Pre order Vinyl: Bandcamp
Space Afrika announce new album featuring LA Timpa. The LP titled ‘Honest Labour‘ is due out late August via Dais following 2020’s ‘hybtwibt?‘, originally one of their regular experimental/ambient NTS shows, ‘hybtwibt?’ became a mixtape out right after George Floyd’s murder to raise funds for racial equality in UK, becoming Pitchfork and Bandcamp’s best ambient album of the year.
‘Honest Labour‘ album is introspective, emotive, expressionistic, open-ended from the yearning solitudes of life under lockdown, as a labour of love representing loyalty and resilience — same as co-founder Joshua Inyang\’s Nigerian family tree named indeed ‘Honest Labour’.
Ultimately this is a homage to U.K. energy, and an album about love and loss — Space Afrika
The album goes beyond the dusty, ambient, urban dubscapes templates of Space Afrika’s early years, expanding Space Afrika with classical strings, shimmering guitar, and visionary vocal cameos, leaning further into their enigmatic fusion of ambient unrest and cosmic downtempo.
‘Honest Labour’ is also following Space Afrika collab with photographer, filmmaker and poet Tibyan Mahawah Sanoh to create ‘Untitled (To Describe You)’ short film premiered at Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival 2020. Stay tuned, full details below.
Active since 2007, Dais has released also Drab Majesty, ADULT., Coil\’s Drew McDowall, Rafael Anton Irisarri, and repressed Coil, Tempers, Tor Lundvall just in the last year. Also Alessandro Cortini and Prurient are out on Dais.
Manchester UK’s Space Afrika make music of what they term “overlapping moments” – oblique mosaics of dialogue, rhythm, texture, and shadow, half-heard through a bus window on a rainy night.
Honest Labour, the group\’s first full-length since 2020\’s landmark hybtwibt? (have you been through what i’ve been through?) mixtape, expands the project\’s palette with classical strings, shimmering guitar, and visionary vocal cameos, leaning further into their enigmatic fusion of ambient unrest and cosmic downtempo. It\’s a sound both fogged and fragmented, at the axis of song craft and sound design, born from and for the yearning solitudes of life under lockdown.
The album title is tiered, alluding to a legendary patriarch from co-founder Joshua Inyang\’s Nigerian family tree (who was lovingly called “Honest Labour” for his loyalty and resilience) as well as the nature of self-designated work, such as Space Afrika\’s music – a “labor of love” in its truest sense. With fellow co-founder Joshua Reid recently relocated to Berlin, the pair began sharing files last fall, piecing together poetic vignettes of looping haze and found sound, inspired by the notion of “records that leave an impression, and help the listener deal with their life.” As the isolation of Covid compounded with the worsening winter, the songs skewed increasingly introspective and emotive, reflecting a mood of dissipating futures and the infinite nocturnal unknown.
The artists cite two core motivations for Honest Labour: to transcend the sum of their influences, and “to show what we\’re capable of.” Both ambitions are entirely realized. The collection\’s 19 tracks flow with a synergy and sophistication as rare as they are radical, untethered to the dusty dub-techno templates of Space Afrika\’s early years. These are interstitial anthems, expressionistic and open-ended, delirious but deliberate, attuned to the drift and dreamstate of the present moment: “Ultimately this is an homage to U.K. energy, and an album about love and loss.”
Cover Artwork.
Artist. Space Afrika
Title. Honest Labour
Label. DAIS
Cat#: DAIS181
Release date: August 27, 2021
Format: Vinyl/CD/DIGITAL
Genre: Experimental, Electronic, Ambient, Dub
Tracklist.
LP SIDE A:
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Indigo Grit ft. guest
Lose You Beau
Solemn
LV
Preparing the Perfect Response ~
Ny Interlude
Rings ft. guest
Noise Sweet
B£E ft. Blackhaine
LP SIDE B:
Like Orchids
Meet Me At Sachas
U ft. kinseyLloyd
Girl Scout Cookies ft. bianca scout
Ladybird Drone
With Your Touch
Strength ft. LA Timpa
Honest Labour ft. HforSpirit
Credits.
Space Afrika pics 1 by Chloe Magdelaine Timon Benson
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