Adorcist & Post-Industrial ritual from the n'döep. Spirits, Possession & Trance. Senegal.
Ndox Electrique is a ritual of possession coming from the n’döep ceremonies in Senegal.
It’s wild, it’s dark and solar, it's feminine and powerful, groovingly calling the spirits
to heal the modern world with traditionnal incantations, dances & percussions,
electric guitars & computers. On stage, healing mistresses & musicians make a pact
with the Spirits : it takes much more than good intentions but dancing sweat
and a consistent volume to achieve salvation through music & trance.
World music in the West is most often formatted & presented as fancy & innocent
postcards: the sun, the dunes, the smiles, the welcome, the attaya or the ceebu jën
offered to the lovely toubabs, etc. However the music of the cruel, wild, frenzied,
real and even bloodthirsty worlds betrays that neo-colonialist postcard presentation.
To cast out the demons during a n'döep ceremonie among the Lebous
of Senegal, it will take music & songs of a huge volume to reach the elevation
of the trance, and sweat & blood to sanctify the action and to satisfy the spirits.
Rituals of incredible loudness and musical violence for a spirituality
coupled with a magnificent and imperious social role during liturgies
where Western griots like Meshuggah or The Birthday Party
would only be considered as well-educated choir boys.
(The volume of N'döep is so huge that its singers nowadays
use megaphones.)
People around the world have always felt the need to transcend
their fears of life and death, to rise above their misfortunes and terrors.
Now it’s about time to destroy, immolate your own music and annihilate
your cultural influences by the power of other songs, melodies, chants, other rhythms, other sweats of trance and elevation.
Breaking everything in turn, then reshaping the materials, respectfully iconoclastic to become what music really is when it is no longer commercial: a wind, little or nothing but a wild and cathartic emotion.
Still working from years with Ifriqiyya Electrique, François R. Cambuzat and Gianna Greco (from the seminal Putan Club) could not find out where the North African adorcist communities, such banga, stambeli, diwân or gnawa, came from. Of the Arab-Muslim slave route, that was certain, but from which country, from which region? The traces seemed lost. Research after research, little by little this five-century-old road led them to West Africa, Senegal and the Lebu's n'döep. For months in Mbour, Guereo, Rufisque, Yoff and Ndar (Saint-Louis), François R. Cambuzat and Gianna Greco got lost among the seas and banks of Senegal, sacrificing to spirits -most often aquatic- ndox, water, in the Wolof language.
LINEUP:
Group Size: 7 Artists + 1 technician (at times 1 tour manager)
François R. Cambuzat : guitar & computer, vocal
Gianna Greco (her/she) : bass guitar, vocal
Ndeye Coumba Mbaye Kebe(her/she) : vocal: vox
Awa Mbodji (her/she) : vox
Oumar Ngom: percussion sabar & vox
Mamadou "Pape" Ngom: percussion sabar & vox
Mouhamet "Sangue" Sambe: percussions sabar & vox
Sound engineer:
Alessandro Maffei
WHAT IS N'DÖEP
In Senegal, there is a traditional healing ceremony called n'döep. It is an adorcist ritual that treats depression. N'döep is primarily connected to the sea. It is also intensely musical and movement-based. A treated person will first see their senses overwhelmed by the immediate proximity of certain animals, buried with them under canvases, surrounded by drums (sabars) intensely played around them. The canvases will then be removed and the patient will dance and dancing at this point can be openly observed by community members. The person being treated will then interact ritually with certain spirits, certain animals because unhappiness or depression is considered to be a spirit which penetrates the sick person. The person will then sing and dance to ask these spirits to leave them, thus affirming that they will not forget them but will honor these spirits. Finally the community will dance together.
Adorcist & Post-Industrial ritual from the n'döep. Spirits, Possession & Trance. Senegal.
Ndox Electrique is a ritual of possession coming from the n’döep ceremonies in Senegal. It’s wild, it’s dark and solar, it's feminine and powerful, groovingly calling the spirits to heal the modern world with traditionnal incantations, dances & percussions, electric guitars & computers. On stage, healing mistresses & musicians make a pact with the Spirits : it takes much more than good intentions but dancing sweat and a consistent volume to achieve salvation through music & trance.
World music in the West is most often formatted & presented as fancy & innocent postcards: the sun, the dunes, the smiles, the welcome, the attaya or the ceebu jën offered to the lovely toubabs, etc. However the music of the cruel, wild, frenzied, real and even bloodthirsty worlds betrays that neo-colonialist postcard presentation.
To cast out the demons during a n'döep ceremonie among the Lebous of Senegal, it will take music & songs of a huge volume to reach the elevation of the trance, and sweat & blood to sanctify the action and to satisfy the spirits. Rituals of incredible loudness and musical violence for a spirituality coupled with a magnificent and imperious social role during liturgies where Western griots like Meshuggah or The Birthday Party would only be considered as well-educated choir boys. (The volume of N'döep is so huge that its singers nowadays use megaphones.)
People around the world have always felt the need to transcend their fears of life and death, to rise above their misfortunes and terrors. Now it’s about time to destroy, immolate your own music and annihilate your cultural influences by the power of other songs, melodies, chants, other rhythms, other sweats of trance and elevation.
Breaking everything in turn, then reshaping the materials, respectfully iconoclastic to become what music really is when it is no longer commercial: a wind, little or nothing but a wild and cathartic emotion.
Still working from years with Ifriqiyya Electrique, François R. Cambuzat and Gianna Greco (from the seminal Putan Club) could not find out where the North African adorcist communities, such banga, stambeli, diwân or gnawa, came from. Of the Arab-Muslim slave route, that was certain, but from which country, from which region? The traces seemed lost. Research after research, little by little this five-century-old road led them to West Africa, Senegal and the Lebu's n'döep. For months in Mbour, Guereo, Rufisque, Yoff and Ndar (Saint-Louis), François R. Cambuzat and Gianna Greco got lost among the seas and banks of Senegal, sacrificing to spirits -most often aquatic- ndox, water, in the Wolof language.
LINEUP:
Group Size: 7 Artists + 1 technician (at times 1 tour manager)