Rev. Sekou's debut solo album, featuring the North Mississippi Allstars, is out everywhere!!!!

Rev. Sekou heads out on tour with the North Mississippi Allstars next week, announces UK dates and Paste Live today!

 

 

As Rev. Sekou's album drops this weekend we're also announcing that he'll be heading over to the UK with the North Mississippi Allstars for a handful of dates at the end of June. Exclaim! gave Rev. Sekou's debut solo album a 9/10, ending it by saying "Rev. Sekou, thank you for taking us back to church. Your hope and healing has long been necessary." Mother Church Pew has called it "one of the most important and relevant albums...of 2017". Sekou did an in-studio on WNYC earlier this week, which will be live soon, he's doing a Paste Live session today, taping World Cafe next week and you can hear this interview from yesterday on Sputnik Radio's By Any Means Necessary with Eugene Puryear where he and Sekou discuss the new album, the importance of music in movement work, and what exactly neo-liberalism is.
His first single, a call to action that begins with an excerpt of a speech Sekou did while on the ground teaching non-violent resistance tactics in Ferguson, "Resist", premiered on Noisey with Sekou's reimagining of Bob Marley's "Burnin' and Lootin'" coming up on Afropunk, No Depression put out the last single, "Loving You Is Killing Me", Oxford American and Colorlines featured the full album stream.

To make his debut album, In Times Like These, noted activist, author, documentary filmmaker and theologian Rev. Osagyefo Sekou went back to his Southern home searching for his family’s musical roots in the deep Arkansas blues and gospel traditions. Produced by six-time Grammy nominated Luther Dickinson of the North Mississippi Allstars, featuring Luther’s brother Cody Dickinson, and supported by Thirty Tigers, Rev. Sekou’s debut solo album is a new vision for what Southern blues and rock can mean today. In Times Like These is drenched with the sweat and tears of the Mississippi River, the great tributary that ties so much of the South together. The album’s sonic landscape captures the toil of Southern field hands, the guttural cry of chain gangs, the vibrancy of contemporary street protest, backwoods juke joints, and shotgun churches—all saturated with Pentecostal sacred steel and soul legacy.   In Times Like These’s opening song, “Resist,” opens with a rousing speech given by Rev. Sekou at a rally in Ferguson, Missouri, protesting the shooting of Michael Brown. Upon hearing about Brown’s death, Sekou immediately returned to his hometown of St. Louis, MO, taking to the streets in a series of protests and interfaith demonstrations that led to his being arrested multiple times. “Resist” surrounds the listener with the spirit of protest.   The images of Ferguson’s protests are burned into Sekou’s mind even today, and led to his moving cover of Bob Marley’s classic, “Burnin’ and Lootin’,” which captures the feeling of the riots. “In Times Like These”—the album’s title track—confronts the sense of helplessness that many feel in this current political moment.  Carried by congas and explosive steel guitar, the song moves around the central line “In times like this, ain’t no one going to save us, we’re the ones we’ve been waiting for.”

Tour with North Mississippi Allstars
5/10 Philadelphia, PA -World Cafe Live
5/11 New York, New York - Bowery Ballroom
5/12 Boston, MA - The Sinclair
5/13 Pawling, NY - Daryl House Club
5/16 Toronto, ON - Mod Club
5/17 Detroit, MI - El Club
5/18 Chicago, IL - Lincoln Hall
5/19 Nashville, TN - Third Man Records
5/20 Atlanta, GA - Variety Playhouse
6/1-3 Austin, TX - Antones
6/4 San Antonio, TX - Sam's Burger Joint
6/6 Houston, TX - The Heights Theatre
6/7 Dallas, TX - Kessler Theater
6/9 Santa Fe, NM - The Bridge @ Santa Fe Brewing
6/13 Salana Beach, CA - Belly Up
6/15 Los Angeles, CA - The Roxy Theatre
6/16 San Francisco, CA - The Independent
6/17 San Francisco, CA - Slim's
UK Tour Dates
June 25 @ Oran Mor Glasgow, United Kingdom
June 27 @ Komedia Brighton, United Kingdom
June 28 @ Dingwalls London, United Kingdom
June 29 @ The Ruby Lounge Manchester, United Kingdom