One of the city's great hidden treasures, the Brussels music scene hosts some of the biggest and best up-and-coming artists and bands in the international, European and Belgian scene.
Every month, Europe's capital has no shortage of thrilling concerts – and picking out the best gigs can be tough. This is why we have put together a monthly guide to discover the best live acts in the city, perfect for new and old Brussels folk alike.
Carefully selected by music journalist Simon Taylor, here are The Brussels Times' choices for the concerts that you should not miss with your friends throughout May.
Best gigs this month
14 May
Lucretia Dalt
Bozar
Colombian-born Dalt started out making electronic music but her more recent work uses more acoustic instruments, though they are often sampled and intertwined with electronic textures. I read that she is currently in a relationship with David Sylvian, the former lead singer of 80’s group Japan and whose solo work treads a fine line between pop and the avant-garde.
Lucrecia Dalt
You can hear in Dalt’s music a common artistic vision with Sylvian. Singing in English and Spanish, she creates sound worlds that are at once intriguing and slightly scary. Not surprisingly, she has written a score for a sci-fi horror film, The Seed. UK alternative music voted her 2022 album (upside down !)At! record of the year, a genuine honour in a contested field. I haven’t seen her live but I expect a moody and emotionally intense show, mixing traditional Colombian musical influences with a love of bold sonic experimentation.
20 May
Brandee Younger
Flagey
Brandee Younger has been a pioneer in introducing jazz harp and the music of its two leading lights, Alice Coltrane and Dorothy Ashby, to a modern audience. Since coming to the public’s attention in 2007, Younger, from New York, has become an important leader and composer in her own right, as well as the torch carrier for the two players who went before her in the 1960s and 70s. She released her first album as a leader, Wax and Wane, in 2016.
Brandee Younger. Credit: Erin Patrice O'Brien
Her last two albums, Brand New Life (2023) and Gadabout Season (2025), both on the famous Impulse! jazz label, demonstrated her skills as a composer as well as a harpist. Gadabout Season was met with particular acclaim from critics and fans alike. It was recorded on Alice Coltrane’s harp, which was given to her by the musician’s son, Ravi. As well as the albums she had made as leader, Younger has been the go-to harpist for a range of high-profile musicians, including John Legend, Robert Glasper and Lauren Hill, as well as her long-time friend and collaborator, drummer Makaya McCraven.
23 May
Molchat Doma
Botanique, part of Les Nuits Botaniques
Molchat Doma (the name means Houses are silent) formed in Minsk, Belarus, in 2017. Their music is dark or cold wave, which, if you are not familiar with those terms, means they carry on in the doomy, goth tradition of bands like The Cure, Joy Division and late Depeche Mode, artists to whom they have been compared.
Molchat Doma. Credit: Yauheni Korshun
After releasing their first two albums, the group, a trio, signed to US independent label Sacred Bones, which released their third and fourth albums, Monument and Belaya Polosa (meaning White Stripe) in 2020 and 2024, respectively. Joining an important international label gave the band the exposure they deserved. The band has also contributed a track (Heaven and Hell) to a Black Sabbath tribute album, issued in 2020. I haven’t seen them live, but I’m looking forward to seeing how their dark music comes across on stage.
28 May
Nectar Woode
Botanique, part of Les Nuits Botanique
I find myself writing so often about the depth and quality of the UK music scene. Nectar Woode is no exception. Twenty-six-year-old Woode is from Milton Keynes in the UK, the daughter of a Ghanaian father and English mother. Her vocal style is a mixture of soul in the same vein as current UK stars, including Olivia Dean and Jorja Smith.
Nectar Woode
But Woode brings a jazz element to her songwriting and performances that gives her work an extra musical depth. She released her first single, For the Best, in 2022 and was featured by the BBC as one of their upcoming artists in 2024. Expect a set of mellow, jazz-inflected soul, mixed with occasional bursts of passion.
Nubya Garcia
Nubya Garcia is a tenor sax player from London and one of the leading lights of the current wave of talented UK jazz players. Like many other prominent UK jazz musicians, she was part of Gary Crosby’s Tomorrow’s Warriors (which includes other luminaries such as saxophonist/flautist Shabaka Hutchings, keyboard player Joe Armon-Jones and drummer Moses Boyd). She released her first EP Nubya’s 5ive in 2017 and her third album, Odyssey in 2024.
Nubya Garcia
Garcia embodies the best of what the new, mainly London-based crop of jazz players offers: skills to match their transatlantic counterparts and an openness to incorporating other popular black music forms such as reggae, ska and hip hop into their music. Like the best of her US contemporaries, Garcia can play with the intensity of her inspiration, John Coltrane, but can deliver tender ballads in the vein of another of her heroes, Dexter Gordon.
31 May
Smerz
Botanique, part of Les Nuits Botanique
Smerz, an electronic alt-pop duo, are the biggest success story from Copenhagen’s Escho music label, one that is home to an impressive number of new artists in the alt R'n'B genre. Unlike most of the artists on Escho, Smerz are from Norway and consist of Catharina Stoltenberg (the daughter of former NATO Secretary-General Jens) and Henriette Motzfeld. I saw them a few years ago at a small festival at the Vauxhall stage in the Royal Park.
Smerz
While they were good, they have since then hugely improved their stage presence, adding more musicians and dressing for the occasion. Their 2025 album, Big City Life, their first on Escho, has been a big success, not least to the standout track You Got the Time and I Got the Money. I expect Smerz will go down a storm. I saw them recently at the Rewire festival in the Hague, and their show was packed with excited young hipsters.
ML Buch
ML (Marie Louise) Buch is another rising star from the Escho label and, for my money, one of the most interesting. Her first LP, “Skinned”, contained the standout track “I’m a Girl You Can Hold IRL” and relied on woozy, heavily processed electronic sounds. Her most recent album “Suntub” moved towards more traditional instruments, including a seven-string electric guitar, and the songs make more of a nod to classic soft rock.
ML Buch. Credit: Lengua
Live, she has toured with label mate Astrid Sonne, a cello player, playing guitar. Despite the experimental sounds of Buch’s music, her lyrical themes address the most human emotions and often go to the heart of our alienated, over-mediated existence. In I’m a Girl You Can Hold IRL, she reassures (or promises) the listener that she can leave the screen and be there “in real life”. What’s not to like? Also check out Pan Over the Hill and Dust beam from Suntub to get a taste of her beguiling sonic world.
Kiss Facility
Kiss Facility are a duo consisting of Egyptian-Emirati singer Maya Alkhateri and Ireland-born producer and musician Sega Bodega (real name Salvador Navarette). Based in Paris, they make an intoxicating mix of Arabic-language vocals with dreamy electronic backing that draws on 1990s trip hop, alt R'n'B and hyperpop.
Kiss Facility
Their debut album, Khazna (meaning “treasure” or “storehouse”), came out this year and has been hailed by music critics as one of the best current examples of fusion between Arabic lyrics and dancefloor sounds. In interviews, Alkhateri namechecks Celtic new-age artist Enya (best known for her hit Orinoco Flow), and you can hear the same lush textures in Kiss Facility’s music. Bodega has worked with UK singer, rapper and musician Shygirl. Stand-out tracks on the album are Kotshena (“playing cards”) and Flux, so check them out.
