Music

Bill Laurance Project

O2 ABC,Glasgow

Rob Adams

four stars

THERE IS something of the Joe Zawinul about Bill Laurance. Back in jazz-rock masters Weather Report’s 1970s and early 1980s pomp, Zawinul perfected the art of absorbing the atmosphere and street culture of various locations and channelling them through his keyboards over a groove that worked like a magnet.

As he showed on last year’s Aftersun album and demonstrated even more powerfully here, Laurance has a similar talent. The Snarky Puppy keyboards player has a knack of creating melodies that call to mind exactly places including Marrakech and the south of France. The exotic bustle of the former thrummed through a melodic figure that spoke of ouds and double reed wind instruments combined with effervescent drums and percussion, and it wasn’t difficult to picture a sunset stroll along the Mediterranean coast being soundtracked by Laurance’s more reflective Golden Hour.

With Chris Hyson on double bass and bass guitar, the deeply impressive Joshua Blackmore on drums and Felix Higginbottom on percussion, Laurance created a mood here that was as industrious as it was evocative. His improvising is as direct and communicative as his melodies and while the band as a whole can hit hard there was a relaxed ease and elasticity about Hyson’s understated basslines and occasional keys that meant there was plenty of expertly delivered clatter but never any overpowering clutter.

The overall effect was intoxicating, with bass, drums and percussion laying out as Laurance created a hand-pumping head of solo chordal steam before returning with renewed ensemble propulsion and the rich harmonic-melodic development of Madeleine swelling with emotion over Blackmore’s wonderfully crisp, tonally precise kit playing and Higginbottom’s mercurial fills.