Perera Elsewhere
Multi-award-winning producer, songwriter, and performer Sasha Perera aka Perera Elsewhere merges experimental pop with bass-heavy sound design and poetic introspection. Growing up in London, she was shaped by the city’s club culture and the sounds of Notting Hill Carnival, drawing inspiration from artists like Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry and Mad Professor. After time spent in Malaysia and Singapore, she moved to Berlin in 2000, where she co-founded the bass music band Jahcoozi. Her party series Grimetime and Boombox made waves in Berlin’s underground, while collaborations with artists like Modeselektor and Gebrüder Teichmann led her to projects in Kenya and Southeast Asia.

As Perera Elsewhere, she developed a unique sound often described as ‘doom-folk’—a fusion of bass frequencies, poetic lyrics, voice experimentation, and sonic minimalism. Her releases on LA-based label Friends of Friends have drawn praise from outlets like Pitchfork, NPR, and Vogue, while her live performances span venues such as Berghain, the Guggenheim Museum, and Elbphilharmonie Hamburg. Her music has been licensed for film and TV by directors like Paolo Sorrentino and Ava DuVernay, and she was recently awarded the Sony Music Germany Female* Producer Prize (2024). A true shapeshifter, her work blends sound, visuals, and identity into a constantly evolving artistic language.

Kumbia Boruka
The band Kumbia Boruka has its roots in Monterrey, the Mexican capital of cumbia music, where bandleader and accordionist Hernán Cortés grew up in the 1980s. Cortés was taught accordion by cumbia legend Celso Piña, and played percussion in his band, touring internationally for many years. Kumbia Boruka enlivens the classic cumbia sound of the 1960s with influences from reggae, dub, Peruvian chicha, rock and psychedelic guitars, a heavy rhythm section, and powerful horn arrangements—creating what they they call Nueva Kumbia.

Selektor Bony & Calamidades Lola
Selektor Bony grew up in Mexico City, surrounded by the noise of the megalopolis and its nearby airport, but also by the inspiring rhythms of Caribbean and Latin American music styles. After a stopover in Spain, he has lived in Berlin since 2014. Here he founded the Cumbia Fest Berlin, made a name for himself as one of the best local cumbia DJs around, and also became famous for his mixing of rhythms from different times and different parts of the world. With his partner Calamidades Lola, Selektor Bony creates an elegant arc from Latin and tropical beats to cumbia, funk, boogaloo, cha-cha-cha, reggae, and dub. Calamidades Lola is a record hunter, DJ/selector and radio host born and raised in Barranquilla, a city on the Caribbean coast of Columbia. She grew up surrounded by massive and colourful picó sound systems that made the whole barrio vibrate with African and Caribbean rhythms. Calamidades Lola is a resident at Refuge Worldwide, hosting her own radio show where she shares her most recent finds on wax and invites DJs, musicians, and researchers of African diaspora sounds to join.