{"title":"Carrying Colour","description":null,"products":[{"product_id":"sen-am","title":"Sen Am","description":"\u003cp\u003eSen Am is an enduring and tender album, rich and beguiling and generous in a quiet way. Over the last few years, I find myself returning to it, listening and absorbing, reflecting on the voices and working through the multiple layers of feelings and themes it announces with confidence and equanimity. Notions of care and contradiction, expressions of joy and desire and the underlying feeling of unease and turmoil; there is an urgent appeal to the listener for generosity, to strengthen our capacity to hear multiple voices simultaneously, to exist in multiple places at once.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eDuval Timothy’s music was dropped into our world from another realm sometime in the spring of 2017. We received the call and we answered it. The rhythm and spirit was transmitted via London’s NTS Radio on the Do!! You!!! Breakfast Show with Charlie Bones and a short while later we were listening to the first vinyl edition of Sen Am in our living room in Berlin. The record got a lot of plays (at home and at some shows, before and after performances). It was like sunlight filtering through a cracked window and remaining there for a moment, dancing. Blue music emanating from a liminal zone, an in-between space, somewhere on the outskirts of Freetown, or rural Sierra Leone, or the outer edges of South London, or Bath, UK, or some undisclosed orbit, unfixed location. The music is soaked in diasporic experiences. It refuses to settle but still invites us to enter and stay awhile in that zone, where multiple forms exist (all) together with jazz, hip-hop, various strands of expressive electronics and experimental music all breathing together and moving around. It is a portal to a place of possibilities, a space for building and repairing possible and lost connections. But life in that liminal zone is precarious; it is life under duress; under pressure – not merely the pressure to produce a presentable, categorizable, and salable body of work, but the pressure that compels us to experiment and create new concepts and things that will help us imagine a different existence, a way out of the turbulence.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eFreetown is a marvellous and sometimes sad place. It is one of those unmistakable locations inscribed diasporic memory; a place that touches you, a place that holds you and demands you bear witness: witness to pain, poverty, joy and desire. You remember the voices and the eyes of people even in momentary encounters. In Sen Am, you hear not only Duval’s recollections and sounds of Freetown, you hear family and friendship, people coming together and forming bonds, creating surrogate families. Forging community wherever you go is a practice, and community is at the core of this music. It’s in all the voices, from Emmerson and 6pac to Aminata and Aruna. It opens up a space for Black voices, for Sierra Leonean voices, and those voices extend through the succeeding projects, the 2 Sim EP and the album Help, and all that radiates from Duval’s Carrying Colour imprint.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThank you for the invitation to write about the album Sen Am, on the occasion of its re-release which also coincides with the release of the exquisite double 7” Smɔl Smɔl with cktrl — a wonderful piece which calls on the listener to play both records at the same time to hear the music or play them separately and hear different versions. Duval is strengthening us, encouraging us to feel comfortable with discomfort, with incompleteness, with the hard-to-understand. This is a beautiful thing.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Carrying Colour","offers":[{"title":"LP - White","offer_id":50478408728907,"sku":"1127102","price":27.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"CD","offer_id":58115815899467,"sku":"R8423-7293","price":15.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/74ad3b0a-035f-453a-9ffd-cf1197d8b836_thumbnail_4096.jpg?v=1732790535"},{"product_id":"brown-loop","title":"Brown Loop","description":"\u003cp\u003eAfter being out of print for several years, Duval Timothy’s phenomenal ‘Brown Loop’ has finally been reissued. Recorded in New York in the winter months of 2016, this brand-new edition features a slightly adjusted track listing. The release date is 2nd of October 2020, which happens to be the multidisciplinary artist’s birthday. Duval has asked me to write a few words about his record.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Carrying Colour","offers":[{"title":"Black | LP","offer_id":50490569032011,"sku":"1140210","price":25.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/11063fd3-3bb1-475f-baa6-2e419604fb7a_thumbnail_4096.jpg?v=1727666820"},{"product_id":"meeting-with-a-judas-tree","title":"Meeting With A Judas Tree","description":"\u003cp\u003e\"Primarily recorded at my home studio in South London, Carrying Colour studio in Freetown, my old studio in Rotherhithe Old Police Station, and Casa Mahler in Spoleto. Recorded on different pianos, including an upright in Freetown that had lost the felt of its hammers due to the humidity creating a harpsichord-like sound as the raw wood struck the strings. Other prominent instruments featured are Moog Grandmother, double bass, electric guitar and Juno-G.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ePart of the piano recordings on 'Up' and 'Drift' were composed and recorded through April 2021, whilst I was an artist in residence at the Mahler \u0026amp; LeWitt Studios, Spoleto, for the 'Mahler, The Song of the Earth' project in partnership with Mahler Foundation. During the residency, I was studying and creating work in response to the life and work of Gustav Mahler, in particular 'Das Lied Von Der Erde' (The Song of the Earth) — a vast song cycle engaging with nature, forgiveness, friendship, and mortality themes.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWhile making this record, I wanted to explore what the natural environment means personally. I went on many trips into nature to engage with plant life and natural materials. These included everyday strolls around South London, walks with my mum in the hills surrounding Bath (Up), hikes through Freetown, the hills of Spoleto, up line in Ghana and nature sanctuaries in Sierra Leone (Wood). I found incredible examples of nature in all of these contexts, which I felt personally close to.