Wednesday 13 July 2011

New: CongopunQ - It's the same old talk


I came across this act while I was writing about the Les Suds a Arles festival, and thought they certainly deserved a mention.

CongopunQ has been around since 2008, inspired by Congotronics, the series of discs released by Crammed Discs featuring acts from Congo Kinshasa like Konono No1, Kasai Allstars and Staff Benda Bilili who mixed traditional African music with an electro groove, a rural African trance sound played out using modern urban means.

CongopunQ consists of Cyril Atef, Berlin-born French drummer and percussionist, working along with Constantin Leu, AKA Monsieur Cong

Atef has worker wide variety of musicians including L’Orchestre national de Barbès, Brigitte Fontaine and Alain Bashung, and has been a long-time collaborator with Mathieu Chedid who is best known by the name -M-

He is also known for his part in the interestingly-named duo Bumcello, which won the 2006 Victoure de la Musique award for best electronic/groove/dance release of the year for their Animal Sophistiqué release.

CongopunQ released their debut album Candy Goddess - described as an 'unidentified musical object'- in November 2008.

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