‘In his own quiet and quite idiosyncratic way, Ludovico will be the Einaudi to live on in our hearts and minds, although most pertinently in our ears for that longer while yet and I think mine are still ringing slightly from the blissful rapture which greets tonight’s climax. It’s one traditionally reserved for rock shows, though rarely do even they pertain to such resonant, and with that revitalising an aesthetic as that of this evening. Bravo, Ludovico. Bravo.’
Dots & Dashes review the second of seven 2013 Barbican Centre dates from modern-day master, Ludovico Einaudi.
‘The so-called tree-huggers’ opting to depict the things coated in verdant green leafage is perhaps demonstrative of the regenerated optimism innately located within Fade, and they’re at their virescent best when songs from said album are wafted up and over the rolling tiers of the Barbican Hall. Though as each wears on, as with each and every year some more autumnal hues befall the room and as such, there’s a naturalisation as well as a neutrality to it all – every song is destined to come to its natural conclusion as is every year, every marriage, and so too every life. Though the message purveyed is one of enjoying all these sorts of things while they last and as they tease: “What are you going to do? We’re all waiting for you” as Two Trains chugs on blithely, who are we to go against the grain? As sat deep in what seems a flowerbed, Kaplan’s vocal assumes an earthy quality as though only too aware, and indeed at peace with from whence it came and to where it’ll one day return. It’s familiar as the forever insistent thudding of internal organs to have lived with you since the day you were first born, and there is consequently a firm closeness robustly rooted to it.’
Dots & Dashes review the gloriously well attuned London return of Yo La Tengo.
We round off our end of year roundup with our Shows of 2012 feature, which includes late afternoons and later evenings out with the likes of The Luyas & CocoRosie & Suuns & Dirty Three & Azari & III & Savages & Beak> & Efterklang & MONO & Sharon Van Etten & Lana Del Rey, amongst others…
Dots & Dashes’ Shows of 2012.
‘The enduring journey that is Piramida may have begun in an August in a realm all but bereft of conventional shifts in season, but its overall effect was one akin to Blumenthal’s famed Hot and Iced Tea speciality. The record is infinitely more wondrous of course, and serves as an opus of stark juxtaposition – oft both heartwarming and spinal cord-chilling all at once. It seems apt, therefore, that although prickly winds may swirl about the Barbican Centre, within its brutalist gizzards resides a stifling warmth that is generated both by an almost unduly overworked central heating system, and a most avid audience. I, personally, have waited quite some time to bask in Clausen & co.’s reportedly startling live performance, and yet I could never have foreseen something this spectacular.’
Dots & Dashes review Efterklang’s The Piramida Concert live within the brutalist gizzards of the Barbican Centre…
