The Comet Is Coming – Metropol, Sunday, November 6
London jazz dynamo Shabaka Hutchings typically appears as very like a percussionist or a rapper as a saxophonist: He spends lengthy stretches working at one or two pitches at a time, targeted much less on melody than on rapid-fire articulation, spraying staccato notes like syllables throughout the nooks and crannies of a beat. The Comet Is Coming, one in every of a number of ensembles Hutchings leads, headlined Sunday’s present on the Metropol. There was an air of science-fiction ceremony about their efficiency, with keyboardist Dan Leavers dressed form of like a Jawa—face largely obscured underneath a robe-like high-fashion hoodie—and beaming out synth traces you possibly can really feel in your chest. The settings that Leavers and drummer Max Hallett conjured for Hutchings had hints of dubstep, home, and techno, but additionally, extra obliquely, of Seventies heavy metallic and progressive rock. In contrast to Hutchings’ different initiatives, which use largely acoustic devices, the Comet Is Coming make electrical music by design. Hutchings’s low register, particularly, finds new energy in that format, with every reedy bass observe seeming prefer it would possibly set off an avalanche.
Ivy Sole – Metropol, Sunday, November 6
Backed by a powerhouse reside drummer, Philadelphia rapper-singer Ivy Sole got here out like a ball of kinetic power on Sunday, effortlessly commanding a stage in any other case occupied by full bands. As a performer, she is all party-starting charisma; as a author, she conveys depths of narrative and feeling. On “Simple to Kill,” what at first looks as if a battle-rap boast—“Why these n****s really easy to kill?”—seems to be a lament for the way in which American society so typically treats Black lives as disposable. The Native Tongues-reminiscent “Harmful” approaches the topic of unrequited affection with uncommon candor and empathy: “You didn’t love me,” Sole raps at one level, “however you tried.” Sole spent most of her set rapping, however confirmed equal prowess as a singer—particularly on the breezy and melodic “Bamboo,” which sounded a bit like an outtake from Channel Orange.
