"That giant roar, when I walked on stage, was the concert." A happy David Axelrod, sits backstage, at Royal Festival Hall, shaking hands with fans, who lined up to meet one of their heroes. He, trying to make sense of one of his live performances in 25 years. A performance that saw Axelrod lead the twenty-six members of “the orchestra” through some of the most hypnotically beautiful orchestra music of the “rock” era. As chronicled in 91, axelrod’s fortunes turned around radically in the 90s, when artists like DJ shadow and Dr Dre rediscovered the hard edge transcendental beauty of music and started sampling everything from his work with cannonball adderley to such late “60s solo masterpieces as song of innocence and songs of experience. Tonight, a crowd of mainly 25 to 35 year olds were eager to see the man in the flesh, and hear exactly what “ that Dr Dre sample” or such revered tracks as “Holy Thursday” sound like when played by a full orchestra. Axelrod does not disappoint, programing a greatest hits set heavly culled from his late 60s work. He gets the mood right by taking the stage with a raised fist salute and smile, delivering an opening “rap” during “that Dr Dre”, 1968’s “The Edge”, in which, he announces, “I hate samples,” before pointing. Out that it’s also the checks from these samples that allowed him to come to London and perform. The audience appeared a little in awe of their surroundings, unaware that, at it’s heart, this is a jazz performance and we really should be applauding the soloists. They were entirely taken aback when Richard Ashcroft takes the stage to deliver the vocals on “Holy Are You”, Axelrod’s 1968 composition “for” the Electric Prunes. His vocal is one of hushed, understated beauty. The next track is a revelation. “So Low” is the only new track of the evening and comes across like some jazz Stravinsky reinterpreting duke ellington’s oriental suite, has fans confusedly pondering which lost 70s Axelrod classic it’s taken from. The rest of the evening settles into a mood of nocturnal, big city transcendence, from the blissful, driving melancholy of Cannonball Adderley’s “Tensity”, to the “Holy Thursday/Urizen” double header from Song of Innoncence, from Axelrod’s R&B la to Blake’s vision of altered london, all restless soaring spirit, anchored to a hard-eyed jazz-club back-beat. It's safe to say that the record-bag kids have never seen or heard anything like this. Despite the standing ovations, there was no encore. “I don’t do encores” he shouted. Das Vinyl kommt als schickes Gatefold-Doppelalbum und enthält zusätzlich die DVD mit der kompletten Show!