I was really blown away at the audience’s response to Sibot’s set on Friday at the Assembly. He’s a complex artist because I felt for a long time that the audience just didn’t get him; ignorant, disconnected and falsely respectful towards his work. Why would I say this? Because it was my truth for a while too.
Most of the Cape Town audience has not known or gravitated towards glitch as a genre, which features heavily in Sibot’s sets. Producers listen to an array of niche music styles and compose with those influences in mind. This “education” can’t be said for the mass general drunk 20-something listening audience. The concept of clubbing and leaving the music to the DJ is only getting firm roots now in South Africa never mind people actually being open-minded!
This ignorance contributed to their disconnection to his art because most of the audience has not understood that he produces live on stage. Until he included his Go-Pro camera taped to his sample machine (I’m sorry I don’t know what it’s actually called!) they couldn’t really SEE what he was doing and thus could not understand why his music was so important and unique in the South African electronic landscape.
Irrespective of these observations there has been a high level of respect for Sibot’s work from those in the know. This is great but a few hundred DJ’s and producers aren’t the mass of people on the dance floor every weekend. From the audience’s perspective his name is known all over the country because it’s “cool”. He’s produced for big brands such as 5FM and worked alongside other great producers like Markus Wormstorm and Waddy Jones aka Die Antwoord’s Ninja. But was does this mean to the average 19 year old? Not much. Most of them don’t know this so where does that leave Sibot in the all gobbling & spewing modern era of electronic music consumption?
Enter Trap. Yes, I know MANY hate it. It’s too commercial for niche producers and DJ’s BUT chicks dig it. Let’s be honest, “Girls just wanna have fun and the love for putting on stilettos, short skirts and getting whorish on the dance floor is still a timeless favourite. Trap allows this. And dudes dig chick; especially drunk, flirty, flash-my-knickers chicks. So what the hell does that have to do with Sibot?
The commercial love for Trap can’t be said for glitch/glitch-hop. Trap has built appreciation-stepping-stones faster in 6 months than glitch has been doing for the last 18 months in Cape Town. A phat party is all about the audience understanding and accepting the music and I believe Trap has been helping audiences to accept glitch. Pity it didn’t come out first, those glitch parties at Fiction might have done better.
Look, I might be completely wrong, this is just a theory of mine but the audience on Friday night received Sibot’s set with MASSIVELY open arms in a real, ignorant-less, false-respect-less, genuine “let’s party HARD” way that I’ve never seen at Sibot’s gigs before – at this level. Yes, he rocked the Diplo gig but the Assembly was at capacity, it was impossible for any DJ to fail that night.
Cudos to Sibot for being his warm, professional open self and for pursuing his passion irrespective of audience listening-maturity. It takes balls to go with what’s in your heart when it’s not the main stream. I’m just pleased the audience is seemingly, at long last, finally, starting to LOVE his music for no other preconceived idea other than that they simply love what they hear. There were loads of Matrics there on Friday (some guys looked 16!) and they were loving Sibot! This means he’s translated to another generation of music lovers, NOT an easy thing to do, long may his success last.
