Leadmill in 1996, supporting Gorky’s Zygotic Mynci. I then saw them play a few gigs around 2000 when I first moved to London, and last saw them supporting Yo La Tengo at Shepherd’s Bush Empire around 2005. Since then they have been relatively quiet so I was looking forward to seeing them, intrigued by what kind of set they would play. Tonight they played in their new, reduced line up of Trish Keenan and James Cargill.

They started with a 20 minute long echoing, reverberating wall of diffuse, distorted sound, played on a modest selection of analogue synths and various electronic devices. It was a lot closer to the music of their recent collaboration with the Focus Group rather than their earlier albums. Hazy distortion replaced the refracted, motorik grooves of their recorded music and conventional percussion was relatively absent from their sound. Brilliantly psychedelic ‘audio visual modules’ flickered across the large screen at the back of the stage.

The first hint we get of a recognisable track is ‘What I Saw’, its almost-childlike melodies swamped in a pleasing sea of echoes and distortion. Trish Keenan’s vocals sounded as pristine as ever, slightly detached to begin with but as the set moves slowly in the direction of their more song-based tracks the internally illuminated, soft edges returned to the fore. Other tracks performed were ‘Black Cat’, ‘Lunch Hour Pops’, ‘Corporeal’ and ‘The Be Colony’. Nothing was played from ‘The Noise Made By People’ (the fact that I did not really pick up on this until after leaving the venue was a sign of how excellent the gig was).

Occasionally, synthesised chord sequences recall old library music or possibly some of the current acts on Ghost Box Records – The Advisory Circle and Belbury Poly being two points of reference. In a way I guess you could almost say that Broadcast were a ‘Ghost Box’ band years before the label came into existence, predating the whole ‘hauntology’ movement by some distance. I find the term ‘retro’ not an altogether helpful word to use when talking about Broadcast. Sure, there is an element to their sound that could be labelled as ‘retro’ (specifically the fleeting glimpses of psychedelia that bring to mind The Velvet Underground or early Pink Floyd) but it is all presented in such a luminous, forward-thinking, futuristic manner to almost render the association redundant.

Sometimes I go to gigs and see bands stick to familiar, safe territory but tonight Broadcast were the exact opposite, trailblazing an ambitious, exciting, unmapped terrain. It’s great to have them back.

National Youth Orchestra, Varèse 360 (3), Ether Festival, Royal Festival Hall, 18/04/10

After leaving the QEH I quickly headed over to the RFH to see the National Youth Orchestra play the final concert of the Varèse concert. Apparently it was the NYO’s largest ever orchestra – 170 members on stage, including 19 percussionists. It took them almost 10 minutes to all get on stage. The concert featured Varese’s two large scale orchestral pieces ‘Arcana’ and ‘Amériques ’.

They began with ‘Tuning Up’ a piece based on the usual sound of an orchestra tuning up, only magnified and embellished and recast as a mass of orchestral sound. They played without a conductor and during changed seats, exchanged instruments and swapped scores. I guess it was their attempt at imposing their youthful high spirits on the concert. Very much Varèse packed into five minutes.

‘Arcana’ is one of my favourite Varèse pieces and sounded charcateristically turbulent tonight. James Murphy in the programme notes made some excellent comments on the piece’s cinematic qualities. Performed under glowing red lights it sounded fiery and incendiary. In the pre-concert talk Malcolm MacDonald referred to how Varèse talked about his music being like “beams of sound”, an apt description for this piece.

‘Nocturnal’ opened the second half and sounded like something out of a grainy, black and white horror movie. A choir growls about “belonging to the night” and “shadows of death” whilst a soprano shrieks about crucifixion. Quite noir-ish and very different to his other pieces.

The original, unedited version of ‘Amériques’ followed. I had seen the LSO perform a slightly different version at the Barbican in 2008. Inspired by Varèse’s relocation to New York at the start of the twentieth century, it can almost be seen as a vast, sonic portrait of the city, with all the associated minutiae. An urban feel permeates the piece, with skyscraping orchestral moments and neon-lit, raucous harmonies rising to prominence throughout. More brilliant playing from the NYO.

The NYO came back on stage to play ‘Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune’ by Debussy, a piece that inspired Varèse to become a composer.

