“Ambient” is difficult to define and to convey live. But noise is all around us, something Tim Hecker knows well.

Just about to release his seventh album, the Canadian has become a poster kid for live ambient – or noise, or whatever you want to call it – although he would refute such labels for his layered, laptop ’n’ drone emissions completely.

But in the spooky confines of St Mary’s Church, he created a fierce ambience that left the audience stunned into silence after his 45-minute suite.

Performing in total darkness, the crowd was disorientated and totally entranced. The church was the perfect venue, its stone pillars and vast space chiming the phenomenally loud patterns and scree back and forth.

Sound was left to reverberate wherever it pleased, leaving the fact the audience was essentially watching two small laptop lights in pitch black irrelevant.

At the close, Hecker walked from the stage and a heavy door slammed behind him. By the time he emerged to admit in a frail human voice that he would never do an encore, it was a moment that brought everyone back down to Earth.