Today Moor Mother – aka the songwriter, composer, vocalist, poet, and visual artist Camae Ayewa – has announced a new album, Jazz Codes, out on July 1st – her second album for ANTI- and a companion to her celebrated 2021 release Black Encyclopedia of the Air.
Jazz Codes’ uses poetry as a starting point, and moves toward more melody, more singing voices, more choruses and more complexity. In its warm, densely layered course through jazz, blues, soul, hip-hop, Jazz Codes sets the ear blissfully adrift and unhitches the mind from habit. Through her work, Ayewa illuminates the principles of her interdisciplinary collaborative practice Black Quantum Futurism, a theoretical framework for creating counter-chronologies and envisioning Black quantum womanist futures that rupture exclusionary versions of history and future through art, writing, music, and performance.
Alongside today’s album announcement she has shared a video for the new track “Woody Shaw” feat. Melanie Charles, directed by Cyrus Moussavi. “Woody Shaw” was filmed in the Leimert Park headquarters of the Pan Afrikan Peoples Arkestra, founded in 1961 by Horace Tapscott with the vision of promoting a true community orchestra dedicated to Black music in South Central LA. Though Tapscott passed in ‘99, PAPA still goes strong under the leadership of his son, Mekala.
Listen to “Woody Shaw” feat. Melanie Charles and watch the video for it below:
Jazz Codes artwork & tracklist:
1. UMZANSI (feat Black Quantum Futurism featuring Mary Lattimore)
2. APRIL 7th (feat Keir Neuringer)
3. GOLDEN LADY (feat Melanie Charles)
4. JOE MCPHEE NATION TIME INTRO (feat Keir Neuringer)
5. ODE TO MARY (feat Orion Sun & Jason Moran)
6. WOODY SHAW (feat Melanie Charles)
7. MEDITATION RAG (feat Aquiles Navarro & Alya Al Sultani)
8. SO SWEET AMINA (feat Justmadnice & Keir Neuringer)
9. DUST TOGETHER (feat Wolf Weston & Aquiles Navarro)
10. RAP JASM (feat AKAI SOLO & Justmadnice)
11. BLUES AWAY (feat Fatboi Sharif)
12. BLAME (feat Justmadnice)
13. ARMS SAVE (feat Nicole Mitchell)
14. REAL TRILL HOURS (feat Yung Morpheus)
15. EVENING (feat Wolf Weston)
16. BARELY WOKE (feat Wolf Weston)
17. NOISE JISM
18. THOMAS STANLEY JAZZCODES OUTRO (feat Irreversible Entanglements & Thomas Stanley)
19. BLACK HONEY (feat. Loijj & Honeychile) (CD bonus track)
20. WE GOT THE JAZZ (feat. Kyle Kidd, Keir Neuringer, Aquiles Navarro) (CD bonus track)
21. BLACK DUST BLUES (feat. Elaine Mitchener) (CD bonus track)
This summer Moor Mother will be performing at Documenta 15, Montreal Jazz Festival and various other European festivals; she will also be headlining an album release show at Los Angeles’s Resident on July 8. All upcoming dates are listed below.
Moor Mother live dates:
June 16 – Lucerne, Switzerland – B Sides Festival
June 23 – Mannheim, Germany – Mannheim Triennale
June 25 – Toulouse, France – Les Siestes Electroniques
June 27 – Bolzano, Italy – Alte Adige Festival
June 30 – Roskilde, Denmark – Roskilde Festival
July 2 – Budapest, Hungary – Kolorado Festival
July 4 – Montreal, Canada – Montreal Jazz Fest
July 8 – Los Angeles, CA – Resident
August 8 – Wiltshire, UK – End of the Road Festival
August 10 – Berlin, Germany – A L’larme! X Berlin 10