London Sinfonietta, Varèse 360 (2), Ether Festival, Queen Elizabeth Hall, 18/04/10

I was back at the Southbank Centre on Sunday afternoon for the final 2 concerts in the Varèse 360 series. The London Sinfonietta performed a selection of his shorter pieces in the Queen Elizabeth Hall. Earlier in the afternoon I went along to a fascinating pre-concert discussion on Varèse. 

The concert was quite similar to the first show on Friday, all pieces being quite brief and consisting of primal, compacted rushes of sound. In particular ‘Hyperprism’ and ‘Octandre’ both fell into this category, perfectly condensed sonic excursions. ‘Un Grand Sommeil Noir’ and ‘Offrandes’ featured a female vocalist.

‘Poème électronique’ was played into the QEH through speakers as the orchestra retired from the stage. As the stage was left in darkness a selection of abstract visual imagery was projected on to the three rectangular screens. I have since read some mixed reports but I thought it allowed you to focus on listening to the music and was pretty non-intrusive. The images of scientific drawings and mathematical formulae seemed to emphasise the precision with which Varèse constructed his music. It was the first purely electronic piece of the weekend and sounded esoteric and exciting, even now sounding quite futuristic and otherworldly. God knows what people thought when they first heard it in the 1950s.

‘Intégrales’, one of his best pieces I think, closed the concert. It felt like one of his most ‘complete’ compositions, full of clashing percussion and hectic, dissonant brass. Although performed entirely on instruments it did almost sound electronic and digital in places and can possibly be seen as a precursor to modern electroacoustic music. A good example of what Malcolm MacDonald during the pre-concert talk had called Varèse's "gloriously scolding music". The concert may have only been just over 45 minutes in length but you got the impression that the music played really was pushing the orchestra to its limits.

The full programme was:

Hyperprism

Un Grand Sommeil Noir

Octandre

Offrandes

Poème électronique

Intégrales

London Philharmonic Orchestra, Turnage/Glass/Gorecki, Royal Festival Hall, 17/04/10

Sandwiched in between two nights featuring the music of Edgard Varese was a concert at the Royal Festival Hall by the London Philharmonic Orchestra. The programme featured the UK premiere of 'Texan Tenebrae' by Mark-Anthony Turnage, the European premiere of 'Violin Concerto 2 - The American Four Seasons' by Philip Glass and 'Symphony No. 3 - Symphony Of Sorrowful Songs' by Henryk Gorecki. The concert was part of the excellent current Ether Festival.

Turnage's short piece was inspired by the opera he is currently writing and was a punchy composition, featuring moments of percussive punctuation and a subtle, jazz underscoring courtesy of the inclusion of two saxophones within the ranks of the large orchestra.

I thought Glass' 'Violin Concerto 2' began in restrained style, sounding quite moderate (possibly due in part to the exclusively string-based, smaller orchestra that the piece was played by). During the pre-concert talk conductor Marin Alsop mentioned how the piece referenced certain Baroque music, and whilst not really being sufficiently knowledgeable to comment fully I could see what she was alluding to. Signature Glass threads of repetition slowly revealed themselves. Each movement opened with a shorter 'prelude' of solo violin from long time Glass associate Robert McDuffie which gave the concerto a slightly unusual feel. The thrid and fourth movements saw the pace quicken with weaving violin lines and some ascending, accelerating orchestral passages. Very Philip Glass. The piece ended with a virtuosic violin sign-off. In the concert programme Glass explained how the four movements were not assigned a particular season, it being left up to the listener to interpret them in their own way. It is almost an impossible task but my very loosely-based interpretation would be that it went Autumn-Winter-Spring-Summer. The apparent coldness and relative serenity of the second movement evoked a wintery landscape, whereas the last two movements seemed to contain more in the way of musical regeneration and warmth.

Tonight's concert was supposed to have ended with the premiere of Gorecki's 'Symphony No. 4' but due to ill health he was unable to finish it. Slightly worryingly, during the pre-concert talk Marin Alsop revealed she didn't think it would ever be completed. That would be an enormous shame if true. To see which direction Gorecki would go next in his symphonic writing would be fascinating. His 'Symphony No. 3 - Symphony Of Sorrowful Songs instead closed tonight's concert. It was dedicated to the victims of the recent Polish aeroplane crash. During the pre-concert talk Marin Alsop also revealed that soprano Joanna Wos had travelled from Poland to London by car (over a twenty hour journey) due to the ongoing disruption of flights due to the Icelandic volcano ash cloud.

