One of my favourite gigs of 2018 – in fact the last five years.  A Tom Misch and Jorja Smith double bill of young and emerging UK talent. Three days before this concert I was in a Starbucks and was captivated by the music they were playing – I asked the barista who it was. Tom Misch he replied. Who?

I listened to his debut album ‘Geography’ and realised I’d heard a few of the tracks already on Giles Peterson’s weekly radio show on BBC 6 Music which I listen to religiously. This album for me is astounding – every song is strong. It’s got such a lovely laid back vibe and is very tastefully produced and arranged. I’d say it’s quite sophisticated with it’s use of jazz funk riffs and composition that really sets it out from a lot of music being made. There’s even a jazzy instrumental cover of Stevie Wonder which gets a massive ‘big up’ from me. It seems to be coming out of the whole jazz movement that is emerging from the UK right now as audiences look for something a bit more than five geezers with guitars bashing out the same old sounds and cliches since the 1960s.

Live he doesn’t disappoint. You can tell Tom and his whole band are serious musos with years of training and practice under their belt. Tom is even accompanied by a violin player for all the string parts which again makes the sound really stand out for me. He gets the perfect balance between up tempo funk work outs and the more laid back ballads. The show was amazing – catch him whilst you can. He’s already coming back out to Los Angeles in October 2018 to play the much bigger Palladium so it seems like the buzz is growing.