{"title":"Land Of Kush","description":null,"products":[{"product_id":"against-the-day-1","title":"Against The Day","description":"\u003cp\u003esam shalabi is a musician and composer who has been creating and playing music in montreal for the better part of 20 years. unconstrained by genre, sam's musical history spans rock, jazz, free music, punk, and most things in-between. a highly truncated list of his projects includes shalabi effect, detention, molasses, and nutsak, along with several releases under his own name courtesy alien8 recordings and squintfucker press. for the past five or so years shalabi has also been writing and arranging sprawling compositions for large ensembles, the most recurring of which is land of kush, modeled on classical orchestras from late nasser-era egypt. incorporating some 30 montreal players and vocalists, kush includes string, brass, woodwinds, guitar, and percussion sections, in addition to electronics and shalabi's oud. inspired by and named after the thomas pynchon's novel 'against the day', the music is broken into five sections, named for the book's chapters. the three primary movements are centred around solo vocalists (jason grimmer, molly sweeeney, radwan moumneh) who independently composed their own lyrics for the piece. in between vocal performances, shalabi gives the orchestra ample opportunity to strut its stuff between verses, including solos and long instrumental passages that display sam's unique balance of composition and 'expository' or improvisational instruction. 'against the day' is a complex, intense, but accessible hour of hybrid, genre-defying music. the marriage of middle-eastern, north african and western modes and influences yields a recording that evades categorization. constellation is proud to be releasing this new work by one of montreal's most challenging and prolific musical iconoclasts. the album was recorded and mixed by efrim menuck (a silver mt. zion, godspeed you! black emperor). for fans of: black star arkestrar, sun ra and asmz. the cd comes in cardstock package with metallic and fluorescent inks.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"No Label","offers":[{"title":"CD","offer_id":50490963493195,"sku":"311014","price":12.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/3c9f9005-ee4b-4859-98a8-6d0d0701d053_thumbnail_4096.jpg?v=1727679942"},{"product_id":"sand-enigma","title":"Sand Enigma","description":"\u003cp\u003eRenowned Montreal \/ Cairo composer Sam Shalabi returns with his exhilarating and utterly genre-bending big band Land Of Kush. The trenchantly-titled \u003ci\u003eSand Enigma\u003c\/i\u003e bristles with defiant exuberance, restless creative energy, and electrifying cross-cultural expression - the band's most accomplished, acute and accessible album to date (though don't expect 'easy listening' from this boundary-pushing hydra-headed entity). \u003ci\u003eSand Enigma\u003c\/i\u003e is a wildly diverse and hugely compelling tour de force of modern composition that pulses with emotion and experimentation, blending avant-garde, psychedelic, Middle Eastern, out-jazz, electronic, and improv \/ free music tropes to stunning effect. The 75-minute opus, brilliantly recorded by Radwan Ghazi Moumneh (Jerusalem In My Heart, Matana Roberts) captures a band on fire, flowing through composed set-pieces, improvisational turns, harmolodic gestural and textural interplay, bursts of fervent groove, and fearless, feral experimentation. While the bounty of heavy-hitting instrumental players are too numerous to call out here, \u003ci\u003eSand Enigma\u003c\/i\u003e notably features two new Land Of Kush collaborators, both of them leading lights of Cairo's burgeoning avant-electronic scene: Nadah El Shazly and Maurice Louca. \u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Constellation","offers":[{"title":"CD","offer_id":50498585100619,"sku":"1076848","price":14.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"LP","offer_id":50498586214731,"sku":"1076849","price":29.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/8c46559e-9138-4f94-9875-3e018b0a5ae8_thumbnail_4096.jpg?v=1727750081"},{"product_id":"monogamy","title":"Monogamy","description":"\u003cp\u003esam shalabi's land of kush project returns: his psych-arabic jazz orchestra has produced a second album of intensely genre-defying, polymorphic, big band madness. where shalabi structured last year's mesmerising against the day album around the thomas pynchon novel of the same name, this time shalabi tackles concepts of shame, sexuality and society in a new multi-movement work entitled monogamy. rounding up many of the same montreal-based improv and experimental players featured on against the day, shalabi deploys a cast of two dozen musicians and sound artists to realise this fantastic new compositional hybrid of middle eastern tropes and western vocabularies of jazz, psychedelia and experimental \/ free music. for the monogamy album, the group has been given its own sub-moniker as the egyptian light orchestra. the band is a truly hydra-headed beast on this recording; string, brass and woodwinds careen around the drone\/backbeat of the major movements, shifting between short melodic punctuations, free excursions, and consolidated unison lines. dissonant piano, synth and electronics bubble below, above and at the outer limits of the mix. several transitions also allow for various players to stretch out in some lovely virtuosic solo passages. shalabi's oud anchors the album's opening and closing pieces, as well as the glorious 'tunnel visions' piece at the album's midpoint. the rhythm section comprising standard trap kits, upright basses and traditional eastern percussion holds down one hypnotic groove after another. on constellation.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"No Label","offers":[{"title":"CD","offer_id":51106477244747,"sku":"326171","price":12.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/7c3f1672-a1f7-4efd-a25f-339f28504670_thumbnail_4096.jpg?v=1737010164"}],"url":"https:\/\/shop.roughtrade.com\/fr\/collections\/land-of-kush.oembed","provider":"Rough Trade","version":"1.0","type":"link"}