The symphony is generally considered to be one of the most moving pieces of music, especially given its historical and social context. It might not be a symphony in the traditional sense but it certainly is symphonic in scale and magnitude.

There is not much to say that hasn't already been said before - it is a slow-building, mournful, elegiac, spiritual piece full of soaring orchestral waves and minimalist purity. As the piece progresses it seems to get enveloped in a sense of the eternal. Lyrically it is dark and quite upsetting. The programme notes referred to how it could be seen as three responses by females to death, and I have also heard it being called a meditation on separation (the first and third movements coming from the perspective of a mother separated from her child, whereas the second movement is the prayer from a yound girl, separated from the world). If you want to read a more detailed explanation of the piece you can find it here. Tonight it sounded profoundly beautiful and overpoweringly sad, the vocals from soprano Joanna Wos being particularly moving and poignant (despite the endless coughing from members of the audience during the piece - why can't people control this?)

After leaving the hall I moved downstairs to the Clore Ballroom to see Piano Circus play a fantastic post-concert show of layered, intertwining, cyclical keyboard pieces. The six keyboards were arranged in a circle on the ballroom floor and they played 'Log, Line & Loud' by Graham Fitkin and '6 Pianos' by Steve Reich (and possibly other pieces). Their sound had shades of minimalism but was also quite aminamed and compelling, and reminded me of the great Penguin Cafe Orchestra in places.

London Sinfonietta, Varèse 360 (1), Ether Festival, Queen Elizabeth Hall

The opportunity to totally immerse yourself in one of the excellent festivals organised by the South Bank Centre is an experience I always find very rewarding and satisfying (most recently the case with the year long festival to celebrate the centenary of Olivier Messiaen). Therefore, I greeted the beginning of the Ether Festival this week with a high level of anticipation.

As part of this year's festival the complete works of pioneering composer Edgard Varèse was to be performed over the course of a weekend. I was at the QEH on Friday to catch the first of the three planned concerts. 

The excellent London Sinfonietta were performing and they opened up with 'Ionisation', a succinct, heterogenous piece of percussion which sounded almost mechanical in timbre. Some of Varèse's trademark siren wails provided an extra dimension. The scientific inferences of the title reflect the precise, ambitious sound of the piece and the notes in the programme talked of the "pounding industrial soundscapes". It was an accurate description, although this suggested a contemporary sound, whereas I thought they seemed to be soundscapes from an unplacable, distant era. 

The abbreviated, insistent solo flute of 'Density 21.5' soon followed. The organised bursts of sound of 'Dance For Burgess' was performed next and displayed yet more in the way enjoyable, refreshing brevity (a theme that would reappear throughout the concert). 'Ecuatorial' was the final piece played before the interval, and proved a complex, striking assembling of brass, percussion, piano and vocals. A brilliant, condensed orchestral horizon.

'Étude pour Espace' opened the second half and was a vast and varied collage of aggregated choral and orchestral sounds. 'Déserts' closed the concert and was by some distance the longest piece of the evening. It presented itself as a series of deconstructed, miniature sound-worlds where intricate orchestral episodes were brilliantly aligned alongside stark, distorted electronic tape reels (the first piece tonight to explicitly feature his experimentation with early electronic music). Abstract visual imagery was simultaneously projected on to three large rectangular screens on the QEH stage and walls. The video began with what appeared to be dark, mysterious sub-tidal motions. These were gradually replaced by images suggesting vapour-trailed skylines, finally ending with still, blurred quasi-alien landscapes. Very atmospheric. 

The music was unashamedly cerebral but never cold and seemed to show Varèse to be more accessible than some of his twentieth century contemporaries such as Xenakis, Stockhausen etc. 

An excellent start to the series.

Arshile Gorky Retrospective, Tate Modern

After seeing the Michael Rakowitz exhibition I headed upstairs to catch the current Arshile Gorky retrospective. I thought Time Out magazine gave the show a slightly unfair lukewarm review.

The early rooms of the exhibition were fairly undemanding, concentrating mainly on his colourful, occasionally unchallenging oil paintings. Some fairly conventional family portraits followed. It was not until the abstract landscape paintings that appeared in room 8 that we saw the first signs of his distinctive, watery, fluid style which was to dominate his later works. Most are quite minimal in content and in places have an unpolished quality. A mild element of surrealism also can be detected in some of the paintings.

