Keanu Nelson

Hailing from the remote community of Papunya, northwest of Alice Springs, Luritja singer-songwriter Keanu Nelson quietly developed songs with his notebook, guitar, and voice. Songs of longing for Country, for family, for girls.

With no immediate means to record them, he fatefully connected with producer and musician Yuta Matsumura (The Lewers, The Blisks) through the Papunya Tjupi Arts Centre, where he can often be found painting in the Western Desert tradition and curiously scrolling YouTube for music videos and concert footage.

In their first late-evening home studio session, Nelson nailed ‘Family’ in a matter of hours – his instinctive cues to the local gospel sound subtly warped by Matsumura's functionally minimal electronics and humid melodica dub. This impromptu jam became the foundation of Wilurarrakutu 's sonic palette. Working solely with the producer’s available gear, their collaboration drifts beyond the familiar contours of community music – often shaped by preset-loaded keyboard workstations or apps like BandLab – arriving at something singular and untethered.

Across ten tracks, sung in Luritja and at times in English, Wilurarrakutu ’s graceful audio portraits of place emerge as a revelatory fusion of storytelling and sound. Once aptly described as “Francis Bebey meets Suicide meets a slew of home-made Soundcloud artists, broadcasting from one of the most remote places on Earth,” the powerhouse debut notched up Album of the Week nods at community radio stations across the country and was released internationally via Mississippi Records and domestically via Altered States Tapes and Efficient Space.

Tickets are free, available via ballot only.