Moor Mother - Circuit City
Circuit City
Moor Mother is the project of Camae Ayewa, a poet and musician from Philadelphia. She's had an incredibly prolific year, releasing six studio albums, four of which are compilations, and one live album. These albums all have varying genres, but all have one thing in common: they're a vehicle for Moor Mother's poetry. The album we'll be looking at today has a free jazz backdrop overlaid with Ayewa's poetry. How well does this unique format work?
For me, the answer to this question hinges on two key factors: the execution of the free jazz backdrop, and the lyrics and delivery of the poetry. Luckily, both are excellently done. Circuit City is divided into four acts, all with different musical and lyrical themes, but largely stringed together by the thematical consistency of Moor Mother's poetry being strongly leftist in nature. On "Act 1: Working Machine," she sings about being part of a capitalist machine, so unbelievably massive, it feels impossible to confront in any way. She makes reference to her upbringing in a public housing project, describing "the way the house us, anything but a human right." All of this has caused her much trauma, which she makes reference to in the album's opening lines. This album is topically heavy, and damn angry.
The anger is further fueled by the chaotic free jazz laid under the strongly worded poetry. I'll be honest, this is some of the more compelling modern free jazz I've heard. It has everything I like about free jazz, the chaos, the terrifying and angry, yet beautiful arrangements. In total, besides Moor Mother, there are other people on this album, including "electronics," a sax player, a trumpeter, an upright bassist, and a drummer. The solos are furious, and technically impressive.
So how well do these two aspects mesh together? Rather well in my opinion. The stunningly cathartic free jazz mixes beautifully with Ayewa's beautifully yet fiercely delivered jazz poetry. Neither aspect ever drowns out the other, which could have been a real danger, but it's not present thanks to the good mixing job. If I had to pick two favorite acts, I'd say the first and last are my favorites, simply due to them being the most chaotic, and I love my chaotic free jazz. But overall, if you like free jazz, or like anti-capitalist poetry and are open to trying free jazz, I would strongly recommend giving this a shot. It's one of my favorite albums this year, and I'm pretty confident it's the only album released this year I bought a CD of. So, for whatever my endorsement is worth, I would rate this 9/10.