Alt-J - A Take Away Show

Alt-J were odds-on favourites to win this year’s Barclaycard Mercury Prize before it was even announced that they were in the running. With ‘An Awesome Wave’, the Cambridge-based band undoubtedly made one of the most striking records of the year, and in performance their songs are even more open and bright than they are on the glowing album.

In this lovely video shoot for La Blogothegue, the band members share their voices and their instruments with passers by, basking in the quiet haze of the afternoon as they perform their tracks Matilda and Dissolve Me. Aside from that voice, the most dazzling aspects of this performance are a small portable xylophone, the quiet skill of the performers and the astonishing sweep of scenery that forms the elegant backdrop. With the quiet bustle of everyday life fleshing out their sound, Alt-J slide effortlessly into place in this peaceful, everyday scene, just as their album is both calmly familiar and astoundingly, blisteringly new.

If you have seven minutes and twenty seconds to spare today, you’d do well to spend them here.