Tigran tears it up with heavy high-concept Barbican thriller

“Death Jazz” was a novelty term that was being bandied about in the mid-2000s – with various broadsheet newspapers getting excited at the idea of jazz musicians going over to the dark side of metal. A lot has changed since then, not least a wave of seriously talented progressive metal bands emerging, namely Meshuggah and Animals As Leaders (not forgetting Cynic among many others), while jazz musicians have deepened their pool of influences into a vast universe of sounds beyond bebop. Which brings us to LA-based Armenian pianist Tigran Hamasyan, who first emerged with a series of beguiling solo albums merging his folkloric roots and his own wildly original take on contemporary jazz.  And while Tigran’s albums have alternated between spacious sets for ECM and electro-jazz fusion hits such as Shadow Theatre, Mockroot and The Call Within, nothing quite prepares you for the sheer magnitude and intensity of The Bird of a Thousand Voices. The studio album may have divided some critics, but it’s live iteration, making its UK debut at the Barbican tonight, is emphatic, dramatic and intense.

With a bewitching opening set from Jazz FM Award winning vocalist Alice Zawadzki – whose richly resonant voice’s overtones were enough to create a deep sense of harmony, despite minimal backing on violin and hand-drum – she set the scene with a haunting set of folkloric songs dedicated to nature. Tigran’s more thunderously elemental approach began delicately with a wistful piano theme, doubled via some of his virtuosic whistling, stilling the audience’s excitement to the point where, as the notes faded, you could hear a pin drop in the expectant atmosphere. The Bird of a Thousand Voices is a concept album inspired by an ancient Armenian tale in which a hero travels into unseen realms to find and bring back a mythical bird – whose thousand different songs travel the world to spread harmony – and as portentous as this sounds, the subsequent artful barrage of twisted time signatures, crunching heavy riffs and mind-boggling polyrhythms were performed as if the band’s lives depended on it. They were indeed on a mission of epic proportions.

The sonic thrills were all dispatched with po-faced panache by the dextrous Yessaï Karapetian on keyboards, while the heft of the rhythm section came from the unshakable six string bass playing of Marc Karapetian, and for Animals As Leaders fans a real treat, in the form of the band’s drummer Matt Garstka (pictured above), who cut a high precision path through the labyrinthine arrangements. With such cheery titles as ‘The Savior Is Condemned’ and ‘Prophecy Of Sacrifice’ – there’s a sense that Tigran’s tongue is slightly in his cheek, but there’s no doubting the conviction with which he and his band believe in this music. As if proof were needed, an Instagram story before the concert showed Tigran repairing a cut index finger with Super Glue, and a bloodied Steinway keyboard after the sonic battlefield of this gig. Little wonder, as the pummelling riffs kept coming on tracks such as ‘The Curse’, which built from a delicate, almost swinging piano rhapsody, before another pile-driving assault of odd metered jazz metal ensued.

While the album is a tightly scripted affair, the live show thankfully made space for some thrilling improvised moments, with Tigran standing up to play the two synths as his side – alternating between fizzingly funky synth bass and some dazzling solos, while Karapetian matched Tigran note-for-note on some of the most intricate and complex unison lines I’ve ever heard – many in the audience gasping at their audaciousness.

It all built to a peak on ‘Only The One Who Brought The Bird Can Make It Sing’ – its menacing synth bass line snaking away as the band sang in unison over the pensive half-time beat. This (of course) doubled to drum’n’bass speed – and ushered in some frantically heavy soloing, Tigran jerking his body as he surfed a wave of synth lines, Karapetian now seated at the piano, the pair bobbing up and down on this sea riffs, solos, beats and bass. It was the moment the band truly achieved lift off on this deliriously thrilling high-concept, brilliantly executed music. Where Tigran goes now is anyone’s guess, but it’s going to be hard to top this.