London Afrobeat Collective
"10 years and 5 albums... I don't know how I missed it!"
Molten brass and cascading pulses, the LONDON AFROBEAT COLLECTIVE arrive like a warm wave. Their music overflows, it spreads out, it rises. It flows through the body like a joyous procession, an urban trance that makes bricks and hearts vibrate. Eight musicians and a voice that cleaves the air, a brass band in full ebullition, an energy that overflows the frame and repaints the walls with groove. The funk escapes, the Afrobeat takes root, the live sound becomes obvious. They don't play on stage, they are the stage.
PROG IS SOMETIMES JUST A PHIL...
Where and when did you first hear them?
Ten years on the road, five albums, a live energy that shakes the brass... and yet, they had escaped me! It was while programming K.O.G that the tour manager slipped me their name, as if it were an obvious thing to come. Finally, last summer, I saw them live on stage.... And then everything fell into place. The desire to program them because they embody what the festival stands for: real people on stage, real sound that overflows.
3 words to describe their music?
Fela Kuti. Funkadelik. Zappa. Three beacons that illuminate their universe: Fela's incandescent Afrobeat, Funkadelik's psychedelic madness and Zappa's virtuoso free spirit. The result is a brass band on fire, a collective trance where the brass roars, the bass pounds and the vocals split the air. A raw, jubilant energy that overflows the stage and invades the world. The whole world!
When you close your eyes to their sound and imagine a scene, what does it sound like?
You enter a smoky jazz club in the bowels of London, red velvet and dimmed lights. Bodies and souls are still wise, seated, attentive... Then the rhythm settles in, seeps in, takes hold. We get up, we let loose and everything explodes and blooms with a sultry soul train. A dancing procession through the city, instruments as banners, Afrobeat as sparks. And the day rises to the sound of their brassy trance. What a night.
A Line-up anecdote?
Admittedly, their arrival had been hampered by the logistical complexity of eight tickets and cumbersome organization. But the desire was there, latent, ready to blossom. This year, they tick (more than) the 'band-that-occupies-all-the-stage' box and definitely embody what the festival stands for: real live, real people, real sound.