Sun, 14 Jan 2007 12:00am

Event | 0° of Separation

I went to see 0° of Separation at the Roundhouse in Camden last night. The show featured musicians Adem, Juana Molina, Vashti Bunyan and Vetiver playing a selection of their songs.

Adem and Juana Molina have be favourites of mine for a fair while, Vashti Bunyan is a fairly recent discovery for me and Vetiver are a band I've heard of (mostly through last.fm connections) but had not listened to.

At times they played individually, for other songs they played together - with up to 11 musicians on stage at once. Adem had a great stage presence and demonstrated a multi-instrumental virtuosity that included playing a set of toy bells whilst singing a page from a children's story! Juana Molina was also a great live performer, playing guitar, live percussion and keyboards/sampler. Vashti Bunyan played guitar and sang material from her original 1970 album as well as her 2005 release. She (as did Adem) also brought some very talented co-musicians with her. Vetiver's sound was spacious folky/country Americana with plenty of stringed instruments played by a five-piece.

For two hours the revolving line-up played spellbinding music. Familiar songs saw expanded arrangements, others were stripped down to basics and played with a new freshness, and new tunes (well, new to me) blended in seamlessly. The artists were clearly enjoying themselves (especially Adem) and there was a lot of mutual respect going on for each others' music.

The tour now continues at venues around the country and I'd recommend going along if you can. It's not often you get to hear live music as good as this!

Author: Sean Clark