When you play at a festival whose crowds comprise a disproportionately large amount of jaded industry professionals, journalists and labels, you're going to have to work very hard to coax even a modicum of enthusiasm from your audience.
So when Ibeyi walk soberly onto their Eurosonic stage, clad in black and clutching candles, the chattering crowd is, at best, indifferent to their attempts to create atmosphere. It's a worrying start. We've just come from watching Twin Atlantic, who, despite having shows planned for Brixton Academy and the SSE Hydro this year, played to a tent so empty it almost echoed, and failed to win over even those who had turned up.
We needn't have worried about Ibeyi though. As soon as the 19-year-old twins begin their determined, harmonised Yoruban verses, the crowd falls silent. Ibeyi's music, particularly in a live setting, has a potency that cuts through even the most cold and cynical of audiences.
In many ways, the duo have old souls - their music is heavily dosed with the sounds of jazz - but they've also got their feet firmly planted in the present. Their West-African influenced harmonies are undercut with deep, bassy beats, and they seem just as at home with loop pedals, vocal sampling and trip-hop drum machines as they do with a piano and hand drums.
Their new single, 'Ghosts', is a particular revelation. Despite a slight false start, which elicits a burst of laughter from Lisa-Kaindé, it's one of their most weighty and developed performances of the night. The song's chorus clicks so immediately that it feels as if it must, somehow, have always existed.
Ibeyi juggle their eclectic cultural and musical influences with a strange but beautiful ease, and witnessing this incredible balancing act live is a sight (and sound) to behold.
Below: Watch Ibeyi's new video for Ghosts.
Follow Gigwise on Twitter @Gigwise for more update to date information on Eurosonic and read our interview with Ibeyi here.
