I wanted you to give it a whirl, in his memory.

Esbjörn Svensson Trio – Believe, Beleft, Below

Saw the Esbjörn Svensson Trio on Sunday night at the Usher Hall, I hadn’t been quite so excited about a gig in a long time! After the brilliance of the show at the Barbican in 2005 I knew what to expect and I had that strange nervous chill that only gets you when you have your hopes up.

Support came from Chris Bow(the kind you take, not tie)den, and though the acoustics of the Usher Hall are supposed to be superb they really didn’t help his trio’s sound - it was cavernous, the drums too thin, the bass too light. They were good once they’d got started, especially when he soloed, though I prefer Polar Bear & Acoustic Ladyland’s approach to the whole ‘build an atonal lick into a fast-paced climax’ thing. Better in a smaller venue perhaps.

The sound seemed better for E.S.T., maybe they were just more careful about the balance between their instruments. Svensson spent the show either hunched over his keys or swallowed inside his piano, plucking strings and dissonance, bassist Dan Berglund was positioned to reflect a bright light from his scalp and drummer Magnus Öström’s sex face was just an added bonus.

Musically they were everything you might expect, opening with a wonderfully intense version of Tide of Trepidation, covering a good portion of their new album Tuesday Wonderland and closing with Dolores in a Shoestand (though a strangely reluctant audience refused to clap along). A long version of Definition of a Dog was maybe a bit extravagant, especially with the five, six minute white noise interlude, but that aside the show was practically spot on - melodically fantastic and rhythmically perfect. They really do their songs justice.

For me this was far more about reaffirming their brilliance; to have usurped their previous performances would have needed something out of this world. And of course, with some brand of Swedish efficiency, they managed it with honours. On a scale of Marmite to Marmalade it definitely ranks above crunchy Peanut Butter.