Louis Mhlanga

Bob-Dubery

I've been hearing about this guy for some time now. I got to see him at Andy McGibbon's acoustic forum last night and was blown away.

He did a short set on acoustic guitar (Larrivee, I think an LV09), backed by bass player Jimmy Indi.

Loved his playing. Great chops. There was a lovely sense of flow and motion to his solos. Beautiful, ringing tone. And some feeling to his playing. I suppose what I was lucky enough to see last night could be slotted into a broad Butler/Benson category, and too often I find music in that space to be technically excellent but a bit sterile. Not this guy. There was a real.... joyousness about his playing, sometimes some real fire as well.

There were several other players in the room. You could hear jaws hitting the ground every now and then. The annoying thing was not his solos (fantastic) but the way he'd throw these utterly ridiculous little licks and chords in as fills into a verse whilst he was singing. This was, I thought, one of the keys to his performance because even when performing a song, with the necessary repetitive structure, he was not quite repeating himself, keeping things fresh and ear catching all the time.

Great set. Too short. Top player. (really).

Squonk

I have heard him. I think I saw some dodgy video on the SABC, one of those fillers when the program runs out.
The one thing I have realized in this country is that some genre's of music dont quite make it in the studio.
Seeing the artist live doing their thing is usually quite different to what they put out on CD.

These Andy's acoustic evenings sound quite good, keep us posted.

Bob-Dubery

Squonk wrote: I have heard him. I think I saw some dodgy video on the SABC, one of those fillers when the program runs out.
The one thing I have realized in this country is that some genre's of music dont quite make it in the studio.
Seeing the artist live doing their thing is usually quite different to what they put out on CD.

These Andy's acoustic evenings sound quite good, keep us posted.

Well if you're in or near Jo'burg then you should pop along. The more the merrier and all that. There is a cover charge, but Andy is just looking to cover costs and so it's not a lot to pay. Drinks and reasonable pub grub are available from the club. Andy also wants these "forums" to serve as a meeting place for musoes - hopefully that will lead to interesting collaborations. They keep a visitor's book, and so you can sign up for an SMS reminder service. Andy does not abuse this to spam you.

Every time I go there I see acts that I find interesting, engaging and that can PLAY.