On The Romance Of Being - Desire Marea (2023)

Ideated from: some recent releases I’ve been spinning

Marea was involved in the DJ and club scenes in South Africa and dropped his pandemic-era debut with a lot of that sound and attitude. He quit music to train in traditional healing practices, and came out of that with a new outlook on making music to connect with and heal people.

The musical mission has changed as well. This record features a live band made up of avant garde and jazz musicians. While that first album was uncannily mature-sounding, this one is on another level. There are a lot of approaches one might hear in club music, like droning and repetitive beats and lyrics. But the music underneath is constantly shifting and recontextualizing it.

The lyrics make the personal universal, translating his own struggles for love and accpetance into bigger themes.

A very interesting listen.

Tracks I Liked

Be Free - A mix of English and Zulu that tries to deal with a broken relationship. More broken relationship songs should have wicked dance breaks.

Makhukhu - a rather graphic exploration of a lack of physical intimacy, which… and this is entirely me, but the pain in his voice reminds me of Sinatra’s version of Send In The Clowns, which has a lot of similar themes.

Banzi - a 9 minute spiritual epic that touches on all of the various musical elements on the rest of the record, along with the most ferocious jazz passages of any of the tracks