The album will be released on May 3 via Young/Beggars. The new song “Prologue” was released, along with a video directed by long-time collaborator AG Rojas. Watch and listen to it below.
Washington calls ‘Fearless Movement‘ his dance album. “It’s not literal,” he says. “My mortality became more apparent to me, but also my immortality—realizing that my daughter is going to live on and see things that I’m never going to see. I had to become comfortable with this, and that affected the music that I was making.”
Dance as an embodied form of expression marks a shift in focus for Washington. While previous albums dealt with cosmic ideas and existential concepts, ‘Fearless Movement’ focuses on the mundane, an exploration of life on Earth. This change in perspective is largely due to the birth of Washington’s first child several years ago.
“Being a father means the horizon of your life all of a sudden shows up,” says Washington. “My mortality became more apparent to me, but also my immortality—realizing that my daughter is going to live on and see things that I’m never going to see. I had to become comfortable with this, and that affected the music that I was making.”
The album features Washington’s daughter, who wrote the melody for “Asha The First” during some of her first experiments on the piano, as well as an array of new and old collaborators. André 3000 appears on the flute, George Clinton lends his voice, as do BJ The Chicago Kid, Inglewood rapper D-Smoke and Coast Contra’s Taj and Ras Austin, the twin sons of West Coast legend Ras Kass. Washington also enlisted lifelong friends and collaborators Thundercat, Terrace Martin, Patrice Quinn, Brandon Coleman, DJ Battlecat and others.
The album also includes “The Garden Path“, a song that Washington first performed and made its debut on the late-night show “The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon“.
Kamasi Washington is a multi-instrumentalist, composer and bandleader born and raised in Los Angeles. His three works to date – The Epic; Harmony of Difference, an EP originally created for the 2017 Whitney Biennial; and Heaven and Earth – are among the most acclaimed of this century. His short film titled As Told To G/D Thyself, as a companion to Heaven and Earth, was first shown at the 2019 Sundance Film Festival and was widely praised. In 2020, Washington composed the music for Michelle Obama’s documentary Becoming, receiving Emmy and Grammy nominations for his work. Also in 2020, Washington co-founded the supergroup Dinner Party with longtime friends and collaborators Terrace Martin, Robert Glasper and 9th Wonder – their EP Dinner Party (Dessert) was subsequently nominated for a Grammy for Best Progressive R&B Album. In 2021, he contributed a cover of Metallica’s “My Friend of Misery” to the band’s Metallica Blacklist covers project. Washington has traveled the world, collaborated and shared the stage with Kendrick Lamar, Florence + the Machine, Herbie Hancock and many others.
Tracklist “Fearless Movement”
1. Lesanu
2. Asha The First featuring Thundercat, Taj Austin, Ras Austin
3. Computer Love featuring Patrice Quinn, DJ Battlecat, Brandon Coleman
4. The Visionary featuring Terrace Martin
5. Get Lit featuring George Clinton
6. Dream State featuring André 3000
7. Together featuring BJ the Chicago Kid
8. The Garden Path
9. Interstellar Peace (The Last Stance)
10. Road to Self (KO)
11. Lines in the Sand
12. Prologue
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