Search: Hailu Mergia

Before Hailu Mergia fled to America in 1981, his group Walias Band was a guiding light in Ethiopia’s thriving nightclub scene. In America, Mergia ended up driving cabs for almost 30 years, but h...

Every week, we’ll bring you a must-hear track from the Le Guess Who? 2018 line-up. This week, it's Ethio-jazz legend Hailu Mergia with a contemplative solo piano track. Together with the Wa...

Before Hailu Mergia fled to America in 1981, his group Walias Band was a guiding light in Ethiopia’s thriving nightclub scene. In America, Mergia ended up driving cabs for almost 30 years, but h...

We're very pleased to present you the curators and initial line-up for Le Guess Who? 2018. A gentle reminder: current 4-Day Festival Passes are available until Thursday, 7 June, and will increa...

(English version below) Voor de komende editie van Le Guess Who? (8 t/m 11 november in de gehele binnenstad van Utrecht, werkt de organisatie samen met VluchtelingenWerk, dat maatschappelijk par...

Having fled from the fundamentalists in their home country of Sudan, the original members of psychedelic group The Scorpios established themselves in London during the 80s. After releasing their self-...

Started out as a social gathering in their native township of Soweto, BCUC (Bantu Continua Uhuru Consciousness) is an South African alliance of guitarists, djembe players, flute artists, and spoken wo...

Listening to the life-affirming soul and vintage funk of London collective The Scorpios, you probably won't be surprised to find out most of its members originate from Sudan. After fleeing the fundame...

Jerusalem In My Heart has shared ‘Wa Ta’atalat Loughat Al Kalam Pt III + IV’ from the forthcoming album ‘Daqa’iq Tudaiq’. For this track, Jerusalem In My Heart asse...

Ever since their performance at Le Guess Who? 2018 has been confirmed, Alabaster DePlume's latest record 'The Corner of a Sphere' has been on high rotation in our office. We'd now like to introduce yo...

Raised in North Carolina, Kelsey Lu (although she prefers you just call her 'Lu') is the daughter of two devout Jehovah’s Witnesses. From a young age on, Lu was always encouraged to surround her...

In the mid-1960s, Art Ensemble of Chicago sprung from the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM). Ever since, they have been celebrated as one of the most remarkable free ja...

Over the past two decades, Rizan Said has made a name for himself as composer for all kinds of Syrian artists, as well collaborating extensively with Omar Souleyman. In the process, his distinctively...

Every week, we bring you a must-hear track from the Le Guess Who? 2018 line-up. As the festival is getting closer and closer, we dive deeper and deeper into this year's worldly, prismatic line-up. This week, we highlight the elated mix of Arabic rhythms, raw Eastern funk and vintage psychedelia of The Scorpios. Having fled from the...

Armed with a West African cross between a lute, bridge and harp, troubadour Sourakata Koite uses his special modified Kora to interpret his Senegalese roots. He is also a griot, which means he is a story- and history-teller and singer. Picked up by music blog and record label Awesome Tapes From Africa, Koite will soon reissue his debut al...

Songsmith Jessica Pratt’s captivating, wistful coo evokes a mirage-like warmth, seducing the listener into a state between dream and real time. Now, she announces her new album 'Quiet Signs'; the follow-up to 2015's 'On Your Own Love Again' will appear in February 2019 via Mexican Summer and City Slang.  Jessica Pratt now also...

Leading up to their forthcoming album 'For A Lark', set to be released on the exact same day as their performance at Le Guess Who?, King Champion Sounds has shared a new video for 'Memory Is Imagined'. Premiered via Louder Than War, this track is a deeply psychedelic and transformative song featuring heavy guitar action courtesy...

Formed by Kenya-born musician Ajay Saggar in 2013, King Champion Sounds are an impetuous, eight-headed band from The Netherlands and England. Fronted by the inimitable G.W. Sok (former singer of...

On her latest LP, the 80s Goth disco-inspired ‘Rebound’, Eleanor Friedberger creates a cinematic and eccentric dimension by adding layers of repetitive drums, sweltering synths, muted...

The Bogotá-based sextet Meridian Brothers offer a very distinctive and playful take on tropical sounds like salsa, cumbia and reggaeton in an electronic context. The band have now shared t...

During the latest edition of Berlin's CTM, two jazz pioneers and members of the AACM - Art Ensemble of Chicago's Roscoe Mitchell and music professor George E Lewis - spoke about th...

In this new breakdown-series we analyse and extract the groundbreaking work of pioneers in their line of musical duty. In this article, we explore Colin Stetson’s unconventional approach to the...

Last year, Circuit des Yeux released her fifth studio album 'Reaching For Indigo'; a deeply personal record and probably Haley Fohr's most fulfilled full-length to date. Now, Circuit des Yeux has...

In Consequence of Sound's most recent 'This Must Be The Gig' podcast, Eleanor Friedberger joined host Lior Phillips to talk about her experiences touring the world with The Fiery Furnaces, a...