{"title":"Space Afrika","description":null,"products":[{"product_id":"honest-labour","title":"Honest Labour","description":"\u003cp\u003eManchester 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. \u003ci\u003eHonest Labour\u003c\/i\u003e, 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. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe album title is tiered, alluding to a legendary patriarch from co-founder Joshua Inyang's Nigerian family tree (who was lovingly called \u003ci\u003eHonest Labour\u003c\/i\u003e 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. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe artists cite two core motivations for \u003ci\u003eHonest Labour\u003c\/i\u003e: 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.”\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Dais","offers":[{"title":"Purple | LP","offer_id":50426705084747,"sku":"1140432","price":24.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"CD","offer_id":50426704953675,"sku":"1124749","price":12.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/8210e75b-1213-4032-8985-0427d8136a5d_thumbnail_4096.jpg?v=1726815902"},{"product_id":"a-grisaille-wedding","title":"A Grisaille Wedding","description":"\u003cp\u003eFixed Abode label head Rainy Miller met Space Afrika through regular nights he runs at Salford’s The White Hotel, a hub for leftfield electronic music. What started out as an idea for a collaborative EP between Rainy and Space Afrika turned into a longer form project, with features from Mica Levi, Coby Sey, Richie Culver, Voice Actor and Iceboy Violet - amongst others. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eA Grisaille Wedding\u003c\/i\u003e is an immersive experience that fills the space these artists have come to dwell in during their creative journeys. It not only pushes the boundaries of music but also bridges regional dialects within the conversation of contemporary electronic music. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eRainy Miller: “\u003ci\u003eA Grisaille Wedding \u003c\/i\u003eis a project based in the personification of the semi-fictitious world that Space Afrika have come to build over the years. Using musique concrete and British soundscapes, I wanted to fuse the sonic with both noise and the contemporary.” \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eSpace Afrika: “The record’s title figuratively describes the marriage of two similarly motivated perspectives, each affected by a common backdrop and familiar ground tread amongst the scrimmage of urban sprawl, sombre, a boisterous landscape and clouds of uncertainty.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eFor fans of: Actress, Dean Blunt, Lee Gamble, Loraine James\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Fixed Abode","offers":[{"title":"Black LP","offer_id":50432599294283,"sku":"2149367","price":27.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/a3042591543_16_5e9b9f02_thumbnail_4096.jpg?v=1726870890"},{"product_id":"untitled-to-describe-you-ost","title":"Untitled (To Describe You) [OST]","description":"\u003cp\u003eSpace Afrika follow last year's heartbreaking x perception-bending mixtape \u003ci\u003ehybtwibt?\u003c\/i\u003e with an anxious patchwork of drill bass, reflective musique concrete and after-hours surrealism \u0026gt;\u0026gt; singular deep headspace exploration to file alongside Mark Leckey, Perila, Burial or Klein. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAssembled to accompany a short film from Manchester-born visual artist, poet and filmmaker Tibyan Mahawah Sanoh, Joshua Inyang and Joshua Tarelle’s newest is a cinematic audit of identity and ancestry. In the film, Sanoh works hard to visually illustrate an honest and vulnerable picture of her soul. Inyang and Tarelle respond by doing the same with sound, collaging disparate elements together in a way that should be familiar to anyone who heard \u003ci\u003ehybtwibt?\u003c\/i\u003e or their jawdropping RA mix from earlier this year.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWarped field recordings, overdriven rhythmic pressure, syrupy pads and disorienting vocals are cut and pasted over each other, generating a living, breathing study of the duo's Northern working class Black British reality. Unlike the duo's acclaimed \u003ci\u003eSomewhere Decent To Live\u003c\/i\u003e full-length, elements mutate and transform: mushy noise bends into street sounds, haunted vocals into echoing drill melancholia and muffled howls into shattered digital remnants.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe main event is the full 10-minute soundtrack, that's layered with Sanoh's disorienting and deeply personal poetry and echoes Mark Leckey's recent \u003ci\u003eIn This Lingering Twilight Sparkle\u003c\/i\u003e. Then the EP is bumped up with three sketches from the same sessions, two of which never made it to the final mixdown. 'Version 3' is a particular highlight, pasting heartbreaking piano and blowtorched vocal loops over winding drill bass \u0026gt; sounds like Burial remixing Unknown T into pure syrup.\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Sferic","offers":[{"title":"Black | 10\"","offer_id":50459928461643,"sku":"1126063","price":17.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/6bf9feb6-60e3-4553-905d-30cf4189d2c2_thumbnail_4096.jpg?v=1727228130"},{"product_id":"quiet-storm","title":"Quiet Storm","description":"\u003cp\u003eSpace Afrika, the Manchester\/Berlin-based duo of Joshua Tarelle Reid and Joshua Inyang, make raw, intensely detailed, visceral music with shades of ambient, trip-hop, techno, and modern classical, drawing spacious urban dubscapes from the contours of their city.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003cem\u003eQuiet Storm\u003c\/em\u003e expands on their sound and scale as a sprawling, collaborative vision shaped with profound patience and intention, embedding their own coming-of-age story within a moving suite of cathartic abstraction. Songs allude to spirituality and the human condition, the tension between boldness and softness, ambition and persistent inner demons.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSpeaking to the multidisciplinary nature of the project is the involvement of celebrated artist Glenn Ligon, whose work deals with Black identity and queerness. A central inspiration at the onset of recording, Ligon offered his work Figure #30 (2009) for the cover artwork, and following the completion of recording, he agreed to provide the project's name—an unprecedented gesture from the pioneering artist.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003eListening to the final sequence, Ligon thought of \u003cem\u003eQuiet Storm\u003c\/em\u003e, the 1970s radio format known for smooth, late-night programming with themes of life and love.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003cem\u003eQuiet Storm\u003c\/em\u003e brings the listener through various scenes, interludes, and arcs, marked by a sense that its movement is fluid and its characters are fleeting. Into-the-mirror monologues grapple with the existential and the immediate: survival, autonomy, purpose.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003eThe album opens with the explosive, string-backed “Vanity,” featuring Grammy Award winner Axelle Fanyo. At first fixated on the crevices of a quiet room, “Vanity” unfurls under Fanyo's expressive soprano, traversing a wide emotional spectrum from sublime contemplation to poignant, heart-piercing pain.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003eThroughout the record, words spoken and sung are placed sparingly to powerful effect. “2MLN”'s beauty and catharsis is a collective slow march, featuring British-Nigerian artist Tony Njoku, with guitar and lead bass by Gabriel Evans, London's PIKE on drums, and Copenhagen's GB on keys and strings.\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003eHeavy yet hopeful, Joshua Tarelle Reid and Joshua Inyang remind you of their journey so far. An appropriately cryptic and transportive outro for their open-ended opus, Quiet Storm is a landmark level-up: self-produced, self-funded, and manifested out of sheer drive and conviction.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Through bent time and low-lit haze, undoubtedly, Space Afrika has arrived.\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Dais","offers":[{"title":"LP - Blue Ripple","offer_id":57535145148747,"sku":"R4390-4935","price":27.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"LP - Black","offer_id":57535145181515,"sku":"R4390-1293","price":24.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"CD","offer_id":57535145214283,"sku":"R4390-2849","price":12.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/SpaceAfrika-QuietStorm-DAIS232-Packshot.jpg?v=1780935411"}],"url":"https:\/\/shop.roughtrade.com\/collections\/space-afrika.oembed","provider":"Rough Trade","version":"1.0","type":"link"}