Reviews: Music

Usher Hall, Edinburgh

Keith Bruce

As well as being his 60th birthday year, 2014 is also the 25th anniversary of Costello's unveiling of his persona as Spike, the beloved entertainer, a less spikey version of whom still serves him well today. The lead single from that 1989 album, Veronica, which kindly chronicles his grandmother's Alzheimer's, was the first of a series of family references that punctuated an evening in which the UK's finest living songwriter unpacked his extensive back catalogue in yet another different, brilliant and seemingly effortlessly diverting way.

That meant that as well as hearing The Last Year of My Youth, the song he wrote for his own anniversary when called upon to dep for Lana Del Ray on David Letterman in June, and the version of the title track of Lost in the River that he sings on T Bone Burnett's forthcoming "New Basement Tapes"- on which a collective that also includes Marcus Mumford and Rhiannon Giddens of the Carolina Chocolate Drops sets a bunch of lyrics Bob Dylan never got round to using - we were also treated to Poison Moon and the once-notorious S&M ditty Wave A White Flag, bedroom recordings by the 21-year old tyro that DJ Charlie Gillett aired in the years before Stiff released My Aim Is True.

Yet there was still room for Oliver's Army, Shipbuilding, Good Year for the Roses, and Charles Aznavour's She, from the soundtrack of Notting Hill, for those who know his work less thoroughly, and even Leon Payne's Psycho for the bloke who has been shouting for it at Scottish gigs for over 30 years. And The Costello Show has an irresistible twinkly charm these days.

Christian Wallumrod Ensemble

Queen's Hall, Edinburgh

Rob Adams

THERE are times when it seems that, lacking a musical score, Norwegian pianist Christian Wallumrod's musicians might somehow have access to a film that they watch while onstage, their responses mirroring the on-screen drama.

And it might be nice to be able to watch with them. But then, that would dictate what the sounds that emanate from piano, cello, trumpet, saxophone, drums and vibes are describing, instead of letting listeners paint their own pictures, and it's actually quite fascinating to watch how the group works, picking up cues and possibly looking to see what effect the often weirdly beautiful passages are having on the audience.

This was Wallumrod's first visit to Scotland with his ensemble and even the experience of listening to his recordings, which are absolutely in the experimental sonic terrain promoted by his label, ECM, doesn't prepare the senses for a live performance.

It began with Wallumrod fingering the spare, funereal chords of Stille Rock from his Outstairs album and through a continuous first half the musicians tapped and feathered their instruments, with a musical saw shimmering into focus here, a shruti box offering its drone there, and piano notes seemingly being buffeted by a breeze as the emphasis shifted and the ensemble moved as one towards a teasingly twisted closing melody.

The whole concert was a masterclass in restraint and gentle changes of musical colour, sometimes hinting at Lutheran hymns, sometimes - especially on the encore, Jumpa - suggesting a medieval procession of jousters to the lists, and at one point featuring a tone poem created with four triangles played, as with all else, with compelling, sensitively poised results.

Level 42

O2 ABC

Stuart Morrison

Difficult though it may be to remember it now, but there was a time, in the early 1980s, when bass virtuoso Mark King and his troops were pretty cutting edge. Emerging from the hotbed of cultural innovation that was the Isle of Wight, they offered the then rather revolutionary idea that hard- edged funk could penetrate the consciousness of punks and new romantics. But penetrate it did and their early recordings, especially the sparkling major label debut, was a sizzling introduction.

Appropriate then, that 30 or so years later they should open with Love Games, from that first record. A splendid, funky, thing it is, too. Mark King's famous right thumb twanging the strings of his led-encrusted bass with machine gun-like rapidity, the three piece horn section parping in pleasingly uniform fashion and a drummer proving that the maxim , "less is more" does not always apply.

In fact the opening half hour was a non-stop barrage of frantic funkiness, albeit superbly played, so that it was by way of a blessed relief when the beautifully laid back It's Not the Same For Us arrived, allowing the music to breath and letting us hear Mike Lindup's keyboards, for example, as something other than part of an aural assault.

The tour was in support of Sirens, an EP of new material, which fitted seamlessly with the older tunes, but it was the classic stuff that most folk had come to hear. It duly arrived in the shape of Something About You and a sing-along Lessons in Love. They finished the show with the excellent funk workout that was Hot Water, King's thumb a blur and the punters sweaty, but absolutely delighted.