Elf Traps + Shunya

"Spiritual jazz meets glitch, jungle and live electronica" Saturday 5th December Elf Traps \+ Shunya 7pm - 10pm The Jam Jar, Bristol ELF TRAPS is a new project formed by Mercury Prize nominee Rob Turner (Mammal Hands, former–GoGo Penguin) and Liviu Gheorghe (former–Matthew Halsall / Gondwana) where beat-driven electronica collides with spiritual jazz and psychedelic, otherworldly tones. On stage, live drums and synths are intertwined with drum machines, laptops, samplers, chopped vocal fragments and custom robotic percussion, creating a hypnotic exchange of rhythm, texture and improvisation. The music twists and evolves in real time, moving from meditative ambient passages to explosive, adrenaline-charged rhythmic peaks. No two performances are ever the same. Emerging from Manchester’s underground scene, early championed by Graham Massey (808 State) AND Giles Peterson, Elf Traps channels Squarepusher’s rhythmic chaos, Four Tet and Floating Points’ textural electronics, and Pharoah Sanders’ spiritual openness — creating music that’s raw, vibrant and rich with emotional depth. SHUNYA (akaAlan Keary) is a musician and artist from Limerick, Ireland. Whether performing entirely improvised sets to sold-out crowds at Village Underground,London; writing and performing orchestral arrangements for South African cellist Abel Selaocoe’s BBC Prom at the Royal Albert Hall, or creating dense electronic remixes for ex–Blue Notejazz giants GoGo Penguin, Keary constantly showcases his ability to slip seamlessly between styles and genres—balancing on the line between recklessness and precision. His music and live performances showcase his command as a violinist, bass guitarist, and vocalist, all of which meld seamlessly with electronics and drum machines, moving between futuristic Irish folk, jazz-tronica, and ethereal sound worlds. ‘enigmatic new discovery’ - Rough Trade Records