[Shuffle 33] Islanded
græ, Moses Sumney
Untitled (Black Is), SAULT
Jaime, Brittany Howard
Show Some Emotion, Joan Armatrading
Bitter, Meshell Ndegeocello
Took a few listens before græ settled in, but now it’s stuck between my ribs and I can’t shake it. Cutting and healing at once. A natural pairing with another surprise SAULT release. (And here I thought 7 more directly expressed the undertones I felt in 5. Hah.) Moses’ intersectionality forces me to think about voices — black voices, obviously, but somehow genderless voices too. Or is it genderful? Tones and tremors that arch around suspected dualities, full spectrum. I got to Brittany very late, but she pulls the jazz out of Moses and SAULT. Wanted to reach back, too. Something older that aches the aches and settles into the same groove, loops thru the same poetry. Joan, then. Deep roots and deeper. Seeking a bridge, Meshell sat up and waved: of course. Bitter came to my family thru Lilith Fair, freshman year of high school. Four years later, Charles couldn’t believe I knew every word. A vague queerness to live within, to live in me and listen to. Theirs or mine?
Heard this go’round: July 20, 2020
“Islanded,” boxed in and shuffled along, defined and distributed. Their winding wail drops off into soft-spoken inquiry. Is it the world? Or is it me? Polyrhythms bounce around my belly, jiggle my hips, shimmy my shoulders. Protest and ritual united thru chant. Preaches and speeches. “Everyday I am alive! … A master student.” Synth and thick percussion, blend and sync, “we are all brothers and sisters.” Paris cabaret noir, jangling keys and twitchy digital drone. Crisp spoken alto. Floating falsetto. “Light up!” Driving jazz bass. Hot-hot guitar. Sax and sex. Effs and esses, whistle and burn, flame fed by an open grate. Great. Græt. Melody broken into ethereal electricity. Moon and star and sun and love and love and lovin’ “my only saving grace” “bit by bit by bit by bit...” “your kiss, your touch” reaches around my shoulders and holds me close. “When everything else fails, Black endures.” Islands.
and so I come to isolation
boxes
Neither/Nor
13th Century Metal
Gagarin
Baby
Willow
Show Some Emotion/
Wildfires
Grace
Kissin’ And A Huggin’
Out the Lies
insula
a way to listen