TUSH

“Incendiary groove machines, [TUSH surfaced] from the fertile warehouse scene where Kamilah Apong and Jamie Kidd ignite dance floors with their transcendent live show –– a celebration indebted to the glory days of early disco that cleverly [avoids] pastiche thanks to the troupe’s sheer talent.” (Exclaim!)

In 2017, musician Apong responded to a Craigslist ad, ending up in seven-piece ‘70s live disco band Mainline with production guru and bassist Kidd. They later rebranded as TUSH, with Apong and Kidd at the helm. The pair dove into songwriting and live band curation to release ‘do you feel excited?’ in 2018. “A big part of that was to make [the music] more reflective [of] the origins of disco and house. How mixed it was, how Black it was, how queer it was,” says Apong. The record charted at No. 3 in electronic music across national campus radio, with the album’s cover of ‘Southern Freeez’ making German collective Jazzanova's top ten. This success was chased by two remixes of ‘Oh My’ by underground house icon Osunlade, which saw the charts of luminary DJs such as Danny Krivit, and was followed by with singles ‘Don’t Be Afraid’ (2019) and ‘Leh We Guh’ (2020).