Given how many members the band has had over its long existence, there will always be a running joke as to who’s who in The Fall? One thing we can say for certain is that the pretty, poised Greek woman on keyboards, the one who returns hand-in-hand with frontman Mark E Smith to the stage for the encore, is Elena Poulou, his wife of a decade-and-a-half. Alongside her, the band create a rollicking, potent brew. It is, however, her husband who everyone’s come to see and, somehow, his slurred, haphazard, and unpredictable performance caps the whole thing off.

After Judy Dyble left Fairport Convention in May 1968, it was her replacement Sandy Denny who picked up critical kudos as the ensuing years unfolded. Dyble, though, did not drop off the face of the earth and, if credits were looked at closely enough and margins examined, it was evident she had a career in music as fascinating and often as admirable as that of Denny. Widespread consideration of her role in British folk and folk rock began after the issue of her album Enchanted Garden in 2004. Before that, Dyble’s last commercial release had been in 1970.

Featuring the usual, divertingly eclectic mix of singers from the worlds of jazz, pop and soul, last night’s Jazz Voice announced the opening of the 2015 EFG London Jazz Festival with a programme that satisfied both aficionado and newbie alike. Arranged, scored and conducted by the unceasingly inventive Guy Barker, the epoch-spanning celebration of jazz-related anniversaries, birthdays and milestones stretching back from 2015 was hosted by the mellifluously voiced BBC Radio 3 presenter, Sara Mohr Pietsch.

There were no shouts of “You’re a genius!” from the Hammersmith crowd last night, as there have been earlier in Newsom’s tour. But there were the shrill gasps of astonishment and adulation you would usually find at a One Direction gig, or during a tense rally at Wimbledon, not from a mature, West London audience attending a recital of harp and song. Live, her voice is fresh, and the accompaniments clearer than on record, which allows the incredible range and ambition of her compositions to stand out.

 It’s one of the greatest rock songs of the Seventies. The production is dense and the churning guitars are thick with tension. Beginning with a minor-key riff suggesting a familiarity with The Stooges’ “No Fun”, the whole band lock into a groove which isn’t strayed from. The tempo does not shift. Rhythmically, this forward motion has the power of a tank stuck in third gear. The voice suggests John Lennon at his most raw. Two squalling guitar breaks set the Jimi Hendrix of “Third Stone from the Sun” in a hard rock context.

When it comes world music there are few countries bigger than Mali in terms of impact and popularity. (Cuba probably ranks a close second.) It’s from Mali that Songhoy Blues hail, one of the few major new successes in world music to emerge in the past few years.

Sometimes appearances can be deceptive. The frontman on stage looks as generic it gets. His scruffy beard, retro specs, baseball hat, shapeless jeans and the bulging outline of a mobile phone stuffed in his trouser pocket don’t add up to suggest that his band Tahiti Boy & the Palmtree Family are going to be anything distinctive. But the studied casualness belies what actually takes place musically. This is exceptional.

Until last night, critics had a clear view of Esperanza Spalding as the virtuosic jazz bassist and singer, whose prodigious composing, performing and bandleading made her one of a small and precious group capable of re-making serious and popular jazz. In a rare moment of triumphalism, jazz critics love nothing more than recalling the fury of Justin Bieber fans, whom Spalding beat to the Best New Artist Grammy in 2011. Best get that story out the way before we go any further.

Levitation: Meanwhile Gardens

It’s Patti Smith week. Her second memoir M Train is out. To mark its publication she spoke on Wednesday night at a Guardian event of her love of Morse, Lewis and George Gently. On Thursday she had an appointment with U2 at the O2. Last night (and again tonight) Smith was back at the Roundhouse, where she first performed in the UK in 1976. The question on nobody’s lips was whether, at 68, senior citizenship has remotely withered the savagery of her voice.