Jacco Gardner – live at Ancienne Belgique – May 13, 2012 – AB Live –
Jacco Gardner for Wednesday. Something melodic and mind-melting for the middle of the week. Jacco Gardner is a Dutch entry to the world of New-Psych these past few years. In a vibe not dissimilar from Tame Impala and Jagwar Ma, Gardner is also a one-person entity in the studio, but has a band join him in concert. Fortunately, all three have highly-defined visions and clear methods of going about doing it. In those kinds of tightly controlled situations it could run into the sterile, but in the case of Jacco Gardner, as with the work of Kevin Parker, their palette is pretty extensive and their ideas are intricate which make them very engaging and prime for repeated listening.
Needless to say, this relatively new hybrid of Psychedelia melded with Electronica is wildly appealing and it gives some indication of how wide the possibilities are if you’re open to new ideas and methods. Color me a fan.
The other thing I find appealing is how Jacco Gardner takes some influences (i.e. Syd Barrett and his arcane sense of lyric writing) and updates it – Barrett is a frame-of-reference while the execution and structure is all Gardner.
I am greatly enthused by this revisiting of the Psych genre through new-millennium eyes – I always though it was a genre that wasn’t fully explored the first time it was introduced, and some attempts over the years to re-capture it have always sounded a little like “tribute bands”, in that they didn’t add anything to the conversation. Jacco Gardner does. And that’s why he’s been a fascinating artist to watch and to see what he does next.
This concert, via the Belgian concert site Ancienne Belgique is from 2012, around the time Jacco Gardner was heavily touring and getting his message out.
I haven’t seen anything new coming out since his last album Hypnophobia which came out in 2015, nor have I seen any live gigs upcoming.
In the meantime, have a listen to this one. And if you’re not familiar, it’s time you checked him out.
