QPAC  - Mon Jun 29

Ladysmith Black Mambazo are a nine-piece South African traditional vocal group famous for coffee commercials and collaborations with Paul Simon. What they aren’t famous for is being funny, which is tragic because they’re hilarious. While singing they keep slapstick routines going in the background, one member bumping another, one going off-mike for a dance move then coming back to the wrong position and being waved over by his neighbour. Each of them builds a personality over the course of the night, both through gags and their spontaneous and ecstatic dancing. They high-kick, jump, shake and throw their legs out like Cossacks; you almost wish their microphones weren’t on stands so they had more room to move. Most of their songs are in Zulu and although they teach us a few words, mostly what comes across are broad topics rather than specifics. Love, politics (they do Homeless and dedicate a song to Mandela) and religion (they finish with Amazing Grace). I don’t believe in God but I believe in bass. Great rolling gobs of it pour over us in the kind of harmony that’s easier when four of the singers are brothers – unstoppable waves of it with a cumulative effect that’s trancelike and transformative.

JODY MACGREGOR

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