After supporting Fat Freddys Drop last weekend at the Enmore, England’s Belleruche returned to Sydney to headline a much more intimate gig at Will & Toby’s. This was the first time I’d been to this venue, and contrary to some bad press it has received in the ITM Sydney forums recently, I found it to be a most agreeable space. The vibe of the night was closer to that of a house party than a club night, due in no small part to the kind of crowd that Niche Productions events attract, but the intimacy of the venue no doubt contributed too.

Trevor Parkee kicked off proceedings with a tasteful mix of funk, afrobeat and disco flavours. He has a very serious demeanour behind the decks, but he always plays some seriously good music, so that’s easily forgiven. Mr Glass was up next with an excellent mix of rare funk, the highlight of which was an extended mix of 45’s, and unlike Boca 45 a few years back, he didn’t feel the need to advertise the fact. No fuss, just dope tunes and skilful mixing.

Belleruche are here to tour their most recent album Turntable Soul Music, released on indie nu jazz/funk label Tru Thoughts. Belleruche are a trio consisting of DJ Modest on decks, Fabulous on guitar and Kathryn deBoer on vocals; however, Modest was forced to miss this tour for some undisclosed reason. Micky Morphingaz was called in to cover DJ duties for the night, and given that Melbourne’s DJ Thief was performing this role the week before, full credit to all involved for pulling together such a tight performance.

The set opened with the sublime Balance, a track based around Fabulous’ ample skills on guitar and the spine-tingling vocals of deBoer. Turntable Soul Music is a particularly apt description of the music Belleruche make, although they happily switch between blues and jazz with equal aplomb. Their version of Duke Ellington’s jazz classic It Don’t Mean a Thing (If it Ain’t Got That Swing) was phenomenal. Fabulous arrived at the venue wearing a Rancid shirt (a seminal US Punk band) and thanks Django Reinhardt and Charlie Parker in the liner notes of their album, which gives some idea of the breadth of the influences that the band draw from. Casual mention was also made of the fact that DJ Vadim is remixing one of their tracks for an upcoming 7-inch. Although I missed the title of the track, this will undoubtedly be worth looking out for.

The venue emptied out appreciably after Belleruche finished, but there was a treat for those who stayed. Robert Luis, A and R and co-owner of Tru Thoughts came on and played an absolutely astounding set. As the crowd thinned out he dropped some great tracks, opening with a version of Marvin Gayes Sexual Healing, a reggae version of The White Stripes Seven Nation Army (at least the second one I know of – this wasn’t The Dynamics) and plenty of older Quantic. The highlight was The Hoop Loop, a track from Luis’ own album made under the Me&You moniker with TM Juke.

This was the kind of night that leaves you smiling for days afterwards. The vibe was good, the people friendly and there for the music, not just to be seen. Most importantly however, the music was uniformly fantastic. Sydney needs more of this kind of thing.