Les Disques Bongo Joe, Black Sweat Records and Sing A Song Fighter are teaming up to present Zodu Were, the collaboration between Zouratié Koné and well known Astral Synth Transmitters aka DJ soFa
Following Lulanga Tales, soFa elsewhere returns as The Astral Synth Transmitters, this time alongside Burkinabè musician Zouratié Koné. Rooted in the Griot tradition, Zouratié brings voice, kora and ngoni into dialogue with soFa’s leftfield electronic production. Recorded in Brussels, Zodu Were moves between acoustic and electronic, ancestral and futuristic: an “ancient future” where tradition remains alive by being transformed, transmitted and sent somewhere new.
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Following Lulanga Tales, his collaboration with Nyati Mayi, Brussels-based DJ, producer and tireless digger soFa elsewhere returns to The Astral Synth Transmitters for a new encounter. This time, his path crosses with Zouratié Koné, a musician from Burkina Faso rooted in the Griot tradition. Brought together through Brussels’ musical underground, the two found common ground in the studio, bringing together practices that may seem distant at first, but share the same refusal to treat music as something fixed in time.
Zouratié Koné comes from a lineage in which music carries memory. In the Griot tradition, songs, stories and knowledge remain alive by being passed from one generation to the next and continually finding a new place in the present. Since childhood, Zouratié has devoted himself to his instruments, particularly the kora and ngoni, not only playing them but also building them himself. On the other side of the conversation, soFa deploys through The Astral Synth Transmitters a language of synthesizers, machines and distinctly leftfield production. Recorded in Brussels, Zodu Were grew from this exchange between two practices, two histories and two ways of keeping music in motion.
The result is neither an exercise in preservation nor an attempt to simply dress traditional music in contemporary production. Zodu Were is built on the movement between acoustic and electronic, ancestral and futuristic, warmth and cold, human and machine. Following the dialogue with Nyati Mayi on Lulanga Tales, The Astral Synth Transmitters continues the same idea of collaboration: creating a space where distinct musical worlds can meet without one disappearing into the other. An “ancient future” where tradition is not something to look back upon, but a living force capable of being transformed, transmitted and sent somewhere new.
expected to be published on 11 Dec
