Beneath a large dome in a square room – the former home of the Limelight Club in Shaftesbury Avenue – this was a highly intimate show. Performed in the round in the centre of the audience, the quartet facing each other close across the floor – the degree of musical and visual communication between the musicians was remarkable. It was an unusual set up, but the band appeared to thrive on it: they seemed to relish the music, and express joy in their playing together.
Long-time collaborators Ant Law and Alex Hitchcock on guitar and tenor sax respectively were joined for this outing of the music from their recent record Same Moon In The Same World by bassist Misha Mullov-Abbado and Franco-Brazilian drummer Ananda Brandão. The latter was a new name for me but she proved a highly sensitive percussionist with an ability to propel things along when necessary. Mullov-Abbado is a forceful, energetic presence, but adept to the more delicate nuances in the music. The responsiveness of all four musicians to each other, and the twists and turns in the music, meant that they really felt like a single entity.
The intimate feel was aided by Hitchcock and Brandão playing acoustically; without the intervention of sophisticated mixing, the sound was balanced perfectly, at least where I was sitting.
Across a single set, with few introductions to the pieces from Law and Hitchcock, the music morphed from one tune to another. It it developed organically as they shifted from one theme to another. The music moved from quiet sparseness through abstraction to forceful insistence with a natural fluidity.
The focus was naturally enough on Hitchcock and Law, both of whom played some great solos. Law let rip a few times, wringing lines from feedback. Mullov-Abbado and Brandão contributed some stand out moments, too, the bassist playing a couple of extended, pulsating solos. This was an evening of exciting, accessible and very enjoyable music.
