- Having not heard There's Me and There's You, Matthew Herbert's most recent full-length, I wasn't sure what to expect from him, his Big Band, a 75-strong choir from Goldsmiths University, one larger-than-life vocalist, one pianist, three conductors and one Royal Festival Hall. I'd listened to and been impressed by Goodbye Swingtime, The Matthew Herbert Big Band's debut album, and only followed Herbert via his more underground productions and remixes on labels like K7, Warp, Versatile and his own Accidental Recordings.
That said, I had a sense of anticipation as I walked into the Royal Festival Hall on London's South Bank. And we were soon greeted by Herbert, his big band, choir and the true star of the show, Eska Mtungwazi—the main vocalist on the new album. Mtungwazi, like Herbert, is hard to pin down, sitting comfortably within the sounds of jazzy big band, experimental electronica, cabaret and theatre that Herbert crafted for her. Her operatic voice boomed throughout the hall on tracks like "Breathe," "The Yesness" and "Just Swing," each bringing out the power and intensity in both her and the band.
What lifted this show to greater heights, though, was the introduction of a bit of theatre. "Battery," for instance, became a living, breathing, dancing performance when the choir donned black and white pillowcases over their heads, making the singers look alternately like executioners or KKK members. With lyrics like "Blindfolded, hooded and shackled" and "Don't do this, sit down there, don't do that," the seriousness of Herbert's political convictions were clear—and made all the more obvious by the fact that even he was hooded, taking samples, looping them and then driving them into obscurity through via his three Kaoss pads.
Herbert's commitment to his "Personal Contract for the Composition of Music" also plays into the performance, leading him to sample the choir talking, scrunched newspaper and even directing the crowd to sing in "D" which magically becomes one of the band's older tracks "Together" after a jazzy interlude. As you might expect, Herbert seems to be in a world of his own throughout, but he remains connected to the band as well, constantly moving, tap dancing and fidgeting like Frankenstein watching his creature coming to life. But—strangely—every time he leaves the protective barrier of his mixing desk and Kaoss pads, he always dances and performs for his band, never facing the crowd, as though he's too shy to do so. He might be performing, but it seems he isn't performing for us.
Listening to There's Me and There's You after the show, it hardly seems to do justice to what happened at The Royal Festival Hall. The visual aspects and theatre of Herbert, Mtungwazi, the Big Band and choir, left me in real awe at the potential of live music—and how it can be harnessed with reasonable ease for artists to record and re-create electronically. I admit, Herbert is possibly a genius, but I think his genius stems from not only his musical ability but in his willingness to admit that making mistakes and utilising improvisation to create new sounds is far more enjoyable and satisfying than perfection. Truly inspiring.