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We’re gearing up for the annual Global Music Showcases! On Monday, October 12, music professionals with a passion for global sounds will have the chance to discover 8 promising acts performing live on stage. Don’t miss it!
On the program: 3'Ain, Aishinka, Jeroen Knapen, AwTaaR Moors, Ananta Roosens, Peixe e Limão, Quentin Dujardin & Nicolas Fiszman and WÖR
Register at https://clustermusic.be/nl/global-music-showcases
Monday, October 12, from 10:00 a.m. to 5:30 p.m., including lunch and closing drinks
De Casino - Sint-Niklaas
Organized by Cluster, in collaboration with Music Idea, Muziekpublique, Choux de Bruxelles - artist collective, and HalfmOon, with the support of the City of Sint-Niklaas and PlayRight
This week. Different years. Same band. 30 years on stage. Brussels based. Jaune Toujours.
Some weeks begin with a hole in a poster. Some involve emergency microphones and visitor badges. Some involve portable toilets. And some involve Piet multiplying.
1999–2004 Ghent. Oud-Heverlee. Brussels. Meerbeke. Ottenburg. Vorst. Komen-Waasten. Blanmont. Bree. Gent. Maaseik. Evere. Festivals. Fairs. Community events. A multidisciplinary project. A theatre premiere. A lot of moving around.
2008 Aachen. Soundcheck in daylight. Concert at night. Wim listening from the stage. Théo listening from behind his kit. The band filling the stage. The audience filling everything in front of it. Then the CDs come out. Piet and Mattias selling, signing, talking. The gig keeps going after the last note.
2009–2010 Antwerp. Vic. A closing party. Mercat de Música Viva. Two portable toilets beside the stage. A packed audience in front of it. Both, apparently, part of the scenery.
2014 London. BBC Radio 6. Cerys on 6. Visitor badges. Emergency microphones. Theo and Mathieu waiting. Bart drawing the room. Mattias figuring out the setup. A very Jaune Toujours moment.
2018–2019 Save Le Monde. A single. A clip. Piet dancing. And then several Piet Marises, apparently.
2023 Ixelles. Camp Flagey. A benefit for people without papers. A packed audience. The rhythm section in front of a banner: This is not a crisis. This is a crime of the state.
2024 Vertigo. A video. An album. Out now.
2025 Brussels. Piet, Mathieu, Loes, Yamen. Then Bart and Mattias joining the picture.
Different combinations. Same musical organism. From a festival field to a BBC studio. From soundcheck to CD table. From one Piet to several.
Still playing. Still moving. Still looking for the next place to plug in.
Different places. Same week, stretched across time. We don’t archive the past. We carry it. Still playing. Still moving. Still open to the next room.
Apparently, it’s still worth saying. MAKE MUSIC, NOT WAR.
Pictures: many thanks to Emma-Jane Down, Cas Laga, Sandra Peeters, Sarah Baur
Some things are worth keeping a record of. Before the guests. Before the extra horns. Just Jaune Toujours, warming up the room.
Keeping the whole thing in motion. Quietly. Relentlessly. With excellent timing. When the horns have something to say, they don’t always say it in a straight line. Two instruments. Thirty years of trouble. The warm-up is over. Now we’re in it. Yamen Martini. Refugiés sans Frontières. Sometimes the loudest moment in a concert is the one when an entire tent falls silent. Adding depth to an important song.
Réfugiés sans Frontières.
More voices. More stories. More reasons to listen Different voices. Different histories. One stage. Different frequencies. Same wavelength. No borders on stage. Not now. Not then. A guest on paper. Part of the band, really. More instruments. More voices. No walls between them. For a moment, the stage became a different place.
All eyes on the bass. Camping del Mundo, and one very well-supported solo. A room full of people. All with different ways of being there. And still, somehow, together. The revolution is exhausting. Backstage, four of us sit down.
MAIN STAGE. Manifiësta. And yes, we meant it.
This week. Different years. Same band. 30 years on stage. Brussels based. Jaune Toujours.
From village halls to festivals. From activist stages to German clubs. From Belgium and the Netherlands to Romania.
1999–2002 Lauwe. Waterlandkerkje. Genk. Alsemberg. Ghent. Bruges. Koksijde. Small rooms. Outdoor festivals. Community events. The band finding its way into all kinds of places, right from the beginning.
