‘White Man’ is an intricate, grating and uncomfortable concept album letting the listener in on what it feels like to be a black body ensconced in the trappings of a white societal power structure. Not meant to be pleasant, the music pervades the senses and gives the listener a feeling of being torn apart by this inherently racist system.
From government to justice to law enforcement to education to employment to consumerism to housing to relationships…if it exists in this system, it’s founded on White Supremacy. Racism is so deeply embedded in the way we exist that it creates tension anyone who’s aware of it and physicality for anyone who experiences it. I grew up sheltered from the realities of racism, a White girl who only understood it as hateful words or actions that were obvious and easily perceived–not as a physical, mental, and emotional imprisonment; a war on self-worth; a lack of safety; a shared truth made invisible to me through systematization. But as an adult who’s navigated this world alongside Black people, I see how my Black partner is perceived as a threat in so many everyday situations, how he needs to keep his emotions in check because they scare people, how my Black daughters are gazed on like they’re exotic, how people look at me as their White mother and make assumptions about me because I received seminal fluid from someone who isn’t a White Man. And when I listen to Shame’s debut full-length album White Man, I feel like everything’s slowed down so that every facial tic and unconscious flinch and dirty thought is thrown into sharp relief on the whitewashed walls. Through the use of harsh noise soundscapes, Abdul-Hakim Bilal, the composer, improviser, and multi-instrumentalist behind Shame (and Grey Wulf and Och), paints a picture of daily existence in a Black body forced to navigate a hostile White world. It’s traumatic. It’s nauseating. It’s beauty and joy and love paved over but still managing to crack the cement and spring up, only to be pulled up by the roots and paved over again. It’s a struggle to thrive. Today we’re honored to share Shame’s video for their track “Throbbing” off the album White Man that’s out October 16th – you can pre-order it via Cacophonous Revival Recordings and Orb Tapes. Now call for your soul to listen and feel the sounds and voices on this record…
The packaging includes a 20 page booklet with photography by Dylan Rozzelle presented on glossy paper.
