Writings: Artist Bios for Cochemea & Okuté
Over the past few months I was asked to compose artist bios for two of my favorite current artist/groups - Cochemea for his new Daptone release “Baca Sewa Vol 2”, and the Havana-based group Okuté for their self-titled debut LP on Chulo Records (distributed by Daptone). The music speaks for itself. Enjoy.
Summer 2021 News
Time continues to march on. I’m at my studio a lot, just collaborating with MoonRun on a new film soundtrack at Tiny Telephone in Oakland, dipping into the the studio for some last-minute horns to the new Toro y Moi album, and vocal engineering and production with vocalist Chris Gabo, writing new music for the next Antibalas record, and taking care of my baby daughter.
Stranger’s Guide, the literary / travel magazine of which I’m a contributing editor, recently won two major magazine awards: the ASME / National Magazine Awards for 1) General Excellence, Literature, Science and Politics, 2) Photography. This was a big win as the only other organizations that won more were the New Yorker and ProPublica.
I’m also excited to announce the release of an album I’m on, a long time in the works, Daptone Super Soul Revue - Live at the Apollo. My group Antibalas, along with Sharon Jones (RIP) and the Dap Kings, Charles Bradley (RIP), Naomi Shelton (RIP) and the Gospel Queens, Sugarman Three, Budos Band, Menahan Street Band did three nights at the Apollo in December of 2014, the culmination of a summerlong tour through Europe.
Spring 2021 News
One year and counting into this pandemic. So much of what I do and love has been put on ice, indefinitely.
We (Antibalas) didn’t win the Grammy this year, but to quote Bill Withers, “I’m flattered to have mattered.”
I’ve been raising a baby, composing and recording new music, restoring a 1975 Rhodes piano (and playing it). I’ve been getting together regularly with a circle of synth geeks to make improvised electronic music and collaborating with my Antibalas bandmates on new material for our next album.
I was recently appointed contributing editor at Stranger’s Guide, one of my favorite travel/culture/literary magazines. I curated a collection of music for their latest Colombia issue and will be doing a brief chat at their issue launch (online like everything else these days).
UC Berkeley invited me to do a workshop for students and resident faculty on Critical Genealogy. I helped a student and a professor get back to the 1750s in their respective family trees in the span of 45 minutes which was fun and intriguing.
Right now I’m reading “Scammer’s Yard: The Crime of Black Repair in Jamaica” by Jovan Scott Lewis, “Intimations” by Zadie Smith, and spending far too much time than I should scrolling my Twitter feed.
So many people are dying, I’m blessed and lucky to remain alive.
Grammy Nomination "Fu Chronicles" 2020 Best Global Music Album
I am pleased to see “Fu Chronicles,” my latest work with Antibalas, nominated for a 2020 Grammy Best Global Music album, along with albums by Burna Boy, Bebel Gilberto, Anoushka Shankar and Tinariwen.
I co-produced, arranged and performed on this album, released in February 2020 on Daptone Records.
The songs on this record were the results of two decades of vision and persistence on the part of Amayo, the composer and frontman, and the scores of musicians who kept the heart of these songs beaten until the moment when they could be recorded, as well as the skill and vision of Daptone Records who enters their third decade of putting out quality music made by real musicians with a reverence for and a connection to our musical elders.
Arranging the album was painstaking— so many good parts of the songs had to be compressed, truncated, even sometimes deleted for this to be something resembling a record. A double or triple album wasn’t an option. In the end we managed to squeeze five songs into about forty minutes, the amount of time you are limited to when making a vinyl LP. (anything more and you drastically reduce sound quality, especially in the bass). In their live incarnations, the songs on Fu Chronicles could/can last anywhere from 12-25 minutes long.
We began 2020 with a lot of momentum, with a run of sold-out shows from Los Angeles to Vancouver to Denver. We went home for a few days before the tour picked up in Boston and had bookings through the end of 2020 on four continents prior to the Covid-19 shutdown. I don’t know when we’ll be able to hit the road again, but hopefully this nomination will put us/keep us on the radar till live music is back up again.
You can sign up on our mailing list or go here to listen to / buy the album.
New Antibalas Single : Amenawon
From the upcoming album "Fu Chronicles" - out February 7th. Pre-order/stream single now: https://daptone.ffm.to/bwav9ee.oyd
New music from Antibalas: ‘Fu Chronicles’
Antibalas releases the 7th LP “Fu Chronicles” on Daptone Records, Feb 7 2020 with worldwide tour dates.
We have a new record coming out in February on Daptone Records! It is called “Fu Chronicles”. It is our seventh full-length album.
Here is the first single “Fight Am Finish”
The album is a suite of songs composed by Antibalas vocalist/multi instrumentalist Duke Amayo. The musicians include the current touring band as well Our extended musical family
We recorded it in the summer of 2018 at the Daptone House of Soul in Bushwick, Brooklyn. Additional studio work and mixing were done at Penrose Recorders in Riverside, CA.
My contributions include baritone saxophone, flute, percussion and background vocals. I prepared the arrangements and co-produced it with Bosco Mann.
Enjoy!
HONG KONG / ART BASEL / EUROPE SPRING 2019
2019 Tour Recap: Art Basel in Hong Kong, Europe, NOLA Jazz Fest
I’m back home in a moment of repose and pivot after five weeks on tour with Antibalas.
We began the tour in late March in Hong Kong (our first trip there and only other Asia appearance outside of Japan). We played the LACMA X UCCA Party connected to Art Basel.
I wasn’t sure what we were in for but it was a beautiful and strange night filled with immersive dance and theater performances, lots of people in couture, and a performance before us by Vava, an MC from China who put on a really good show.
The jet lag was intense and at times, crippling.
We had a few days to walk around before the next leg of the trip.
Part Two: Europe
From Hong Kong we flew via Moscow to Paris. It was not a nice flight, and the transfer was hectic.
We arrived in Paris and none of our checked luggage had arrived: no clothes, nor instruments (except for what we gate-checked and carried by hand.
Luckily our stuff arrived the evening before our first show in La Rochelle.
We set off on the next 3.5 weeks in a sprinter van and 4-person car throughout France, Switzerland, Belgium, Netherlands, England and Ireland.
Sugar Club, Dublin Ireland.
The shows were a lot of fun and the level of production overall was tremendous, a much higher level than what we normally experience at clubs of the same size in the US. A large part of this has to do with two things: culture is taken seriously as a profession and social benefit/right and 2) The state (at local, regional and national levels provides financial support to both venues and festivals which allows them to staff each event with capable staff who are trained and getting paid okay.
It was non-stop, and has to be when you have 12 people on the road all needing to eat, drink, sleep and move. We can’t really afford many days off.
In Zurich, we made a horn squad field trip to the workshop of Thomas Indirbinen who makes some of the most divine instruments I’ve ever seen and played. These baritone saxophones are so balanced and resonant, top to bottom. Saving my Swiss francs…
The squad was top notch and we had Jerome Bach on sound and tour managing. I can’t imagine having done this run without him.
Part Three: New Orleans / Jazz Fest / Music Box Village
The Music Box Village is hard to describe: it’s a cluster of home-made buildings made from repurposed materials that are musical. Each one has different sounds (percussive, chimes, horns, metal, strings) and can be played with the other buildings. Everything is mic’ed or has electric pickups and the sound is fed and mixed through a soundboard.
We did a hybrid performance using our own instruments integrated with the sounds of the buildings. We had two days to get the repertoire and new compositions and set together. On day one it poured for five hours straight so our rehearsal was confined to the warehouse.
The day of the show we had pure sunshine and got to work setting up and testing the sounds.
