With it is driving beat and spidery, dual guitar lines, Congolese band Loboko is exactly the kind of band that would have a packed crowd on their feet at the Folk Festival Dance Pavilion. They are coming to Richmond due to the efforts of an emerging alliance of local and regional promoters, expanding performance opportunities for world musicians.
Getting the chance to see them up close, among the gilded skeletons and fairy lights at Révéler Experiences, is an exceptionally rare opportunity. While they call their music “post-Soukous,” their approach is actually a return to fundamentals for an African style that has, over the decades, scaled up, sped up and become encrusted with electronica.
Guitarist Yohni Djungu-Sungu and drummer Morgan Greenstreet developed the band’s retro-future concept while playing behind successful contemporary Soukous artists.
“We felt the environment wasn’t really the setting we wanted,” Greenstreet says. A journalist, DJ, and expert in the music of the African diaspora, Greenstreet has a deep understanding of the development of the style. “Contemporary Congolese music has a very big and dense sound. There are usually there are a lot of instruments and singers at the same time. We wanted to draw on the sound of the ’70s bands, which were much smaller and did not have horns.”
Djungu-Sungu adds that they wanted a sound that was more authentic, guitar-based, and not incorporating so many synthetic keyboard sounds. “We wanted to slow down the tempo a little bit, and have the drums be very organic,” he says, adding that they kept talking about it, then started writing material and the idea really solidified.
Loboko means “hand” in Lingala, one of the many languages in the linguistically diverse Republic of Congo. “Yohni Loboko is my stage name,” Djungu-Sungu says. He was given the name early in his career from a bandleader impressed by his proficiency in playing the intricately syncopated guitar lines. “I got it while I was first performing and it stuck. Morgan thought it would be a good name for the band. I thought a band needs several pieces [i.e., fingers] to work. It was maybe kind of cheesy, but it made sense.”
The band played its first gig in November of 2019, just months before COVID put live performances on ice. They released their first single in 2023 and played a showcase in New York City last January for Secret Planet, one of the promoters of this, their first tour.
Secret Planet is the result of an alliance between Washington, DC-based Jim Thomson, owner of Electric Cowbell Records and one of the founding members of Bio Ritmo (who also drummed in RVA bands Alter Natives and Gwar) and Olivier Conan, owner of venerable Brooklyn musical hotspot Barbès and its eponymous record label. Together they started the Secret Planet showcases at Drom, a club in NYC’s East Village, as an adjunct to the annual APAP [Association of Performing Arts Professionals] conference, an event bringing together a global array of bookers and performers.
“Olivier and I share the same taste, and he does what I do, only at New York speed,” Thomson says. “We put together this unofficial showcase for six or seven bands that are not well known but may be on their way. We do it festival-style; each group gets a 30-minute set and we keep the cover cheap so people can easily come by and check out artists. It is great because often I hear the next day that they have signed with a booking agent [after] somebody saw them at our show.”
Thomson explains that they decided it would be cool to have a consortium of like-minded presenters on the East Coast who could help book tours. They started in Western Massachusetts, then Pittsburgh, then State College [PA]. “We have someone in Philadelphia, I am in DC, and I am really eager to get something going on in Richmond,” he says. For Loboko, Secret Planet is working with Jim Bland of Plan 9 Music and JAMinc, and Bill Lupoletti and Radhika Bhatt from WRIR Richmond independent radio. “And I always check in with Marlysse [Rose Simmons] from Bio Ritmo and Miramar,” he adds.
Luckily for us, with a NY-DC-RVA-and-beyond connection, there will be increased opportunities to hear global music in Richmond beyond the Folk Festival and random, if welcome, tours and university performances. (Next on the local Secret Planet schedule is Colombian cumbia musician Yeison Landero in January.)
This week the focus is on the African guitar sounds of Loboko. In addition to Greenstreet and Djungu-Sundu, the lineup includes second guitarist Nikhil Yerawadekar and bassist Brice Armel Adjo (replacing Ngouma Lokito, the veteran Soukous player who appears on the tour poster.) “[Adjo] is going to blow everybody away,” Greenstreet promises.
This may be the first time they have played in Richmond. “I remember being on tour in Virginia before,” Djungu-Sundu says. “But I was just another player in the band. At this point it is a blur.” They will get a bit of a chance to get acclimated, and introduce themselves before the performance, in an interview on Lupoletti’ s Saturday afternoon “Global A Go-Go” program on WRIR.
So what can people expect from the show?
“It’s really energetic music,” Greenstreet says. “We are working hard to have a good time. There is the artistic aspect, great guitar lines. They are going to have joy in their hearts. And one thing that I know, for sure: They are going to dance.”
Loboko plays Révéler Experiences on Saturday, Oct. 26. Doors are at 7 p.m. and music at 8 p.m. Tickets are $20 in advance, $25 at the door. Seating is on a first come basis.
