You are currently browsing the monthly archive for December 2011.
It feels like it has been a particularly good year for live music in London – I saw a lot of shows, but missed just as many that I really wanted to see. A glance at the top 10 below shows, yep, as expected, a convincing Cafe Oto majority, with 6 of the top 10 places going to performances I saw in that most fertile of places. Judging by the shows they are already announcing, next year is likely to be just as good – I’ll see you there, in the front row.
1. Peter Brötzmann Tentet at Cafe Oto. Review
2. Eliane Radigue retrospective, various venues (photo by Alex Delfanne). Review
3. Joe McPhee and Decoy at Cafe Oto. Review
4. Ghédalia Tazartès at Cafe Oto. Review
5. Barn Owl at the Supersonic festival.Review
6. Entr’acte showcase at Cafe Oto. Review
7. Bill Orcutt at Cafe Oto. Review
8. Ryoji Ikeda at the Barbican. Review
9. Henry Grimes at Cafe Oto. Review of another recent Henry Grimes performance
10. Raster-Noton showcase at the Roundhouse. Review
My picks for this year were fed into The Liminal’s hydra-headed beast of a list, along with my commentary about the year end process. You can read all that over there. The world would clearly be a far poorer place though without my own list getting an airing in its own right though, so I’m publishing that below. The nature of my involvement with The Liminal means that, for the first time, like, ever, I haven’t actually reviewed all of my top 20, so some of the links are to reviews that someone else has written. The estimable Matt Poacher, most likely. Read the rest of this entry »
As 2012 is the 30th anniversary of their first release, I recently interviewed Jon Wozencroft and Mike Harding from Touch for the Liminal. We discussed a wide range of subjects, including their genesis, principles, key relationships, attitudes towards technology, and plans for Touch 30 events. The interview is split into three parts – Ritual, Contact and Vectors.
At a recent concert at London’s Vortex jazz club, Evan Parker described his co-performer for the evening, the trumpeter Peter Evans, as “a genius”, and as “the future”. Having heard him play several times now, including a dizzying solo set at 2010′s Freedom Of The City festival, I let the first description slide without question. The second was more intriguing. The future of what, precisely? The future of jazz? Improvisation? Noise? Sound? The trumpet? His live performances make notions of genre seem inadequate, while attempting to locate his approach on a temporal scale is equally problematic. His new record for the Dancing Wayang label, Beyond Civilised And Primitive, seems to revel in this. Read The rest of this post over at The Liminal.
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