Singapore – Son Lux has released a new track “Live Another Life”, along with a rework of it which includes rapper Nappy Nina. This is the first single off their forthcoming album ‘Tomorrows II’, which will be released on December 4th, the second chapter in a three-volume body of work, which will unfurl over the coming year.
“Live Another Life” deals with the tension of control and how identities can be bound together in relationships. A simmering percussive loop sets the stage for Lott’s threadbare entrance: “I’m done asking you to be healed for me, I’m done asking you to heel to me.” As the music approaches a boil, bursts of a smeared, hashy choir undergird Lott’s lyrics as an abrupt flurry of drums snaps the song into an urgent tumble. Listen here: sonlux.lnk.to/LiveAnotherLife
On the other hand, the rework “Live Another Life (Heal For Me)” trades the tactile percussive sounds of the original version for an unstable swirling haze of guitar-generated textures, grounded by heavy, mangled 808 kicks and gut-punch snares. Nappy Nina deftly delivers angular cadences on her two verses, diving deep into the nuances of a fraying relationship, reflecting: “we forage and make believe, force a forest with made up leaves.” Listen here: sonlux.lnk.to/LiveAnotherLifeRmx
As ‘Tomorrows II’ opens, the listener joins an album already unfolding. The music provides an appropriate parallel for the sustained cacophony of the present moment, advancing a friction that reveals the strange in the familiar and the familiar in the strange. While this carefully crafted inversion acclimatizes the ear to tension, the steadily hardening exterior fractures at unlikely moments, revealing a strikingly visceral, emotional core. The process of creating ‘Tomorrows’ is iterative in nature, with the lyrical content and music continually adapting and responding to one another and the shifting landscape of the moment.
Last week, Son Lux expanded the scope of ‘Tomorrows’ even further, launching their own artist-interviewing-artist podcast series, entitled ‘Plans We Make’. It sees the band members take turns speaking with guests about a shared theme in three volumes: Technology, Collaboration, and Voice.
The first episode of Volume 1 sees Son Lux’s Ryan Lott joined by multi-platinum record producer Chris Tabron, who has worked with Beyoncé, Nicki Minaj, Mary J. Blige, The Strokes and more. Out yesterday, the second episode features drummer Ian Chang interviewing Sougwen Chung, a former research fellow at MIT’s Media Lab and a pioneer in the field of human-machine collaboration. And the third episode of this volume, out next week, includes a conversation between guitarist Rafiq Bhatia and Deantoni Parks, avant-garde percussionist and cofounder of experimental outfits Bosnian Rainbows, KUDU, and We Are Dark Angels. More information can be found here: smarturl.it/sonluxpodcast
Son Lux is a geographically and culturally diverse band, with Rafiq Bhatia, Ian Chang, and Ryan Lott each bringing their unique sonic approach to create an otherworldly whole. Son Lux’s balancing of raw emotional intimacy and meticulous electronic constructions, coupled with the act of distilling their varied influences, has most strongly shaped their identity.
Based in New York, Rafiq Bhatia is the first-generation American son of Muslim immigrant parents who trace their ancestry to India by way of East Africa. Early influences such as Jimi Hendrix, John Coltrane, and Madlib—as well as mentors and collaborators including Vijay Iyer and Billy Hart—prompted him to see music as a way to actively shape and represent his own identity, not limited by anyone else’s prescribed perspective.
When Ian Chang describes his creative process, the phrase “third culture” keeps coming up. Born in the colony of Hong Kong in 1988, Chang has lived a nomadic life. Stationed out of New York for 10 years and since relocated to Dallas, Texas, he built an impressive roster of progressive pop collaborators such as Moses Sumney, Joan As Policewoman, and Matthew Dear, among others, all while performing internationally and recording as a member of Son Lux and Landlady.
Ryan Lott makes his home in Los Angeles, but grew up all over the United States. Music was the one constant, his formative years spent at the piano. In addition to an extensive career writing music for dance, he also has become a sought after composer for advertising, television, and film. Lott’s feature film credits include The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby (2014), Paper Towns (2015), and Mean Dreams (2017). He has co-produced and co-written music for and with Woodkid, Sufjan Stevens, and Lorde.
With each new work, Son Lux has forwarded their uniquely mercurial vision, their brilliantly fluid approach to genre and structure drawing on a genre-agnostic groundwork of soul, hip-hop, and experimental improvisation. Balancing raw emotional intimacy and meticulous electronic constructions, Son Lux have crafted a carefully cultivated musical language all their own, rooted in curiosity, individuality, and commanding creativity.
‘Tomorrows II’ Tracklist
1. Warning
2. Molecules
3. Prophecy
4. Yellow Leaves
5. Out of Wind
6. Apart
7. Bodies
8. Weight of Your Air
9. Live Another Life
10. Borrowed Eyes
Single art by Yuanyuan Su
“Live Another Life” is now available to stream here:
sonlux.lnk.to/LiveAnotherLife
“Live Another Life (Heal For Me)” [Feat Nappy Nina] is now available to stream here:
sonlux.lnk.to/LiveAnotherLifeRmx
The album ‘Tomorrows II’ will be released on December 4th via City Slang. Pre-order/save here:
sonlux.lnk.to/Tomorrows
