Polar Bear - 27th January 2012

After not particularly enjoying their show at Cardiff University a few years ago Polar Bear were back on form at the Cheltenham Jazz festival in 2010. We then headed to the recently revamped Welsh College of Music and Drama with high hopes.

Earlier in the day they had performed a master class to students who enthusiastically filled the auditorium. Modern Jazz is not everyone's cup of tea but we had been entranced by the controlled music boldness that they had presented on stage and CD. Today, however, they seemed determined to push the limits as far as possible. There were a few tracks I recognised from their albums but generally they seemed keener to explore new and more experimental work. When they announced the end of the set after an hour I was preparing to leave until my wife pointed out this was merely an interval.

Ultimately, though I was proved to be right. There were more gaps in the venue after the break as other audience members resisted the urge to stay. Any hopes I had that we would hear more familiar tunes were quickly dashed and we were forced to watch another hour of Leafcutter John trying to find increasingly weird ways to create noise.

The main disppointment of the evening was that Sebastian Rochford was reduced to being a purely pedestrian backing drummer. We were therefore robbed of the chance to see his idiosyncratic drumming style leading his group. Let's hope he fares better when he joins Kit Downes at the Cheltenham Jazz festival in May.