“[A] bit like the French ‘gomme’ but the q is a post-alveolar click”

February 2, 2016 5:13 PM

Whence gqom, for the West?
January, 2016? Gqom Oh! The Sound of Durban is the first full-length, high-quality audio compilation of the scene and you can stream it on Bandcamp for free. Jake Hulyer profiles the scene and album, and suggests that gqom : kwaito:: footwork : ghetto house. Kwanele Sosibo breaks the style down in more detail.

October, 2015? Adam Harper describes the style in The Fader.

June, 2015? The Goon Club Allstars label releases The Rudeboyz’s self-titled EP and a corresponding DJ Mix.

November, 2013? Benjamin Lebrave goes to South Africa and interviews DJ Jumping Back Slash. He talks about being amazed by the new sound of gqom and by the independent music sharing website kasimp3. Lebrave also helpfully points his Western readers to an article by Ts’eliso Monaheng on the South African website Mahala about its origins. JBS also makes “A Guide to Gqom” mix for Stamp The Wax

Sometime, 2013? Martin “Blackdown” Clark gives Goon Club a zip of some tracks compiled by Gerv “Okzharp” Gordon. They get hooked and use kasimp3 to get up on the scene -including the Rudeboyz’s back catalog- and start the surprisingly long slog of getting an EP made.

Sometime, 2010? Blackdown meets Okzharp and wrangles a DJ mix and interview out of him and got clocked onto the sound.

All of which is to say: wherever it whence’d, here it be, and the West should really be ready for it by now. So go back to the top and listen to that compilation! (Or dig around on kasimp3 for other songs, I suppose.)

posted by Going To Maine (8 comments total)

Nice, have been digging the Gqom sound, and look forward to digging further thanks to your post.

Also, check this fantastic Gqom mix on Spoek Mathambo's soundcloud.

And his (Spoek's) Thump doc: Future Sound of Mzansi:
Part 1
Part 2
posted by nikoniko at 6:07 PM on February 2, 2016 [2 favorites]

Wow, there is a lot to listen to and watch here, but this looks really interesting.
posted by Dip Flash at 6:18 PM on February 2, 2016

Lots of stuff I want to check out, but let me just say, Kwaito is great music to work out to.
posted by Joakim Ziegler at 1:47 AM on February 3, 2016

Thank you— this reminds me of Benga, the electronic musician (youtube), who is perhaps named after benga, a style of music from kenya, which might be the "specific dance called bhenga" (youtube) referenced in the first article.
posted by yaymukund at 2:26 AM on February 3, 2016

Thanks a lot for this. I hadn't heard any Gqom before, although I'd heard of it. It's very good.
posted by OmieWise at 7:27 AM on February 3, 2016

I love this bit from The Fader's article

beats that are so commanding they often trick your ear into thinking they're on-beats, an effect that imparts a feeling of weightlessness.

posted by Nelson at 8:12 AM on February 3, 2016

Alexander Iadarola at Thump: “Palm Wine Draws Entrancing Cross-Connections Between Gqom and Afro House on New Mix [for Thump]”
posted by Going To Maine at 3:49 PM on February 10, 2016

I've listened to the compilation a few times and I'm not sure I love it. It's awfully spare. But it has a lot of integrity. It also seems pretty cerebral, hard to imagine this being a big club hit anywhere.
posted by Nelson at 2:45 PM on February 11, 2016