Khruangbin - The global village of psych-funk

This is what we do, and we’re not gonna try and go outside the box too much. We’re gonna explore the box we’re in. I’ve always been a big fan of that. Music should never be just for the sake of being experimental. Before you even start, you have to know what you’re experimenting with first!”

(Mark Speer)

Sometimes, for some strange reason, three or four short sentences are enough to grasp the stylistic hallmark, the thinking and the philosophy behind an entire musical journey. The idea underpinning the project made up of three musicians who, by another quirk of human circumstance - this time of birth - hail from Houston, Texas, but could just as easily be from the American South as from Bangkok or Islamabad, is simple, yet startling in how it declares itself, so at odds with the now-standard, hollow expansionist ambitions we hear about every day. Explore the box you're in; before experimenting with what's far from you, look inside yourself. And at the same time, set no geographical limits in doing so - draw inspiration from anywhere, as much from the French Antilles as from Spanish flamenco guitarists. That's who Khruangbin are: they do what they do well, but let themselves be shaped by everything, they contain multitudes, as Whitman would have said, forming a fluid vessel capable of enchanting, drawing you in and ultimately winning you over, all while staying true only ever to themselves.

Chronologically, the Khruangbin project has two decisive moments. The first takes place in 2004 in the gospel band of St. John's Methodist Church in Houston, Texas, founded by the well-known preacher Rudy Rasmus and still one of the most multi-ethnic hubs in the whole of the American Church. Mark Speer is a twenty-five-year-old with extremely particular musical tastes: having started out as a devotee of the various projects born between the Seventies and Eighties out of the musical genius of George Clinton, he soon falls in love with that genre as vague as it is fascinating known as world music, drawing inspiration in particular from Middle Eastern musical traditions and encouraged by the precious work of groups like Dead Can Dance. He plays guitar in the church band, and it's here that he meets Donald DJ Johnson, who dabbles on the organ on these occasions but has the drums as his favourite instrument and 90s old-school hip-hop as his musical bedrock.

The second sliding-door moment comes six years later, in 2010, when Mark Speer and Laura Lee - a friend whom Mark himself taught to play bass - are chosen by the versatile Yppah to play in the band that would open Bonobo's American tour. This experience convinces Mark and Laura to finally get the Khruangbin project off the ground, bringing in DJ on drums to form an extremely classic lineup. Despite the enormous differences between the three members in so many respects, the result of their first jam sessions is a distinctive sound, fluid and genuinely well-knit. The band chooses as its headquarters an old barn in the small town of Burton, population 300, about a hundred kilometres from Houston, and it's there that they officially launch the adventure that, within a few years, would see them cast their spell over much of the American independent scene and beyond with a unique and truly compelling style.

After the brief tour with Bonobo, the British producer and DJ includes their track "calf born on winter" on his compilation "Late Night Tales" in 2014. The track is the very first ever released under the Khruangbin name, and besides marking the band's debut on the world stage, it also enjoys modest success thanks to the sounding board Bonobo provides. The band is in good creative shape, and taking advantage of this favourable moment, the British label Night Time Stories (already a partner of both Bonobo and the aforementioned "Late Night Tales" compilation series) wastes no time signing the three Texan lads to a contract.

After a couple of short EPs released during 2015, the trio are ready for their full-length debut. The Universe Smiles Upon You comes out on 6 November 2015, produced by Khruangbin themselves together with sound engineer Steve Christiansen, also from Houston, who already had a Grammy under his belt for Best Folk Album for Steve Earle's "Townes", albeit in a completely different genre. The title is telling: the band's sound makes itself felt right from the opening track, "Mr. White", giving a clear sense both of an approach that resists easy classification (you can find traces of psychedelia, of world music, of ethnic sounds, of the much-cited Thai funk, even of soul, but it's all blended into a compound where it's hard to tell the various components apart) and, above all, of the musicians' talent. Laura Lee's bass groove is sticky, quietly but effectively captivating; DJ is a kind of supreme metronome in human form, a mysterious presence always lurking in some corner of the song, as precise as an analogue clock made in some farmhouse in the Swiss valleys, yet discreet, almost silent.

