Dwarfs of East Agouza, Hania Rani, Ata Kak, Yoo Doo Right, KUUNATIC, Devendra Banhart and many more announced as Le Guess Who? reveals full line-up

03 September 2025

Le Guess Who? has revealed its full 2025 line-up, and once again the festival in Utrecht proves why it remains one of the most adventurous and forward-thinking gatherings in the world. Running from November 6th – 9th, the festival continues to champion unclassifiable music and voices from the margins, creating a space for discovery, experimentation, and collective wonder. Back in May, the first announcement already had us buzzing, with eight daring guest curators – Amirtha Kidambi, Asher Gamedze, Edna Martinez, gyrofield, Lonnie Holley, Tianzhuo Chen, Valentina Magaletti and Ziúr – helping to shape stellar programmes that span the globe. Early highlights included Saul Williams & Carlos Niño, SUNN O))), Mark Ernestus’ Ndagga Rhythm Force, Lido Pimienta, DJ Haram & Aquiles Navarro, and Julianna Barwick & Mary Lattimore, amongst many more.

Now, with the full line-up revealed, Le Guess Who? promises even more discoveries. Among the guest-curated programmes, Asher Gamedze brings Cairo-based trio Dwarfs of East Agouza, who have been blowing our minds since their debut Bes dropped in 2016. With their new album Sasquatch Landslide landing this October, the outfit of Sam Shalabi, Maurice Louca, and Alan Bishop are set to mesmerize audiences with their “signature trance-inducing explorative energies”. Gamedze will also host The Vocal Museum by Masello Motana, a recital that journeys through collective memory and township childhoods in South Africa, with Masello’s commanding voice backed by a live band.

Fresh additions to the general lineup include Hania Rani, introducing her alter-ego Chilling Bambino, blending piano, synth, and voice in a quietly mesmerizing mix of classical and contemporary textures, Ata Kak, the Ghanaian artist whose mix of highlife, early hip-hop, and funk turns every track into a dancefloor adventure, Bhajan Bhoy, the project of Lancashire-born, Netherlands-based Ajay Saggar, who brings his meditative organ works, first performed in a 15th century church in Yorkshire, and London-based producer Djrum, who explores piano, harp, and electronic textures in Under Tangled Silence, balancing intimacy with rhythmic energy. From the outskirts of Rio, singer songwriter Caxtrinho brings his debut album Queda Livre, a bold fusion of Brazil’s experimental Vanguarda Paulista tradition, Devendra Banhart returns with a stripped-back solo set that moves through his psychedelic, acoustic, and folk-inspired repertoire, and Daniela Pes and IOSONOUNCANE join forces for a live collaboration that fuses Pes’s ethereal vocals and instrumental fluidity with IOSONOUNCANE’s finely sculpted electronic textures. Vocalists Lamisi, Gavina, and Maria Alice bring Afro-fusion pop, Panamanian folklore-infused grooves, and Cape Verdean mornas and coladeras, respectively, each shaping a vivid and global soundscape. Experimental performances also include Heinali & Andriana-Yaroslava Saienko, whose Гільдеґарда pairs modular synths with Ukrainian vocal techniques, and Tunisian and Dutch composer, audiovisual artist, curator, and science educator Skander Jaïbi, who blends classical composition, choral textures, and ambient soundscapes in his debut album Who Has the Right to Closure?. Gina Birch, co-founder of The Raincoats, brings her solo record Trouble, merging post-punk, dub, and experimental rock into an introspective yet fiery statement, augmenting a lineup that cements Le Guess Who? 2025 as a festival of curiosity, boldness, and musical discovery.
Other electronic and experimental innovators also expand the festival’s palette, from the genre-defying collages of Smerz to Valentina Goncharova’s inventive mix of violin and electronics in Every Growing Tree, alongside Montreal trio Yoo Doo Right, whose krautrock-tinged post-rock grooves hypnotize and pull audiences in. Fresh additions also include tribal-psych trio KUUNATIC, Dutch hardcore punk band Forbidden Wizards, and British post-hardcore band Mclusky.

