When Joan Armatrading emerged we immediately felt her presence. Dressed all in black loose-fitting clothes, she was an understated air of cool.

A musician since the early 70s, Armatrading has a vast back catalogue. Obviously she couldn’t play everything but she succeeded in appealing to nostalgia whilst also introducing new material.

The Charming Life, the title track from her latest album features her distinctive memorable melodies. Standout classics like ‘Drop the Pilot’ and ‘Me, Myself, I’ energised the audience, and (as any fan would expect)  ‘Weakness In Me’ and ‘Willow’ were emotional highlights of the evening.

Her between-song-speaking was sparse but what she did say was very witty. She charmed and entertained, whilst retaining her mystique.

Armatrading’s voice was so powerful and poignant; she moved from register to register effortlessly, there wasn’t a note out of tune. She was backed by three very proficient musicians on bass, keyboard/synth and drums who progressed every so often into psychedelic improv passages. Joan herself went though what seemed like a never-ending supply of guitars, electric and acoustic.

The quality of sound inside the Sage was seriously impressive and the mixing was impeccable. It was clear, rich, and immersive, never obtrusively loud.

The audience loved every minute of the length-generous gig and when they weren’t listening intently they were singing and clapping along. (I had supplementary backing vocals and a vibrating chair courtesy of the man behind me). In fact, the only drawback was that I felt too restrained in my seat. Some songs demanded dancing to!

Ivy Taylor

On the evening of May 4, Ninja Tune’s Bonobo – aka Simon Green – graced Hall Two of The Sage with his 7-piece live band, playing a set led mostly by three-pronged bass-brass-percussion downtempo catchiness.

Appearing on stage in almost darkness, the band played an atmospheric opener at once intensely and anonymously. As the warm, red back-lights illuminated heads and the glint of instruments, for the most part we were looking at unassuming silhouettes at work. As the set progressed, the lighting became more defined, the band more visible. This is indeed music to accompany a sunrise.

Bonobo’s latest album Black Sands is an accomplished work, rich in sound and anchored by the delightful voice of Andreya Triana, whose forthcoming debut album for Ninja Tune Green has produced. Triana’s voice is an elusive mix of soulful gravel coated in honey, and on stage she has a confident presence that rightly and literally takes centre stage; when not performing, the band became more of an ensemble, with no musician dominating – without the singer, there were no spotlights.

Triana, whose vocals filter Black Sands as India-born Bajka’s did Days to Come, sang “Eyesdown” and “The Keeper” from the new album, as well as offering her grounding, disciplined talents to “Days to Come”, “Between the Lines” and “Walk in the Sky”. Strong instrumental tracks included “Kiara”, “Kong” and “Black Sands” from the new album. From Days to Come, “Ketto”, “Recurring”, “Nightlite” and “Transmission 94” all featured. “Noctuary”, from 2003’s Dial M for Monkey, offered a relaxingly relentless sort-of would-be intermission halfway through.

I didn’t quite catch the names of Green’s individual performers, and for the sake of acknowledgement here, I wish I had. Each of them worked well in the intricate whole; Green himself stood mostly back-of-stage playing the bass riffs that so often drive his mostly self-instrumented studio efforts. A brief coda gave special solo time to the drummer and saxophonist-clarinet/flute player, whose almost jarring aggressive rivalry became somehow complimentary.

Michael Pattison

Tango Siempre concluded their “Malandras del Tango” UK tour in front of an attentive Sage Gateshead on Friday May 7. The ensemble featured Jonathan Taylor on piano, Ros Stephen on violin, Bimbi Urquhart on viola, Richard Pryce on double bass, Julian Rowlands and Victor Villena (the latter of Gotan Project) on bandoneon and Argentinian guest singer Guillermo Rozenthuler.

Led by Taylor’s frequent and insightful comments between numbers, the group played many covers of Argentinian compositions as well as a number of their own. The gig gained much by Rozenthuler’s quiet and charming presence.

As an ensemble, these musicians are quick to pay tribute to their influences, including Astor Piazzolla, whose “Vuelvo al Sur (Return to the South)” was covered with subtle conviction, as well as several traditional milonga compositions and “Pata Ancha”. “Café Dominguez”, meanwhile, displayed Rozenthuler’s vocal range effectively. The group’s encore was a cover of the Uruguayan composer Gerardo Matos Rodríguez’s famous composition “La Cumparsita”.

It was Tango Siempre’s (which translates to “Tango forever”) own compositions that most impressed, however. If there is a strong sense of workmanship about this bunch, it shines through not only in their debt to historical predecessors but in the discipline with which they compose their own pieces. “A Matter of Life and Death”, written by Taylor, is an evocative piece that, as its title suggests, offers a dual presence of lightness and darkness, of bounce and foreboding.

It was the final pre-encore piece, “The Warriors”, though, that most impressed. An epic of aggressive romance, both the composer (Taylor) and the on-stage performers took relish in the technical difficulty of the piece, which was driven as ever by a fierce, passionate delivery.

Michael Pattison