Albums to watch

Black Encyclopedia Of The Air

Moor Mother

Black Encyclopedia Of The Air

Fifth full-length release from the Philadelphia poet, musician and activist Camae Ayewa

ADM rating[?]

7.7

Label
?Epitaph
UK Release date
17/09/2021
US Release date
17/09/2021
  1. 9.0 |   XS Noize

    Ayewa pulls together a collection of underground hip-hop artists to help create something more digestible without sacrificing an ounce of her boundary-pushing, political, or adventurous spirit
    Read Review

  2. 8.5 |   The Quietus

    Moor Mother has never been haphazard with language, but here her improv-intuition is volcanic
    Read Review

  3. 8.4 |   Beats Per Minute

    This is a great and important record. Just listen
    Read Review

  4. 8.0 |   The FT

    The experimental American artist confronts a menacing imaginative world with a varied cast of guest vocalists
    Read Review

  5. 8.0 |   Loud And Quiet

    It’s factual and unphased – one more tenet to Aweya’s Sun Ra-like vision of uniting the revolution in jazz, poetry, politics and space travel
    Read Review

  6. 8.0 |   Uncut

    Less abrasive but no less urgently meaningful [than 2016's Fetish Bones], a fusion of experimental hip-hop, soul, poetry and jazz-etched beatscapes that ebbs and flows around the concept of an Afrofuturist universe. Print edition only

  7. 8.0 |   Mojo

    It's a wilful shuffle through the space-time continuum, where powerful pearls of wisdom about memory, the future and black justice pierce the sonic murk. Print edition only

  8. 8.0 |   All Music

    The most experimental tracks arrive at the end of the album, including the abstract drift of the YATTA-assisted "Tarot" and the bracing "Zami," a throbbing, claustrophobic nightmare which nevertheless has a bit more breathing room than some of Moor Mother's earlier work
    Read Review

  9. 7.9 |   Pitchfork

    Though the Philadelphia experimental poet and sound artist has called this her most “accessible” album, her aims remain as radical as ever
    Read Review

  10. 6.0 |   The Skinny

    By presenting a platform for black and queer collaborators in her latest record, Philly-based noisemaker and activist Moor Mother creates an Afrotopian soundscape
    Read Review


blog comments powered by Disqus

Watch it

Roll over video for more options

Hear it

Latest Reviews

More reviews