çhâñt électrónïqùe don’t need a ton of bells and whistles to work their magic. The avant-garde international musical collective is unassuming in its stagecraft - no lightshows, no elaborate choreo, just a sprig of flowers springing from the stem of each microphone. And with the beginning of their mesmerizing set at the North Wall, the reasoning becomes obvious - nothing should distract from the beauty of their sound, the richness of their compositions, the communion between tradition and innovation that defines their sound. Their blooming mics are a fitting metaphor for the ethos of the band itself - using technology to elevate something as universal and naturally occurring as the desire to make music.

The band’s members span a plethora of heritages and cultures: French, Portuguese, Croatian, Bosnian, Irish. Unless you’re a particularly accomplished polyglot, at some point there will be a song on the setlist in an unfamiliar tongue. But the soaring vocals of Louise Calzada, Dunja Bahtijarevic and Teresa Melo Campos, in conversation with Nils Peschanski’s moody, atmospheric synths, charging kinetic percussion from Nenad Kovacic and the grounded rumble of Raphael Hardy’s bass, evocatively communicate the spirit of their source material while using modern tools to expand their potential further; not to outdo, but to enhance what was always there.

There is always potential with any ‘modern reimagining’ for that modernity to choke the beauty of the original, but nothing is hastily transplanted here. Original melodies are given room to breathe and establish themselves before being brought into dialogue with the more high-tech production, feeding off the energy of each with a wonderfully energetic ebb and flow. The twinkling, crackling samples that make up Bosnian track ‘Osu Se Nebo’ reflect the sky full of stars its opening lines invoke, as well as the instability of the world below - it reminds me in its instrumentation of Lido Pimienta’s gorgeously anthemic track ‘Eso Que Tu Haces’. In ‘Quando Eu Era Pequenina’, the harmonies are enveloped in a roaring electric crescendo, before closing on archival audio of the song being sung as it would have been originally, a capella with only faraway birdsong and dogs barking as its orchestration. And their closer ‘Senhora Das Aguas’ begins with standalone vocals before culminating in a mad symphony of chaotic sound, as though caught in a maelstrom.

There is always a sense of reverence and respect to çhâñt électrónïqùe‘s influences, using the tools at their disposal both to honour their respective heritages and share them in a way that feels instinctive and universal. As Bahtijarevic translates in one introduction, to sing is to be free, and the band’s practices feel like a modern extension of the oral tradition. The atmosphere is conscientious and collaborative - at several points members of musical collective Remorae join the chorus on vocals, cello and violin, some of it rehearsed, at other points simply feeling the flow of the music and improvising accordingly. There may be more plugs and wires involved, but at the heart of it is the same impulse that started these customs in the first place; an urge to create communally, to share feelings that, regardless of mother tongue and culture, we have all experienced. Find them on Bandcamp or Spotify and let yourself be transported - I can tell you firsthand it is nothing short of spiritual.