Burn the passports, rip up the map and immerse yourself into the borderless, limit-free world of Family Atlantica. Anchored to London but home to many different nationalities, this collective's musical voyage zigzags back and forth across the Atlantic, soaking up influences and styles from Venezuela to Ghana, finding common ancestry and reshaping it into an irresistible tsunami of psychedelicised tropical grooves.
Signed to Soundway Records, guardians of endangered musical styles from Africa and Latin America, Family Atlantica's debut album also takes excursions to Cuba and Senegal, but at no point does a single note or beat sound remotely contrived. As a recent five-star review in Songlines so correctly declared, in the hands of Family Atlantica, "it becomes impossible to separate the source from the offshoots".
At the heart of Family Atlantica are three people from three different continents: London-born Jack Yglesias, band leader, producer, arranger, multi-instrumentalist and instrument maker; his wife, Luzmira Zerpa, a traditional Venezuelan musician, poet and singer with a magical, universally acclaimed voice; and half-Nigerian half-Ghanaian percussionist, backing vocalist and arranger, Kwame Crentsil.
The Family Atlantica Quartet summon a tropical hurricane of Venzuelan calypso and Ghanian highlife, guaranteed to make you sing and dance – as shown in their recent Royal Albert Hall double bill with Buena Vista Social Club.