The later rooms were the highlight for me personally (as is quite often the case with these big shows). ‘Waterfall’, with its watery merging of shapes and colours stood out. This seemed to be the best example where his surrealism and abstraction were successfully assimilated. 

I especially enjoyed two of his paintings of 1944, ‘How My Mother’s Embroidered Apron Unfolds In My Life’ and ‘One Year The Milkweed’. Both possessed more in the way of enjoyably busy, vivid abstraction. However, I thought these (and most of his later works) do also seem to display a heightened sense of subtlety and finesse, which is especially evident in ‘Apple Orchard’ and the ‘Bethrothal’ series of the final room. I also liked the fine, black delineations that seem to enliven a lot of his paintings of this period.

"The worst condition is to pass under a sword which is not one's own", Michael Rakowitz, Tate Modern

Last weekend I headed down to Tate Modern to catch a couple of their current exhibitions. The first exhibition I went to was “The worst condition is to pass under a sword which is not one's own” by Michael Rakowitz and very entertaining it was too.

The opening text remarked upon how he was “interested in exploring how powerful contemporary mythologies derived from popular culture have informed the collective unconscious”.

The exhibition largely consists of a series of drawings which cover recent Iraqi history whilst also containing references to Star Wars. Apparently Saddam and his sons were big fans (really!). As well as the cartoon style drawings, we get to see examples of the helmets worn by the Iraqi Fedayeen which do bear a passing resemblance to the helmet sported by Darth Vader (apparently US troops commented on how surreal this was…)

The artist also recreates the ‘Hands Of Victory’ monument of Baghdad, this time using lightsabres and Darth Vader helmets (as opposed to the slightly-less-fun alternatives of swords and helmets of dead Iranian soldiers used in Baghdad). A TV in the corner of the room plays footage of Iraqi military parades to the Imperial March music from Star Wars. In the final room we are invited to look through a telescope, at the end of which is an image of the moon which appears to feature Saddam’s face within the terrain (as it was claimed happened after his death in 2003).

In a parallel theme, the exhibition also featured some drawings on the World Wrestling Federation (and the character Sgt. Slaughter in particular) and how its storylines during the 1990s made reference to and reflected the ongoing political situation between American and Iraq.

Quite an enjoyable, revealing and funny exhibition.

Vashti Bunyan, David Kitt & Danny Norbury, Union Chapel, 11/04/10

I have been going to Union Chapel quite a lot lately for the free Daylight Music events organised by the Arctic Circle but evening concerts hosted there really are something else. The dark, discreetly lit Victorian chapel with its beautiful stained glass and gothic arches make for quite a special venue. I experience an undimmed sense of wonder each time I visit. I was there on Sunday evening to see Vashti Bunyan, with support from David Kitt and Danny Norbury.

Danny Norbury opened with an instrumental set of nice solo cello with piano accompaniment from English folk singer Nancy Elizabeth. Later, he uses a laptop to loop the cello to create a layered sound which suggests it to be the sonic equivalent of a fresh, crisp, rural spring morning. I found his music both expressive and involving and within it could detect hints of modern classical luminaries such as Max Richter and Johann Johannsson.

David Kitt played next with a little help from two members of The Magic Numbers. I remember seeing him play a slightly confusing set of heavy, looped electric guitar at 93 Feet East a few years ago but tonight he was back to his usual acoustic-singer-songwriter mode. His soft Irish accent lends songs such as ‘Step Outside In The Morning Light’ a real warmth. He also played a brilliant, quite sensitive, version of ‘Teardrops’ by Womack & Womack. By choosing to re-interpret a song from a different musical genre he shone light on the lyrics to reveal a previously unnoticed meaning and depth. Quite similar to when Tindersticks covered ‘If You’re Looking For A Way Out’ by Odyssey. He closed his set with ‘No Truth In Your Eyes’.

Over recent years I have got to know and love Vashti Bunyan’s music (after having first heard her music on Stuart Maconie’s wonderful Freak Zone show on BBC 6 Music). Tonight she is backed by three young musicians, who amongst them, play acoustic guitar, violin, piano, glockenspiel & flute. Vashti Bunyan plays acoustic guitar all evening. What becomes immediately evident is that she sounds live exactly like she does on record. Her voice is fragile and brittle, the musical arrangements gentle and pastoral. The whole show had an endearing sense of innocence to it and benefitted from the Union Chapel’s intimacy.