Among the highlights in this year line-up is Sounds of Places: Cremisan Valley, an immersive residency-based project that transforms one of the last green spaces near the city of Bethlehem in Palestine into a living soundscape. Over several days, artists, designers, and local participants collaborated to create site-specific sound sculptures that respond to wind, rain, and movement, blending composed pieces with the natural environment. The resulting performance captures the valley’s layered history, its ecological and cultural struggles, and its resilience, turning listening into an act of reflection and connection with a place shaped by both memory and resistance.

Beyond concerts, Le Guess Who? remains a meeting place for communities and ideas. On Friday, November 7th, BATEKOO x Los Angles presents a club night at De Helling celebrating queer communities, with performances by Brazilian singer, actress, and presenter Linn da Quebrada,  trans-femme DJ and founder of Club Stamina Mina Galán, along with Miranda, Juju ZL, and smother b2b YoungWoman, collectively creating a vibrant, joyful space for marginalized voices.

With the full programme now unveiled, Le Guess Who? reaffirms its status as a festival like no other: a gathering where boundaries blur, traditions are honoured and reshaped, and discovery is paramount. From November 6th –9th, Utrecht will transform into a privileged playground of sound. Festival passes are now sold out but day passes are still available at leguesswho.com/tickets so be quick to catch this monumental lineup, and countless other names waiting to be discovered across the city.

Petter Eldh pushes the beat further with Projekt Drums, Vol. 2

01 September 2025

Petter Eldh is back with the second volume of his ambitious Projekt Drums series, taking the sonic exploration he began with Vol. 1 in 2021 to an even more electrifying level. Projekt Drums is a true hybrid, fusing elements of hip-hop, jazz, breakbeats, and jungle rhythms into a dense and energetic whole. Pulling in inspiration from beat-makers like J Dilla and Flying Lotus, alongside jungle pioneers like Roni Size and Squarepusher, on the new album Eldh focus on a breakbeat-driven landscape with his signature cutting-edge production.

To bring the album to life, the Swedish bassist, composer and producer assembled a trio of drumming heavyweights, featuring James Maddren, Savannah Harris, and Richard Spaven, and the chemistry between them is palpable, with each one bringing their own unique flavour.

Projekt Drums, Vol. 2 arrives on October 10th through Edition Records and ahead of it, Eldh has shared the daring and bewildering ‘Lorimer Axes’ featuring Savannah Harris. Check out the accompanying video below.

Blue Earth Sound shares final single, ‘On the Court’, from upcoming debut LP Cicero Nights

27 August 2025

We’ve been eagerly anticipating the release of Cicero Nights, the debut album from  multi-instrumentalist, bandleader and composer James Weir. Releasing under his new moniker Blue Earth Sound, Cicero Nights was recorded at the International Anthem studio space in Chicago with in-house engineer Dave Vettraino, with stellar contributions from drummer Patch Romanowski, Resavoir’s Will Miller on trumpet, flautist Eamonn Pritzy, and longtime collaborator Michael Wells, amongst others.

Following previous singles ‘Mariposa‘ and ‘Lover’s Rock’, and ahead of the album’s release on September 12th through Root Records, Blue Earth Sound slipped in a new preview with ‘On the Court’, a track inspired by the soundtrack to the 1994 basketball documentary ‘Hoop Dreams’. Groovy and irresistibly catchy, ‘On the Court’ taps in to hip hop influences, and you can listen to it below. You’ll be playing it again the second it ends.

Listen to Tom Skinner’s new single ‘Margaret Anne’

26 August 2025

Photo: Jason Evans

Last month, Tom Skinner announced the release of his second solo album, Kaleidoscopic Visions, and enticed us then with the beautiful, swirling and cinematic title track. With just a month to go until the album drops on September 26th through Brownswood and International Anthem, the ingenious drummer, producer and composer has unveiled ‘Margaret Anne’, an exhilarating and sublime track named after his mother Anne Shasby, the former concert-piano prodigy. Speaking about the single, Skinner comments:

“In the early 80s, shortly after I was born, my mother stepped away from the concert stage — not out of a loss of ability or passion, but out of frustration with the entrenched misogyny of the classical world, and to focus on raising our family. No small thing, as I have come to understand. She never stopped playing, though; the sound of her piano has been a constant presence throughout my life, and still is to this day. In no small part shaping my musical sensibility and laying the foundation for my own musical path. The Max Roach inspired rhythm and taut energy of this piece speaks to her courage, strength and resilience in following her heart.”

