Music

AN HONEST JON'S CHOP UP!: Tony Allen + The Hypnotic Brass + Damon Albarn + Kokanko Sata Doumbia + Lobi Traore + Afel Bocoum + Candi Staton + Simone White + Victoria Williams + Toumani Diabate
Sat Jul 5
- Recommended
This event has finished
Barbican Centre, Silk St, London, EC2Y 8DS
Damon Albarn
By Tamara Gausi

Posted: Mon Jun 30
Ever since the ‘Mali Music’ compilation dropped in 2002, Honest Jon’s Records has made a name for itself specialising (or rather, generalising) in everything. From post-war calypso to soulful indie-folk and classic Afrobeat, this intrepid label – run by former Blur frontman Damon Albarn alongside Mark Ainley and Alan Schofield from the west London record shop of the same name – has become a byword for quality, eclecticism and good music from wherever’s clever.

Their latest venture is typically awesome. ‘Chop Up!’ – an evening of live music and God knows what else from Honest Jon’s artists – will be curated by Albarn, who shares the stage with drumming genius, Afrobeat co-creator and current bandmate Tony Allen. Joined by a few friends, soul legend Candi Staton takes a break from recording her new set with producer Mark Nevers (following the success of her 2006 country soul hit ‘His Hands’) to perform with (and in the spirit of the free-flow nature of the evening, sometimes without) folk singers Simone White and Victoria Williams, New York street band the Hypnotic Brass Ensemble, kora maestro Toumani Diabaté and fellow Malian troubadours Afel Bocoum, Lobi Traoré and Kokanko Sata Doumbia.

Now you don’t need to be a Nollywood film expert to know that in Nigerian pidgin, ‘chop’ doesn’t describe the actions of a woodcutter. ‘To “chop” is to eat,’ explains Allen in his languid Franco-Naija drawl. To ‘chop up’ describes a big meal, or this case a big fecking deal with each artist bringing something juicy and quite unknown to the table. ‘I know a few of the artists,’ says Allen, ‘and I’ve had the opportunity to play with many of them before, though I have no idea what will happen on the night.’ But Allen wants London to know this: ‘We’re going to have a ball’ – this chop-up promises to be one helluva musical chow-down.