2004–2006 A press conference at KVS. Illegal Beauty at Antwerp’s Zuiderpershuis, a happening against discrimination and the criminalisation of undocumented residence. Universite d’Attac at the Halles de Schaerbeek. The stages may change, but the music keeps showing up where things are being questioned.
2011 Vilvoorde. Rock The Ring. A Greenpeace action. And the band playing its part in a day where music and activism share the same space.
2012 Marburg. Akkordion Festival.
2016 Germany again. Meldorf. Lübeck. And Anseroeul in Belgium. A smoky stage. Yellow light. Trumpets catching the glow. A rhythm section locked in. Backstage, a sleeping Bart. On the wall, the band’s own tag among the names of countless other bands.
2018 Manifiësta, Bredene. A festival crowd. The JT letters.
2022 Boom. Ubuntu Festival. The view from the stage, and the view from behind it.
2025 Satu Mare, Romania. A new country. A new audience. The same old ingredients.
Accordion. Brass. Bass. Drums. Bass clarinet. A crowd dancing. A crowd filming. A crowd reaching back towards the stage. And afterwards, Piet talking with people in the audience. Thirty years on, perhaps that is the thread running through it all. The stage changes. The countries change. The faces change. But the conversation between band and audience keeps going. Still playing. Still travelling. Still meeting people on the other side of the stage.
Different places. Same week, stretched across time. We don’t archive the past. We carry it. Still playing. Still moving. Still open to the next room.
This week. Different years. Same band. 30 years on stage. Brussels based. Jaune Toujours.
Some weeks are about what happens when the band is waiting backstage.
1999–2000 Brussels. Sint-Gillis. Venlo. Leeuwarden. Belgium and the Netherlands. The band already moving between languages, cities and audiences.
2002 Cognac. Coup de Chauffe. Silhouettes on stage. Bass clarinet in the wings. A sousaphone backstage. And Mathieu and Théo apparently discovering a whole new level of affection.
2006 Brussels. Hove. Antwerp. Mattias on bass clarinet. Yves on trumpet. Piet on accordion. And Tim De Jonghe dropping in on trumpet for Hovelive. Different combinations.
Same musical playground.
2009 Busking at the Fnac in Liège. A concert at Place Poelaert. Attac at Les Halles. The band turning up in all kinds of places, not just the ones labelled “stage”.
2010 Antwerp. Rataplan / De Roma. Theatre Festival. And Théo riding a pig. Naturally.
2017 Rotterdam. Nacht van de Kaap. Piet and Théo giving the drums, accordion and entire nervous system everything they’ve got.
2024 A music video for Vertigo. A train station. A camera. Sarah directing. The live band story temporarily becoming a film set.
2025 Veszprém. Pécs.
Pinball. Mural portraits. Moody bass clarinet and double bass. A phone on a tripod. A selfie with the audience. And a band laughing together after the picture is taken. Thirty years on, the archive keeps reminding us that there has never really been a single way to be Jaune Toujours. Concert hall. Street corner. Festival stage. Film set. Backstage. Pinball machine. Still playing. Still experimenting. Still finding somewhere to make a noise.
Different places. Same week, stretched across time. We don’t archive the past. We carry it. Still playing. Still moving. Still open to the next room.
Somewhere between the crowdsurfing and the dancing on the subwoofer, things got slightly out of hand..
Last night at Cirque Gitan, in the magical setting of the Citadel of Diest, Jaune Toujours found themselves in a crowd of steampunk characters and seasoned party people who were ready to go from the very first note.
The audience was both wonderfully attentive and wonderfully festive. Their trombone player Loes ended up dancing with some of them on a subwoofer.
And near the end, there was even some crowdsurfing!
The last time that happened was at the 1 May Labour Day festival in München in 2010.
Sadly, last night’s final airborne moments didn’t make it onto camera. Guess you had to be there.
Huge thanks to the Cirque Gitan festival team for inviting them, and to the audience for welcoming them in such a way.
Diest, you definitely know how to throw a party.
This week. Different years. Same band. 30 years on stage. Brussels based. Jaune Toujours.
