Oneohtrix Point Never, Glasgow
Drone resides somewhere between industrial noise and ambient; musically speaking it’s a halfway house near both the shit and the fan. From this unpromising locale, Daniel Lopatin – a Brooklyn-based Bostonian who records as Oneohtrix Point Never – has in the past couple of years run to a pair of superb electronic albums, Returnal and Replica, that combine Tangerine Dream-like kosmische synth repetition, evocative chording, and occasional bursts of noise. Replica, a concept of sorts, incorporates snippets of commercials into his swells of electronic drifting, a game with nostalgia, electronics and melody that occasionally recalls Boards Of Canada. Live, meanwhile, Lopatin is unafraid to stir up some harsh currents in these otherwise meditative and ambient waters.
The Berkeley Suite, Tue
John Robinson
Dexys, Treorchy
Dexys
These gigs by the re-formed, renamed, rejuvenated Dexys take place in seated venues and are described as “theatrical shows”, which may be a surprise to people who have heard the generally understated and unchoreographed musical performances devised by Kevin Rowland and his various bands since 1978. Passion, theatre and a sense of Rowland’s extremely personal mental/spiritual journey, though, have been the abiding themes of Dexys music, and those have been preserved miraculously for their new album One Day I’m Going To Soar. The new material will be unfamiliar; the high-level musicality, beauty and stirring passions within it, however, most certainly will not.
Parc Dare, Fri; on tour to 8 May
JR
Hiss Golden Messenger, On tour
Hiss Golden Messenger
Mike Taylor is an ethnomusicologist by trade and as near as music gets to a kind of Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall character: rural dweller, family man, pork product consumer. If anyone’s lifestyle would seem to give their music carte blanche to go fully native and embrace alt-country at its most mud-caked, it’s his. In fact, pretty much the opposite is true. As HGM, Taylor makes warm and identifiably American music, but drawing from far wider points than simply the country and folk you might reasonably expect. Sometimes, there are even saxophones. His signature sound is an immediately identifiable one: a faintly funky acoustic shuffle, with Taylor’s wry vocal plotting a familiar melodic course.
The Band Room, Kirkbymoorside, Sat; Captain’s Rest, Glasgow, Sun; Slaughtered Lamb, EC1, Tue; Prince Albert, Brighton, Wed; Triskel Arts Centre, Cork, Thu
JR
Marcus Miller, London
Marcus Miller. Photograph: Kumiko Higo
American bass guitar virtuoso and composer-arranger Marcus Miller worked with RB star Luther Vandross for 20 years, but his renown among jazz listeners lies in the key role he played in the late-career work of Miles Davis. Since the millennium, Miller has returned to a jazz-focused agenda, and his creatively funky shows often mix powerful 1980s Miles vehicles with earlier jazz landmarks, such as Duke Ellington’s In A Sentimental Mood or a revisit to the indelible theme of So What that might find Miller reworking the classic Miles trumpet solo as a bass guitar display. A canny populist, Miller will occasionally opt for soul-pop bravura and flashy technical posturings Miles would have fastidiously avoided, but his shows still feature plenty of inventive jazzmaking, and the leader is an astute employer of rising-star newcomers as capable of setting the show alight as he is himself. Miller follows this London date with an appearance at Cheltenham Jazz Festival next Saturday.
Royal Festival Hall, SE1, Fri
John Fordham
Melody Gardot, Cheltenham
Melody Gardot
It’s become a tradition at the Cheltenham Jazz Festival to mix pop-jazz accessibility with cutting-edge adventures and open with a star mainstream singer. This year, the role falls to Melody Gardot, the subtle and honey-toned singer-songwriter who releases notes as if she’s anxious not to disturb the air. If Gardot sounds as if she has learned her craft in privacy and some distress, that’s what she did – discovering music as therapy following a near-fatal road accident. She specialises in rather self-denying love songs, and if her use of jazz-vocal devices can veer toward the mannered, she’s poignant and honest at her best, with a sound and a story of her own. Other highlights this week are rock and RB legend Steve Winwood, whose saxophonist Paul Booth can unleash all the jazz a devotee could want (Wed), and lyrical vocalist Jacqui Dankworth, delivering intimately personal songs (Wed).
The Big Top, Montpellier Gardens, Thu
JF
Einstein On The Beach, London
Einstein On The Beach. Photograph: Lucie Jansch
Thirty-six years after it was first performed in Avignon, one of the landmark works in the history of 20th-century opera finally reaches this country. Einstein On The Beach was nothing like any opera that had been seen before, but then the 20-odd stage works Philip Glass has composed since have been nothing like it either. Taking its cue from director Robert Wilson’s experience of performance art, Einstein dispenses with narrative altogether. In one sense it is “about” the famous physicist and his discoveries, but more accurately it’s a seamless five-hour series of stage images conceived by Wilson, choreographed by Lucinda Childs, and underpinned by Glass’s score, performed here by his Ensemble. It’s a major event.
Barbican Theatre, EC2, Fri to 13 May
Andrew Clements