{"id":130351,"date":"2025-08-25T14:13:07","date_gmt":"2025-08-25T12:13:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/?p=130351"},"modified":"2025-08-25T14:20:55","modified_gmt":"2025-08-25T12:20:55","slug":"lamsi-clubbing-suriname","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/lamsi-clubbing-suriname\/","title":{"rendered":"Lamsi, club music from Suriname to Amsterdam"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Lamsi is a Dutch-Surinamese artist embedded in Amsterdam\u2019s experimental club scene, known for his genre defying blends fusing grime, Afro-diasporic electronica, deconstructed breaks, and traditional Kawina rhythm. In the 2 years since his breakout hit \u201cGive It 2 Me Now\u201d and collaboration with Bambii on \u201cSlip Slide\u201d, he\u2019s made his Boiler Room debut, penned as an \u2018Artist Who Could Define 2024\u2019 by Clash, and worked with grime legend JME as well as LA\u2019s Bianca Oblivion.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We spoke to Lamsi about his connection to Suriname, where he spent his formative years. While both his parents are Surinamese, Lamsi was born and raised in Amsterdam. Nonetheless he remains deeply connected to his heritage through his family. \u201cUntil about 10 years ago, I used to travel to Suriname every year- a lot of my family still live there. Through these trips, my parents, and my cousins’ influence- I became connected to the rhythms from a very young age, and always felt a personal affinity to the music.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lamsi\u2019s music is clearly informed by Suriname, a country where almost everyone is raised learning how to play traditional instruments like the Agida and Skratjie drums. Lamsi, who\u2019s familiar with the practice, explained that the specific ways of playing these instruments are an extension of each region and its sound. There\u2019s no way of emulating the specific regional sound, apart from being taught by those embedded in the culture – history passed down through generations. A natural form of preservation of local identities, even if that may be beside the point, it\u2019s still precious knowledge as much of the world is still widely unaware of Surinamese culture and music.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lamsi\u2019s forthcoming EP, titled Dimi<\/em>, (the name of his late cousin) and an extension of this need to dig into the music of Suriname\u2019s past and forgotten corners. \u201c[Dimi] was the first person to get me into dance music, he also introduced me to a lot of underground electronic music in Suriname. He took me to a lot of record stores, where we dug through vinyl and CDs – discovering the sounds of unknown producers that still to this day I haven\u2019t uncovered. He\u2019s no longer with us, so I can\u2019t ask him about the producers and music that we used to listen to. But this year I\u2019ll go to Suriname for the first time in 10 years, and look through his collection.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n
<\/div>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s thanks to people like Dimi and their record shop digging sessions that Lamsi began to pick up on the heavily percussive rhythms and patterns of the region, connected it with his electronic affinities, and learned the drum patterns and use of instruments in Kawina (Suriname\u2019s best known local genre). Lamsi recommends listening into a run through the history of the sound curated by the formidable Tash LC,<\/strong> Evolution of Afro Surinamese Kawina<\/em><\/strong><\/a>, featuring Kawina, Kaseko, and all sorts of call and response singing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cTyar Faya<\/strong><\/a>\u201d the first single from Lamsi\u2019s EP features a modern, club twist on call and response. It\u2019s a darker abstract, a call to action that translates as an invitation to \u201cbring fire\u201d. It\u2019s the evolution of the technique born through a need for communication, community and entertainment by our enslaved ancestors on plantations, in prison work camps, later adopted in the church, and developed across history in Black music including kawina, soul, gospel, jazz, blues.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cSurinamese music is historically uplifting. I\u2019ve taken these elements and added a dark, club twist,<\/em>\u201d Lamsi explains. \u201cRather than featuring purely traditional sounds or samples, I\u2019m creating something new and modernising the sounds I grew up with. I\u2019m adding a textured layer – linking it to the origins of the music, especially with it being protest music. It was created by those pushing back against colonial influences, and I believe this is coming full circle. People don\u2019t usually understand the words per se, but they can feel the message and the energy.<\/em>\u201d Lamsi, and the diaspora across the Netherlands, have developed a new, specific, imaginative, and darker euphoria as previously featured in traditional Kawina.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lamsi again refers to the music coming out of Jamaica and the diaspora, and the use of Patois. \u201cIt\u2019s the language that we have chosen<\/em>.\u201d He tells me of recent conversations around how \u201cit\u2019s now considered surprising when people speak the Surinamese language – even in Suriname. In school, they learn Dutch.\u201d<\/em> They have begun forgetting the language, losing the whole heritage through language and with it, a piece of history. \u201cThe youth in Suriname don\u2019t really speak the language anymore, it\u2019s strange.\u201d <\/em>There\u2019s a sense of remaining connected to your heritage through the language. Will this connection begin to fade without it?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We create our own versions of connection to heritage in the diaspora. It\u2019s an unknown home that we still dream of, feel nostalgia over, and try to recreate in our communities. Suriname is a melting pot of both cultures and languages. The creole adaptation meshes English, Dutch and other languages to enable flow of communication through those without the ability to speak each other\u2019s languages. It\u2019s been adopted as the \u2018lingua franca\u2019 of Suriname, despite the official language of the region being listed at Dutch. Creole can be described as protest against the enforcement of colonial language, and immortalising it through music is something that is vastly important, as the erasure of these languages amounts to the erasure of struggle.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n
\n