Festival Music
Young Fathers
The Hub, Edinburgh
Nicola Meighan
five stars
SUNDAY night, in a bygone church, and you bet it was a transcendent experience. Edinburgh pop insurgents Young Fathers raised the roof and ruptured the castle bedrock as they tore through some of the myriad dark and thrilling songs that have cemented the trio's status as Scottish hip-hop trailblazers, and global stars.
Taking to a dim-lit stage, under what sounded like sirens circling overhead, Graham Hastings, Alloysious Massaquoi and Kayus Bankole – whose roots are in Edinburgh's Drylaw, Liberia (via Ghana) and Nigeria (via Maryland, USA) respectively – unleashed a furious, relentless set in which every track felt like the pummelling climax. Until the next one.
From the clanging psychedelia of Rain Or Shine, to blind-siding rap dirge Queen Is Dead, the Mercury winners' fired-up trance, industrial electro and provocative pop induced mass fervour. It was reinforced by a visual spectacle of silhouettes, mind-melding monochrome strobes and dance moves that incited some entirely ungodly thoughts.
Their set, too, revelled in stark contrasts. Young Fathers' colossal musical alchemy is deceptively minimalist – there was little more than (multiple) drums and voices onstage – and was equally forceful whether shaking the building (and establishment) to its foundations, party style, with Get Up, or reminding us that Young Fathers are gorgeous soul singers (as well as killer rappers) on Low.
Their punk chorales were enhanced by the glorious Leith Congregational Choir, and by the time they reached the stunning I Heard, it felt like a nigh-on religious experience. If this band preach anything, it's unity. “We are all migrants,” they hollered later, to communal cheering. “We're all in this together”. Let us give thanks for Young Fathers and their righteous anarchist gospel.
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