Twilight Sad/Hidden Orchestra

Edinburgh Pleasance, October 9

On paper (or screen, for that matter) the pairing of these two acts might seem utterly bizarre and misguided. Yet the two sets we got this evening actually complemeneted each other extremely well.

Hidden Orchestra are a five-piece, instrumental act. Their atmospheric smokey grooves at times evoke Bernard Herrmann’s soundtrack to Taxi Driver. Through in a mix of samples, jazzy trumpet and bass, and it feels like a soundtrack to a film that has yet to be made. Described by wiki as an electronic jazz collective, the muso, beardstroking nightmare that that throws up shouldn’t put you off checking out these guys (and gal).

Tonight’s gig is sold out (thank God for free tickets for humble reviewers!), and there’s an understandable sense of anticipation in the air. Twilight Sad are shortly to release their fourth album Nobody Wants To Be Here And Nobody Wants To Leave and those in the know are getting extremely excited. The set is a more stripped-back set as a three-piece (not an acoustic set), and even for those of us more used to seeing them at ear-melting level, the set they turn in is pretty special.

Because the album is yet to hit the shops, we get a mixture of new songs and what might be turned a greatest hits set from the boys. So as well as the likes of the title track of their latest and ‘It Was Never The Same’ we also get the likes of ‘I Became A Prostitute,’ ‘That Summer, At Home I Had Become The Invisible Boy’ (the first song they ever wrote for the band), and now classics like ‘Sick’ and ‘the Wrong Car.’

Self-effacing banter included, the intimacy of this show is something to savour. Having been privileged to hear the new album, it combines all the best bits of their previous three albums, much like tonight’s show and points us, excitingly, to what promises to be an even brighter future.