The Blessing - Bleach Cake
What do you mean you didn't visit the Jazz World stage when you were at Glastonbury? It's all well and good to stagger in a cider haze between the Pyramid and Other stages with a wobbly diversion to the Park, Queen's Head and Acoustic tent but you need to be embrace some jazz too.
Don't be scared - it can nourish the soul, and in all its diverse forms, It need not be too far from something you already know and love such as rock. Take The Blessing, for instance, who delivered a belting show on the Saturday afternoon of this year's Glasto (shortly after the masterful pianist Neil Cowley). Their sound takes in elements of ska, punk and space rock for a truly mind-blowing combination (they call it 'wonky rock-jazz'). With their smart skinny suits they could even pass for the Bad Seeds if the wind is blowing in the right direction.
Take a listen to Bleach Cake and you can hear the scratchy indie jazz-funk of Pigbag or Rip Rig and Panic over a chunky twanging bassline, building to a gloriously squawking chorus; on some of the band's other tracks the bottom end would not sound too out of place on a Fugazi album.
The band formed in 2000, initially playing the unstructured free jazz favoured by Ornette Coleman, but took a radical change of direction in 2006 when they began to work on proper tunes of their own which had reference points such as Polar Bear, Acoustic Ladyland, Morphine and apparently Kings of Leon. Their debut album All Is Yes was released earlier this year and is in contention for the best album at the BBC Jazz Awards.
[Hear The Blessing play Bleach Cake]
[And watch The Blessing's video to Bleach Cake here]
1:21 PM | 07/07/2008
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yeah! these guys (jazz)rock! saw them a couple of times, killer live band and great players. going to catch them at the big chill this year too, should be very cool...
Posted by the_low_end at 10:07 AM | 08/07/2008 | Report Abuse
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