Afro Cluster: Broadening Horizons at Glastonbury

A number of artists from Wales will be performing at the Glastonbury music festival the weekend of June 24 to 26. Among those performing on the BBC Introducing stage will be Afro Funk artists Afro Cluster, Folk band Plu and electric trio XY&O.

Charlie Piercey is a guitarist with South Wales based band, Afro Cluster.

Afro Cluster. Not a funky breakfast cereal (in the amusing words of Radio Wales DJ Adam Walton) but a rather hefty nine-piece Cardiff based Hip Hop group of which I am cheerfully a member.

Born in the epicentre of Cardiff’s ever-booming music scene, more specifically at the now defunct Toucan Club formally on Womanby Street, Afro Cluster emerged at a series of live jam sessions hosted under the Starving Artists promotional platform. These were decidedly merry community-based celebrations of the more Afro-centric musical happenings on the Welsh soundscape with most of the focus on Jazz, Funk, Hip Hop and the like.

So what came next?

Afro Cluster, as a collective through its inception to the present day, has always been united on one thing, and it’s unquestionably the music. Like any band, it’s the music that keeps us together and maintains the work ethic. Unfortunately though, life sometimes gets in the way and it did… a bit.

But now we get to play Glastonbury on the BBC Introducing Stage! An excellent opportunity for us to reach out to a new audience, and set in motion our plan to play bigger stages, access wider audiences, move our music all over the country and then onto Europe and beyond. I’m pretty sure none of us have been to Glastonbury before and although there’s always unscrupulous media coverage (quit saying its so muddy and there’s queues, of course there are… IT’S GLASTO!) we’re not really sure what to expect. We finished our final rehearsal yesterday and the excitement about the next few days is palpable. Our set is perhaps the most compact it's ever been but we're still aiming to melt faces and induce furious boogieing

Packing has been a momentous occasion with wellies, binbags and a profusion of wetwipes taking paramount place on our checklists, though a spot of mud is good for the pores you know...

What we’re most looking forward to is kayaking between stages, basking in the momentary intervals of tepid British Sunshine and enjoying the amazing line-up. Especially Mbongwana Star, Gregory Porter, Unknown Mortal Orchestra, Earth Wind & Fire, Oddisee, Shibusahirazu Orchestra and a plethora of others.

Welsh talent on the bill will also be a priority as well as the artists we’re sharing a stage with: X Y & O, Plu, Bossy Love and the Tom Robinson Band are all earmarked stops in our wandery, haphazard festival itinerary.

There’s just so much to take in! It’s really going to be a unique discovery of new music for us and a fantastic slot on the Sunday to take advantage of. We’re supercharged and ready for it.

Of course we can’t forget that reaching this point has all been made possible by the unwavering enthusiasm of the Horizons/Gorwelion BBC Wales scheme, the BBC Introducing radio DJs, countless other media, producers, management, promoters, artists, graphic designers, sound engineers, recording engineers, videographers, photographers, journalists, fellow musicians, music industry professionals and most importantly YOU! You beautiful people who listen to our noise unconditionally, a massive thank you to you all! .

We’ll see you on Sunday 26th of June, BBC Introducing Stage, Silver Hayes, 4PM.

- Charlie Piercey (Afro Cluster)