As it’s happening since 2001, for ten days in April, London sounds and plays Latino. The responsibility rests on ¡COMO NO! which, 15 years ago, started to organise one of the most chéveres Festivals of the London music scene.
La Linea has indeed brought to the British capital some of the finest, most eclectic and forward-looking Iberian, Caribbean, Latin and South American musicians and projects inspired by the sounds coming from those regions.
The 16th edition of the events will take its first (dance) steps at Oval Space on the 17th of April. In the Hackney venue, Cuban-Iranian project Ariwo will blend Afro-Cuban traditional rhythms with fine-grained Iranian electronica and introduce on stage the acid-house guru A Guy Called Gerald.
Two days later, Ana Moura will bewitch Cadogan Hall’s audience with fado-inspired bittersweet emotions and her kaleidoscopic voice. While on the 21st, Daymé Arocena will bring her soulful Cuban vocal richness to Rich Mix. On the following evening again at Rich Mix, La Yegros will keep her audience under the Argentinian nu-cumbia spell, thanks to her “magnetismo” and smooth grooves.
Then, it will be the turn of the boys starting from Brazilian MC Criolo. He will pay visit to London and Koko on the 24th of April (part of his five-date U.K. tour). Be ready for an outspoken and multifaceted performance, bringing together one of the most representative artists in the hip-hop scene, his cultural and musical wide-ranging inspiration and skilful stage-partners. If this wasn’t enough, he will be introduced by Congolese talent Baloji.
La Linea will decisively move North on the next day, when the referential tex-mex band Calexico will lead its fans and Barbican Hall through dilated and open-wide sound sceneries, desert sands and rolling tumbleweed.
Chile will have the arduous task to bring the Festival to a close and it will surely do it in style. The last two events of La Linea 2016 will be indeed animated by some Chilean poles-apart but intriguing musicians. On the 27th Chicho Trujillo will get everyone wild at Camden’s Electric Ballroom thanks to their uptempo beats, energy and indefatigable cumbia vitality. While on the final day of the event (28th of April), Adanovsky & Xavi y Los Imanes will dim down the Rich Mix’s lights with their refined songwriting and soft pop.
We will never get tired to repeat… ¡Que viva La Linea!
![Album Review: Ariwo – Quasi [MANANA Records; May 2019]](http://www.rhythmpassport.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/ariwo-quasi-cover-620x620.jpg)
A four piece, Ariwo is made up of: Hammadi Valdes from Cuba on percussion; Oreste Noda; Canadian Jay Phelps (a renowned trumpeter who has played with Hugh Masekela, Wynton Marsalis and Soweto Kinch, among others); and Iranian-born composer/producer Pouya Ehsaei. They specialise in bringing traditional rhythms together into a modern…
Artists: Ariwo![Album Review: Calexico – The Thread That Keeps Us [City Slang/Anti- Records; January 2018]](http://www.rhythmpassport.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/calexico-620x620.jpg)
Chicano / Mexican rock today is a long list of formidable bands which have produced memorable albums and songs. Calexico, a band from Arizona on LA’s Anti- Records, is such a band – one that has outed itself from the shadow of typical mass-rock to sculpt marvel works. Their new…
Artists: Calexico
This year, we only got a glimpse of the music bonanza offered by the Womad UK weekend. Our stay in Malmesbury consisted of a hit-and-run or a ‘toccata-and-fugue’, in-keeping with the musical topic, and saw us pay a visit to Charlton Park on the last day of the event. Still,…
Artists: Ariwo , Benjamin Zephaniah , Benjamin Zephaniah and The Revolutionary Minds , Chico Trujillo , King Ayisoba , Msafiri Zawose , Noureddine Khourchid , Noureddine Khourchid & the Whirling Dervishes of Damascus
They came, they played, we danced all night to their wild cumbia vibes! That’s, in a few words, the recap of the short, but intense, London visit of Chico Trujillo. Between one gig and another of their Euro tour, the Chilean band found the time and energy to turn Rich…
Artists: Chico Trujillo![Album Review: Ariwo – Ariwo [Manana Records, June 2017]](http://www.rhythmpassport.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/a2879113004_16-620x620.jpg)
Ariwo‘s eponymous EP may only be four tracks long, but the length of the tracks gives it more of an album feel and, indeed, one on an opus level. Bridging an extraordinary cultural and global gap, this quartet is one part Iranian and three parts Cuban and explores the rich…
Artists: Ariwo
