LA fusion band Fool's Gold blends Western music and African rhythms with variety of instruments and a cowbell

UCLA, I need more cowbell.

I had to bite my tongue from yelling this (I can’t resist a classic Saturday Night Live reference) as the fusion band Fool’s Gold performed in Bruin Plaza Wednesday at noon. The instruments onstage outnumbered the band members, and the interesting use of three electric guitars, a saxophone, traditional African instruments, drums, bongo sets and, of course, a cowbell, made for an entertaining show that literally had people dancing in the streets.

The laid-back music provided the perfect soundtrack as students and faculty strolled by, and standing in the 70-degree weather, I felt as though I was at an eclectic outdoor venue or a poolside barbecue, rather than stopping outside Ackerman Union after class.

This Los Angeles-based indie band blends Western pop music with African rhythms. The founders, vocalist/bassist Luke Top and lead guitarist Lewis Pesacov, planned to explore their love of African music (Congolese, Ethiopian, Eritrean and Malian music, in particular) and fuse it with a 1980s dance-pop vibe.

The band plays a beautiful array of hand-made instruments, including Ewe-, Gungon- and Djembe-skinned drums; Gankogui and Bananna bells and claves; kashishi; nut-rattles; goat-toe rattles; chekeres; Axatse shell gourds; and an oversized tambourine bought on the street in Cairo, Egypt. These various instruments, combined with the band’s background use of auto-tune, made the music both interesting and easy to listen to, and even easier to dance along with.

The band began as a side project of Top’s and Pescaov’s and was eventually cultivated into a dynamic group that wrote a few inspired songs. They then asked friends, friends of friends and even strangers to join them onstage. While not all of the band members were present at the show in Bruin Plaza, it was still apparent that this band is focused on group collaboration and drawing from all band members’ diverse cultural backgrounds.

Fool’s Gold performed tracks from its self-titled debut album, and performed songs in English, Hebrew and other languages that I didn’t recognize. When Top, who was born in Israel, performed in his native tongue, it was just as, if not more, soulful than the songs I could understand.

Fool’s Gold has developed a solid following in the Los Angeles area, and its fans were out in full force, equipped with everything from their cheering voices to a vuvuzela. I enjoyed the show immensely, for the fun atmosphere it created on a lovely afternoon and the diverse cultures that a single band succeeded in bringing together.

And, of course ““ gotta love some good, old-fashioned cowbell.