Banished Music, Strange News Touring, and Astral People are psyched to bring you one of the planet’s newest and truest musical pairings. GENA - the duo of rapper, singer, and songwriter Liv.e and jazz drummer and producer Karriem Riggins, a close collaborator of J Dilla, Madlib, and Common) - are set to make their Tāmaki Makaurau debut on Thursday 1 October at the people’s HQ Neck of the Woods.

After dropping their Lex Records debut The Pleasure Is Yours earlier this year, GENA (short for God Energy, Naturally Amazing) are headed our way to showcase the sum of their incredible parts, dishing up the tastiest "cosmic experimentalism and amorphous funk” (Pitchfork) and the smoothest R&B-rap-jazz-magic we’ve heard since D’Angelo left the building. 

With a career that began with working alongside the likes of Earl Sweatshirt and Pink Siifu, Dallas-born Liv.e brings a raw, experimental approach to R&B, her smoky, unpolished vocals gliding through Riggins’ warm, percussive universe. Rooted in jazz, soul, and hip-hop as living language, Detroit native Riggins - known for his work with Common, Erykah Badu, Paul McCartney, The Roots, Madlib, and a close kinship with the late J Dilla - extends his lifelong dialogue between jazz improvisation and beat science. Together they create a world that’s analog and ethereal, percussive and poetic, bridging eras without ever settling in one. The Pleasure Is Yours is the sound of Liv.e and Riggins bringing each other’s music to life and finding a new language together - one rooted in rhythm, vulnerability, and exuberance.

‍

‍