Healing Voices – the eagerly-awaited debut album from ESINAM and Sibusile Xaba – is everything we were hoping for: a white-hot blend of hypnotic African rhythms and spiritual jazz.
Release Date: 25th April 2025
Label: W.E.R.F. Records
Formats: Vinyl / Digital
A COSMICALLY POETIC DUO…
We’ve already had our interest piqued by a string of excellent, thoroughly compelling singles. Now here comes the big one. Healing Voices, the debut album from pan-African duo ESINAM & Sibusile Xaba is everything that we’d been hoping for – and more.
They’ve been described as: “A cosmically poetic duo blending Afro-Roots Electro with a clear nod to spiritual jazz.” ESINAM Dogbatse is a Belgian-Ghanaian multi-instrumentalist, based in Brussels. In her artistic guise as ESINAM, she creates a musical world of her own, filled with rhythms, grooves, melodies and loops. Charismatic guitar savant Sibusile Xaba specializes in blending the maskanda traditions with the avant-garde, blues, jazz and malombo rituals to create a musical style that is uniquely his.
Sibusile’s vocal style is a mix of dreamscaping and ancestral invocation. It’s been suggested that he “divines as opposed to plainly singing.” ESINAM looks after the ethereal end of the bargain. It’s a match made in heaven!
MUSIC AS ART; MUSIC AS MEDICINE
Speaking of the creation of Healing Voices, ESINAM says: “We make music as art. We make music as medicine. These songs are created with a strong connection to our soul and to the music of our ancestors. When I play this music, I feel better. It is a musical collection of rhythms and melodies that touch my heart and soul. Sounds of healing voices, musically charged with authenticity and creative inspiration.”
Sibusile adds: “Healing voices explores freedom and unconditional love as the two primary elements of healing. We hope these sonic gestures touch everyone’s hearts as they listen. The songs came to us effortlessly, demonstrating that the music has its own agenda. We couldn’t help but listen, receive and share with the world. The beauty and depth of the album is full of respect and humility. Every melody is surrounded by good vibes and movements of confidence in every moment of creativity.”
PERCUSSION-RICH AFRICAN RHYTHMS
It’s Flowing Keep Flowing, the most recent of the album’s three singles, that gets Healing Voices off to its flying start. Trancelike and thoroughly absorbing, it’s a song that grows with each listen. Back in April, we described the track as: “…both joyous and dreamlike, the song is [a] wonderful merger of the duo’s diverse musical influences. Any listener is bound to be transported into a blissful state of mind.” We’ll stick with that. It still does the trick!
Percussion-rich African rhythms are a principal feature of Healing Voices and they’re out in strength for the hypnotic, jazzy Dololo. Sibusile’s voice has a comforting tone as he delivers his repetitive chant. Horns and guitars provide the song’s melody. Joyful crowd sounds – rhythmic clapping and choral singing – set the scene for the evocative yeMA. The song has the feel of an African village festival. Drums, pipes and a xylophone-type instrument all provide support to Sibusile’s lead vocal.
LEFT IN A DEEP TRANCE
ESINAM’s vocals are sweet and clear as she steps forward to deliver the “We’ve got a healing voice” refrain to Africa Wola, the album’s lead single. The drums call the shots as the groove takes root and guitars, a fluid bass and upraised voices create a vision of pure happiness.
Akadi has twangy guitars, echo-y voices, a shuffling rhythm and some lovely harmonies to provide a counterpoint to Sibusile’s vocals, before events take a techno-turn for Umhale. The African influences are still plainly detectable but the drums are pared-back somewhat. A swampy concoction of keyboards and woodwind provide the backing to Sibusile’s soaring vocals. It’s the kind of song that will send its listeners into a deep trance and leave them there.
FREEFORM JAZZ, FUNK AND FUSION
We head even deeper into left-field with the freeform jazz of Inner Cosmic-Imagination. Sibusile’s sinister spoken -word vocals celebrates the triumph of light over darkness to a pulsing rhythm and blasts of horn. In complete contrast, Ready to Love, the album’s second single is, perhaps, the most immediately accessible song on the album. It’s jazzy, soulful and funky with Sibusile’s Ghanaian-dialect vocals sweetened by ESINAM’s dreamy reprise of the song’s central message: “Ready to love, ready to share, ready to go, ready to let it flow.”
And ESINAM’s ready with another dreamy refrain with Send It, another of the album’s melodic highlights. Sibusile’s ecstatic rap considers the various states of the ‘vibrations’ as drums propel the song along. Plucked strings and flutes lead the way on Vuma, a song that is, in many ways, the epitome of the duo’s Afro-Roots-Electro-Jazz mission. Sibusile’s vocals are soaring and passionate and ESINAM is at her ethereal best with her melodic backing vocals.
ENTICING AND ENCHANTING – EVERYTHING WE HOPED FOR
To close this engaging album, we return to ESINAM’s and Sibusile’s deep African roots. Sibusile sings to a strong African rhythm, whilst flutes fill the gaps. It’s enticing, it’s enchanting and, in the best of traditions, it leaves the listener wanting more.
We’ve been waiting eagerly for Healing Voices. It’s been worth the wait. Healing Voices is everything we hoped it would be. And more.
Listen to Ready to Love, one of the three singles to preview Healing Voices, below:
ESINAM & Sibulsile Xaba online: Instagram / Bandcamp
Keep up with At The Barrier: Facebook / X (formerly Twitter) / Instagram / Spotify / YouTube