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:: Monday, June 06, 2005 ::

Gig Review: Will Gregory – The Service of Tim Henman @ Bath Music Festival, 03.06.05

Will Gregory (of Goldfrapp) pushes for the acceptance of synthesisers in serious music with this concert celebrating their potential. A nine piece orchestra, including Portishead's Adrian Utley, jazz soloist Django Bates, classical composer Graham Fitkin, and Gregory in the conductors position as well as handling three synths himself. (And who was the woman in the floral pattered tights? She was gorgeous.)

In total I counted five assorted Moogs, three Korgs, three Rolands, one Nord Lead (Bates), and this Polivoks monster (thanks to the UN Working Group on Romanization Systems for the translation that allowed me to find that!) These were all amped up individually through an assortment of guitar, bass and keyboard amps from Roland, Line6, Boogie, Marshall, Trace, Fender, and one Line6 Pod feeding an active monitor.

The performance is spilt into two halves. The first features predominantly classical pieces arranged for this huge collection of synths, and a couple of specially written pieces. Think Wendy Carlos's Switched On Back or A Clockwork Orange soundtrack and you'll know what this sounds like, except it's all the more impressive for being performed entirely live. My favourite moment is the improvised sounding second movement to a Bach organ piece that I've forgotten the title of (it was apparently written in three movements except Bach didn't bother writing the second) where Bates and Utley have call and response synth battle across the stage. Bates creating amazing squelching and retching noises with his Nord Lead and Utley providing more atmospheric rumblings and squawks with a huge old Korg (possibly an MS10?) and a circuit bent toy robot. My usual taste in electronic music hampered my enjoyment slightly, as I found all of the material absolutely crying out for percussion. Even though most, if not all, of these pieces were written without any percussion in mind, my mind finds them lacking without it, but that's just a matter of training I guess.

The second half is dedicated to The Service of Tim Henman piece. As the music builds the screen behind the ensemble (who are all now wearing headphones) shows a tiny yellow dot slowly moving closer and closer. After a couple of minutes, when it eventually fills the screen, it fades into a seemingly static image of Britain's current number one tennis player deep in concentration, eyes closed. The "dramatically slowed down footage," appearing to have been shot at quite a high frame rate, is played back so slowly every single mpeg artefact is blindingly obvious. Small arm movements are moved as blocks thus creating the effect of Terry Gilliam style cut out animation. Sharp edges are jagged and become fuzzy as they move.

As Henman lifts himself up for the serve it seems like forever before he even opens his eyes. When he does, it is so slow, so menacing, so focused, that he looks demonically possessed, like some red eyes caricature of Tony Blair sending troops to war. The audience audibly flinch and laugh at the same time.

The music is more up to date sounding than anything from the first half. A bass line, pads, lead arpeggios around just a few notes. Until the slow moving yellow smear of the tennis ball makes contact with the racket. Then we see the first visual cut; to Henman, sidestepping, waiting for the return of serve, and the music steps up a notch, perfectly synchronised, and the drum machine kicks it. At last, some percussion. Suddenly the slow moving footage seems driven, as if some invisible force is pushing it forward.

Several cuts follow, all jumping back about 10 seconds through the footage. Progress seems even slower and more like dragging heavy feet through thick mud. The suspense is horrible. You find yourself on the edge of your seat, not waiting to know the final score, not who wins the point, not how well placed the volley is, but just to see what's just to the right of the HSBC logo, or what strange facial tick he'll exhibit next.

The footage stays solidly on Henman. It doesn't matter who the opponent is. All you want to do is stare at this amber frozen figure of national pride. His face eventually drops and he turns away. It's a familiar expression from a lost point, but the pain is more prominent than ever before. When you watch Henman play you loosely follow his emotions, but don't feel them to the same extreme he obviously does. Here, you feel like you can see into his thoughts, you know everything that's going on in there. Like his very being is exposed for all to experience along with him.

Another scene, following nothing but trainers scraping through soft clay. As the music spirals around and his feet back and forth, you've never previously had so much time to consider exactly why he pulls his socks up so high. He really should think about that.

Another serve. Cut up visuals, slowly zooming in on his face as the same few seconds are constantly replayed, and simple kick snare kick snare rhythms give the same feeling of seeing any big dance act blowing up their visuals onto huge festivals screens. It could be Underworld or Chemical Brothers or Orbital just about to let loose. And Henman wins the point! It's the fist! Henman's patented fist of doom! He wields it well. His face looks like he could kill with a single look if he so desired and his raised fist like a mallet that could strike down and smite any who doubt his power. He also looks faintly ridiculous.

The ball rolls across the ground, coming to a stop with its pixilized yellow fur blurring and leaching into the clay behind it. Until the giant god like hand seizes it. More light footed scraping of feet through the dusty red clay shows the video artefacts suddenly looking like part of the artistic effect. The cracked ground under the feet seems to lift up with them, like a cloud that Monkey could fly on, holding the silver souled trainer god aloft.

The final movement has built the music faster, the tension in the video is more palpable than ever, and when the point is decided, the expression gives nothing away. Presumably it was lost, but you couldn't say for sure, the concentration is too intense. The performance ends on this perfect cliff hanger, leaving you begging for more hypnotic synth-action, and for resolution to the one sided game and the self referential review.

P.S. I overheard Adrian Utley chatting to someone during the interval and saying that they were hoping to put on more shows like this. I'll be first in line for tickets if they do.
P.P.S. Local celebrity spotting; I think I saw Jeff Barrow in the audience too.

:: Dan 6.6.05 [Arc] [0 comments] [links to this post]    ::
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