Worldly acoustics wrapped in layers of electronic reverberations will echo down South Peters Street in New Orleans on Friday night when Beats Antique performs at the Howlin’ Wolf.
If listeners find their way inside, the distinctive nature of these tunes will only become more apparent upon seeing the accompanying performance that includes animal-themed art performance routines and professional belly dancing — an art the trio originally produced music for.
Zoe Jakes, a producer, creative voice and belly dancing performer for Beats Antique explained the group has defined itself since those experimental endeavors.
“Our first two albums, we very specifically knew exactly what we were going to make,” she remembered. “Middle Eastern, sort of down-tempo music for belly dancers.”
Jakes said she believes Beats Antique’s third album, “Contraption Vol. 1,” truly brought out the group’s “sound” and ultimately the three members’ personalities. With a switch in objective and record labels, the group moved from belly dance-tailored tunes to the more pointed ideas the three have produced through collaboration. The group now combines elements like folk acoustics that range from middle eastern to eastern European instrumentation with electronic dance and hip-hop elements.
Jakes’s boyfriend and band member, producer, song writer and multi-instrumentalist David Satori said this combination was natural between the trio’s interests and the development of belly dancing. Satori himself was largely influenced by world music in his travels and studies.
“A lot of the music the belly dancers were listening to was this electronic hybrid music with some traditional elements,” Satori said. “I think we were all influenced by traditional folk music, so it was just natural to bring them together and experiment with electronic and acoustic.”
Tommy Cappel, the third creative force, spent time in New York city drumming for DJ performances during an experimental hip-hop movement there that also influenced his interest in electronic dance music, he said.
“I got a lot of gigs playing drums with DJs in a small bar settings that really influenced me in a way that was really like, ‘Wow, this really works well together,’” he said. “So I was already producing hip-hop and electronic music before Beats Antique, and that provided a really great combination when me and David and Zoe came together.”
But while Satori and Cappel do much of the songwriting, often times Jakes’ performance pieces or props influence this process, they noted.
“Some of the songs build from the ground up as performance pieces,” Jakes said. “One of the features in the show with this head dress piece and this crazy skirt. The piece was developed, and the song was made for it after, so it’s a very symbiotic relationship when a song is already created, and then I make a dance to it.”
Satori explained a lot of the group’s musical ideas gear toward live shows and what fans are responding positively to. And on this tour, the three have been able to showcase their Sept. 18 released “Contraption Vol. 2” as a new piece of this live experience.
“The album is a continuation of the Contraption series,” Cappel said. “It basically has a similar format as the ‘Contraption Volume 1’, which has more acoustic things as opposed to electronic. It has some traditional-esque songs that we’ve written that sort of help define the Balkan genre that we go through.”
Because the record is so new, the group has enjoyed watching crowds react to this material as many fans hear it for the first time, Jakes said.
However, fans who plan to attend the group’s Dec. 21 performance in front of the Great Pyramids of Giza, Egypt for the Great Convergence celebration may witness an entirely exclusive element in this live performance.
“‘Do Lab,’ the group who is putting it on, got a transmission from an extraterrestrial being a couple of years ago that told them they needed to set an event on the solstice when all the planets were aligned,” Satori said. “The great change was coming, and the earth was going to open up, and a huge UFO was going to come out and transport us all to the Promised Land. They wanted to bring us with them, so they booked us for the gig, I guess.”
Assuming Beats Antique isn’t abducted on Dec. 21, Cappel said the members plan to taking a long-deserved break from their constant touring and production work.
“I think we were all influenced by traditional folk music, so it was just natural to bring them together and experiment with electronic and acoustic.”
