Cut by Concrete: Robert Logan at Moose Factory

I arrived at The George Tavern this afternoon just in time to catch Robert Logan performing to an almost empty room (people trickled in throughout the performance, by the end we had just about hit double figures). As I came in Logan was hunched over a Nord Lead 3 in a bright blue hoody, drawing from it sounds which reminded me of some of Karlheinz Stockhausen's later electronic pieces or the mid-80's Dr Who music of Dominic Glynn and Keff McCullough, though enriched with a post-rave palette of sounds and post-jazz rhythmic arsenal (Frank Byng of Snorkel accompanied on drums, using far more cymbals and far more ways of playing those cymbals than is usually thought necessary). Whilst the grinding ostinatos drew my mind towards the more industrial sounding tracks on Andrew Poppy's Beating of Wings album, the real time timbral shaping and throbbing low end led me to think of some of the spacier bits of dubstep on the Hyperdub label. As the set progressed, beats took over more and more and it became just that little bit more ... expected. Perhaps fewer people would get into Logan's music were he to reduce the dominance of these dance rhythms, but perhaps those that still did would listen closer.