Seeing My Baby might still be my all time favourite stumble-upon discovery.

It was a heady night, crisp out with the moon sitting high. Eyes swimming with good liquor, it was time for me to take my leave of the bar and go uptown. A jazz musician friend said oh, hey, check out the gig at Laundry if you’re heading that way.

Yeah, cool.

Imagine my delight to traipse in, grinning like a slippery idiot (the world’s friend at this point), to find a cosy three piece crammed into the corner, barely separable from the throng surrounding them, lost somewhere between the tail of a chorus and the steady hypnotic wind of some voodoo infused jammed out bridge explosion.

I was enraptured by the sound, rising like smooth and fat smoke to fill the room. It evoked images and emotions that I wouldn’t properly reconcile until some time later when I was all sleek on rum, catching some dusky tunes with the locals in Louisiana. But here it was on Cuba St, in Wellington, intoxicating the crowd.

They’re playing again this coming Thursday at Meow as part of their new album’s pre-release tour, which promises a “time warped, transcendental blues rave”.

I reckon you’ve got every reason to believe it.

Tickets are $15: http://www.undertheradar.co.nz/gig/52729/My-Baby.utr