“In the early 1980’s, rap music was really starting to take off, but we didn’t want the recording to come off as a rap record. There had been poetry recorded over jazz music before (e.g. The Last Poets, Gil Scott Heron), but we also didn’t want the recording to be overtly political in nature. We decided on The Night of Power (Laylatu’l Qudri) as the project title because of its symbolic meaning. The message was strong but not angry, and spoke to our deeply held beliefs—namely, that a new, more enlightened time was coming. One night during the month of Ramadan in 1982, I performed and recorded all of the music for the album. Rafiyq came a week later (still during Ramadan), and stayed up all night recording the poetry. “Reflections From the Grave” was recorded right before Maghreb (morning prayers) the next day. The music for “Reflections” was inspired by my admiration for artists like Wayne Shorter, Joe Zawinul, Sun Ra, and Alice Coltrane.” — Dennis Matthews (Abdur Razzaq)
Abdur Razzaq & Rafiyq - The Night of Power (Laylatu'l Qadri) (LP) *PRE-ORDER* Release date: May 5th
Recorded in one mystical night during Ramadan in 1982, The Night of Power (Laylatu'l Qadri) is a prophetic tapestry of politically and spiritually conscious poetry and revelatory home-studio electronic jazz.
RIYL: Amiri Baraka, Sun Ra’s Disco 3000, Roland Young, Otis G. Johnson, Jeff Phelps, TJ Hustler
Link in comments for more info, samples and to purchase.
Another new Séance Centre release alert! 🚨
The innovative, radical soul of Guadeloupe explored across thirty years of contemporary gwoka music, released by Time Capsule and Séance Centre. 🇬🇵
V/A - Lèspri Ka: New Directions in Gwoka Music from Guadeloupe 1981-2010 (2LP) *PRE-ORDER*
Release Date: Jan 28, 2022. Further info in comments.
Dream Voyage Through The Milky Way 💫
A Refraction Festival premiere. ✨
8pm EST tonight. Streamed alongside Dreamcastmoe w/ care of tyrous morris in conjunction with our friends at Public Access / Public Records NYC. 💚
Séance Centre’s Brandon Edward Hocura has created an exclusive mix exploring the deep listening, psychedelic and meditative corners of the label’s catalogue. The mix highlights the diverse yet complimentary range of the label, traversing ambient Gwo Ka from Guadeloupe, planetarium music from Mexico, and cosmic electronic music crafted on Manitoulin Island. The accompanying visuals were created by the label’s co-owner, Naomi Elaine Okabe. 🌀
More info via link in comments. 🔮
Refraction Festival is a two-week festival celebrating electronic music, visual art, fashion and internet culture.
Festival passes free or by donation.
All donations to The Bail Project, Color Of Change, Okra Projects, Afrotectopia and Primary Colours.
Keyboard Fantasies: The Beverly Glenn-Copeland Story
A glimpse of The Beverly Glenn-Copeland Story. 💚
LUCA presents Keyboard Fantasies: The Beverly Glenn-Copeland Story
Emerging from years in isolation to an enraptured crowd, a time-travelling, transgender musical genius finally finds his place in the world.
As a sci-fi obsessed woman living in near isolation, Beverly Glenn-Copeland wrote and self-released Keyboard Fantasies in Huntsville, Ontario back in 1986. Recorded in an Atari-powered home-studio, the cassette featured seven tracks of a curious folk-electronica hybrid, a sound realised far before its time.
Three decades on, the musician – now Glenn Copeland – began to receive emails from people across the world, thanking him for the music they’d recently discovered. Courtesy of a rare-record collector in Japan, a reissue of Keyboard Fantasies and subsequent plays by Four Tet, Caribou and more, the music had finally found its audience two generations down the line.
Keyboard Fantasies: The Beverly Glenn-Copeland Story, tells the time-travelling tale of this mystical musician and vocalist, as the present finally catches up with him and he embarks on his first international tour at the age of 74.
Full trailer: https://www.luca.earth/keyboardfantasies
We will keep everyone posted on when and where this will be available for viewing.
Final copies of our Keyboard Fantasies LP repress are available in our online shop now: https://www.seance-centre.com/
