Baloji, London
Skeletons dancing in the street, car surfing, a baptism, boxing, and a shop called "No Comment". In 2010, without record company money, Baloji made what has to be the best music video of all time. Karibu Ya Bintou is amazing, but it's just one part of the political/cultural jigsaw that is the life of this Belgian rapper. Born in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Baloji was sent by his wealthy dad to live in Belgium where his troubled teenage life found expression in the successful hip-hop group Starflam. In 2007, he reconnected with his mother in Congo, and began the journey that has led – finally – to the release of his second solo album, Kinshasa Succursale. An organic mixture of Baloji's lithe but hoarse flow and locally sourced Congolese music, the album can feel a little on the worthy side, but when he accesses the raw, idiophonic sounds of Konono No 1, it's little short of magnificent.
Village Underground, EC2, Wed
John Robinson
Tinariwen, On tour
An ironic thing about the "desert blues" of Saharan musicians such as Tinariwen and Terakaft is that, for all the conflict of their origins, they can sound surprisingly slick. The latest Tinariwen album Tassili actively rejects that, being not just derived from the desert but recorded there, a politicised version of superstar rock bands of the 1970s "getting their heads together in the country". Magnificent guitar players and haunting singers, for this latest record Tinariwen's purposeful long-distance groove was added to by like minds: Nels Cline from Wilco and Tunde Adembimpe and Kyp Malone from TV On The Radio.
Warwick Arts Centre, Coventry, Sun; The Apex, Bury St Edmunds, Mon; Union Chapel, N1, Tue, Thu
JR
Glasgow Improvisers Orchestra Festival
A free improv big band is a tough call. Improv requires hawk-like listening, unerring instincts for when to play, and a small enough ensemble to pull it all together. But the Glasgow Improvisers Orchestra, which is celebrating its 10th birthday, is a world-famous exception: a 20-plus outfit that respects musical detail, and doesn't wind up every expedition with a racket like an artillery battle. Evan Parker, George Lewis and Maggie Nicols guest at these gigs, German piano legend Alexander von Schlippenbach's trio (featuring Parker) plays, and Jim O'Rourke has written a new commission for the festival.
CCA, Glasgow, Mon, Thu to 1 Dec
John Fordham
Wolfgang Rihm, Huddersfield
Sixty this year, Wolfgang Rihm is now one of the senior figures in European music, still as staggeringly prolific as he has been throughout more than 40 years of his career as a composer, and still as stylistically unpredictable as ever. Huddersfield Contemporary Music festival's birthday tribute gets into its stride in its last two days, with works by Rihm, two receiving their British premieres. The first of two programmes that the BBC Scottish Symphony is giving under its artist-in-association, composer-conductor Matthias Pintscher, premieres Rihm's 2009 cello concerto, Versuchung, inspired by the paintings of Max Beckman (Town Hall, Sat). The following day the Minguet Quartet, which has recorded all his string quartets, plays the Fourth and the 11th, the latter new to this country (St Paul's Hall, Sun). Ensemble Recherche chip in with Rihm's Fremde Szenen (St Paul's Hall, Sat), his three-part piano-trio tribute to Schumann.
Andrew Clements
Django Bates' Beloved, On tour
Django Bates, the London-born pianist-composer who was in at the founding of the great 1980s UK big band Loose Tubes, spent most of three playfully sophisticated decades on original music, then returned to a childhood hero in his 50th year. His celebration of the dazzling bebop tunes of Charlie Parker triggered a new creative roll for Bates, with the Parker-dedicated album Beloved Bird in 2010, and this year's follow-up, Confirmation. The latter, showcased by this short tour, more evenly mixes classic covers with Bates originals. The pianist's sombre Sadness All The Way Down and the childlike Peonies As Promised are performances of an emotional weight not always associated with this impish artist. Likewise, Parker's Confirmation and Donna Lee offer mind-warping time changes, lissome bop-improv melody lines and jagged, Monk-ish chords. It all sounds great on disc, but live it's something else.
Stratford Circus, E15, Sat; Crucible Studio, Sheffield, Thu; Wakefield Sports Club, Fri
JF
Purity Ring, On tour
In the house of electropop there are many rooms. A bit like their labelmate Grimes, Purity Ring make music that harks back to 1980s teen films. Unlike Grimes, Megan James and Corin Roddick use hip-hop to create something more Tim Burton than John Hughes, as heard on their debut album, Shrines. While Roddick supplies the music (an array of skittering syndrums and doomy synthesizers), James delivers the songs: slightly self-harmy lyrics delivered in the tone of a children's TV presenter.
Sound Control, Manchester, Sat; The Hifi Club, Leeds, Mon; Stereo, Glasgow, Tue; Kazimier, Liverpool, Wed; The Button Factory, Dublin, Thu; Stiff Kitten, Belfast, Fri
JR
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