And then Mark's guitar is immediately striking: it spins around profusely as if in an endless jam session, carrying us into a loop that seems impossible to escape. "Two Fish And An Elephant" calms things down and introduces some more reassuring elements, like a chorus halfway through the song, but Mark's rollercoaster antics still dominate, and this genre, which until just moments before had never been heard under quite these dynamics, already feels almost familiar, homely - you settle into it without any difficulty.

To find the first sung lyrics you have to wait until "White Gloves", one of the band's biggest successes and arguably the high point of the record. The mood is beachy, evoking a sunset on the shore as disjointed lines are whispered to us about a queen mourning her past, while some liquid notes from Mark's guitar nod to the true queen that any song of this kind can't help but gesture toward, "On The Beach" by Neil Young.

The melancholy mood lasts just long enough to register, because "People Everywhere (Still Alive)" kicks back in with a whip-crack rhythm that lets us appreciate both sides of the Khruangbin style. These two tracks, at the heart of the record, hold the creative high points of the entire 2015 output - pure talent, hard to deny. Towards the end, "Balls & Pins" is also worth noting, where the more canonical world-music influences come through more strongly, with atmospheres recalling those of Passion by Peter Gabriel.

The Universe Smiles Upon You is an incomplete record, not yet fully in focus due to the repetitiveness of certain stylistic tics that sometimes turn from a strength into an Achilles' heel (the stillness of "Dern Kala" and "August 12", which really do spin on themselves quite a lot), but it's also a record of fiery, strong and direct talent, a statement of the band's unique style, hinting at years to come of interesting solutions.

The release of The Universe Smiles Upon You, while it still doesn't bring Khruangbin any real mainstream recognition, allows the Texan trio to start making a name for themselves on the American "indie" circuit. The group is picked as "new band of the week" in the Guardian's column, as well as being chosen as an opening act by several high-profile artists such as Father John Misty and Massive Attack for their 2016 tours. Throughout 2017 the band, after a tour that also takes them to Glastonbury, devotes itself to writing its sophomore album, which is officially released on January 26, 2018. Alongside Night Time Stories, Khruangbin this time also release through Dead Oceans, something of a sacred cow of North American and English indie music (Slowdive, A Place To Bury Strangers and, more recently, Phoebe Bridgers, just to name a few artists who might help define that musical "space"). Production is again handled by Christensen together with the band (mainly Mark Speer, as much the "musical" and sonic leader as he is a shy personality who shuns the spotlight, which instead suits a little more the lovely voice and intriguing personality of Laura Lee). The album's title is a nod to the bassist's own father, who, when asked "Como me quieres?" ("how much do you love me?"), could give no other answer than "Con todo el mundo". And "Como me quieres" is also the title of the opening track, a symbolic link to the previous record, picking up its curves, contours and features, almost as if to reassure the listener, bringing them back into the comfort zone that The Universe Smiles Upon You had created and consolidated.

But the influence of Laura's Mexican and Latin American roots isn't only felt in the titles and in the everyday-life references of the lyrics. Con todo el mundo is indeed the answer to the question "como me quieres", but it's also a nod to the cosmopolitan imprint at the heart of Khruangbin, this vessel to be filled with as many different colors and as many flags and cultures as possible. "Lady And Man" draws heavily on Hispanic culture, behind lyrics that are, as usual, hermetic and elusive. For this song, the group has said they were inspired by a scene from the teen comedy "Clueless". One practice Khruangbin apparently use during their jam sessions is watching films with the sound off on the old TV in Burton's barn: during a scene of bickering between two characters in the aforementioned comedy, Mark and Laura tried to give voice to the characters through their instruments, resulting in this guitar-and-bass duet that runs through the track's whole cyclical writhing.

The tight rhythms and the scratchy riff of "Maria Tambien" make the third track one of the best-realized pieces of the bunch (the live version of this song performed at the Tiny Desk Concert, available on YouTube, is particularly beautiful). If the declared source for the first record was thai funk and Thailand, to which Khruangbin also owe their name, for Con todo el mundo the trio has confessed that their inspirations include not only Laura's Hispanic roots but also Mark's listening habits rooted in Iranian music, which peek through in the atmospheres created by the mellotron on "Maria Tambien". DJ, needless to say, does his job like clockwork, rounding off these three minutes, among the best in Khruangbin's discography.

