WOMAD

Nickens Nkoso & Kasaï Masaï

From Congo, Kenya, Tanzania

Red-hot Congolese rhythms to goNickens Nkoso’s been around the block. Over the course of his career, the singer/percussionist from the Democratic Republic of Congo has lined up alongside the undisputed heavyweights of the country’s music, including Papa Wemba, Koffi Olomide, Kanda Bongo Man, Mose Fan Fan and Samba Mapangala. Nickens is now leader of Kasai Masai, a sharp-shooting London-based six-piece who take the steeped-in-tradition acoustic music of the remote equitorial villages of the Congo and inject it with a sharp measure of urban modernity – and no doubt a flavour or three born out of life in the English capital. Boasting djembe, guitar, sax, bass, drums and MC (with the addition of impossibly energetic dancers a distinct possibility), Kasai Masai successfully marry a respect for vintage grooves with an overwhelming urge to move the dancefloor. This is the sound of the old and the new, of the countryside and the city, from deep in the heart of Africa.