MYH presents YOUNISS (BE) + SEIGFRIED KOMIDASHI (UK)
- CAFÉ ARSENAAL -
YOUNISS
When we were asked to do something in the context of Construct Europe, “Building Europe together… “, the multicultural reality of the Europe of today seemed just the topic. And if there is one artist in Flanders working and living this theme than it’s… YOUNISS.
For Youniss Ahamad, music isn’t just an exploration of sound, but a means to unearth explanations for the ways of the surrounding world. Since his beginning, Youniss’ music has evolved into an amalgam of noise, electronics, and samples interacting with his post-punk and hip-hop influenced poetry. In all his music, Youniss aims to examine and communicate his own Black life as it unfolds in Belgium, a country with a particularly brutal colonial history. “Where White Space (previous album) was the movement against the views of white society on a person of color,” Youniss explains, “Do We Try (red. new album out since April 2024) is the forever existential question of if existing in a capitalist hellscape is better than to go to non-western spaces that get exploited in the most horrific forms of aggression.”
As a young, angry, punky Gil-Scott Heron of his time, Youniss' anger and miscontentment with how he’s been looked at as a young black man with an Arabic name in our Flemish culture fuels his energy in his music and shows.
SEIGFRIED KOMIDASHI
Actually we asked Youiss if he didn’t know anyone interesting to join him that evening. And that became… SEIGFRIED KOMIDASHI.
Afrofuturist, London born and of Yoruba descent, Seigfried Komidashi is anarcho-Blackness, experimentation and exploration. Although a classically trained saxophonist and multi-instrumentalist, his artform began to take shape when he saw musical notations come to life on and off the page, introducing him to the idea of playing with classical forms and transforming them into something otherworldly.
Komidashi works with nature, sound, and space; immersing himself in a process of learning and unlearning, drawing inspiration from the beauty and chaos of the world around us.