She introduces each song and says a little about it, at the same time alluding to certain periods and events of her life. Her lyrical themes of nature, weather, children, love and life appear throughout the set. She plays ‘Rainbow River’ alongside a recorder quartet as a tribute to arranger Robert Kirby who died last year. She divides the set between her three albums and also includes a couple of new songs yet to be recorded.

At one point she seems slightly taken aback by the exuberant cry of “thank you” from an audience member but on the whole seemed to be enjoying the show. While still not a person who appears naturally comfortable on stage she looks like a performer who has successfully overcome any previous nerves or shyness.

For me, the highlight of a brilliant show was the song ‘Wayward’, the last song before the encore. The lyrics and her explanation of what the song was about (being left at home to look after children while her partner is out experiencing life) reveal a sadness that I had never really picked up on before. The line about “wanting to be the one with road dust on my boots” is particularly poignant and the song sounds just beautiful.

I would have loved to have heard ‘Trawlerman’s Song’ (my favourite Vashti song) but it wasn’t to be.

A very special concert. Well done to the Arctic Circle for organising it all!

Vashti Bunyan Set List

Hidden

Diamond Day

Here Before

Train Song

Winter Is Blue

Lately

If In Winter

Against The Sky

Rainbow River

Rose Hip November

Across The Water

Glow Worms

Wishwanderer
I’d Like To Walk Around In Your Mind

Wayward

----

Here
Come Wind Come Rain

Ennio Morricone, Royal Albert Hall, 10/04/10

I had kind of hesitated when I had initially saw the prices for Ennio Morricone's concert at the Royal Albert Hall but ultimately getting a ticket was to prove extremely worthwhile. The concert saw Morricone conduct the 100 piece Roma Sinfonietta Orchestra and the 100 piece Crouch End Festival Choir play a career-spanning selection of his classic film soundtracks. Earlier on in the day, I had spent an enjoyable afternoon at the nearby V & A and Brompton Oratory before heading over to the Royal Albert Hall.

The evening began with a 30 minute film - "A Life In Music'. It was a good way to open the concert, giving a brief overview of Morricone's music, beliefs, the way he works etc and offered a nice glimpse of what was to follow musically (as well as allowing late comers to arrive without major disturbance). I liked the newspaper headline was flashed across the screen, dubbing Morricone "the Mozart of film music". Quite true, I think.

'Icaro Secondo' opened the programme, allowing the orchestra to find their way. The section entitled 'Scattered Sheets' followed, pulling together individual pieces from different films. An early highlight was my personal favourite 'Metti Una Sera A Cena'  a  dreamy piece of music that has a light, almost bossa nova / 'tropicalia' kind of feel. Tonight it sounded beautiful, albeit without the fluttering, sun-kissed vocals of the recorded version. It is a piece of music which sometimes I feel I would be quite happy to listen to on loop for the rest of my life.

The next segment was entitled 'The Modernity Of Myth In Sergio Leone's Cinema' and showcased  his most well-known music from those timeless Western films. The evocative titles from 'The Good, The Bad &  The Ugly' was played first and listening to it live I realised just how brilliantly unusual and idiosyncratic the music is, despite its familiarity. The music from 'Once Upon A Time In The West' came next and for me, was the emotional heart of the set. Soprano Susanna Rigacci's beyond-beautiful vocals orbit around the hall. It is profoundly moving and I'm sure I wasn't the only person in tears. 'The Ecstacy Of Gold' from 'The Good, The Bad & The Ugly' closed this part of the set. At the start of the concert, Sir Christopher Frayling had introduced Morricone on stage and mentioned how he had chosen 'The Ecstacy Of Gold' as his choice on 'Desert Island Discs' for the one piece of music he would take with him. It is not hard to see why, it kind of operates on a different level to most other music and tonight sounded just amazing.

So, a great first half but I did wonder if it was a fraction quiet? Admittedly, I was sitting in the very back row in the Circle which could explain this. However, thankfully, the sound of the second half seemed to project better around the hall.

A section called 'Tre Adagi' opened 'Act 2' (as it was referred to in the programme), collecting together three adagios from his soundtracks. His music for the TV series 'Nostromo' followed, Susanna Rigacci coming back on stage to provide more in the way of exemplary, heavenly vocals. Next, two pieces were played in the section entitled 'Tribute To Mauro Bolognini'. It was the first time I had heard them but I thought they had a real orchestral eloquence.

