Monday, November 7th, 2005

Konono Can’t Stop

May we all be as cool as Mingiedi when we grow old.

Got to see Konono last night–their first show in San Francisco, probably one of their first gigs in the States period–and they are certainly No. 1 in generosity and joy and general ass-shaking funkiness.

It took 3 songs–about oh, a half hour–for the uptight SF Jazz festival crowd to actually get on their feet and start dancing. Which must have really confused the band. So to make up for it, they played an extra long last “song”. They started that one at about 8pm, an hour into their set. Every 15 minutes or so, lead vocalist Waku Menga would say, “Thank you thank you thank you!” Then the band would pick it up and go another 15 minutes!

That happened, like, 5 times.

So 75 minutes later, they gave their last thank yous and goodnights, ended their epic last track–I think the title was something like “I Thought I Told You That We Don’t Quit”–and everyone filed out nice and sweaty. Mingiedi was in the building and feeling himself, and punctuated his exit stage right with several little hip wiggles. Next time they play in SF, they need to sell some We Heart Mingiedi T-shirts.

Then the whole band came back. And even though the house monitors and the sound men were done for the night, Konono played another half hour for the 100 or so punks and punkettes, Aquarius Records employees, and this aging hip-hopster. Note to bands and DJs who would knowingly or unknowingly seek to violate your house contract: it is always good to bring your own amplification system.

Of course, The Suburbs Are Killing Us has the entire world scooped on the next installment of Congotronics and Konono, because Christopher just can’t stop either. Includes complete US tour info!

posted by Jeff Chang @ 3:13 pm | 1 Comment

One Response to “Konono Can’t Stop”

Anonymous says:

November 17, 2005 at 5:43 am

I caught them in Chicago a few days ago. It was incredible. They played a two hour set, only stopped twice, groove a mile-and-a-half thick and everyone just dancing and dancing. Techno trance has nothing on this.

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