For me, ‘best gig of the year so far’ goes to Joe Watson, performing in a pub basement to twenty-odd randoms and acquaintances. Experiencing his work made me feel a bit like a child on discovering that Santa’s grotto has suddenly appeared next to BHS in the shopping mall. Not only was I able to lose my sense of the room at certain times within the euphonic electronic noise but when I opened my eyes again there was the visual treat of an enlarged projection of Joe’s hands fiddling with parts that might have been nicked from a space-ship flight deck. read more