Accidental Meetings X Nyege Nyege in Bristol
The second of three week-long collaborative residencies came to a head at Trinity Centre with Ugandan drum unit Arsenal Mikebe, percussion powerhouse Valentina Magaletti, improv firebrand Dali de Saint Paul and dub disruptor Ossia.
Accidental Meetings lineups have been ambitious since they first came barrelling into the scene some four years ago. Starting in Brighton and now primarily splitting their micro-festival arrays between London and Bristol, they’ve carved a unique path through club energy and live experimentation, joining the dots between leftfield soundsystem spasms, electro-acoustic tinkering and an absolute abundance of drums. With such a sharp instinct for matching distinct sound palettes like a bass-drenched tasting menu, it felt inevitable they would start to actively engender new musical ventures on a fundamental level. This Autumn, a trio of events in Bristol are demonstrating exactly that as they channel a successful Arts Council bid into a cross-cultural collaboration between alumni from Uganda’s authoritative Nyege Nyege label and a strong cast of experimental heads from around the UK.
Each event is the culmination of a week-long studio residency between an AM-curated collective. This particular review centres around the results of the second session, where Kampala-based Arsenal Mikebe were holed up in Factory Studios in Bristol with Valentina Magaletti, Dali de Saint Paul and Ossia. Their quest for common ground came to a head on November 9 at Trinity Centre, a church-turned dancehall which forms something of an epicentre for Bristol’s dub scene. Powered by the monstrous Sinai Soundsystem and flanked by a top tier selection of DJs, the seven-strong crew quietly took to the stage just shy of midnight as AM residents i-sha and k means faded down their outstanding opening round of minimalist wub and skittering, steppy curveballs.
There was something instantly powerful about the sound and image of Arsenal Mikebe’s Ssentongo Moses, Luyambi Vincent de Paul and Dratele Epiphany, outlined in a flicker of red light, dressed sharp in black suits singing almost accapella to a full house on a Saturday night. Ossia later told me Epiphany and Vincent de Paul also lead choirs back home, which figures. Guided by just the most subtle bed of reverb and drone, the three held this minimalist mode for a good 10 minutes before the music started to move. The crowd were rapt from the off, wholly reset to a stock still position as a blank canvas for every ripple of energy that followed. Magaletti, surely one of the most important percussionists at work in leftfield music right now, teased the odd flicker of brushed cymbal, but the incremental shifts in the set were ruthlessly restrained in this opening section.
Dali de Saint Paul, best known around town for her EP/64 improv project, started to merge her own incantations — “it is about you,” “it is about us,” — with Arsenal Mikebe’s voices. At some point, Ssentongo Moses left the mic to move to the curious instrument behind — a stunning drum sculpture at the centre of the stage which forms the central conduit for Arsenal Mikebe’s music. It was envisioned by Henry Segamwenge, taking the principles of the 808 and unpacking them into a visceral live tool for the three Ugandan artists to perform on. Their project is completed by Portuguese producer Jonathan Uliel Saldanha, better known as HHY, who was manning a laptop on sound design duties for the performance, tweaking bass tones and working in subtle details.
From a patient first few steps, the drums started to creep in, the energy cradled so carefully from that beatless opening but growing and swirling through polyrhythms shot through with considered threads of dubwise synths and bass. The sonic stamp of Young Echo champion and lifelong dub provocateur Ossia was definitely detectable in the icy textures, splashy reverbs and low-end pressure rounding out the space behind the steadily intensifying percussion.
From the first subtle sways in the opening stretch through a steady communal head nodding to tentative limbs flicking upwards, every incremental step up in intensity was visible in the crowd’s physical dialogue with the performance. De Saint Paul was a couple of steps ahead, already a whirling dervish on stage adopting the role of MC and toasting the energy as it exploded into a blizzard of high-pressure drum workouts.
The obvious trap with these sorts of projects is that so many players flinging their sounds into the mix can make for a muddled, muddied whole, but the week of workshopping clearly paid off. The collective seemed to make space for each other, which gave them the flexibility to dynamically shift into distinct phases of the set that felt pointed and purposeful. That meant that, by the time they reached an inevitable crescendo of hardcore drum punishment that stretched the immensity of the Sinai Soundsystem, the blistering assault on the senses felt entirely welcome. There was a widespread sense of ‘what the fuck just happened?’ amongst the crowd — an experiment with little to no forewarning that frankly shot well past anyones expectations.
It was the kind of experience that absolutely demanded the physical moment, in that space and time. The idea of listening to a recording at home felt hollow in comparison — some things are meant to be experienced in the flesh. Speaking to Saldanha afterwards, he reflected on the instinctive, primal quality of this kind of music compared to more typical electronic club fare, and the metaphysical effect it can have on a crowd. From the starting point of the voice — that first and most universal of instruments — to the deep rooted relationship we all have to rhythm and percussion, this was a sound that speaks on a fundamental level well past genres and scenes. That’s something every participant in the project acutely channels in their own practices, and the resulting outburst as their spirits intertwined was a marvel to behold.
Photo credits: Screenshots courtesy of Leon Arifin.
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