SYD ARTHUR & THE JACK HUES QUARTET
“TIME, AND SPACE, ARE TWO OF THIS EVENING’S KEY INGREDIENTS,
ALONGSIDE SOME STELLAR MUSICIANSHIP AND A SETLIST THAT IMPROVISES
ITS WAY AROUND SOME EXEMPLARY
COVERS.”
VENUE st Pancras oLd church, London
DATE 11/04/19
Everything feels remarkably relaxed when Prog arrives at the delightful setting of St. Pancras Old Church this evening. Support act Adam Coney is strumming away on acoustic guitar, Syd Arthur bassist Joel Magill is stood grinning away at the back, and a bijou crowd fill the tiny pews of the ornate church. We had wondered what sort of crowd tonight might pull, and the answer is mixed. A few recognisable faces from the prog community, some hipster types, even, we discover later, a Wang Chung fan all the way from Germany!
Musically this evening is a fascinating proposition. Joel and brother Josh on bass and drums, together with former Wang Chung man Jack Hues and his fusion Quartet. Things are centred around their cover of Beck’s Nobody’s Fault But My Own, which grew out of a similar jam back in 2010. They recorded the Beck song in 2012, but only released it earlier this year. Time moves slowly in this new Canterbury-inspired world.
Time, and space, are two of this evening’s key ingredients, alongside some stellar musicianship and a setlist that improvises its way around some exemplary covers. If everything seems eclectically loose as the musicians strike up, Radiohead’s Weird Fishes/ Arpeggi soon becomes mostly recognisable, the In Rainbows
track stretched out into an epic, loose-limbed workout. Although they dance around the core arrangements of the songs they cover, it soon strikes you that this is music, often great music, being made simply for the enjoyment of it. This is possibly why, by the time the band indulge themselves with Nobody’s Fault
But My Own, you’re left with the feeling that this entire performance should possibly be operating on a far greater scale, such is the magnitude of the performances on offer.
When they dip into Robert Wyatt’s Sea
Song you know something special is occurring, Hues handling the vocals with aplomb, following it with an utterly wonderful take on Talk Talk’s Myrrhman, with Hues paying tribute to the late Mark Hollis as, fittingly, the church bell tolls (an occupational hazard of gigs here). Hues’ own Non Locality In A Sea Of Electrons holds its own amongst the covers, before an astonishing take on
Soft Machine’s Facelift brings things to a wonderful conclusion.
There’s no encore. It’s as lowkey an ending as the beginning. The musicians linger, happily chatting with fans, while Hues is collared with a wedge of
Wang Chung releases to sign by the aforementioned avid fan. You’re left with the feeling that this wonderful exercise in freeform jamming, progging up some contemporary tunes and paying homage to some prog classics really does deserve a bigger audience.