Uma Chine

The name of this band that brings together six Ghent musicians may evoke a Peruvian Inca princess, but the music that Uma Chine plays sounds much more like David Lynch’s house composer Angelo Badalamenti on a diet of electric guitars and ethereal female voices. Or: the proof that cacti and mushrooms are not needed for a psychedelic experience. (dS)

The vibe of Ghent-based band Uma Chine is somewhere between roots and electronics, the human (hUman) and the maChine. A young, quirky band that oozes the pleasure of playing!

Frontwoman Nele de Gussem (Maya’s Moving Castle, Future Old People Are Wizards, Inwolves, BRNS) took a number of top-class musicians from the Ghent pop and jazz scene under her wings and merged everyone’s talent within Uma Chine to create a strong amalgam of sixties psychedelica and contemporary synthpop (Indie style).

The sultry, dreamy voices of sisters Rana and Sherien Holail Mohamed (Binti) seduce each listener and harmonise wonderfully with the jazz and experimental background of Simon Raman (drums - Steiger, Ivy Falls), Nils Vermeulen (bass - Jukwaa) and Gilles Vandecaveye-Pinoy (synths - Steiger, Peenoise, Ruben Block). Uma Chine creates a universe in which the extremes of pop and jazz merge beautifully and the unconventionally structured songs create a path between the accessible and the hard-to-grasp.

With the title of finalist in Humo's Rock Rally 2020 to their name, they released their second album in April 2021 via W.E.R.F. Records. The album Changes was described by Humo as dreamy, nostalgic and powerfully brittle.