Llay Lamas

Lay Llamas (kraut/dub - Sicily )   Bandcamp   Instagram    

is the musical project founded in 2012 by Sicilian musician, producer and visual artist Nicola Giunta. Over the years, the project has moved fluidly between solo work, collaborations and collective formations, developing a distinctive language where psychedelic music, krautrock, afrobeat, dub, cosmic sounds and experimental electronics converge. Drawing inspiration from artists such as Can, Sun Ra and the Italian library music tradition of the 1960s and 70s, Lay Llamas creates a sound world suspended between the earthly and the cosmic, the primitive and the futuristic. Repetitive rhythms, hypnotic grooves, exotic percussion, analogue textures, voices and electronic sounds become tools for exploring altered states, imaginary landscapes and a sense of timelessness.

The project has released albums and recordings on labels including Rocket Recordings, Black Sweat Records, Miracle Pond, Delete Recordings and Zel Zele, collaborating along the way with
artists such as Damo Suzuki (Can), Mark Stewart (The Pop Group), Goat, Clinic, Ariel Kalma and Gioele Valenti/JuJu.

Today, Lay Llamas performs as a trio, with Nicola Giunta joined by Padova-based bassist, multi-instrumentalist and songwriter Nicolò Masetto, known for his work with Collettivo Immaginario, Mamuthones, Orange Car Crash and Nic T, and Andrea Davì (Snuff, Orange Car Crash, Mamuthones, Lorelle Meets The Obsolete) at percussions and drum pad. The live set is built around rhythmic patterns largely sampled from old vinyl records, combined with Masetto's bass, twangy surf-inspired guitar, Davì’s retro futuristic percussions, voices and fragments taken from vintage audio documentaries, electronic sounds rooted in cosmic music and krautrock, and Nicola's vocals and sound manipulation. Repetition is a fundamental element of the performance: patterns gradually evolve, overlap and accumulate, creating a hypnotic, almost trance-like dimension. The music is accompanied by a continuous visual component featuring archival footage from the 1970s — wild nature, technology, imaginary futures, fierce animals, jungles, outer space and psychedelic imagery — turning the concert into an immersive journey through sound and image.

Rather than simply reproducing the recordings, the live performance transforms Lay Llamas' musical language into a physical, hypnotic and cinematic experience, somewhere between a psychedelic ritual, a cosmic transmission and an imaginary documentary from an unknown future.