MC Taylor (Hiss Golden Messenger) stretches his wings on Revelators Sound System, a new collaborative project with Cameron Ralston (Matthew E. White, Natalie Prass) of the Spacebomb house band.
Revelators Sound System influences are vast and sweeping, citing The Meters, post-Bitches Brew Miles Davis, Can, Alice Coltrane, and Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry‘s Black Ark. With a title that recalls Blind Willie Johnson’s spiritual-inspired “John the Revelator”, the forthcoming album concludes with “George the Revelator”. The band explain that “‘George’ was initially composed on May 26th, 2020, the day after George Floyd was murdered by a police officer in Minneapolis, MN, and evolved into its final form in the months that followed.”
All of those above influences above are set within lush arrangements, with J.T. Bates‘ intuitive drumming setting the scene for what feels like a spiritual jazz space jam. The accompanying video accentuates the freedom of expression found in the music. The video is a collaboration between Moses Sun, whose artwork fuses hip-hop, jazz, and afro-futurism and Bill Jones for Moses Sun Studio. The results are soulful on the one hand but equally bold and intense on the other. Wordless, it carries a strong message of intent, mirroring those strong emotions they were feeling at the time.
“We only ever talked about what emotion we were going for,” Ralston recalls. “We never talked about gear or fidelity.” Taylor echoes this sentiment, elaborating, “This record is about grief. Grief, and whatever comes after. We were looking for a way to communicate that musically.”
The results speak for themselves…communal activism with a dynamic spirit that, while sonically closer to the influences above, put in mind the ‘Organic Music’ project of Don Cherry and Moki Cherry, where art and music co-existed on a deeper level that was worth rejoicing about.
Their debut album, Revelators, is out June 17th with 37d03d.
Pre-Order: https://lnk.to/RevelatorsSoundSystem
M.C. Taylor returns to his day job as Hiss Golden Messenger and tours the UK next month (with Bobby Lee is in support):
14/6: Fiddlers Club, Bristol, UK
15/6: Brixton Electric, London, UK
18/6 Brudenell Social Club, Leeds, UK
19/6: Black Deer Festival, Turnbridge Wells, UK