The new Twelves line-up played an extended set earlier this week featuring material from their forthcoming new album at the Green Note in Camden as part of the London Jazz Festival. Formerly known as “Twelves Trio” these days the band includes guitar protagonist Rob Updegraff, so clearly four does not a trio make.

Sensitivity and vitality were the over-riding impressions from their set. From the off Updegraff played a series of shimmering Marc Ducret-like harmonies that gently eased the audience into an attentive state of mind.

As his phrases developed he pin-pricked clichés with a narrowly off-kilter timing in his delivery. As if to highlight the group’s cohesion, tenor saxophonist Mark Hanslip’s opening statements were given shading by Updegraff’s subtly warped chordal voicings. Tim Giles on drums and Riaan Vosloo on double bass added a further dimension by playing with free sensitivity while managing to cultivate a rhythmic pulse for the others to react to. An up-tempo bop strut emerged during ‘Kerfuffle’ allowing Hanslip to expand his melodic ideas in a direction plotted somewhere between the two pillars of Joe Lovano and Wayne Shorter. Conversely, ‘Jiggery Pokery’ found Vosloo and Giles pursuing an almost Roots-esque jazz-based hip-hop beat that got heads bopping and toes tapping.

However, the quartet’s capacity for sensuality is arguably their USP. This was most ably demonstrated during the two folk covers; ‘She Moves through the Fair’ and ‘Shallow Brown’. Melodies were gracefully delivered by Hanslip while dreamy chord sustains by Updegraff evoked early 70’s John McLaughlin as the band edged towards a prog-rock sound reminiscent of Soft Machine. Elegant rhythmic thrusts by Giles provided suitable vivacity for soloists to feed-off in a way that was crucial for the energy created. With the release of this material due early next year on Babel Records Twelves are definitely a band to catch in 2010.

– Joseph Kassman-Tod