By Jase Walker
In the interest of switching things up a bit with my love for a wide variety of music, I’ve gotten into jazz massively over the last couple of years and Snarky Puppy played a big part of that after seeing their YouTube video for ‘Lingus’. And after seeing them announce this tour, I wasn’t going to miss it, come hell or high water. But, thankfully, nothing really stopped me anyway!
Snarky Puppy have Nate Wood along with them for this tour, just the two of them for the grand show at one of Manchester’s largest venues, the O2 Apollo. I bloody love this venue. I’ve seen so many different artists here and catching Snarky Puppy here is going to very much be the icing on the cake
The lights darken and just two strong beams remain focused on the drum kit at the forefront of the stage. Oddly enough this isn’t the first time this year seeing a single man band on a drum kit which is kind of weird although this particular set up seems a bit more complex in that he’s playing a keyboard, and the drums, AND a bass guitar AND singing while at the same time! I’ve seen people multitask in live music shows but this is quite legitimately on another level entirely!
He’s fretting the bass and playing with left hand, his right jumps between playing keys and the snare, all the while his legs hit the hi-hat and bass drum and somehow he’s still got enough focus to sing along to all this at the same time. It seems he’s also got enough time to quickly add the keys stuff into loops as well, I can’t get my head around how much time Nate must have spent to be able to get to this point but this is no small feat by any means. He even managed to lose a stick at one point and seems completely unphased by it and just carries on without missing so much as a beat.
According to Nate, the programming side of it was too slow and boring so he just decided to play it live as it’s more fun, and I suppose that’s fair! The music itself is most definitely rooted in Jazz but has a really nice electronic edge to it with a bit of a funky feel in parts. Really interesting bass melodies, smooth drum grooves, dreamy keys and his voice is pretty great as well. Sadly it’s just a short set but Nate has really left an impression on me, not just because his live performance is quite literally one of the most extreme versions of one-man-banding I’ve ever seen, but also because it was really great music that was played brilliantly. I’ve never seen someone play a bass solo, whilst also playing the drums. Crackers.
Soon enough the gigantic ensemble that is Snarky Puppy takes up the entirety of the Apollo’s massive stage, it’s time for some jazz! I mean to say this sort of stuff is layered is a bit of an understatement, with roughly 12 people on stage there’s a lot going on at any given moment unless there’s a focus on one specific element for an improvised section. The band is also surrounded by Halogen light bulbs which adds to the effect of the strong lighting setup that the Apollo already sports in its own right. Each part of the light show is finely tuned to their stage performance, either used to drive home specific segments or home in on a specific band member.
The sound balance is incredible as well, the sheer number of component parts of this act and I can hear *all* of them clearly! This even comes down to minor elements such as a tambourine, or some layering from the live synth. There’s also something so engrossing about a loud, bendy-note keyboard solo too, such a wonderfully unique sound that I can’t help but be engrossed by. Some members at various points switch to different instruments too as if it couldn’t get any more crazy, the sax switching to flute, one of the keys players switching to trumpet and one of the other keys players switching to what I am told is a clavichord (I’ve legitimately never heard of one before).
Snarky Puppy feels like a mix between a live show and an educational demonstration, I’d never even considered that a trumpet would use a wah pedal for a solo before! Another part of their sound that I find astonishing is how strong the drums are, to the point where you can feel each snare and bass drum hit in your chest, but it’s not overpowering anything else the band is doing at all, incredible work from the sound engineers. Not only that but the pulse from the bass guitar is not only heard clearly but it’s felt in my legs as well, this live performance is a real masterclass in how a band can sound when wonderfully balanced in this way. There’s no nuance lost at any point, even the minor scrapes and movements on the violin and guitar are heard.
I think the only real frustration I’ve had with the show wasn’t even to do with the band, sadly a large chatty audience means that some of the quieter, more subtle songs were marred by the full roar of the crowd. I’ve been so sucked into the whole performance that it barely registered to me that most two hours have passed. Surprisingly, they didn’t actually play ‘Lingus’ in the end! Oh well! Absolutely bloody stellar show anyway and I’m bowled over by it.
Snarky Puppy really are something special. Thank you for the music!
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