Moor Mother - Analog Fluids of Sonic Black Holes (2019)

Building on the fierce reputation of her early albums, ‘Analog Fluids of Sonic Black Holes’ is the brutally transfixing 4th LP by force of nature, Moor Mother, featuring contributions from Justin Broadrick (Godflesh, Zonal), King Britt, Saul Williams, Giant Swan, and Bookworms...

Delivered with a booming, stentorian confidence, Moor Mother holds the listener’s gaze with frightening conviction of purpose, underlined by the ratchet strength of her Afro-punk-techno-blues-noise backdrops. Alongside guest input from poet/rapper Saul Williams and her fellow Philly native, MC Reef The Lost Cauze, Moor Mother holds darkness to light in a way that edifies and complicates the magick of her art.

In its detailed arrangements and penetrative focus, ‘ Analog Fluids of Sonic Black Holes’ resembles an immersive film sans the visuals, but the range of real and synthetic textures and timbres, coupled with Moor Mother’s central narration bring the music and her ideas to life in a way that visual languages may not fully be able to articulate so fully, while also leaving room for the listener to fill in their own gaps. She’s lost none of the rage that informed her first three albums, but here it feels more tempered and pointed than ever.

From the introductory portal/mental compression chamber of ancient sounding vocals, diaphanous synths and tightening, dissonant strings in ‘Repeater’, the album erupts across the first half, only to slow and crystallize into boulders and ash clouds. Warning flares come early with the bristling noise and wailing vocals of ‘Don’t Die’, and surges into gear with the exceptional Jk Flesh-like slam of ‘After Images’, the urgency of ‘Master’s Clock’ and the sooty rock and rolige of ‘Black Flight’ featuring arresting verse by Saul Williams. From here it runs slower, inward, pulled toward the black hole of ‘The Myth Holds Weight’ and the vice-like squeeze of ‘Sonic Black Holes’, resting the pace for her glaring vocals in ’Shadowgrams’ and the heaving slug of ‘Private Silence’, again recalling JK Flesh productions and making room for Reef the Lost Cauze, and a spirited resolution or recycling of they senses in ‘Passing Of Time.’

As we sit here writing in Manchester, which built its name as Cottonopolis, and thousands of miles from the US, there’s lots of food for thought when Moor Mother talks about her ancestors working cotton fields. We all share a history, but we only acknowledge a fraction of it. The visceral context and nature of Moor Mother’s music is vital in prizing opening ears and minds to history and the way it informs modernity.