Reviewed on Tuesday March 8
International Women’s Day delivered some powerhouse female performances to Oxford Art Factory. Punters and revellers may have come to see Ibeyi in their only (not to mention sold-out) Sydney gig, but seeing Sampa The Great was also quite the revelation. This truly was one of those spellbinding, never-to-be-forgotten gigs.
DJ JC opened the show. Filling the space with funkafied jazz and soul beats, he quickly had the crowd loose and relaxed. Perhaps too much so, for when Sampa The Great came onstage, she found it a bit of a struggle to get the audience to respond to her high-energy, transformative take on hip hop. But the Zambia-born, Sydney-based artist was not ready to give up without a fight. And through spectacular performances of such tracks as ‘Female’, ‘Blue Boss’, and a Hiatus Kaiyote cover, Sampa The Great turned it around.
JC then returned to the decks to spin some more of his signature sounds before Ibeyi arrived. Pronounce ‘ee-bey-ee’, and meaning ‘twins’ in Yorùbá – a Nigerian language spoken by their father and Buena Vista Social Club percussionist Angá Diaz – the French-Cuban duo took to the stage swathed in cool cobalt and with two candles in tow. What came next was just shy of a religious experience. Ethereal, transcendent and captivating, hearing the Diaz sisters’ voices live and in harmony was pure joy.
Their set opened with an exquisite Yorùbá-based chant. Fusing various musical cultures, jazz and beats, the pair filled their songs with a mix of instruments and sounds. Lisa-Kaindé sang lead and played the keyboard while Naomi handled the traditional Spanish-Cuban cajón, as well as the Batá drum.
Their performance of ‘River’, the lead single from their eponymous debut album, was mesmerising, as were the hand clap rhythms of ‘Mama Says’, new song ‘Fly’, and the divinely gorgeous ‘Ghosts’. And with that they blew out the candles and disappeared into the night.
