Lau Played!

Contemporary World Good: I'm listening to the new Death Grips album, which I downloaded for free.  Why don't you?

Contemporary World Bad:  The new iTunes.  Is that not repulsive?  Maybe it's good if you want to put your earbuds in a cloud and tag each semibreve (or something), but if you just use it to load an iPod and burn CDs, it's a pain in the arse.

LAU – DHP Promotions, Jericho, 16/11/12

Enjoying a pre-gig pint in the Gardener’s Arms, Jericho, we admire the old records displayed round the walls.  What a great way to celebrate vinyl, we think; followed by, well, not as much as actually playing it.  We’re sorely tempted to indulge some proper vinylphilia, and half inch a twelve inch, and that’s the paradox: as soon as you start actively celebrating something, you’re effectively admitting its demise - the living need no eulogies, after all.  Which makes Lau an interesting band.  The gig’s promoters describe them as sounding like Godspeed You! Black Emperor, which they do, but only in the sense that a shrew probably looks like a puma from the point of view of a cuttlefish.  Crazy comparisons aside, it’s quite hard to pigeonhole an eclectic trio that fights hard to walk between the twin evils of preserving folk as a taxidermied museum piece and clogging the arteries of a living tradition with an excess of gloopy crossover syrup. 

And, to a great extent, they succeed.  The playing is impeccable, especially Aidan O’Rourke’s fiddle, the mid-range so creamy and rich, the phrasing so natural, you’d swear it was talking to you, murmuring secrets so comfortingly indulgent they’d make Nigella sound like Dot Cotton.  The atmosphere is wonderful, too: some of the apparent ad libs were probably well aired, but they stopped the gig getting too salon polite or rock pompous.  There are impressive musical twists to discover, “Horizontigo” displaying the clockwork sugar locals might associate with Message To Bears, and “Far From Portland” a stately plucked coda that reminds us unexpectedly of Papa M.  There are also less successful departures from the folk path, like fuzzy laptop snuffles somewhat akin to Four Tet, and it’s frustrating to watch Martin Green leave off the spry accordion lines to tinkle faux-atmospherically at a Rhodes.

Folk trios don’t normally sell out the Jericho, or require much award storage space, so it would be easy to assume that Lau had cynically cross-bred their music to make it palatable. It would also be downright wrong, as the honest love of what they’re playing oozes from the musicians.  It’s just that, in general, the more folk they are, the more we like them, and the pieces that transport us are “Torsa”, with its lively Scottish rhythms, and Kris Drever’s lovely, straight take on Lal Waterson’s “Midnight Feast”.  Not perfect, then, but still great to see a band with a love of British folk, and wide enough tastes to distract the barman at the Gardener’s whilst we swipe that old Warp EP.