Auntie Flo - Sneaky Pete’s, Edinburgh, Sun 13 May (4 stars)

Club-friendly house beats with a world music undercurrent

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This article is from 2012.

Auntie Flo - Sneaky Pete’s, Edinburgh, Sun 13 May

Photo: Tom Welsh

It’s a foul Sunday night and getting late, with the hour moving near to midnight when Glasgow duo Auntie Flo take their place behind a pod of trestle tables loaded down with kit and cables. The flickering projection behind them bears the legend ‘Night Music’, and what they play really is: a dense, clubby soundtrack which culls the best beats from the classic sounds of Detroit and Chicago. Yet there’s more going on here, a developing world subcurrent that’s deftly handled by bandleader Brian d’Souza, the one in the techy thick-rimmed glasses.

Within a couple of tracks he’s introducing a clanking synthesised steel drum rhythm and a sharp Latin horn stab, while his live partner Esa Williams batters bongos in the background. ‘This is Esa,’ laughed d’Souza after a rare missed cue from the latter, ‘he doesn’t pay attention sometimes but I love him.’ His contention that Williams is ‘the fastest bongo player in Scotland’ was put to the test by an impressive face-off between the pair’s electronic and analogue rhythms, and then their signature tracks emerged: ‘Highlife’, an afrobeat funk with a taut steel pulse at its heart, and the shimmering anthemics of ‘Oh My Days’. It was a feast for the ears and the feet.

This article is from 2012.

Highlife

A night with excellent pedigree, from the people who bring you Slabs of the Tabernacle and Huntleys & Palmers Audio Club. Expect afrobeat, jackin' house, Italo, 80s electro, UK funky, and Latin beats at this monthly Sunday night version.

The Sub Club, Glasgow

Fri 31 May

Prices to be confirmed / 0141 248 4600

Celebrating Highlife's 3rd birthday in association with Deadly Rhythm, this date will see the new Auntie Flo live show unleashed alongside an as-yet unnamed special guest.

  • 23:00 – 03:00

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