WAI8
KMRU presents WAI8
Sound artist KMRU takes over Cloud Nine to present WAI8, an eight-hour durational performance.
Joseph Kamaru, aka KMRU, is a producer whose practice is grounded in the discourse of field recording, noise and sound art. By capturing the overlooked vitality of natural and everyday environments—first in Nairobi and then in Berlin—he has developed a rich and evolving sonic archive that forms the foundation of his work.
First realized in 2023, WAI8 established a foundation of sustained listening and temporal immersion, examining time and attention through the practice of waiting as an active form of engagement. Its iteration at Le Guess Who? 2026 features nine performers, positioning waiting as a space where sound is allowed to breathe, decay and resonate over time. The artists joining KMRU on stage are: Aho Ssan, Carmen Villain, Elvin Brandhi, Koshiro Hino, NEXCYIA, ouri, Samora Ogeda-Chemba Obyerodhyambo and Whatever The Weather.
The project explores sonic temporality by investigating how sound can stretch, fracture, loop, or dissolve linear time, positioning sound not only as material but as a temporal agent. Through exchanges across noise, silence, drones, rhythm, voice and waveform, WAI8 privileges the in-between: thresholds where sound becomes barely perceptible and listening itself becomes a compositional act. It extends listening beyond the purely auditory toward spatial, sensorial and environmental awareness, embracing openness and resisting narrative closure, climax, or resolution. In doing so, it challenges conventional concert formats and emphasizes drift, pause and gradual transformation.
Dive into the program of artists invited by KMRU via leguesswho.com/line-up.
Photography in the header by Dawid Makowski
