The sound sys­tem at Oslo bar in Hack­ney is one of the best you’ll encounter at Lon­don’s small­er venues, and it was par­tic­u­lar­ly effec­tive for the dense, envelop­ing sound of Jane Weaver. The front row is per­haps a tad too close to the stage and although I tried to remain absorbed in the music it was dif­fi­cult to not just be an observ­er, but I could­n’t help being entranced by Weaver’s stage pres­ence and out­fit – a sculpt­ed sil­very retro-future top and glit­tery eye makeup.

Jane Weaver is cur­rent­ly enjoy­ing a surge in pop­u­lar­i­ty with con­sis­tent air­play on Radio6 Music, notably mate­r­i­al from her album The Sil­ver Globe. It was this body of music that took up most of the hour-long set, that is, after the open­er, 2010’s The Fall­en By Watch Bird,  with its eerie and trib­al refrain sum­mon­ing us to accom­pa­ny her on a mys­ti­cal, musi­cal journey.

Set against a mus­cu­lar, dri­ving bassline and wall of dense synth/guitar, Weaver’s voice adds a spacey, ethe­re­al light­ness, the two ele­ments bal­anc­ing each oth­er, cre­at­ing almost vis­i­ble lay­ers. There’s the Hawk­wind riff-laden Elec­tric Moun­tain super­im­posed with Weaver’s Gold­frapp-style whis­pery vocals. As for the sul­try, play­ful Mis­sion Desire, this sure­ly has all the right com­po­nents for a Bond theme.

One of the joys of see­ing an artist live is the way it can alter your appre­ci­a­tion of their music. The num­ber which I felt stood out on The Sil­ver Globe was Argent, but after see­ing Weaver live, it’s Your Time in this Life is just Tem­po­rary which I’m now cap­ti­vat­ed by: its depth and dra­ma, the Kate Bush-style wail, it is a dis­til­la­tion of what makes Weaver dis­tinct and unique.

Weaver comes across as a refresh­ing­ly ground­ed and mod­est artist. She engages in a lit­tle ban­ter between songs but it looks as if there’s a strict time pol­i­cy so there’s no time for any extend­ed off-the cuff ram­blings. For an encore, Weaver takes up the gui­tar, and the five-piece play a cou­ple of num­bers, which includes her lat­est sin­gle I Need a Con­nec­tion.

THE SMALL PRINT

WHO: Jane Weaver, sup­port Ten­der Prey
WHEN: 22 Octo­ber, 2015
WHERE: Oslo, Hack­ney, London
TICKETS: £10 approx

Catch the rest of Jane Weaver’s tour at

Octo­ber
23    The Exchange, Bristol
24    The Green Door Store, Brighton
24    CLWB IFOR BACH, Cardiff
Novem­ber 
28   Var­i­ous Brighton venues, Muta­tions Festival