Ibeyi - Ibeyi

Signed to XL Recordings in 2013, the buzz about Ibeyi has been building for some time, making this one of the most eagerly anticipated debuts of the year. 19-year-old French/Cuban twin sisters, Naomi (cajon, vocals) and Lisa-Kaindé (vocals, piano) Diaz are the daughters of renowned Cuban percussionist Anga Diaz, who was part of the Buena Vista Social Club. They sing in a mixture of English and Yoruba, a west-African language which arrived in the Caribbean on the slave ships of the 1700s – Ibeyi means ‘twins’ in Yoruba (apparently the Yoruba people give birth to the highest number of twins in the world).
Listening to Ibeyi is like hearing Bjork’s Debut for the first time. It’s strange and otherworldly, combining traditional chanting from the Yoruba tradition with jazzy piano, sassy rhythms and even subtle electronica – the twins were raised in Paris and that city’s urban soundscape influences their music just as much as their Cuban heritage. The one constant throughout is their voices, which twine sinuously around each other, like two serpentine branches of the same tree.
They performed heart-rending lead single ‘Mama Says’ on Later With Jools Holland late last year, an electrifying glimpse of just how exciting they can be. The album version is like Nina Simone meeting the aforementioned Bjork in a late night jazz club; an incredible blend of piano and percussion, all finger clicks and cajon, over which their voices glide gloriously. This is family disharmony laid bare, as is the haunting chant of ‘Yanira’, where the twins lament their older sister, who died in 2013.
The jazzy piano riffs of ‘Ghosts’ transform magically into a beautifully sparse ballad for its mid-section, with Lisa-Kaindé lamenting how “we ain’t nothing without love”, before sexing it up for the crescendo. ‘Thinking Of You’’s menacing bass rumble introduces hip-hop rhythms into the equation, while on ‘Faithful’, there’s an intensity to their voices that twists seemingly love-filled words into something scarily like a warning, as they implore the object of their affections to show loyalty or else...
Elsewhere, there’s the haunting, almost mystical sway of ‘Oya’, the percussive funk/gospel of ‘River’ and the feather-delicate caress of ‘Behind The Curtain’. Through it all, Ibeyi create a mesmerising, enchanting and compelling debut that gets better with each listen.

Key Track - 'Ghosts'