Just over three years removed from releasing MartyrLoserKing, Saul Williams has detailed a follow-up effort.
Williams will deliver new album Encrypted & Vulnerable on July 18 through Pirates Blend. Thirteen tracks in length, the album will be the first Williams has categorized as "spoken word," using "invisible and implied beats."
Of the album, Williams explained in a statement, "Encrypted & Vulnerable is simultaneously a personal and intimately optimistic takedown on struggle, defiance, awareness, aloneness, and a takedown of heteronormative capitalistic patriarchal authoritarian politics in topics ranging from love, technology, religion, war, to migration."
Of "invisible and implied beats," he added, "I wanted to make an album with invisible beats — I always want people to dance — but this time I wanted the drums to be DIY. I figured the drums in your head could be crazier and more complex than anything I could program. So I started working on sounds that would instigate that. You feel the rhythm and you're already dancing in anticipation of the drums... that was one goal of the album."
Entirely self-produced, Encrypted & Vulnerable was mixed by Gonjasufi and features contributions from Dave Sitek, My Brightest Diamond, Grammy-winning trumpet player Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah, astrophysicist Bianca Rhym, King Britt, Orko Eloheim, Thavius Beck, CX KiDTRONiK, Paul Whiteman and Lippie.
The album is said to be the second instalment in his MartyrLoserKing trilogy of releases, while also doubling as a score to Williams' self-directed musical, Neptune Frost. Executive produced by Lin-Manuel Miranda, the aforementioned production is based on a graphic novel penned by Williams chronicling African hackers living in a village made of up-cycled computer parts. The novel will be release in 2020.
Alongside the announcement, Williams has shared a 360-degree video for album track "Experiment," which you can view below. Encrypted & Vulnerable is now available for pre-order.
Encrypted & Vulnerable:
1. Coronation As Harness
2. I Own The Night (sufi vision)
3. Experiment
4. Underground
5. Before The War
6. People Above The Moon
7. Encrypted & Vulnerable
8. Fight Everything
9. Dare
10. Full Of Shit
11. Infinite
12. Magnify The Feeling
13. Thought About It
Williams will deliver new album Encrypted & Vulnerable on July 18 through Pirates Blend. Thirteen tracks in length, the album will be the first Williams has categorized as "spoken word," using "invisible and implied beats."
Of the album, Williams explained in a statement, "Encrypted & Vulnerable is simultaneously a personal and intimately optimistic takedown on struggle, defiance, awareness, aloneness, and a takedown of heteronormative capitalistic patriarchal authoritarian politics in topics ranging from love, technology, religion, war, to migration."
Of "invisible and implied beats," he added, "I wanted to make an album with invisible beats — I always want people to dance — but this time I wanted the drums to be DIY. I figured the drums in your head could be crazier and more complex than anything I could program. So I started working on sounds that would instigate that. You feel the rhythm and you're already dancing in anticipation of the drums... that was one goal of the album."
Entirely self-produced, Encrypted & Vulnerable was mixed by Gonjasufi and features contributions from Dave Sitek, My Brightest Diamond, Grammy-winning trumpet player Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah, astrophysicist Bianca Rhym, King Britt, Orko Eloheim, Thavius Beck, CX KiDTRONiK, Paul Whiteman and Lippie.
The album is said to be the second instalment in his MartyrLoserKing trilogy of releases, while also doubling as a score to Williams' self-directed musical, Neptune Frost. Executive produced by Lin-Manuel Miranda, the aforementioned production is based on a graphic novel penned by Williams chronicling African hackers living in a village made of up-cycled computer parts. The novel will be release in 2020.
Alongside the announcement, Williams has shared a 360-degree video for album track "Experiment," which you can view below. Encrypted & Vulnerable is now available for pre-order.
Encrypted & Vulnerable:
1. Coronation As Harness
2. I Own The Night (sufi vision)
3. Experiment
4. Underground
5. Before The War
6. People Above The Moon
7. Encrypted & Vulnerable
8. Fight Everything
9. Dare
10. Full Of Shit
11. Infinite
12. Magnify The Feeling
13. Thought About It