Oct. 1 | Crystal Bay Casino | Crystal Bay, Nev.
Eno Williams will soon be enjoying the Nevada sunshine.
“It’s been raining all day,” she says from her neighborhood south of London. “Good, old English weather.”
The captivating, yet soft-spoken, international vocalist is bringing her eight-piece supergroup Ibibio Sound Machine to Lake Tahoe for a night of dancing, connection and bliss.
Born in London, Williams spent most of her childhood in the former Nigerian capital of Lagos and the coastal city of Uyo surrounded by family, food and music. She remembers her grandparents taking her to colorful dances, parties and masquerades where the contemporary American pop of Aretha Franklin, Kool & The Gang and Michael Jackson intermingled with the West African funk and jazz of Cameroonian saxophone and vibraphone superstar Manu Dibango and legendary Afrobeat pioneer Fela Kuti.
From a young age, Williams’ mother organized her and her sisters into a singing group. They grew up listening to and reciting children’s folk stories passed down by relatives in the Ibibio language of southeastern Nigeria.
“We are all about hope, positive energy and bringing people together. Without electricity there is really no love. We need love. Electricity is what sparks that. And we get it from a connection with each other.” –Eno Williams
“She was always encouraging us to be really hardworking,” says Williams. “She and my grandmother were our role models, our female heroes. They taught us about believing in ourselves, whatever you are putting your mind to and saying you can do it, if you stick with it. When I decided to go into music, she was encouraging and supportive the whole way.”
After secondary school, Williams moved back to London where she joined in church choir and tribal theater. In 2013, a chance collaboration with Australian producer Max Grunhard inspired Williams to begin rewriting the stories of her youth in her mother tongue.
“It’s an ancient language,” says Williams of Ibibio. “It’s quite rhythmic and very musical. It’s got inflections, the high pitch and the low pitch. It has deep meanings. To relate something back to Ibibio would take two or three words in English.”
Ibibio Sound Machine is a synthesis of golden era West-African disco, vintage London electro and postmodern punk. Lyrics from traditional sources are joined to modern themes, all set to a throwback blend of polyrhythmic 1980s Afrobeat and 90s drum and bass that sounds somehow timeless yet futuristic. The band features an all-star cast of global musicians including esteemed Ghanian guitarist Alfred Kari Bannerman of highlife groups KonKoma and Osibisa, dynamic Brazilian percussionist Anselmo Netto and Berklee College of Music trumpeter and keyboardist Scott Baylis.
Watch Ibibio Sound Machine’s video
The band released their self-titled debut in 2014 followed by three more LPs and a live album. They’ve since joined Coldplay at Wembley Stadium, rocked All Points East festival with Gorillaz and opened for Beninese singer, songwriter and activist Angélique Kidjo at Lincoln Center.
Their most recent release, “Electricity,” is a polished, intense rumination on the earth-shattering events of the last two years produced by London synthpop icons Hot Chip. The energetic, multifaceted upshot sounds something like Talking Heads jamming with Whitney Houston and Nigerian funkmaster William Onyeabor at a back-alley London club in 1989. The heart-thumping, kaleidoscopic soundscape is vibrant, euphoric and borderless.
“It’s reflective of the time we are in,” says Williams. “It’s about the emotions we’ve all been feeling. It kind of lent itself to that darkness and uncertainty. There is a sense of everything running through a current. We get into that electricity and charged atmosphere we’ve had the last two years.”
On the Crystal Bay Club stop of Ibibio Sound Machine’s North American tour, expect a night of transcendent beats and universal harmony that only world music can create. Dreamy hip-pop duo Terror Jr opens the show.
“We’re here for people to go to a different place, forget their reality for a minute and be transported into a trance dance,” says Williams. “I think to be honest, we are all about hope, positive energy and bringing people together. Without electricity there is really no love. We need love. Electricity is what sparks that. And we get it from a connection with each other.” | crystalbaycasino.com
