Before the festival season has even started Brick Lane Jazz Festival is serving up one of the most essential lineups of the entire year!
The festival is taking place this coming weekend from Friday 14th through Sunday 16th of April in various venues around the Truman Brewery in Shoreditch and will be showcasing over 50 incredible artists. With so much to choose from we thought we would come through with some top picks to catch this weekend.
Here are our top 5 essential acts not to miss at this year's fest!
1. SEED.
Kicking off the festival with a bang on Friday we have the fantastic SEED. ensemble. These guys got nominated for the Mercury Prize back in 2019 with their ridiculously good debut album Driftglass. As a 10-piece, they certainly aren't lacking in depth with their compositions, producing an incredibly rich and layered sound.
Their tune "Afronaut" ft XANA even won them the Ivors Academy award in 2018 for the best large ensemble Jazz piece of the year! Representing everything that's good about the UK's, wonderful Jazz scene this is not a band to miss.
2. Steam Down
These guys are a South London collective founded by multi-instrumentalist, composer and producer Ahnansé back in 2017. Since then they've been killing it with multiple sold-out London headlines, two European tours and a hell of a lot of buzz from across the music landscape. Check out their stellar cover of "Etcetera" on the first Blue Note Reimagined record. They haven't got much music out but what they do have is some of the best around.
3. Lex Amor
Next up we have one of the most exciting voices in UK hip-hop. Lex's signature hushed delivery, laidback flow and excellent lyricism set her aside in a league of her own in the current rap landscape.
With recent features with the likes of Knucks and Kojey Radical, she's most certainly your favourite rapper's favourite rapper.
Check out her debut album Government Tropicana as well as her appearance on "The Silhouettes Project" and her colors performance of "Odogwu".
4. XVNGO
Drill Jazz. XVNGO is making waves right now pioneering the drill-jazz genre which as it says on the tin is a blend of drill-style synthesised bass with various flavours of Jazz. At the same time as being a neuroscientist, he also plays for such artists as Joe Armon-Jones, Tara Lily, KOKOROKO and Levitation Orchestra.
We saw him at Love Supreme festival where he was amazing bringing out multiple special guests...
Check out his tune "First Consul" for a flavour of drill jazz.
5. Bel Cobain
Bel Cobain has a truly once-in-a-generation voice. Her vocals are delicate, gentle and personal and her catalogue so far is wonderfully diverse tackling sound palettes from tri-hop all the way to afrobeat. One of my favourite musical discoveries of recent years I'm absolutely desperate for more new music from her. I'm sure she's a name you've heard of if you're looking at attending the fest but if not do yourself a service and get your ears on one of the best upcoming vocalists out.
Bel will be headlining Saturday night with her band which is sure to be a very special performance.
The booking team at Brick Lane Jazz Festival have done a fantastic job of collating a lineup that collects many of the best upcoming jazz acts, singers, rappers and DJs on the scene right now and all for an incredibly competitively priced ticket. This will be the first festival GROAT attends this year and you can expect a full review up here next week.
You can get tickets here.
Check out the official playlist here:
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