A selection from Morricone's music for the film 'The Mission' closed the programme, 'Gabriel's Oboe' sounded particularly poignant and 'On Earth As It Is In Heaven' saw the choir truly soaring for the first time.

Morricone left the stage but was soon back on to conduct the orchestra/choir to play the music from 'Cinema Paradiso' as an un-programmed encore. The concert finished with three additional reprises of 'Once Upon A Time In The West', 'The Ecstacy Of Gold' & 'On Earth As It Is In Heaven'.

Awe-inspiring.

The full programme of music played can be seen here.

Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Cadogan Hall, 09/04/10

Despite living in London for over 10 years there are still some venues/galleries that I haven't been to. Over recent months I have been trying to put that right. 

Cadogan Hall in Sloane Square was one of those venues but tonight I visited it for the first time, and what a beautiful concert hall it is. Light, welcoming and intimate with faultless sightlines and exceptional acoustics. I loved the curves of the balcony. The capacity seemed a lot smaller than the official figure of 900.

Tonight the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra played three pieces by Russian composer Dmitri Shostakovich. The first piece played was his 'Festive Overture'. This was the first time I was hearing the piece and it was typical Shostakovich - bold, pure and dynamic. The next two pieces were two of my favourite Shostakovich compositions - his 'Piano Concerto No. 2 in F major' (written in 1957) and his 'Symphony No. 5 in D minor' (written in 1937). 

I think the 'Piano Concerto No. 2 in F major' is a piece of succinct perfection, with the second movement being almost insurpassable in its sheer beauty. 

The powerful, all-encompassing drama of Shostakovich's 'Symphony No. 5 in D minor 'closed the performance. This seems to be a recurring characteristic of many Fifth symphonies. A lot of them seem to contain music of epic scale and grand ambition. Whilst listening in the hall I thought of Beethoven, Sibelius, Vaughan Williams, Bruckner, Mahler & Nielsen.

An evening of absorbing, hugely enjoyable music from the RPO.

Port O'Brien & Laura Gibson, The Borderline, 06/04/10

When I heard last year that the Borderline was going to close for a couple of months for refurbishment I wasn’t particularly worried. I imagined it would maybe involve some replastering, a few new coats of paint and maybe a little tidying up here and there. I went along to the new, refurbished venue for the first time on Tuesday to see Port O’Brien and Laura Gibson. As I approached I began to feel quite nervous over the changes I was about to see….

Things got off to a good start as I entered and saw that the photographs of bands to have previously played the venue remained on the walls of the main entrance. So far, so good. Then, heading towards the stairs I noticed the framed lists of bands to have played the venue had gone, replaced by a series of empty frames (presumably which will eventually house more photographs). Disappointing I thought, but continued to move downstairs cautiously into the venue. On first glance there didn’t seem to have been a lot of changes. The layout generally remained the same. Then I noticed a second bar, directly opposite the main bar. Quite a good, sensible addition. Then, I slowly noticed the changes in décor and other alterations made since my last visit. I paused to take it all in….overcome with a wave of mixed feelings.

There is now a red curtain around the back of the stage (which kind of makes it look a little similar to the Luminaire in Kilburn and totally obscures the classic Borderline logo that used to be visible in the background as bands played). There is a cash machine (!) next to the main bar. Comfortable seating appears to have been installed in the back area. The main bar has new contemporary wooden décor. The little seating gallery to the left of the stage has been kept and redecorated. The toilets have been upgraded (although still ridiculously small). A new flat screen TV has replaced the outdated, old box top that used to relay bands to the bar-dwellers. It now looks more like a Soho music venue as opposed to previously when it looked like an individually unique, small bar from the dusty, American mid-west that had been miraculously transported across the ocean to central London.

I can understand why the owners felt the need to modernise but I couldn’t help feeling a little sadness as I sat on the steps in front of the stage before the gig started. The old Borderline had a certain ramshackle charm that simply didn’t exist anywhere else on the London gig scene. The Borderline may have gained a more modern, cleaner look but I think in doing so it has unfortunately lost a tiny bit of its character. And that’s a huge shame. I liked the old venue with its air of slight dilapidation and preponderance of natural, wooden décor.

