The Wire: The Cycle Album Preview

Read the full write up and preview The Cycle here.

“We are a multi-generational, gender and genre non-conforming amalgam of Black Culture dedicated to servicing the stories and songs of the apocalyptic diaspora,” reads the introductory statement on Mourning [A] BLKstar's website. The Ohio ensemble – consisting of vocalists James Longs, Kyle Kidd and LaToya Kent, guitarist Peter Saudek, drummer Dante Foley, trombonist William Washington, Theresa May on Trumpet, and RA Washington. – release their fourth album The Cycle on 15 May.

“I tend to work in batches,” states the group's founder RA Washington via email. “Sometimes a year or two ahead of whatever record we have slated to release. So, at the time of [previous album] Reckoning coming out I had most of the song sketches and lyrics done for what we ended up calling The Cycle. We rehearse every week for about four to five hours and it's been that way since the beginning. That's where the singers begin adding their vocal arrangements and the instrumentalists write their parts around that. So, we begin to add the songs to our live set as soon as we think we have them and we play them out, introducing the audience to the new material even in the midst of promoting the current record.

“The Cycle was an opportunity as a composer to figure out just how to add the writing of the instrumental section in a purposeful way and to think of the song sketches with their collaboration completely,” Washington continues. “We have an amazing practice space and it’s a warm sound in there with the old Cleveland wood floor and high tin ceilings. So I just wanted to really capture our room sound with no overdubs. To see if we could capture our live show sound on record, while still considering it not in the traditional way bands approach live recordings. I wanted to work with an engineer who was willing to come to our space and who understood my values. Jah Nada was the only choice I considered. He has an amazing grace and feel about him, and this tremendous ability to use the room in a recording. Originally The Cycle was designed to be triple LP but we ended up culling it down to a double album due to label budget restraints, and as a way to make sure the vinyl was affordable for the people at our shows. One of the unseen components of this record is, I'm running a few pedals giving surface noise and hiss a bass tone and then placing that underneath the entire recording, just constantly having that low rumble underneath the whole entire cycle of songs. To me, this acted as a metaphor for how we as marginalised POC folk have to create beauty above the noise of an imperial country, how we push past that noise to create a truth for ourselves, and then humbly share that truth with anyone willing to listen.”

The Cycle is released by Don Giovanni Records on 15 May and is available to pre-order now.