SAINT ABDULLAH "IN GOD'S IMAGE" 2xCD FINAL REPRESS
Compact Disc (CD) + Digital Album
Saint Abdullah // “In God’s Image” // 2xCD on Psychic Liberation //
Release date: August 21, 2020
Saint Abdullah, composed of Tehran-born brothers Mohammad and Mehdi, have fine-tuned their vision of conceptual, blown-out dub and free jazz with “In God’s Image,” an ambitious twenty-song double CD on Psychic Liberation. The opus by the two Iranians living in New York, is full of mourning and rage, but these affects only scratch the surface of the work’s emotional and formal heterogeneity.
Like the image gracing its cover—a tiny, dusty peykan, its roof fitted with an image of Ruhollah Khomeini and cone speakers—Saint Abdullah uses DIY minimalism to deliver maximal messaging. On “Problem,” distorted percussion, Shia oration, and a sample of the late Nipsy Hussle meld into a cathartic club burner, while the rhythms and lifted string arpeggiations on “Potion for sorrow” induce hazy cinematics, the duo’s attempt at Persian stoner boom bap.
Elsewhere are instances of improvised jamming, melancholic twinkling, and pensive restraint. The powerfully eclectic statement by Saint Abdullah includes appearances by saxophonist Travis Laplante, who blows a spiralling noir line over feedbacking cacophony. On another track, Moor Mother delivers a poetic lashing on Western imperialists who rain missiles on hospitals, grieves the bodies piling up as capital gets sucked from the Earth.
The sample work on “In God’s Image” draws heavily from Iranian documentaries, and includes the brothers’ field recordings from Tehran and New York. Heretical combinations collide senses of antiquity and contemporaneity, resisting the many orientalist reads on Iranian culture and politics. In this struggle, Saint Abdullah conveys many emotional registers, from exhausted depression to righteous indignation.
Among many things, the image of Khomeini on the cover, which often scandalizes American audiences, represents the overthrow of a 2,500-year-long monarchy. All forms of dehumanization receive the sonic snakebite of Saint Abdullah, and “In God’s Image” resuscitates the revolutionary potential of music that pulls from the traditions of oppressed peoples in both the East and West.
Psychic Liberation, in operation since 2018, is an experimental music label started in Brooklyn, New York, currently based in The Hague, Netherlands. The label is distributed in North America by Fantastique, and in EU/UK by Boomkat.
Mastered by Glyn Maier
Layout by Sara Abruña
Includes unlimited streaming of IN GOD'S IMAGE
via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
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Saint Abdullah // “In God’s Image” // 2xCD on Psychic Liberation //
Release date: August 21, 2020
Saint Abdullah, composed of Tehran-born brothers Mohammad and Mehdi, have fine-tuned their vision of conceptual, blown-out dub and free jazz with “In God’s Image,” an ambitious twenty-song double CD on Psychic Liberation. The opus by the two Iranians living in New York, is full of mourning and rage, but these affects only scratch the surface of the work’s emotional and formal heterogeneity.
Like the image gracing its cover—a tiny, dusty peykan, its roof fitted with an image of Ruhollah Khomeini and cone speakers—Saint Abdullah uses DIY minimalism to deliver maximal messaging. On “Problem,” distorted percussion, Shia oration, and a sample of the late Nipsy Hussle meld into a cathartic club burner, while the rhythms and lifted string arpeggiations on “Potion for sorrow” induce hazy cinematics, the duo’s attempt at Persian stoner boom bap.
Elsewhere are instances of improvised jamming, melancholic twinkling, and pensive restraint. The powerfully eclectic statement by Saint Abdullah includes appearances by saxophonist Travis Laplante, who blows a spiralling noir line over feedbacking cacophony. On another track, Moor Mother delivers a poetic lashing on Western imperialists who rain missiles on hospitals, grieves the bodies piling up as capital gets sucked from the Earth.
The sample work on “In God’s Image” draws heavily from Iranian documentaries, and includes the brothers’ field recordings from Tehran and New York. Heretical combinations collide senses of antiquity and contemporaneity, resisting the many orientalist reads on Iranian culture and politics. In this struggle, Saint Abdullah conveys many emotional registers, from exhausted depression to righteous indignation.
Among many things, the image of Khomeini on the cover, which often scandalizes American audiences, represents the overthrow of a 2,500-year-long monarchy. All forms of dehumanization receive the sonic snakebite of Saint Abdullah, and “In God’s Image” resuscitates the revolutionary potential of music that pulls from the traditions of oppressed peoples in both the East and West.
Psychic Liberation, in operation since 2018, is an experimental music label started in Brooklyn, New York, currently based in The Hague, Netherlands. The label is distributed in North America by Fantastique, and in EU/UK by Boomkat.
Mastered by Glyn Maier
Layout by Sara Abruña
credits
released August 21, 2020
Audio by Saint Abdullah
Mastered by Glyn Maier
Layout by Sara Abruña
Label founded in 2013, originally ran with Miguel Alvariño titled Primitive Languages as a cassette and record store project
in New York City. Operated solo by Nick Klein since 2019 under the working title Psychic Liberation out of the EU. PL is made possible with the distribution assistance of Fantastique INC USA, Industrial Coast UK, Tobira Records JP, Rope Editions SK, and Stellage Store RU....more
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