Channel Zero, AKC Metelkova Mesto
Sat 30 May | 22:30
Druga Godba 26 will be brought to a close by a musician who’s been on our wish-list since his debut record, Maghreb United, back in 2018. No matter, he’s here now and inviting us all to Club Tounsi, as his latest album for (who else but) Glitterbeat is called.
On this record, Denmark-based Tunisian Sofyann Ben Youssef, or AMMAR 808 to his friends, explores the vibrant folk tradition of his native country – or, more particularly, a specific genre of it called mezoued, which is named after the ancient goatskin bagpipes that create the music’s sinuous melodies and traditionally accompanies popular singers backed by clattering hand drums. The music originates from the 1950s, which was when a wave of migrants from rural areas of Tunisia surged into the capital in search of work. It’s the music of the suppressed, the repressed and the deprived, and has long been looked down-upon by polite Tunisian society.
‘I want to grab energies from the past, from the root of the music and then project them to the future. It’s like a bridging between places and times,’ says AMMAR 808, who takes this festive tradition and repurposes it for the 21st century with pulsating bass lines, sparkling synths, crunching distortion and, as is only right for an act with 808 in his name, the mechanical rhythms of the mighty drum machine.
We certainly won’t be holding back as the fezzani takes over. This is a new word in the Druga Godba lexicon and refers to a rhythm found in Tunisia and nowhere else (‘The Tunisian rhythm par excellence’ as AMMAR 808 calls it). There will be mayhem, so put your hands in the air for AMMAR 808 and DG 26!
