SA PROMO Magazine gives you an overview of the SA talent on display in France. (You can click on the band name to go to their MySpace to hear their music)
Tumi & the Volume (14 April)
They’ve turned the globe upside down, with the voice of Tumi Molekane, pulsating Afro beats, hints of Miles Davis, house, good old American hip hop, kwaito and echoes of dub poetry.
340ml (15 April)
The four musicians that founded 340ml in Johannesburg a little over ten years ago, are originally from neighbouring Mozambique and they embody the complexities that make up the melting pot culture of Southern Africa – reggae, ragga, pop.
Gazelle (15 April)
Xander Ferreira was a South African reggae man by the name of White Lion before founding Gazelle – another kind of animal, another energy. Gazelle mixes organic and synthetic, with the pulsation of traditional music and the frenetic pace of synthetic rhythms. Afro-disco, afro-psyche, afro-futuristic, afro-world, Gazelle’s music is radical, and radically new.
Blk Jks (16 April)
Pronounced Black Jacks, they are an electrifying mix in which we can distinguish all of the urban music from the last 30 years, from jazz to dub, garage to mbaqanga, afrobeat to stadium rock. Come see the globalisation of rock, from a Johannesburg perspective.
Nibs van der Spuy (16 April)
Southern Africa is changing and several artists are seemingly writing the collective road journal in parallel with their own personal diaries. Nibs Van Der Spuy navigates between folk all the way to South African mbaqang music, between the fresh air of the Indian ocean and echoes of classic European guitar, from Zulu rhythms to rock melodies. He has recently released his third international solo album, A House across the River.
Ben Sharpa (17 April)
‘Masakela meets Neil Young’, boasts Ben Sharpa on one of his singles from a worldwide rap compilation. Ben is a native of Soweto, who grew up in Chicago and symbolises all the strengths that can come out of the global hip hop scene. His style accumulates orthodox rap and English grime with a delicate touch of African extravagance.
Playdoe / Sweat X / The Real Estate Agents (17 April)
A special mash up set of three of the most important personalities in the electronic music scene of Cape Town. Their names are Sibot, Spoek Mathambo and Markus Wormstorm. If Sibot is on the machines and Spoek is on the mic, they are called Playdoe, a colourful duo that mixes old school hip hop, booty music and breakbeats. If Markus is on the machines and Spoek is on the mic, then they are called Sweat X, and the set becomes more electronic, carrying house and breakbeats crossed with ghetto music. When DJ Sibot and Markus are on stage together, they constitute The Real Estate Agents, an abstract hip hop duo that plays everything from minimal to African Trance music.
