On his Lahai Tour, Sampha is Dancing
Cynthia Minh, Anita Minh
Sampha commands the emotions of a room like the best of contemporary artists. He has been the storyteller on some of the most melancholic songs in recent years. But last Sunday night, closing the North American leg of his Lahai tour at the Vogue Theatre in Vancouver, Sampha did something that we haven’t seen him do in previous tours. In the middle of “Stereo Colour Cloud (Shaman's Dream)”—the third song on his amended setlist—Sampha crouched down at the front of the stage and started dancing. And it felt like a celebration.
His return to Vancouver was just as much of a celebration for fans. Tickets to this show sold out in a matter of weeks. Concert-goers arrived early and quickly packed the front of the theatre to the back like sardines. The feeling of anticipation in the room was palpable.
The truth is, Sampha could have filled the seats of larger venues in Vancouver. That Lahai is only his sophomore album feels incongruous with the reputation of someone who has been in our ears for over a decade. Collaborations with artists like SBTRKT, Drake, Kanye West, and Kendrick Lamar have long introduced his unique and recognizable voice to audiences. His debut LP, Process, released in 2017, was a display of meticulous vocal arrangement and production.
Process was also layered with emotional depth, written through the grief of losing his mother. If Process was shaped by the pain and heaviness of this chapter in Sampha’s life, Lahai, released six years later and after the birth of his child, seems to have been borne out of a chapter of fullness and levity.
Sampha brought with him to this stage a new energy. He opened the night with “Suspended”—featuring whistles, bird noises, discordant synth strings, and rattles, that set the tone for audiences to suspend themselves for a while. Sampha’s voice, always pristine, lilted across the melody with ease.
What followed was a set that was measured, precise, yet loose. On “Spirit 2.0”, Sampha’s syncopated ad libs when he repeated “light will catch you” became passionate audience chants. Upbeat songs like “Dancing Circles” saw Sampha doing crowd work, moving and gliding along the stage.
The magic of going to a Sampha concert is that he doesn’t just perform his songs, he reimagines them, making the experience of his songs in concert go beyond listening to them. Re-envisioned renditions of his earlier music were standouts. The live version of dance track "Without”, began with a drumming circle on the side of the stage—a return to a setup he used in his last tour with Process, but this time made even more bombastic with a fuller band. Ethereal sounds that mimicked rain and bubbling water in the background of “Plastic 100ºC/Hold On” emphasized the intensity of the emotional boiling point alluded to in his lyrics. Save minor almost imperceptible issues with asynchronous timing, cacophonous percussive arrangements during “Blood on Me”, especially when paired with harsh red lighting, made the battle-like ahs and oohs of the song’s bridge feel eruptive.
The power of these performances relies heavily on his new band. Drummer Blake Cascoe, percussionist Ruthven Ready, bassist Rosetta Carr, and keyboardist Elsas, all played multiple roles as instrumentalists and vocalists to contribute to the show’s polyphonic feel. It’s clear that all band members were accomplished musicians in their own right. Ruthven, who opened the show with a comparatively simpler setup that paired multi-toned synths and vocal layering, sounded like he was ready to step into the next stage of his music career. This is an artist on the verge of widespread recognition.
But while movement was the main theme of the show, it was the quieter moments in Sampha’s set that grounded it. Songs where Sampha stood on stage solo, including emotional renditions of “Too Much” and “No One Knows Me Like the Piano”, were crowd favourites. The encore of the night, “Can’t Get Close”, was among the most serene moments of the show, filled in by distinctive harmonies from the entire band.
This tour feels like a special time capsule. To watch an artist at Sampha’s level of talent and creativity in such an intimate setting is a rarity that will surely become less accessible in the next stages of his career. Sampha, who spent another few moments with his many fans after his show to sign copies of his albums shows us that belongs in this rare light, ready for what lies ahead.
