The Ex (NL)
From Amsterdam
Popularity
The Ex has one upcoming show in the Netherlands: on November 8, 2026 at BIMHUIS, Amsterdam.
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About
Also known as: Ex Orkest, The Ex Quartet, the ex
Few bands have kept their edge for as long as The Ex. Formed in Amsterdam in 1979 out of the squatting movement, they started as a raw Dutch punk outfit inspired by The Fall and The Mekons, then spent the following decades twisting their sound into something genuinely hard to categorise. Rhythmically jagged, politically charged, and always restless, their work pulls in noise, free jazz, folk traditions from Hungary, Turkey, Ethiopia, Congo and Eritrea, and just about anything else that fits their relentlessly curious approach. Drummer Kat Bornefeld nailed it: growing up outside any formal music education left them free of the usual rules. With over 20 full length albums behind them, The Ex have never settled. They recorded a 20 piece big band under the name Ex Orkest for the Holland Festival, dropped the improvised double album Instant, and had singer G.W. Sok's furious vocals eventually handed over to Arnold de Boer of Zea. Their lyrics have always stayed blunt, aiming squarely at political abuses and social injustice, delivered with the kind of atonal guitar attack that made them a cult name well beyond the Netherlands.
