Sudan Archives — the songwriter, violinist, singer and rapper born Brittney Denise Parks — had a crowded agenda when she visited New York City for Fashion Week in September.
The 31-year-old musician, who lives in Los Angeles, would perform, solo with her electronic arsenal of loops and sound effects, at There Goes the Neighborhood, a Brooklyn festival headlined and curated by TV on the Radio. She was also an invited front-row guest at the fashion show for Luar, a label with edgy designs by its founder, Raul Lopez. And she had booked a music lesson for a recent addition to her collection of traditional bowed string instruments: a kamancheh, a Persian fiddle played upright, supported on a spike. She had bought it in Istanbul, and had long been searching for an instructor.
“You place it on your knee, you play it and you move it; I want her to teach me that technique,” said Sudan — as associates call her — over coffee at a waterfront cafe near Luar’s offices. She was wearing a tight black dress and a leather jacket that had “Aaliyah” lettered on the front and a painting of the late R&B singer on the back.
“I’m doing a two-hour lesson,” she added. “Once she teaches me the basics, then I can experiment, record it, make music with it.”
High-tech performance, provocative fashion and ever-expanding instrument lore are all part of Sudan Archives’ multifarious yet oddly coherent artistic presence, as she constantly mixes brash experimentation, folkloric sounds and unguarded candor. On Friday, she’ll release her third album, “The BPM” — which is, among other things, a tale of self-discovery, a surreal electronic romp, an embrace of physicality and an onslaught of feisty hooks. “I really want it to be disruptive,” she said.
The post Sudan Archives’ Music Comes From Her Own Universe. All Are Welcome. appeared first on New York Times.
