FIYAH!!! by Abdu Ali

this album is everything that i am and everything that i am not. i wanted to embrace all of the facets of my identity but not let those paradigms build chains around my artistic vision. this album is a queer’d journey of interrogation in order to discover the seed of my fire. realizing i didn’t need to go anywhere else but my past for inspiration, i shoveled into my upbringing of living in Baltimore, where as a youth, during humid summer days i often would here in the distance, the go ghetters having marching band practice, or how i would sneak into 17 and over nights at the paradox to be engulfed by the vibrations of the powerful subwoofers the played bmore club or vogue music all night long, or how i would love post church sunday drives with grandad, as he play the stylings of motown in his dodge caravan (sometimes he would play a mix of pfunk or mystikal tool) after witnessing the visceral beauty of gospel performances at bethal ame.

so i wondered how can i take my baltimore experiences and my hometown sound into the future where my influences of free jazz, soul, punk, and rap could be fused into one movement? i wondered how could i unleash social political critiques, emotions, and personal traumas into a musical abyss of revolution? FIYAH!!! is me wondering, questioning, climbing up a mountain into the burning bush of endless musical possibilities in a post afro futurist realm. i feel as though, this is the first established musical chapter of Abdu Ali and im excited to invite you into this journey.

Abdu Ali is a Baltimore born avant-garde electronic musician whose work is an idiosyncratic blend of punk, jazz, Baltimore club music, and rap. Their work is a yielding poetic uprise that often interrogate ideas of identity as well as narrate and promote liberation from oppressive ideologies.

Unapologetically black and queer, Abdu Ali’s work is bold, raw, and most importantly life-affirming.

abduali.com