The Maccabees, On tour
There’s a case for the Maccabees being the English Kings Of Leon; not in sound, but in how the current, arena-filling proposition is almost completely unrecognisable from the quirky indie rock band they started out as. Having found huge success with progressively epic and seriously intentioned music, the band’s 2015 album Marks To Prove It debuted at No 1 in the charts. Interestingly, though, this landmark was achieved with a record that recovers some of the Maccabees’ original eccentricities. Of course, the windswept Arcade Fire-like characteristics remain, but some of the antic structure of their earlier records makes a welcome return.
Barrowland, Fri; touring to 23 Jan
JR
Daughter, On tour
Less is more with Daughter. A trio based around the talents of singer-songwriter Elena Tonra, the group have previously exercised a minimalism in all things, from the stripped-down nature of their arrangements to the manner in which they conceal their strong emotional content beneath a mainly placid delivery. But having shown promise as a kind of folky version of the xx, to judge from the singles from forthcoming second album Not To Disappear the mask is slipping. What seems to be emerging is a rather more melodramatic and rockier beast, wherein the band work less by implication, more by wearing their hearts on their sleeves.
Cambridge Corn Exchange, Fri; touring to 28 Jan
JR
Angel Haze, On tour
An MC with no absence of attitude, Angel Haze has found it difficult to walk quite as hard as she has historically talked. All round, this combative confidence has brought her as much bad as it has good. Professionally, her Classick mixtape of three years ago found her confronting the horrible circumstances of her early life on top of some of hip-hop’s legendary beats. About the same time, she entered into a social media war with Azealia Banks, a rather distracting and unproductive move that served to invite unhelpful comparisons between the pair. As it turned out, Haze’s raw delivery and aggressive stance was an unsuccessful fit with the mainstream, but now she is back among the independents, where her underdog determination may find a more favourable environment in which to develop.
JR
Heather Leigh, London
Heather Leigh plays pedal steel guitar: towering riffs that break into streaming squalls of sound, her voice wavering between a soft coo and a ghoulish wail. She was born in West Virginia, the daughter of a coal miner, and cut her teeth in the “new weird America” scene of the 1990s and early 00s as a member of Texan psychedelic noise and drone group Charalambides, among others. Now living in Glasgow, until last year she ran one of the world’s best underground record shops, that city’s Volcanic Tongue, with her partner, the writer and former Telstar Ponies man David Keenan. Leigh has toured as the bassist for Sterling Smith’s Jandek project, and recently joined one of Peter Brötzmann’s many improv assemblages. Only few women have made it into that particular hall of fame – improv’s version of getting a star on Hollywood Boulevard – and she’ll return to this venue to duet with the sax player in February.
JA
Roller Trio, Newcastle upon Tyne & Southampton
When Roller Trio emerged from the volcano of Leeds’ new music scene to a Mercury nomination in 2012, they sounded as if they’d been inspired by that city’s pioneering thrash-improv outfit trioVD, but their volatile chemistry – a fusion of almost romantic tenor ruminations, spacey ambience and hard rock hooks – made them a clear alternative. In recent times, the group once dubbed “the new sound of UK jazz” by Gilles Peterson have grown a little more reflective, incorporating dark, ambient-electronic mists and hip-hop-influenced themes, but always with the implication of an impending explosion hovering in the wings.
The Bridge Hotel, Newcastle upon Tyne, Sun; Turner Sims Concert Hall, Southampton, Fri
JF
Pelléas Et Mélisande, London
Although Simon Rattle doesn’t officially take over as the London Symphony Orchestra’s music director until autumn 2017, he is already conducting regularly and putting his own imprint on its programming. There have been hints about what we can expect from the upcoming Rattle era, and some of the performers with whom he will work. It’s already clear, for instance, that the great pianist Krystian Zimerman is likely to be a regular visitor, while another of Rattle’s collaborators, the director Peter Sellars, is involved in the semi-staging of Pelléas Et Mélisande that Rattle is conducting this weekend. Rattle and Sellars have worked on Debussy’s opera together before, for an impressive full performance in Amsterdam in the 1990s, but this will be a production designed for the concert hall, similar to that the pair have already undertaken with Bach’s Passions.
AC
