aja monet – the color of rain
aja monet releases her anticipated kaleidoscopic new album, the color of rain, today on drink sum wtr.
On the album, monet’s singular and surrealist poetry melodically interacts with a track list that combines jazz, soul, hip hop, afropunk and rhythm and blues into a one-of-a-kind experience. She uses surrealism as a response to rising fascism, offering a waking-dream intervention amid the sinister reality of contemporary events. The album is a refusal of convention and apathy. A timely and important album from one of our most vital artists, which The New Yorker recently called “a dreamlike tangle of genre-blurring ideas.”
Alongside the album release, monet has shared an animated video for album standout “Working Class Musicians.”
At the crux of rising fascism, aja monet offers a waking-dream intervention, amid the sinister reality of contemporary events. A prompt to look up at the sky within, the color of rain, co-produced by monet, Justin Brown and Meshell Ndegeocello, is an imbrication of familiar genres forged beyond category or definition. As one strides through the sequence of poems, each song shifts between musical perceptions of jazz, soul, hip hop, rhythm and blues. Surrealism at its finest, a marvelous unleashing of the mind. the color of rain reminds us that poetry predates the very blueprints of genre. Rather than delivering poetry over fixed arrangements, aja works in close conversation with the music, adjusting phrasing, cadence, and tone as the compositions shift.
the color of rain is an evolution from the intimate, live-café energy of aja monet’s GRAMMY-nominated debut album, when the poems do what they do. While she nods at the Black Arts Movement’s legacy and lineage, this sophomore album is a conjure the experiment and explore the interior. If the first album was a gentle altar call, then the second is an impassioned call to bare arms, a definitive guide to choose your weapon, wisely. If the pen is the sword, music sharpens or blunts the blade.
Live instrumentation anchors the record, but its spirit surfaces in pre- and post- production with warped sonics, wayward voltas, and delicate investigations. Meshell Ndegecello conducts the illustrious cast of musicians while Justin Brown bolsters the prismatic vision. In true community organizing fashion, aja knows how to bring artists together, recruiting meaningful musical contributions from Burniss Travis, Josh Johnson, Daniel Mintseris, Jermaine Paul, Ambrose Akinmusire and Nico Segal, as well as features by Mick Jenkins and Vic Mensa.
monet’s tour in support of the color of rain kicked off earlier this week with a performance at New York’s famed Carnegie Hall and continues through the US and Europe this summer and in the fall monet will tour Australia for the first time, with a kick off show at Melbourne Jazz Festival.
Tour Dates:
05/23 – Atlanta, GA @ Atlanta Jazz Festival
05/30 – Los Angeles, CA @ Getty Museum
06/01 – San Francisco, CA @ Chapel
07/04 – Montréal, QC @ Montreal Jazz Festival
07/05 – Toronto, ON @ The Great Hall
07/30 – San Diego, CA @ UC San Diego
08/08 – San Jose, CA @ San Jose Jazz Festival
08/19 – Geneva, CH @ Scène Ella Fitzgerald
08/22 – Dorset, UK @ We Out Here Festival
08/26 – Istanbul, TR @ Kommunite Social
08/28 – Cella Monte, IT @ Jazz:Re:Found
08/29 – Nantes, FR @ RDV de l’Erdre
08/30 – Paris, FR @ Festival Jazz à la Villette
10/22 – Melbourne, AU @ Melbourne Jazz Festival
#ajamonet