Antipodean bastions of soulful Drum & Bass, Shapeshifter lock down one of their live performances from back in September 2006 at the Christchurch Town Hall with the city’s Symphony Orchestra in accompaniment.
Now Drum & Bass can always do with a good dose of orchestral strings (think 4Hero) and this recording is no exception. Ethereal strings float over unsequenced kick-snare patterns in complete equipoise resulting in six tight, polished ‘versions’ of the band’s back catalogue. Victoria Kelly’s arrangements work particularly well on the soaring opener ‘Good Looking’ and ‘Tapestry’ with guest vocalist, Lisa Tomlins, ‘When I Return’ and ‘Bring Change’ are the album’s standouts.
Live albums vary in their success in terms of translating beyond the arena. But getting beyond that, this CD got me thinking about the ephemeral nature of live performances and an Eric Dolphy quote sampled by DJ Cam on Mad Blunted Jazz “When you hear music, after it’s over, it’s gone in the air. You can never capture it again…” Shapeshifter Live does justice in preserving crucial aural and visual elements of the performance somewhat awarding the CD as a finished product aesthetic equivalence. P.Digsss’s stage presence and his effortless intensity as a vocalist in a live setting transfer brilliantly into recorded format as does the audience-performer interaction. The CD’s booklet contains some stunning black and white images of the performance by Pat Shepherd each with an overlay of indigenous Polynesian design in clear varnish by Inia Taylor.
Shapeshifter Live demonstrates that live albums in the electronic genre can be somewhat aesthetically equivalent to the arena experience.
Shapeshifter are touring nationally in September. See them.
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