Reviewed by Ian Phillips.
By Sault, Forever Living Originals 2020.
Sault is an English collective that shuns the hype that comes with the music industry.
They don’t give interviews, release publicity blurbs, do photo-shoots…they just release impressive songs.
2020 was a year that we’ll all never forget, not only did the world have to deal with a deadly pandemic we were also constantly assailed by the rants of a megalomaniacal president and, with the brutal murder of George Floyd telecast around the world, the exposure of endemic racism and the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement.
Untitled (Black Is) is the first of two beautifully crafted albums released by Sault during 2020 that dealt with racism.
The other is Untitled (Rise) and both albums can really be seen as one larger work.
These albums chart the breadth and depth of the racism we all live with but only some of us truly experience.
The songs are portraits of what it is to be black in a predominately white and privileged world.
They are sometimes combative, sometimes introspective, regularly confronting and often heartbreaking but they are also affirmative.
They speak to those among us who, because of the colour of their skin, are unable to turn off the noise and ignore the fact that many see them as different and ‘not worthy.’
But Sault also challenge their non-black audience to question their own privilege and latent racism.
Sault’s musical palette draws from the broad spectrum of black musical styles including funk and afro-beat, disco and soul, and R&B but not hip-hop.
I recently wrote in a review for Sampa The Great’s latest single that ‘hip-hop has become the musical form for protest for this generation. ’
Well these two albums remind us that protest is made up of many, differing, voices.
From the opening track which starts with a chant reminiscent of a cottonfield work song to its conclusion after a journey through the pantheon of black music, Untitled (Black Is) reminds all of us that our lives have been immeasurably enriched by contact with black culture.
