By Jase Walker
For an esteemed prog metal gremlin like myself, I am eating well so far in 2023, and tonight is three acts that straddle the line between prog metal and jazz fusion; Plini, Jakub Zytecki, and Owane & Jack Gardiner. It’s no secret that Plini and Jakub have become steadfast friends over the years and often play support to each other on many shows with just swapping out who plays first fiddle for their particular set. Not only that but Owane & Jack Gardiner released one of my favourite albums of last year and getting to hear that stuff live is going to be a right treat.
The stage goes dark, a chilled synthy intro plays as we await Owane & Jack Gardiner and their accompanying musicians to appear. The high and sweet guitar playing rings out across the room supported by groovy bass and drums, this mix is bloody incredible. So well balanced that I can easily tune in to each part of the band without any issues and pick out what they’re playing. Essentially this set seems to more or less just be blasting through the entirety of their cooperative album and I am totally okay with that! Such unbelievably tight playing, complex virtuoso noodling and grooving from everyone on stage and I can hear constant “Oh my god” and “Fuck yeah” comments coming from behind me.
This is one of those performances where it’s actually hard to pick out if anyone is doing a “bit” or an actual solo at any given time because essentially everyone’s going nuts almost the entire time. As an ex-bass player, I keep having my gaze drawn to their bass player’s elastic fingers and how he’s effortlessly dancing all around the neck and playing some incredibly tasty stuff, that tone is sublime too. Fantastic show to get us started tonight, and if they’re reading this, yes I totally heard Jack play the lick and make their bass/keys player burst out laughing, I saw that. Owane even got a cheeky stage dive and crowd surf at the end, well done that lad!
After Jakub Zytecki‘s superb set at ArcTanGent last year, I’ve been excited to see even more of him after his latest stellar album release. The ex-Disperse guitarist has made a big name for himself over the years since the dissolution of his former band and he’s got the chops to back it up. Jakub’s signature style is a mix of sharp rhythmic strikes, bright chords and extremely quick hammer ons/pull offs up and down the neck. It truly is an astounding sound to behold and watch him pull it off live and make it look just so damn easy as well. He remarks that this is the final date on an extensive 33 date tour: it’s often easy to forget how lengthy these tours can be and yet the guys on stage still put everything into their craft.
The “feel” that Jakub has in his playing is wonderfully unique as well, it’s almost playful in the way it seems to dance around, to the point where it seems like he’s just trying a random chord out for the first time to see if it fits. He’s not lost complete touch with the sort of heavier stuff he’s been responsible for in the past with riffing on his 8 string and going wild with some of those low string chords and belting it out. He truly is an astounding guitarist and musician, so very tasteful and works magic with his balance of quiet ambience and cacophonous noise. Watching him play is mesmerizing; a rising star of the new blood of virtuoso guitar players taking on the Titanic old guard.
Prior to Plini‘s show, their drummer comes up to the microphone and says “I’ve got a text from Plini here, it says ‘I can’t fucking wait to get out of England and back to Australia’, he said you’d understand that?” And then walks off, bizarre. Anyway, on they walk and I’ve got prime position for the man I’m probably going to be staring at a lot, Simon Grove on bass guitar, nevermind Plini! I’ve just noticed that Plini’s got one of those odd fret shape necks on his guitar, looks bloody gorgeous and sounds sublime. As with what has come before in tonight’s show, Plini and his accompanying band sound unbelievably good, all so well balanced and yet so strong in its delivery. I can feel my jeans vibrating along to everything Simon is playing on the bass, every snare and bass drum hit is felt in my chest and the guitars are crystal clear.
Plini’s live shows always feel a bit strange sometimes, because they’re so often halfway between an incredible live show and feeling like a technical demonstration. It’s rare that you’ll see them jumping around on stage and thrashing their heads around, just a group of extremely composed musicians playing some of the most beautiful yet complex music you’ve ever heard. Well, except in the odd moments where Plini gets the crowd to clap along for a bit but out of time, deliberately or not? Who knows. It does say a lot when the crowd are consistently doing his main melodic hooks for his various songs in acapella though! “Handmade Cities”, one of my favourites of his, goes down a storm and even has me vocalizing all the little melodic bits, what a song!
Prior to the encore, Plini asks the crowd to loudly boo them while they stand in the darkness before continuing the encore and to Manchester’s credit, they absolutely did. Plini ribbing Manchester’s football teams might have been a risky manoeuvre however! But following on with the encore and finishing with ‘Electric Sunrise’ to wrap things up was a fantastic stroke to bring this set to a close, not only that but with Jack Gardiner and Jakub Zyteki returning to the stage for a full ensemble as well as Plini and Jake having a guitar battle. Outstanding evening with some of the best musicians, never mind just guitarists, around right now. These are the sorts of shows that’ll be talked about in reverence decades from now, get a piece of them before they’re up on massive stages and all too distant from most of the crowd, because they’ll be there before long.
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