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eI made field recordings with my phone or Zoom recorder, documenting various birds, insects, monkeys, bats, plants, trees, stones and so on, which are all on the record.\"\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Carrying Colour","offers":[{"title":"LP","offer_id":50902558081355,"sku":"2001594","price":25.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/Meeting_with_a_Judas_Tree_a13cadee_thumbnail_4096.jpg?v=1732791844"},{"product_id":"my-fathers-shadow-ost","title":"My Father's Shadow (OST)","description":"\u003cp\u003eCarrying Colour releases the official soundtrack to \u003cem\u003eMy Father’s Shadow\u003c\/em\u003e, composed by Duval Timothy and CJ Mirra. Duval and CJ craft a score of striking emotional depth — tender, transcendent and texturally rich. Centring Timothy’s piano and a palette of analogue studio devices, the music evokes the film’s period, its turbulence, its grief and its fleeting moments of joy. Across 12 tracks, the soundtrack stands as both a fully realised album and an integral narrative voice within the film. Set over a single day in Lagos during the 1993 Nigerian election crisis, My Father’s Shadow follows an estranged father guiding his two young sons across the city as political unrest threatens their journey home. The film premiered in Cannes’ Un Certain Regard in 2025 — the first Nigerian production ever selected for the official selection — where it received the Special Mention Caméra d’Or. It went on to earn 12 British Independent Film Award nominations, including Best Score for Duval and CJ, Best Sound for CJ, and Best Director for Akinola Davies Jr., alongside multiple wins at The Gothams and festivals worldwide. The film is the UK’s submission for Best International Feature Film at the 2026 Oscars and will be released in UK cinemas on 6 February 2026.\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Carrying Colour","offers":[{"title":"LP - Opaque Green\/ Milky Transparent \/ Opaque Green","offer_id":56941921796427,"sku":"R7427-2367","price":32.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"Tape","offer_id":56941931397451,"sku":"R7427-3015","price":16.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/2000x2000bb_80a3dc7b-4b01-46ff-850c-0cf2951440b5.jpg?v=1775207985"},{"product_id":"son","title":"Son","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eSon\u003c\/em\u003e was recorded in London and Freetown between 2019-21. Inspired by the pair’s shared love of choral music, it began as an experiment to explore playing with the voice in more creative ways, using layered vocals as an instrument following piano harmony, arrangement and sampling. The project started in London with the title track and became a story about a world in which we hide our true ‘colours’ in order to fit in. A mother tells her son that he needs to fit in to survive before realising that she is following the same tropes passed on to her as a child. Following this realisation, she encourages her son to protect his dreams and not to listen to anybody telling him he can’t be whatever he chooses. Rosie joined Duval for a week in Freetown in February 2020 where they wrote the rest of the project, bringing friends Daniel Koroma, Kandeh Bangura, Valentine Coker, Chino Greene and Tom Herbert in for musical contributions.\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Carrying Colour","offers":[{"title":"LP - Transparent Green","offer_id":58115858760011,"sku":"R2399-1410","price":21.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"LP - Black","offer_id":56941947388235,"sku":"R2399-0042","price":22.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/2000x2000bb_482952ad-61ae-488b-b9e2-137ef89a57b0.jpg?v=1775208375"},{"product_id":"rain-music","title":"Rain Music","description":"\u003cp\u003eAn international link-up between South London’s \u003cstrong\u003eDuval Timothy\u003c\/strong\u003e and Californian producer and artist \u003cstrong\u003eCarlos Niño\u003c\/strong\u003e, this is a meeting of distinct voices and open-hearted collaboration.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWith contributions from \u003cstrong\u003eNavy Blue\u003c\/strong\u003e, \u003cstrong\u003eNate Mercereau\u003c\/strong\u003e, \u003cstrong\u003eLaraaji\u003c\/strong\u003e, \u003cstrong\u003eAaron Shaw\u003c\/strong\u003e and more, the project brings together a wide cast while keeping the focus on connection, exchange and shared musical language.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Carrying Colour","offers":[{"title":"LP - Yellow","offer_id":58115730309451,"sku":"R8945-5344","price":27.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/duvaltimothy_carlosniA_o-rainmusic-albumartworkSM-1.jpg?v=1786557397"},{"product_id":"help-4","title":"Help","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eDuval Timothy\u003c\/b\u003e's \u003ci\u003eHelp\u003c\/i\u003e feels like his most expansive and searching record yet, bringing in collaborators including \u003cb\u003eLil Silva\u003c\/b\u003e, \u003cb\u003eMelanie Faye\u003c\/b\u003e, \u003cb\u003eVegyn\u003c\/b\u003e, \u003cb\u003eDesta Haile\u003c\/b\u003e, \u003cb\u003eMr Mitch\u003c\/b\u003e, \u003cb\u003eDave Okumo\u003c\/b\u003e and \u003cb\u003eTwin Shadow\u003c\/b\u003e.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eRecorded between London and Los Angeles, the album traces experiences of moving through the music industry, living alongside mental health struggles, and navigating the strange comfort of YouTube self-help videos.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWhat comes through most strongly is the sense of healing \u003cb\u003eDuval Timothy\u003c\/b\u003e found in friendship and collaboration, giving \u003ci\u003eHelp\u003c\/i\u003e a generous, open-hearted pull that makes its ambition feel deeply human.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Carrying Colour","offers":[{"title":"2LP - Milky Clear","offer_id":58115787030859,"sku":"R9204-9497","price":21.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/HELP-DuvalTimothy2020_RGBSM.jpg?v=1786557939"}],"url":"https:\/\/shop.roughtrade.com\/fr\/collections\/carrying-colour.oembed","provider":"Rough Trade","version":"1.0","type":"link"}