Anyway, pleasingly, the layout remains unaltered which is the most important aspect. It still overwhelmingly remains a great, intimate place to watch bands and the atmosphere on Tuesday was as good as I’ve experienced in the decade I have been going. Possibly the most important result of the refurbishment is the improved sound. The rattling, vibrating pipework that used to echo out from the ceiling has been fixed and no longer interferes.

Ok, enough about the venue. Now on to the gig….

Portland, Oregon songstress Laura Gibson was first up with her clever, prettified acoustic-country-folk songs. Tonight she performs on stage wearing a red dress, the epitome of classic feminine country chic. She gets us to help out on an “experimental” a capella song. Her sweetly American-accented vocals occasionally recall Laura Cantrell (maybe if she had been reared on American folk songs instead of country songs). She closes her set with the rolling, rippling 'Spirited' from her latest album ‘Beasts Of Seasons’.

California's Port O’Brien soon come on stage next – this evening as a four-piece band featuring two new members (drummer and guitarist) after the previous duo were unable to make the European tour (which singer Van Pierszalowski appears less than thrilled about). Their melding of dynamic American-guitar-power-pop with weather-beaten alt-country sounds and brilliantly rough-around-the-edges rock thrills the capacity crowd tonight. They play old favourites 'Stuck On A Boat', 'Close The Lid' and 'Fisherman’s Son'. Later in the set during the slower tracks, they almost sound like a ragged Neil Young, especially on ‘Sour Milk/Salt Water’. They play current album favourite ‘My Will Is Good’. They close their main set with a rambunctious, sing-along version of ‘I Woke Up Today’. They then come back on to play ‘The Rooftop Song’ as requested by an audience member. This, despite the guitarist not knowing it (a brief description of the chords and structure of the song by front man Pierszalowski to the new guitarist Nico is all that is needed). Quite impressive.

The animated Pierszalowski continuously darts back and forth across the stage for most of the evening, and appears to be loving the show. Towards the end of the set he successfully attempts to climb on top of the drum kit (as the drummer continues to play). As an act I always find it to be quite an enjoyable spectacle (last witnessed by Warren Ellis of The Dirty Three).

A very enjoyable gig and proof, if any was needed, that the Borderline will continue to be the scene of many a great gig to come.

'Repulsion' at the BFI Southbank Mediatheque

I spent a couple of enjoyable hours at the BFI Southbank Mediatheque yesterday. 

Where else can you access a huge catalogue of interesting / obscure / classic / cult films on your own personal screen with headphones for free?

I decided to watch Roman Polanski's pyschological thriller 'Repulsion', starring Catherine Deneuve as a Belgian girl living in 1960s South Kensington ,who over the course of the film suffers some sort of horrible mental collapse and gradually descends into a state of mental paranoia/psychosis with slightly horrifying results.

It was very dark, very sinister and quite scary. Similar in style and content to 'Rosemary's Baby'. Highly recommended. Go see it!

A Single Man, The Prince Charles Cinema, 03/04/10

I was at the PCC earlier to see 'A Single Man' the recently released debut film by Tom Ford. The story focuses on the slow, almost methodical emotional breakdown of a gay English teacher based in 1960s Los Angeles.

From the outset it proved a very measured, artfully shot film containing some great period detailing. It was one of those movies where not a great deal actually happens but what does is very beautifully presented. The story unfolded at an unhurried pace, with frequent use of lingering close ups. As widely reported, Colin Firth was very good. Although not as successful or enjoyable a film, the restraint of the plot and it's key characters on occasion reminded me of 'Lost In Translation'.

Despite the sadness of the story however I found it emotionally slightly unengaging. For me it was definitely more of a film to admire and appreciate rather than form a direct connection with.

Daylight Music, Union Chapel, 03/04/10

I was at the Union Chapel earlier today to see another Daylight Music session, this time featuring artists selected by Manchester label Little Red Rabbit.

First up was five piece Samson & Delilah with their undeviating, pastoral-tinged, contemporary English folk comprising flute, accordion, double bass, guitar and percussion. Second was Kalbakken with their yearning Norwegian folk songs. 

Most impressive however were Last Harbour whose set of dark, shadowy atmospherics coupled with gloriously sombre vocal articulations and emotive strings recalled Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds, or possibly even Tindersticks, if they had eschewed their later soulful excursions in favour of a more forbidding path.