Asian Dub Foundation’s live performance of their soundtrack to La Haine at the Royal Festival Hall was an immersive and captivating experience. The combination of the film’s powerful narrative and ADF’s dynamic music created an evening that felt nostalgic yet relevant.
Known for their genre-defying sound, Asian Dub Foundation blends elements of dub, dancehall, and South Asian music with rock instruments like electric guitar and bass, drawing on punk rock influences. Their signature style—featuring dub-inspired basslines and guitar riffs reminiscent of the sitar—brings a unique energy to everything they do, and this live performance was no exception.
From the opening scene, the music set the tone perfectly, carrying the audience through the intensity and emotion of the story. The live soundtrack added layers of depth to the film without overshadowing it, enhancing key moments like the breakdancing scene, where the music amplified the raw energy of the moment, and the chase scenes, where it heightened the tension and urgency.
The balance between film and music was seamless, with ADF’s performance complementing rather than competing with the visuals. The result was a cohesive and thought-provoking experience that underscored the film’s themes of resilience, and cultural identity.
This event also served as a reminder of ADF’s versatility and longevity as artists. Their recent release, 94-Now: Collaborations, celebrates 30 years of their ground-breaking work, featuring collaborations with icons like Iggy Pop, Sinéad O’Connor, and Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan. The performance was a fitting tribute to their legacy while showcasing their ability to keep evolving.
MUSIC PREMIERES
SEVENTEEN slink into a gloomy, post-apocalyptic world filled with old school technology in the video for their Pharrell Williams-produced single “Bad Influence.” The 13-member K-pop boy band dropped the visual from their new HAPPY BURSTDAY album on Wednesday (June 11) and fans will surely be picking through the arresting clip directed by Beomjin for days looking for Easter eggs.
The video for the English-language single opens with the singers locked in reflective glass pentagons as they sing about wanting to have a good time while seeming like they’re not having one at all. After escaping from the enclosure, they get chased around a brutalist structure by robot dogs singing, “And I had time to think about it/ But life would be so much better without it/ I don’t want it at all/ But, hey, I wanna have a good time” over Pharrell’s insistent, fuzzed-out beat.
And while the song is about having a good time, the action makes it seem like that is a stretch. Dressed in Blade Runner-like leather jackets designed by Japanese fashion house sacai, they stand around while an unseen member plugs an analog cord into a headphone jack that reads “Good” as an old school dot matrix printer spits out the lyrics and a few of the guys ghost ride their old school muscle cars.
The sci-fi action takes a bizarre turn halfway through when they enter a red zone filled with white mannequin heads wearing blindfolds as one of the singer’s puts a checkmark next to “bad” on a checklist that includes “lost,” “sad,” “raw,” “happy,” “innocent” and other emotions. There is also an M.C. Escher-like stairway to nowhere, a bath in a swamp of vintage audio tape, contemplative posing on a pile of tires and moody standing around in dimly lit rooms in the dream sequence-like series of shots that leave more questions than answers
HAPPY BURSTDAY debuted at No. 2 on the Billboard 200 album chart, landing the group their seventh top 10-charting album.
Watch the “Bad Influence” video below.
