'Trance Percussion Masters of South Sudan' celebrates the joy of communal music making. The beating drums and hypnotic chants summon the ancient polyrhythms of Africa's newest nation. Surrender to Wayo's percussive musical potion with their pulsating debut album.
'Trance Percussion Masters of South Sudan' wasn't made by a soloist, by a band, or even by an orchestra - this album was made by a village. That very village nestles in the ever expanding outskirts of Juba, the capital of South Sudan.
During music-making, three villagers play the kpaningbo, a large wooden xylophone. Another man sits atop the gugu, a log drum, and alters its pitch by lifting his leg up and down. Other villagers circle around the ensemble, switching in and out to play the drums. Bells and other hand-drums are also passed from person to person at will. This relay race approach to percussive participation adds a tangible fluidity to every riff and figure, the mood and timbre ever changing and ever unique.
The sound itself is a woven tapestry of polyrhythms, each overlapping and edging in to the other. The driving beats recall the haunting repetitions of minimalism and the trance-inducing club beats of contemporary electronica. 'Trance Percussion Masters of South Sudan' is a quite simply killer compendium of thumping, exhilarating beats.
