It’s difficult to know where to begin when describing Moonchild Sanelly’s headline show at the Village Underground in London on 26 March. The evening had everything you could want in a live performance, it almost felt more akin to a fine-tuned variety show. Moonchild overflows with talent, and has the repertoire to match, bolstered by her most recent LP Full Moon, which dropped in January. The multihyphenate South African artist sings, raps, and speaks in a mix of English and her native Xhosa over genre-defying beats – her style is self-described as ‘future ghetto funk’. Moonchild has been kicking around for the best part of a decade, and has more recently been tapped by big name collaborators like Little Simz, Gorillaz, and Self Esteem. She’s always delivered her art in a way that joyfully meshes sincerity and fun, and her performance to the sold-out London crowd feels like an outright celebration.
Before Moonchild takes the stage, opener DRIIA shares a collection of songs from her upcoming debut EP, Butterfly to a Flame. DRIIA, whose sound could not be farther from Moonchild’s, tells the audience her appearance as the opening act for the UK leg of Moonchild’s tour is her first foray into live performance as a solo artist. This isn’t to say she hasn’t performed in front of crowds – the singer is also a frequent DJ, and regularly plays around London. She melts away any of her own apprehension as she strikes a groove, her charm and uncanny vocal ability all but silencing the pre-show chatter. Her soaring, airy tone dances above sleek electronic arrangements that feel current – a careful blend of jungle, breaks, and trip-hop.
Once she gets going, there’s no stopping her – she hits notes that knock the air out of the room, harkening to the way Billie Eilish’s delicate voice builds and tears up the climax of songs like ‘i love you’ and ‘THE GREATEST’. She reveals that she’s a one-man band, having written, arranged, and produced all her songs herself. DRIIA’s writing style evokes a confessional sensibility shared among many of today’s ‘main pop girls’. A particular highlight is ‘I’d Die’, a track DRIIA wrote after finding out an ex moved on from her two days after they broke up. Dramatic? Yes. Understandable? Absolutely.
There’s no space to breathe between DRIIA and Moonchild, as the headliner takes the stage just minutes after DRIIA takes her final bow. She begins her set with ‘Money Tree’ from her 2022 album Phases. When the song finishes, Moonchild screams into the mic, and asks the crowd for a moment while she ditches her platform Doc Martens.
Moonchild addresses the crowd between each song. It never feels like she’s interrupting the flow of the show or taking the crowd out of the moment. Her personality shines as bright as her catalogue – she keeps the audience laughing with stories of failed relationships and lessons learned. If she ever decides to leave music, Moonchild has a career waiting for her in stand-up comedy. Like a comedy show, her performance involves an unpredictable amount of audience participation. She shares that due to visa issues, her dancers were unable to accompany her on the tour and therefore calls a handful of audience members to join her onstage for a shortened version of Beyonce’s ‘MY POWER’, which she featured on alongside Nija, Busiswa, Yemi Alade, Tierra Whack, and DJ Lag. Moonchild hugs each and every volunteer before Ashwin, her DJ, ushers the group into the wings.
The impromptu audience volunteer dance-off electrifies the room as Moonchild launches into ‘Sweet & Savage’, followed by ‘To Kill a Single Girl (Tequila)’ and ‘Scrambled Eggs’, three of the most energetic entries from Full Moon. ‘To Kill a Single Girl (Tequila)’ is precipitated by Moonchild asking a woman in the front row to join her in doing a shot of what appears to be tequila. But based on the lyrics of the song, in which Moonchild describes her aversion to tequila due to its correlation with poor decision making, it had to have been something else.
It’s worth noting that most of Moonchild’s songs come with choreography, and Moonchild is an amazing dancer, but it’s when Ashwin exits his position behind the decks and ditches his t-shirt to unveil a tiny bubblegum pink PVC two-piece that the choreography really begins. During ‘Boom’, a song about how men are better at sex when they’re broke, Ashwin dances circles around Moonchild, who relegates herself to the side of the stage to let her collaborator shine. The cheers are deafening and reach a fever pitch when Ashwin death drops. The sight is worth the price of admission, and then some.
Moonchild follows ‘Boom’ with ‘Do My Dance’, an anthem that aptly sums up the throughline of Full Moon. “No boys gonna come in my house and tell me he’s the head of what,” Moonchild said, describing the song in a recent interview with V13. “No, no, no. That’s not the head we’re looking for.”
For all the upbeat, club-ready tracks performed throughout her set, Moonchild delivers in equal parts on her quieter, more introspective songs like ‘Falling’, which describes her experience of running away from home, working her ass off, and rising above. She also glides through ‘Big Man’, her collaboration with singer-songwriter Self Esteem. In the absence of Self Esteem, she calls on the audience to finish her lyrics, shouting at the top of her lungs, “I’m a big man, what are you? Yes, motherfucking say it, what are you?”.
An hour into the show, Moonchild grows quiet, a grin erupting on her face. “London, I have a surprise for you,” she announces. Without missing a beat, grime mainstay Ghetts appears beside her, and the duo perform ‘Laps’ from Ghetts’s 2024 album On Purpose, With Purpose, and ‘Mozambique’ from his 2021 LP Conflict of Interest. I’m not as taken aback as some – I’d spotted Ghetts hanging out in the wings a few songs earlier. Surprise or not, it’s an incredible moment, and ‘Laps’ is still stuck in my head. Moonchild’s bond with Ghetts is evident as the pair dance through the two tracks. “That’s family,” Ghetts tells the crowd, gesturing to Moonchild before he exits the stage.
‘In My Kitchen’ is the final song on the official setlist, but Moonchild plays three more, descending into the crowd and partying with her fans. At this point, the venue has gone full night club, and everyone’s forgotten that it’s a Wednesday night. Moonchild locates a person who knows all the Xhosa lyrics to ‘Gwara Gwara’, and lets him sing them into the microphone. Once she’s back up onstage, the audience erupts into an ovation. Someone hands Moonchild a bouquet of roses, and as the cheers continue for well over a minute, it feels like she’s close to tears. Ashwin beams proudly from behind the decks. It’s a triumphant moment for Moonchild, who earlier in the night shared that her manager once brought her to Village Underground and told her that one day it’d be her performing to a sold-out crowd there.
Before departing for good, Moonchild screams into the mic again. I wish I could bottle up the energy in the room and keep it for a rainy day. As an artist and a performer, Moonchild stands in a league of her own. She’s doing her dance, and that night at Village Underground, London did it right along with her.
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Words: Madeline Anderson
Photography: Chantelle KP, Grace Pickering, Oscar Hexter