“We’ve got plenty of time,” says Alberto Bravin. “We’re not in a rush.” There is an interval, he adds, so you can go to the bar — “but you can’t leave.”
He is joking, but there is a truth behind it. This is no ordinary Big Big Train show. The first half celebrates the band and some of their wonderful songs. After the interval, they play Woodcut, the album they released earlier this year, in full.
“Salisbury Giant” builds slowly and brilliantly, giving each new detail room to settle. “London Plane” is cinematic, its horn section beautifully judged, the keys and acoustic passages adding still more colour. Seven musicians are doing astonishing things, yet the golden thread is class: every turn serves the song. It is everything prog should be, and that is before the closing guitar solo.
Big Big Train have always found stories most bands would walk straight past. “Swan Hunter” is another example, its subject given weight by incredible harmonies and Bravin’s astonishing vocal range. “Kingmaker” is long and involved, but has a sense of fun too. There are frog sound effects, and Bravin smiles that this might be a metal club, but “in five minutes we’ll smell the same.” Oskar Holldorff gets his moment on keys. Every member is a virtuoso in their own way, though it never feels like a jam. There is always a destination.
“Lost Rivers of London” feels like a deep cut in every sense, sprawling as far as the capital’s suburbs. Then “Drumpet” gives Nick D’Virgilio the chance to display his prodigious drumming chops alongside Paul Mitchell’s trumpet. Together they make something Latin, primal and wonderfully alive.
There is something ominous about the start of “East Coast Racer”. Once it kicks in, it becomes a compelling 15-minute journey through just about everything wonderful about this band: glorious, multifaceted and full of changes that somehow belong together. It feels like the curtain closing on the first half. Instead, they end it with a singalong.
When I reviewed Woodcut in February, I called it “prog from the top drawer, but worn lightly”. Hearing it played live only strengthens that impression.
“The Artist” is a sensational way back in. It has energy and skill to spare, and Bravin gets a solo, but it is the depth beneath all that which stays with you. “The Lie of the Land” starts drawing the story together, with Clare Lindley’s voice adding another colour, before “The Sharpest Blade” brings out its folk tinges.
An almost haunting piano line runs through “Albion Press”. The plot keeps moving, but so does the music: one moment the keys have an ’80s feel, the next the band hits perhaps the heaviest passage of the night. Lindley’s violin on “Arcadia”, by contrast, is simply gorgeous.
“Second Press” shows how much more strident these songs can be live. The solos and harmonies have room to grow, while “Warp and Weft” underlines the skill involved in making such elaborate music feel natural. “Chimaera” offers something like a palate cleanser before “Dead Point” pushes the story forward again. There is enormous ambition in it, and Bravin revels in every turn.
By “Light Without Heat”, picking a man of the match feels impossible. Every part is vital, and there is a Steve Rothery quality to the guitar that makes this one especially affecting. The layers of “Dreams in Black and White” are astonishing; above the band, the lights twinkle like starlight.
Then “Cut and Run” gives them licence to cut loose. It has an old-school feel, as if they could have played it on The Old Grey Whistle Test. The contrast with “Hawthorn White” is stark. This one lurks in the shadows while Holldorff and Lindley trade lines on keys and violin.
“Counting Stars” starts gently, hesitant and poetic. Bassist Gregory Spawton gets his turn on vocals, and when the song finally bursts into the light — quite literally, with the stage lighting — it is a beautiful thing. “Last Stand” dots the i’s and crosses the t’s. Fittingly, guitarist Rikard Sjöblom gets a vocal turn as the story reaches its end, and the band allow themselves the big finish it deserves.
You need to take all this in. At times, the concentration on stage makes it feel almost like a recital, and you are struck by how good these seven people are at their instruments. More than that, though, you are struck by what they do together: they turn all that ability into songs. Even with an entire concept album to play, they make the evening feel like a hot, sweaty, fun rock ’n’ roll gig. There really aren’t many better bands at it.