Another interesting experiment lies behind "August 10". For this composition the group drew on another one of the band's own tracks, "August 12" from The Universe Smiles Upon You, playing it backwards, and over this base Mark improvised an engaging guitar line, with a few subtle backing vocals from Laura serving as the perfect accompaniment.

While the rest of the record doesn't add much to the opening tracks in terms of innovation or messaging, "Evan Finds The 3rd Room" deserves a separate mention, bookended by Laura's 70s dance groove, with lyrics built on three or four lines that are inside jokes for the band, and with Mark's guitar initially seeming to draw heavily on Nile Rodgers, before letting loose in the chorus into its usual swirling flourishes, free in the air and sharper than ever.

Con todo el mundo marks a step forward, not just a confirmation of the Texan trio's talent but also a further, admirable attempt to pack in as many musical influences as possible into a formula that's remarkably able to stay true to itself and its own ideals. The songs feel sharper, the creative tricks and compositional imagination remain one of the band's strong points; in short, there's no doubt a growth process underway, and where The Universe Smiles Upon You sometimes stayed a bit anchored to repetitive stylistic tics, Con todo el mundo manages to constantly renew itself, while still keeping, as we never tire of repeating, that inimitable Khruangbin style.

The Texan group's sophomore album is a critical success and also quietly, gradually manages to sneak into a few charts (Belgium, above all, seems to be the country where the group is proportionally most appreciated). The band begins an artistic partnership with American singer-songwriter Leon Bridges, opening for him on his tour, a relationship that a few years later will lead to an interesting creative collaboration. In 2019, meanwhile, work begins on recording the third album.

In the meantime, though, on February 7, 2020, Khruangbin release an EP in collaboration with Leon Bridges, titled Texas Sun. The release contains 4 tracks and opens with the title track, where Leon sings about the sun of the state shared by the four musicians involved, over a vaguely country guitar that once again owes a debt to Neil Young's "On The Beach". A beautiful folk song that smells of desert, dry heat and ranches, one that would have fit right into the soundtrack of "Breaking Bad" given the settings it evokes. While "Midnight" and "C-Side" don't add much to this formula, interesting as it is, "Conversion" is a different story, the most "Khruangbin-sounding" of the four, with the usual elegant, chill atmosphere conjured by the Houston trio, over which Bridges sings a gospel part that is also the first lyric the young Texan singer ever wrote. A fine result, in which two seemingly contradictory elements (the gospel/traditional nature of the lyrics and the band's psychedelic/ethno sound) blend together extremely pleasingly.

But returning to the band's "solo" path, by now the ingredients are all in the pot: steady growth, an ever-strong chemistry and an evolution, including on a personal and cultural level, of the band members, all feeding new inspirations and influences into the Khruangbin sound. On top of all this comes a growing popular success that puts them on the launchpad at the start of 2020. The Houston trio doesn't let the chance slip by and lands the decisive blow.

Mordechai (a title once again inspired by a friend of Laura Lee's) comes out on June 26, 2020, preceded in the middle of the pandemic by the single "Time (You And I)", for this writer probably the best song ever released under the Khruangbin name. The expectations, in short, aren't let down. This time Mark really does put up the Nile Rodgers poster in the studio before playing, pulling out a guitar riff straight out of the late 70s, and, closely followed by Laura Lee, leads us into an extremely catchy chorus, carried by Laura's usual imaginative, evocative lyrics. This is surf rock, psychedelia, and world music too, why not, at the start of the most unpredictable decade in years, musically as well. The track fades out with a wonderful outro, where a Mark Speer at the top of his game sketches shapes and images while Laura sings in every language in the world, a celebration of diversity. Magnificent.

Not that the rest of the record falls short: "Connaissais de face" introduces a whispered spoken word passage indebted to Serge Gainsbourg, while on "Father Bird, Mother Bird" all of Mark Speer's talent emerges once again, laid over a bed made up of DJ's usual relentless snare and Laura's bass, which at times follows the guitar like a master to draw inspiration from, and at other times breaks away from it as in an evocative dance.

