@ The Blue Lamp, Aberdeen, on Fri 20 Mar 2015 (for Aberdeen Jazz Festival)
Arriving through the revolving door at the Blue Lamp this Friday night, one is met with a jazzed up slap in the face – raw as hell and seriously infectious drums, countered by the high-octane (and unlikely) combination of tuba and saxophone. Introducing London’s best kept secret – Sons of Kemet – who are, just like Aberdeen’s North Sea wind, guaranteed to knock your socks off.
Sons are a bit like Hypnotic Brass Ensemble‘s jazzier younger brother on speed – full of fierce rhythmic energy and melodic vivacity that so often passes this corner of the world by. This original mash-up of New Orleans street, Afro and Caribbean infused jazz is met with open arms by a full house; one audience member remarks that she can’t remember the last time she saw an Aberdeen crowd like it.
The MOBO award winning quartet are led by the unusual combination of two drummers, perhaps where the force of their infectious rhythms comes from. Composer Shabaka Hutchings‘ saxophone is relentless in breadth of imagination, but the stand-out is Theon Cross‘ tuba. He liberates his instrument from the trudging basslines of marching bands, exploding all over the treble clef, as best heard in All Will Surely Burn.
The Blue Lamp’s overabundance of tables should have been cleared away to allow for the onslaught of this mash up, as the dance floor spills into every unoccupied square metre of space, peaking somewhere around the ticket desk.
One encore isn’t enough for this raucous crowd. The audience howl their displeasure as Hutchings explains there is literally no time left for a second encore. However, the stage manager is forced to capitulate to the crowd, and the remaining band members are back on stage for the second time, while the following act shuffles about at the back of the room as the Sons eat into their soundcheck.