Tenderhost... LIVE!!

A booking for a sophisticated evening for two couples in the romantically candlelit surrounds of the Brixton Windmill. Scuppered by a leg break (and I'm not bemoaning England's lack of a spin bowler against New Zealand) and early morning working Pete and I are reduced to a duo but every cloud has a silver lining and Chris steps up to the plate. Or rather steps out to the Windmill. I arrive to find them outside the front as it's such a lovely evening and not being used to going out have left my wallet and mask at home. I borrow £20 from Chris to buy drinks (there's a Pogues song there) and a mask from the bar so I may do this more often. We go inside and it's pretty empty apart from the regulars who will leave before the band start so find a table with comfy seating. After about an hour catching up on life we wonder where everyone is, how many bands there will be and when they will be on. So we saunter out back to find the place mobbed with socially un-distanced youth all milling around hugging each other, enjoying themselves even, and with the bar staff having to squeeze past to deliver drinks. Crazy Covid Rules. We go back inside to avoid contamination and the band still not on. Pete has now got a 100 minute commute home but Uber are cheap so that's his plan so can stay til the bitter end. Eventually Tenderhost come on about 10.30 and treat us to a great set that swings between jazz, rock (note the comma) and an indie sort of feel. Great line up with keyboards and sax to raise the sound skywards. Difficult to pigeonhole which is good. If they were to go anywhere in my collection it would be next to Zappa as the hard jazz rock riffs (note no comma) along with the big band sound (not as in big band style but as in lots on stage) built songs into a Zappa-esque crescendo. A real shame we all have to stay seated and throw ridiculous shapes whilst sitting down rather than jumping up and sheiking our bouti's. God only knows how bad my dancing will be by the time I hit a dance floor again. I'll look like a dancing fool yalsa yalsa yalsa. They are great musicians too. And run a tight ship. All too soon (i.e. just after 11) they are off stage and with no encore that's our lot. We all part company, I tell the singer guitarist it was a great gig and resist telling him the band reminded me of Zappa. I've found that musicians never like it when you compare them to bands their granddad's liked, or ones they never heard of when they thought they were being original. So the big question of the night... does Jim like jazz? I've flirted with trad jazz and not averse to a bit in the background when drinking in a pub on a Sunday (those were the days). I even own a bit of ragtime Jelly Roll but I class that more as proto blues. OK I've even danced to jazz when infused with funk to the likes of Level 42. And of course head banged to jazz in the form of Zappa. But they were sort of randomly interspersed and I didn't see it as liking jazz and certainly avoided improv like the 'rona. But now the best bands are all delivering free form post indie post hard core jazziness... Black Midi, Black Country New Road, Tenderhost (who I'd love to see again whilst able to dance) and even creeping into FWFB. Maybe I always liked it - after all Ted Milton's Blurt are fantastic.

Apologies to the drummer (at back) and bassist (behind speaker) who were both very good.