The melancholy hit "Pelota" is the clearest admission of flamenco and Spanish-culture influence, and could have come straight out of one of the many love-triangle scenes in Allen's film "Vicky Cristina Barcelona", while "Shida" renews the band's debt to Middle Eastern, and in particular Iranian, culture, both in sounds that recall certain stylistic traits found on Con todo el mundo and in the title itself, inspired by an Iranian girl the band members know. The other big standout on the record is "So We Won't Forget", where a soft guitar nostalgic for the past locks in notes fit for a perfect single over the usual groove (which legend has it was recorded in one take), a specialty Laura always nails whenever the songs get more uptempo; another song destined to become a classic in Khruangbin's discography, able to merge the band's poppier side with the one faithful to their roots.

The two singles are once again, as had already happened with The Universe Smiles Upon You and partly with Con todo el mundo, the best expression of the Khruangbin sound and of the period the band members are going through. Their style is polished to a shine, the gears run perfectly, Mordechai is the right record at the right time for the Texan trio, who thanks to their third studio effort indeed climb the charts of half the world, even managing to find space at home, where they had never charted until 2020.

But, beyond the popular success, which has never seemed to be an essential element for the band, the third album adds a precious piece to a path of steady growth, balanced between a strong bond to certain cornerstones and a constant hunger for new influences. A path that so far has always been able to examine and improve itself. Which, if nothing else, gives us further reason for optimism about what's still to come.

The cosmopolitan nature of their music has led to numerous collaborations – Wu-Tang Clan, Toro y Moi, Men I Trust, Nubya Garcia, Vieux Farka Touré, Leon Bridges – but for Laura Lee Ochoa (bass), Mark Speer (guitar) and DJ Johnson (drums) it's time to come back within the familiar walls of home, or rather of the living room (la sala), scaling back the role of vocals and synths for a record to be leafed through like a yellowed photo album, surrendering to the seduction of nostalgia and sentiment.

For their fourth album A La Sala (2024), Khruangbin have put together 12 tracks drawn from a rich and treasured archive, where the band keeps its most personal and intimate compositions: gentle downtempo pieces and delicate funk-soul grooves adorned with guitar arpeggios poised between flamenco-style tones and spaghetti-western echoes. This scaling-back of identity and ambition chosen by the Texan group is a tricky hurdle to clear, but not for Khruangbin, who are among the most refined interpreters of the art of contamination, to the point of becoming a point of reference for explorations carried out well beyond their own prestigious lineup.

Few tricks and plenty of passion drive the twelve tracks: the romantic Spanish-tinged airs suspended in the dreamlike limbo of "Farolim De Felgueiras", the intoxicating, aching guitar riffs with noir tones of "Ada Jean", and the country–western romanticism of the enchanting "Three From Two" are intense pages that lay bare the band's soul, which even dares a classical-leaning approach with the entrance of piano on the naive, fragile notes of "Les Petits Gris". DJ Johnson's brilliant creativity remains in service of the never-urgent atmospheres laid down by Mark Speer on "A La Sala", introduced without any hesitation from the very first notes of "Fifteen Fifty-Three", moving with fluid elegance from the sun-drenched yacht-rock and soul sounds of "May Ninth", to the slightly psychedelic tropical-funk of "Pon Pón" and the latin-dance drive of "Hold Me Up (Thank You)", with an agility that stirs the waters without muddying them.

A La Sala is nonetheless Khruangbin's most comforting album, and despite all the strengths and weaknesses that come with it ("Todavía Viva", "Juegos Y Nubes" and "Caja De La Sala" don't add much to the project's final outcome), it's the product of a coherent artistic path that adds a few gems to the band's already substantial repertoire – above all the exuberant harmonic virtuosity of "A Love International": just a few notes worked into sharp, sensual phrasing, ready to take over the stage in future live shows.

The Texan group's homecoming is another step in the right direction, a starting point for new, exciting contaminations capable of surprising and overturning even the most imaginative guesses, and although I expect this new album to be showered with excessive praise (Paul McCartney and David Byrne, among others, have already spoken in the band's favor) A La Sala is a record full of personality and depth, but lacking the centrality that albums like Mordechai or the one born from the collaboration with Vieux Farka Touré, "Ali", have earned in recent years.

Contributions by Gianfranco Marmoro ("A La Sala")

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