We live in a time when understanding the benefits of migration and sharing of ideas is more vividly important than ever. Many of the best and most innovative musicians are those who produce radical synthesis of sounds and cultures from across continents – but there are few who do it with such deftness, lightness of touch and infectious enthusiasm as Tanguy Haesevoets, aka Témé Tan. His music is both ultra modern, reflecting the life of a man who can feel at home on four continents, and shot through with a d
Travelling is in Tanguy’s blood: born in the Democratic Republic of Congo, his family were constantly back and forth to both Belgium and Kinshasa. “I was accustomed to fly at a very, very young age,” he says. “Even alone – a very early memory is my brothers and I being taken care of by a hostess on the plane.” He grew up surrounded by the zouk and rumba music of his Congolese relatives, but it was in Brussels, while at school, that he started to make music. To begin with it was just “rapping to rap records
It’s clear that Tanguy is possessed of some serious determination, and an unquenchable thirst to learn. Though he’d never played any instruments before his first band, he taught himself guitar because he’d fallen in love with Brazilian bossanova and tropicalia – unique and complex sounds both – and didn’t know anyone else who could play them, so though he should do it himself. Likewise, he started learning to tap out rhythms on an MPC sampler because he wasn’t hearing the beats that he wanted anywhere else.