Listen to ‘Margaret Anne’ below.

Glass Museum share new single, ‘VAN GLAS’ ft. JAZZ BRAK

23 August 2025

Glass Museum are gearing up to release their highly anticipated new album, 4N4LOG CITY, on September 19th through Sdban Ultra. This will be the band’s first record as a trio, following the recent addition of bassist Issam Labbene alongside keyboardist Antoine Flipo and drummer Martin Grégoire. The album also features guest appearances from artists like vocalist JDS, Swiss drummer Arthur Hnatek, and rapper JAZZ BRAK, who is a member of the Brussels-based hip-hop collective STIKSTOF and features on the band’s latest single, ‘VAN GLAS’. Built around the phrase “Al wat van glas is breekt” (“everything made of glass breaks”), the song delves into themes of “personal doubts, social expectations, and the search for clarity”, as the press release describes. ‘VAN GLAS’ comes with an accompanying video, shot in 16mm film and directed by Thomas De Hemptinne, and visually complements this narrative, following a bicycle courier on a late-night journey through an empty city. Watch it below.

Makaya McCraven announces four new EPs and shares lead tracks

19 August 2025

Photo: Shannon Marks

Makaya McCraven is back with a new body of work, and it’s as ambitious and exploratory as we’ve come to expect from the Chicago-based drummer, composer, producer, and all-around sonic visionary. This time he brings not just one, but four new EPs: Techno Logic, The People’s Mixtape, Hidden Out! and Popup Shop. All four are set to land on October 31st, with a double LP/CD compilation titled Off the Record arriving earlier on October 10th through International Anthem, Nonesuch, and XL Recordings.

These are McCraven’s first new recordings since 2022’s In These Times, and they take him back into the live-to-studio process that has long defined his sound. Like In The Moment or Universal Beings, these new EPs are built from live improvisations, later sculpted in the studio with his trademark layering, sampling, and production wizardry.

The material across the four EPs spans nearly a decade of performances, from his 2015 debut in Los Angeles to a session earlier this year in Berlin, and each EP draws from a different cast of incredible collaborators. Techno Logic brings together Ben LaMar Gay and Theon Cross, weaving together years of performances from London, Berlin and New York, tracing the evolution of their shared musical language. The People’s Mixtape finds McCraven marking ten years since In The Moment with a celebratory session at Public Records in Brooklyn, alongside longtime collaborators Junius Paul, Marquis Hill and Joel Ross, with synthesist Jeremiah Chiu joining the group for the first time. Hidden Out! revisits McCraven’s 2017 residency at Chicago’s Hideout, where he played weekly with a rotating lineup including Jeff Parker, Josh Johnson, and Junius Paul. And Popup Shop comes from recordings of McCraven’s Los Angeles debut in 2015 at Del Monte Speakeasy, as part of RAWS:LA, an event produced by King Hippo and Grown Kids Radio, where he improvised with guitarist Jeff Parker, vibraphonist Justefan, and bassist Benjamin J. Shepherd.

The result isn’t just a collection of performances, but something that reflects the beautiful, messy and human side of making music in real time. Speaking about the project, McCraven says:

“In a time where we’re increasingly connected through phones, in a virtual world where you can’t really tell what’s real or what’s fake, there’s something special where we come together and share space, there is something special where we are sharing music, art. I want to create an energy that amplifies the magic in the underground moments where we come together and we experience something wild, different, off the cuff, human. What I’m trying to present is a dreamlike alteration of that energy, which only exists in the recorded realm. But to actually have been there, in real life, is the special thing.”

Lucky for us we can already hear four fresh tracks to get excited before the full release as McCraven has unveiled a lead track from each EP, ‘Technology’, ‘Choo Choo’, ‘Away’ and ‘Imafan’. Take a listen to all four tracks below.