Music
Counterflows
Various venues, Glasgow
Claire Sawers
four stars
THE SIXTH Counterflows festival began in Glasgow University Chapel with Japanese percussionist Midori Takada walking through the cavernous church, gently ringing chimes. Like a Catholic priest or Buddhist monk purifying the air with incense before a ceremony, it was as if she was leading listeners into a hushed ritual, something mysterious, maybe not of this world. Tiptoeing around a playground of percussion, tinkling gave way to rolling marimba, softly battered gong then an impressive downpour of drums and cymbals, as Takada – a minimalist/improv/ambient artist in her 60s, currently enjoying a revival – shifted into an unleashed, theatrical display, arms crossing, body spinning and legs bouncing.
Day two highlights included the mesmerising sounds of South Indian Carnatic music which induced trances on the closing night last year. This time festival organisers paired up traditional Indian musicians with experimental sound artist, Mark Fell, curating a stunning blend of devotional grooves and booming electronic polyrhythms, played out cross-legged on hypnotic mridangam drum and multi-stringed veena.
A nesting pigeon was unfazed by the arrival of coachloads of musos and weird music fans into a dusty railway arch in the Gorbals, looking down as air horns blasted and The Modern Institute spewed out their industrial-techno-punk mash of Buckfast and strobes, while a massive silver foil ball inflated in the crowd. Day three closed with a serotonin rush from Les Filles de Illighadad, rolling desert grooves on electric guitar by Niger’s Fatou Seidi Ghali and friends on tende drum and a thumped gourd floating in water, keeping the beat. Cracking up onstage with laughter, the party vibes spilled into the Art School for a female-only DJ set of dancehall and house into the small hours.
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