Moses Boyd
(Picture: Getty Images for Dunhill)“I used to come here and do kickboxing,” Moses Boyd told the crowd half way through his show at the Albany arts centre in Deptford on Sunday night. “I got kicked once and that was the end of it…”
Having realised he wasn’t one for hard knocks, this weekend’s gig from the Mercury Prize-nominated drummer, producer and bandleader instead showed off the incredible dexterity and subtlety he’s learned as a musician in the intervening years. Across two 45-minute sets at the south east London venue, Boyd lead his superb five-piece band through a show that was cosmic, joyous and musically dazzling.
The show came as part of the ongoing celebrations for Lewisham’s role as London’s Borough of Culture for 2022. This musical element of the celebrations, a series called Love is Attention, has been curated by south London stalwart and The Invisible mastermind Dave Okumu, who is bringing the likes of Jessie Ware, Rosie Lowe and more to venues across the borough and curating nights showing the eclectic range of music this corner of the capital continues to offer.
Boyd was born and raised in Catford, but it’s suitable that this show took place in Deptford, a neighbourhood that has become an epicentre of the capital’s flourishing jazz scene. Every Wednesday throughout the Borough of Culture series, local heroes Steam Down have been hosting their notorious nights at the Matchstick Pie House down the road from the Albany, which prioritise collaboration, community and musical freedom.
These fundamental ideas were also evident at Boyd’s show. From behind the drum kit, Boyd let saxophonist Quinn Oulton, guitarist Artie Zaitz and keyboardist Renato Paris trade melodies and solos while directing the flow of musical traffic gorgeously, then letting himself take the limelight for an exceptional drum solo to open Axiom.
After running through virtuosic renditions of tracks from 2020’s Dark Matter, Boyd and his band were then joined by Sons of Kemet’s effervescent tuba player Theon Cross, another key player in the capital’s jazz revival, for an ecstatic rendition of Rye Lane Shuffle. “This man redefined what the lower frequencies can do,” Boyd told the crowd of his childhood friend, with Cross duly going on to prove him right via a bone-rattling solo.
Ahead of last song BTB, Boyd explained how his ancestors from the West Indies brought soca rhythms across the world that have informed his musical education. “These rhythms saved my life,” he told the crowd. The celebrations for Borough of Culture aim to shine a light on the music coming out of Lewisham, but – as Boyd showed at his fantastic show – these are sounds and scenes fed by the entire world and as such their reach feels limitless.
