BERSA DISCOS @ echoplex

Posted by Brianna - filed in 18+, echoplex, events

theverybest

It’s easy to be cynical about this process of easing Western listeners into Esau Mwamwaya’s music– RIYL Vampire Weekend, Ruby Suns, other English-language artists cribbing from African music– until you hear the music itself, and in particular the whole of he and Radioclit’s free mixtape, Are the Very Best. Once you get through the indie-guarded gates, Mwamwaya and Radioclit are open here to everything from South Africa’s marabi and kwaito music to Hans Zimmer scores to French and American hip-hop to Michael Jackson– and in most cases, it’s the tracks that lean furthest away from the familiar that work best. The regal “Sister Betina”, BLK JKS collaboration “Salota”, and Radioclit productions “Funa Funa” and “Kada Manja” are as immediately likable as the rest of the mix. And, frankly, much of the best-known source material here– “Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa”, the AiH backdrop on “Kamphopo”, the True Romance via Badlands theme on “Chikandi”, the loathsome Beatles song “Birthday”– is either simply a blueprint or sketch for other ideas, or is vastly improved by Mwamwaya’s treatments.

Mwamwaya’s cultural cross-section is no accident. Although he sings in his native Chichewa, he met Radioclit’s Etienne Tron when he sold the producer a used bike in a London junkshop. Despite that, Mwamwaya and Radioclit’s talents lie far beyond cultural fusion and curatorial skills: In short, they’ve created just about the most listenable and flat-out enjoyable record of the year– and one that happens to dovetail nicely with the urgency for and overdue embrace of morally guided globalism. – Pitchfork

With:
Rainbow Arabia || Listen
Bersa Discos

@ Echoplex
enter at
1154 Glendale Blvd
Los Angeles, CA 90026