It happened little more than a year ago. On a quiet April night, London was stormed by a cyclone cumbiero. Camden and the Electric Ballroom were battered by the uptempo rhythms coming from Valparaiso and branded distinctly as Chico Trujillo. The sound of the band from Vila Alemana (a few…
Artists: Chico Trujillo
That euphoric swelling an artist feels when they connect with their audience is what rumba musicians describe as ‘Manana’. The purity of this Cuban chemistry was the motivation behind the 2016 Manana//Cuba Festival in Santiago de Cuba, the Manana record label, and subsequently this month’s Barbican gig. Three friends are…
Artists: Ariwo , Dj Tennis , Obbatuké , Plaid , Soundspecies , Yelfris Valdés![Daymé Arocena – Cubafonia [Brownswood Recordings, 10th March 2017]](http://www.rhythmpassport.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/dayme-arocena-cubafonia-620x620.jpg)
Caribbean societies are often subject to a certain gaze, in search of exotica. The cultural region’s best musicians are those who break with fulfilling the expectations of such a gaze, and produce music rooted in artistry. Daymé Arocena is such a musician, and with Cubafonia, invites us into the realm…
Artists: Daymé Arocena![Album Review: Gilles Peterson: Havana Cultura Anthology [Brownswood Recordings, 2nd December 2016]](http://www.rhythmpassport.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/a2290789108_10-620x620.jpg)
This is the ‘anthology’ of modern Cuban music that embodies the diversity of a new generation of artists beyond the Buena Vista Social Club legacy. This is also the ‘anthology’ that embraces a good number of Afro-Caribbean rhythms – son, salsa, reggaeton, hip-hop, Latin jazz, among many others – linked…
Artists: Chillum Trio , Daymé Arocena , Elain Morales , Etian Brebaje Man , Francis del Rio , Gilles Peterson , Kerkstra , Los Aldeanos , Mala , Mayra Caridad Valdés , Ogguere , Sexto Sentido , Silvito el Libre , Telmary Diaz , Vince Vella
Despite jazz’s being born to warm weather New Orleans, a city full of “elaborate wedding-cake ceilings, wide sliding doors, tall French windows” to quote New Orleans native Truman Capote, the music has always adapted itself to cold weather living pretty well. If a life of surrounding swamps, deltas, briar patches,…
Artists: Andrew Cyrille / Bill McHenry Duo , Arturo O’Farrill , David Virelles , Daymé Arocena , Ilhan Ersahin , Imany , Julien Labro Quartet , Michael Formanek Quartet , Ravi Coltrane , Somi
“This is NOT world music, this is OUR music! You can’t put me in a box just because I’m black! You can’t put me in a box because I’m African and I’m proud of what I am! Brighton, if you are with us, raise your finger!” With these few words,…
Artists: Baloji
Usually it would be rude to reveal a woman’s age, but there are always exceptions. Especially when it comes to an impressive young musician, composer, arranger and choir director who, at the age of 24, has already released two albums, toured the world, signed for Gilles Peterson’s label Brownswood Recordings,…
Artists: Daymé Arocena
The historical Electric Ballroom in the heart of Camden Town, was indeed a ballroom on April 27th. Few bands are able to make the audience dance from the beginning until the very end, but Chico Trujillo is definitely one of them, with their music making it physically impossible to stay…
Artists: Chico Trujillo , DJ Cal Jader , Rokola
It was billed as one of the highlights of 2016’s La Linea Festival, but Criolo and Baloji gig at Koko went above and beyond all expectations. The event was the unequivocal proof that hip-hop has a thousand faces, and the remarkable ability to adapt and absorb different cultures to spread…
Artists: Baloji , Criolo
Ariwo are a little-known, and newly-established, world fusion act. Led by sound designer, Pouya Ehsaei, they are a quartet of celebrated instrumentalists exploring Afro-Cuban, Iranian and electronic atmospheres. Their ever-growing list of accolades and projects is immense, including trumpeter Yelfris Valdes’ participation in the Buena Vista Social Club, and Latin…
Artists: A Guy Called Gerald , Ariwo
WOMAD UK 2016 edition will also be the 10th on the grounds of Charlton Park, that’ why the organisers are already going all out to celebrate the anniversary… You just have to take a glance at the first name announced for the upcoming 34th edition of the event, which will take…
Artists: Afriquoi , Aziza Brahim , Baaba Maal , Baloji , Dom La Nena , George Clinton , Hot 8 Brass Band , Ibrahim Malouf , Moh! Kouyaté , Sidestepper
Criolo’s UK tour has 6 dates:
– 21st April at Junction 2 (Cambridge)
– 22nd April at The Lantern at Colston Hall (Bristol)
– 23rd April at Belgrave Music Hall (Leeds)
– 24th April at Koko (London)
– 25th April at The Haunt (Brighton)
– 26th April at Band on the Wall (Manchester)
thanks for the correction and details!