Some weeks are about the places. Some are about the people. And sometimes, thirty years in, you find yourself making new pictures of the same band.
1998–2003 Bruges. Brussels. Antwerp. Jette. Hilversum. Amsterdam. Dendermonde. Festivals, city squares, cultural centres, radio studios.
2007 Meldorf, Germany. Frequenzen 07.
2009 Lovendegem. Boombalfestival.
2010 Bremen. Viertelfest.
2014 Dendermonde. Piet under a storm of light.
2015 Namur. Fête des Solidarités. A stage full of people. An audience full of movement.
2019 Izegem. Isotopia Festival. Another open-air crowd. Another night of music stretching beyond the stage.
2022 Beveren. International Street Theatre Festival. And somewhere between all these years and all these stages, the band keeps coming back to Brussels.
2024 A photographer. A subway station. An old train wagon. Graffiti. Industrial landscapes. A circus rope.
The band climbing, jumping, walking, laughing, pulling faces.
Thirty years on stage, and apparently still incapable of behaving for a group photo. Different years. Different places. Different pictures. Same band. Still moving. Still looking for the next frame.
Different places. Same week, stretched across time. We don’t archive the past. We carry it. Still playing. Still moving. Still open to the next room.
This week. Different years. Same band. 30 years on stage. Brussels based. Jaune Toujours.
Some weeks are about the places. Some are about the people you meet along the way. Some are about what happens between the stage and the next soundcheck. Gas stations. Backstage tables. Megaphones. Chess games. Trumpets that refuse to stand still.
2000 Mechelen. Spijkenisse. Two festivals. Two countries. Keep moving.
2003 Brussels, Grande Place. Sam and Sam on trumpet. A lot of noise in a very big square.
2008 Würzburg. Hanging out backstage. The gig is coming. For now, coffee, conversation and waiting.
2015 Zaventem. Piet and Bart going at it on stage. Then laughing with people in the crowd.
2019 Leuven. Meldorf. Megaphones up. Brass flying. Bart pointing at Jo. Piet yelling into the night. The audience comes along.
2020 Budapest. Cancelled. COVID.
2025 Flobecq. The electric set is done. So naturally the band keeps playing. Acoustic. Right in the middle of the people. Dendermonde. Soundcheck. Chess. Then drums, bass, horns and accordion.
Somewhere between the stage and the next gas station, there is always another song.
Different places. Same week, stretched across time. We don’t archive the past. We carry it. Still playing. Still moving. Still open to the next room.
This week. Different years. Same band. 30 years on stage. Brussels based. Jaune Toujours.
Some weeks are about the festivals. Some are about the weather.
Some are about what happens before, after and occasionally instead of the concert.
2003 Den Bosch. A theatre festival. An attentive audience sitting down and listening. Then back on the road again.
2005 Quiberon. A stage on the beach, with the sea behind it. Chanteix. A festival, a little backstage chaos and a car eventually packed far beyond what any sensible vehicle should have to endure.
2007 Portlaoise. The World Fleadh. Rain. Lots of rain. The kind that makes the stage lights glow a little harder.
2010 Budapest. Sziget. A huge festival island, a backstage apple, a megaphone, a bass clarinet solo and a crowd stretching out in front of the stage.
2013 Riga. A trumpet by the river at sunset. A megaphone waiting for the show.
2018 Detmold. A packed square. A bass solo. And two trumpet players enthusiastically pointing the audience towards Mathieu.
2019 MeYouZik, Luxembourg. Another night of brass, rhythm and movement. And the road keeps going.
From beaches to city squares. From theatre festivals to muddy festival fields. From quiet backstage moments to crowds in the thousands. Sometimes the archive gives you the concert. Sometimes it gives you the apple on Piet’s head. We’ll take both.
Different places. Same week, stretched across time. We don’t archive the past. We carry it. Still playing. Still moving. Still open to the next room.
"...Throughout the album, the group creates a mysterious and downbeat mood, allowing melodic motifs to slowly unfurl over beatless soundscapes and drawing listeners into their gentle pace. There is plenty of virtuosity on display, especially in the spaciousness each player allows the other while they take turns to pull focus on each composition..."
Thank you Ammar Kalia and Jazzwise for the review on the new Album Unland by 3'Ain.
► Read the full review HERE.