Le Guess Who? Festival Stories

How do we envision a future where our presence is uncertain, denied, erased? What might it feel like, if revenge were to become a practice within that future? Can the haunting carry our rage, our despair, our ancestral weight, and our spiritual practices?

DJ and sound researcher Raziyah Heath's work aims to uncover the cross pollinations of Afro-diasporic (sub)cultures and sonic threads, focusing on the variations, range and intersectionality of the experiences that result from this.

In this podcast, the fourth in a series of conversations recorded at Le Guess Who?’s Sound & Culture Summit, Raziyah Heath presents a hybrid DJ/live set, which also serves as a sonic lecture. The performance draws on Black nihilism and Indigenous approaches to sound, approaching sound as a technology: a tool for memory, mourning, justice and healing.

Audio recording by Marc Broer
Editing by Margaret Munchheimer
Photography by Noah Schielen

Youth clubs and cultural spaces have long provided young people with a place to connect, socialize and try new things. They have had a huge but almost invisible effect on music, culture and society. Yet, over the past two decades, many have disappeared due to funding cuts and shifting priorities. The question of how such spaces are organized, financed and sustained is therefore more urgent than ever.

In this podcast, the third in a series of conversations recorded at Le Guess Who?’s Sound & Culture Summit, the cultural significance of youth clubs across Europe and the UK is discussed, both in terms of their historical influence and their current state of operation in the present.

'Up The Youth Club’ is moderated by Emma Warren, the author of Up The Youth Club, the book on which this program is loosely based. The conversation features Frank Kimenai, who shares his experiences from the perspective of a decades long music industry practitioner and was involved in a youth club himself in the 90s, and Dina Ziad-Westmaas, who is currently a youth facilitator and co-founder of OP&, a platform and presentation space in Utrecht.

Audio recording by Marc Broer
Editing by Margaret Munchheimer
Photography by 36framez

Music is perhaps widely known to serve as a means of collective and individual healing. But to what extent do we take sound seriously, beyond the auditory experience? What thoughts come to mind when we consider sound as its own sovereign being, containing substance and functioning as an actual medicine—a means that can influence physical and mental well-being?

In this podcast, the second in a series of conversations recorded at Le Guess Who?’s Sound & Culture Summit, four artists and musical practitioners with Quechua, Coptic, Diné and Maasai origins engage in open conversation about their own perceptions and experiences with sound. Together, they reflect on their earliest sonic environments and the elements which inform their musical vocabularies.

‘On Sound as Substance: Indigenous Approaches to Sound / Sound as Medicine’ features sound and multimedia artist Raven Chacon, turntablist and producer Giulia Loli (also known as Mutamassik) and vocalist and narrator Lengai Loita (who together form Ancient Indigenous Africans). The conversation is moderated by multidisciplinary artist, activist and organizer Chihiro Geuzebroek.

Audio recording by Marc Broer
Editing by Margaret Munchheimer
Photography by Noah Schielen

Artistic freedom is too often reduced to “freedom of expression”, but for artists and independent cultural organizers, the ground is much more complex.

It’s not only what someone can say, but where someone can go, how someone can live, who someone can reach, and whether someone can sustain the work without fear.

In this podcast, the first in a series of conversations recorded at Le Guess Who?’s Sound & Culture Summit, three music and arts practitioners from Syria, Georgia and Malaysia join us to offer their perspectives, based on the experiences in their home cultures as well as the place they now call home.

‘Artistic Freedom Under Threat: Mobility, Censorship & the Right to Create’ features U? curator Al-Shaheen Falcon, Nino Davadze of Mutant Radio Tbilisi and Victoria Yam, co-founder of ALIGN.ONLINE and also known as rEmPiT g0dDe$$. The conversation is moderated by Manon Moulin and curated by Reset! network.

Audio recording by Marc Broer
Editing by Margaret Munchheimer
Photography by 36framez

On the closing day of Le Guess Who? 2023, the festival features the first international performance of Ndox Electrique, whose music is inspired by an ancient ritual of the spirit-world originating from Senegal’s n’döep ceremonies. 
Here, Atiyyah Khan, an arts journalist, researcher and DJ from Johannesburg, introduces the group and provides context to the origins of this healing ritual that connects so strongly to their sound. 

Words & audio by Atiyyah Khan
Photography by Gianna Greco & François R. Cambuzat