Joey Bada$$, On tour
Though a young man, Joey Bada$$ is clearly fond of an old school. A rapper whose mixtapes so far have demonstrated how well his mellow flow works with the crackly, jazzy beats supplied to him by more senior producers such as DJ Premier and MF Doom, he recalls the heavily textured, smoothly delivered records from rap’s golden mid-90s era. Bada$$ by name but more Quite$weet by nature, Joey’s raps are most convincing when he confines himself to laidback observational material. His sometime collaborator Freddie Gibbs can convincingly darken the mood of this kind of tuneful and atmospheric material, but the Brooklyn native’s own attempts to do so – as on his recent Christ Conscious single – come over as central casting swagger rather than the real deal.
JR
Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy, London
Whenever Will Oldham seems to be getting more widely recognised, the more diverse his work becomes. A songwriter whose output makes the erratic whim-based releases of someone like Neil Young seem like the focus-grouped product of the blandest corporate drone, Oldham’s catalogue is impossible to corral, despite the best efforts of his devoted fanbase. His output is currently running at about an album a year, plus assorted EPs, collaborations and limited edition free-roamers. Live, the picture only becomes more complicated, his performances as apt to be with his own electric retainers as favoured local pick-up bands. Or something else entirely.
Saint John At Hackney Church, E5, Tue & Wed
JR
Robert Plant, On tour
A big rock band is like a planet – it exerts a gravitational force from which it’s almost impossible to break free. While his erstwhile colleague Jimmy Page has spent his career since the band’s demise firmly in Led Zeppelin’s orbit, Robert Plant has roamed far and wide, from slick 80s chart rock all the way back into music’s past with Raising Sand, his collaboration with Alison Krauss. Now, he’s delivered a free-festival take on folk and blues with his new one Lullaby And… The Ceaseless Roar. Heads of all ages will dig its big world-thinking.
JR
Steve Hauschildt, Bradford
Thanks to promoters such as Golden Cabinet and organisations like Fuse Arts, Bradford has put itself firmly on the experimental musical map in the last 18 months. This Friday, for free, and for one of its final music events of the year, Fuse hosts Emeralds co-founder Steve Hauschildt, who is supported by gauzy future pop project Rough Fields, AKA James Birchall. Sounding as if he’s been teleported direct from a 70s lost future, Hauschildt is a true gearhead, with rhythms appearing in pond-like ripples, lapping against the geological strata of deep kosmische jams. In 2012 he released an album using around 20 different electronic instruments plucked from every decade going back 50 years, and has also released on Editions Mego and Kranky. A new album is on the way next year, following a recent zoned-out selection for the Air Texture compilation series.
Fuse Art Space, Fri
JA
Abdullah Ibrahim, On tour
Abdullah Ibrahim’s combinations of traditional African songs, township dance music, church hymns and American jazz have been entrancing audiences everywhere since the 1960s. The first gig of this short tour is part of the EFG London jazz festival, where he is the most influential representative of South African jazz in a wider celebration of the scene. Ibrahim (then recording as Dollar Brand) co-founded South Africa’s famous Jazz Epistles in 1959 with the then unknown Hugh Masekela on trumpet, and the mix of Duke Ellington, Thelonious Monk, Xhosa songs and Christian hymns that first inspired the pianist are audible still. These gigs feature his warmly eloquent Ekaya septet (Sat), his new piano-sax-cello trio (Sat & Sun), and his hypnotic solo performances (Wed & Thu).
JF
The Gospel According To The Other Mary, London
Though he has composed four stage works that conform comfortably with conventional definitions of what an opera is, John Adams has also produced several others that blur the edges of such prescriptions. The most ambitious of those are his two opera oratorios, works intended to have a performing life in both the concert hall and the opera house. The first was his nativity work El Niño, which was initially staged in Paris in 2000 by director Peter Sellars, though these days it’s most often performed in concert. The Gospel According To The Other Mary has travelled in the reverse direction. It was first performed two years ago in the concert hall; now, thanks to English National Opera, it’s getting its world stage premiere at the Coliseum, directed, inevitably, by Sellars and conducted by Joana Carneiro, with mezzo Patricia Bardon heading the cast.
Coliseum, W1, Fri to 5 Dec
AC
