Afriqua has a new single entitled “Turner” off his upcoming LP Colored due out October 4th via R&S Records. The work of Adam Longman-Parker, the Berlin-based musician credits his upbringing in Virginia as being key in shaping his idiosyncratic sound. Pointing to the early-2000s, and artists like The Neptunes, Timbaland, and Missy Elliot, he explains:
“Black electronic music doesn’t have to be from the Midwest—this isn’t from Detroit, this isn’t from Chicago. It’s from Virginia.”
Afriqua’s unique approach can be heard on this rhythmically driven new cut “Turner.” Utilizing a technicolor palette of sounds, the track’s heady sense of drift is still rife with an almost unidentifiable tension. Upon closer inspection, though, it is Longman-Parker’s use of negative space upping the anxiety levels here. Discussing the track, he explains:
“‘Turner’ is the darkest point of the otherwise uplifting album. When I first started it in London, it transported me to a different place than any of the other joints on the record. Its sinister vibe gave it a cinematic feeling while never losing its drive. It was only a few months later when I finally stopped listening to the loop on repeat and decided to finish the track that I thought of Nat Turner, the slave who led the legendary revolt very near to my hometown of Hampton, VA. For me, the drum-line evokes both the HBCU marching bands that I grew up on back home, and also the martial spirit of that moment in history. On the same tip, with Turner’s revolutionary efforts in mind, the explosiveness of the track falls apart and builds to an intense and abrupt end.”
