Imarhan invite us to the Sahara at 229, London, 2026

It never fails to shock me (pleasantly, almost scoldingly, like why should I have doubted) when a world music band is embraced and adored and sells out a venue in a country that doesn’t speak their language and would be hard-pressed to play their music on any mainstream channel. The lesson being I should have a better opinion of my fellow music lovers. Just like I’ve discovered them – through chance and algorithms, bringing disjointed stars together into the wider constellation of the desert blues – so did the crowd packed into the 229 for Algerian-born Tuareg band Imarhan, the kind of crowd that knows exactly what they’re there for. I hear whispers of last minute waitlist tickets, spot a man with a “Dismantle Colonial Borders” T-shirt at the very front, and DJ John Armstrong spins us hour-long sets of gorgeous eclectic world bangers, from Turkey to Morocco to Tunisia to Iran.

The Imarhan quintet (a sextet on tour with keyboardist Maxime Kosinetz), dressed in glimmering damask, their heads wrapped in fabric and half faces covered, make a striking visual impression: band leader and vocalist Sadam (Iyad Moussa Ben Abderahmane) with his wild head of curly hair, Hicham Bouhasse on guitar with a groovy pair of sunglasses.

The world of the desert blues in its many facets and sister sounds entered the Western lexicon through rebel pioneers like Tinariwen (who are returning to London on May 18th and O2 Kentish Town – tickets HERE), Ali Farka Touré and Vieux Farka Touré of Mali, the hard rock of Niger (Mdou Moctar) and the psychedelic riffs of Tamikrest. Fellow Tamashek-speakers Imarhan add surprising electronic elements to the steady beats of calabash and drums and the through line that unites all these musicians – melancholy for a lost homeland, keeping elements of tradition alive in an ever-changing faster-moving landscape.

You hear it in the music. The sway, as though you’re floating up and down the dune. Sadam’s soft voice on ‘Assouf’ and ‘Tamiditin’ (off their latest album Essam, recorded in Aboogi Studios, in Tamanrasset), like a balm for weary feet and exhausted hearts. The whirlwind energy of ‘Okcheur’ and ‘Azamane’, with Hicham Bouhasse switching from guitar to drum kit to traditional percussion effortlessly. New and modern and clearly of the 21st century, yet there is a feeling that even a thousand years ago, the same courage and the same joy would have rung across the Sahara through the voices of the Tuareg nomads.

As the show ends on the bustling ‘Achinkad’, I turn around and watch the whole room jump as one, hands clapping in unison, not a stern face in sight, couples dancing, women spinning, scarves flying, a whirlwind of lights and colours, humans together as their best selves. What else could we need?

In a world insisting we should fear each other, come be in these rooms. See your neighbour. Dance along. Clap to the beat for as long as the song holds and know, without you all together there, there’d be no music.