Going Bongo
Straight from Dar es Salaam (Tanzania), here's JAGWA MUSIC: a crew of 8 youngsters playing intricate grooves at breakneck speed on traditional & makeshift percussion, a keyboard player going wild on a battered vintage Casio, and three relentless front persons: two breathtaking, spectacular dancers & a charismatic lead vocalist/MC, belting out songs about survival in the urban maze, unfaithful lovers & voodoo. Catch a glimpse of their unstoppable energy HERE
Known as Mchiriku, their music derives from popular dance styles, which underwent a mutation when the band adopted low-cost electronic keyboards and their gritty, distorsion-laden sound. JAGWA MUSIC are not only immensely popular in the poor suburbs of their hometown: their electrifying appearances at European festivals such as Roskilde have created a sensation. Some call this "Afro-punk", because of the DIY attitude and the creative use of noise. Some refer to minimal or trance music, to the sexual energy of kuduro & mapouka... Let's simply welcome the advent of one of the most exciting bands around.
Available on disc for the first time in Europe and North America, "Bongo Hotheads" presents the richness of their rhythm based wildness. Buy this incredible recording now at the Crammed Discs store!
Known as Mchiriku, their music derives from popular dance styles, which underwent a mutation when the band adopted low-cost electronic keyboards and their gritty, distorsion-laden sound. JAGWA MUSIC are not only immensely popular in the poor suburbs of their hometown: their electrifying appearances at European festivals such as Roskilde have created a sensation. Some call this "Afro-punk", because of the DIY attitude and the creative use of noise. Some refer to minimal or trance music, to the sexual energy of kuduro & mapouka... Let's simply welcome the advent of one of the most exciting bands around.
Available on disc for the first time in Europe and North America, "Bongo Hotheads" presents the richness of their rhythm based wildness. Buy this incredible recording now at the Crammed Discs store!
SOME REACTIONS FROM THE PRESS:
"Seriously amazing, multi-rhythmic amazingness being amazing.
If Konono are a cup of tea in first class on a high speed train, Jagwa are like being strapped naked to the windshield" (FREQ)
"A spirited, exuberant debut like nothing you’re likely to have heard before" (The Arts Desk)
"Crazed, urgent stuff, with an incendiary show" (The Observer)
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Do you know your CHICHA?
From gritty backwaters and backrooms, from retro equipment and deceptive nostalgia, the multi-national mixing pot of Brooklyn, NY's CHICHA LIBRE (featuring members of Si Sé and Combustible Edison) returns with Canibalismo, an expression of the edgy craving that is fueling a pop rethink around South America and causing a stir in the rock-tired indie scene.
This album of originals, while tackling obscure mathematics and psychedelic inventors, takes its cues from Peruvian chicha, a style that put surf guitar, rainforest psychedelics and Andean flavor to a cumbia beat with open-minded exuberance. CHICHA LIBRE has learned from and teamed up with the unsung mad geniuses of the music—such as Ranil and Los Shapis, who were featured on Roots of Chicha— then taken it as a springboard to join the international stream of tropical experimenters from Colombia to Argentina.
From gritty backwaters and backrooms, from retro equipment and deceptive nostalgia, the multi-national mixing pot of Brooklyn, NY's CHICHA LIBRE (featuring members of Si Sé and Combustible Edison) returns with Canibalismo, an expression of the edgy craving that is fueling a pop rethink around South America and causing a stir in the rock-tired indie scene.
This album of originals, while tackling obscure mathematics and psychedelic inventors, takes its cues from Peruvian chicha, a style that put surf guitar, rainforest psychedelics and Andean flavor to a cumbia beat with open-minded exuberance. CHICHA LIBRE has learned from and teamed up with the unsung mad geniuses of the music—such as Ranil and Los Shapis, who were featured on Roots of Chicha— then taken it as a springboard to join the international stream of tropical experimenters from Colombia to Argentina.
Canibalismo,, now available at the Crammed Discs online store, solidifies the exotic sounds and eclectic chemistry of CHICHA LIBRE.