NEW MUSIC | APEX ZERO ‘SEVENTH DIMENSION (ON PERSPECTIVE)’ FEAT MOUSSA DEMBELE

By Rishma • On Poetry, Reviews, Visual Arts, What is New , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

‘Sev­enth Dimen­sion (On Per­spect­ive)’ is the latest release by Apex Zero, as he con­tin­ues to devel­op his liv­ing visu­al album ‘Drum­mer War­ri­or Storyteller’. Col­lab­or­at­ing with bril­liant, mul­tidiscip­lin­ary artists, the album is made (so far) of films, paint­ings, metal­work, pho­to­graphy, cos­tume design, drum circles, immers­ive theatre pro­duc­tions and more. The track fea­tures Mali­an sing­er and mas­ter Kora play­er Moussa Dembele and poet­ic­ally expresses Apex’s per­cep­tion shift­ing jour­ney as he strives to focus less on the obstacles and struggles of life and appre­ci­ate the beauty of exist­ence in all its forms. 

‘Sev­enth Dimen­sion (On Per­spect­ive)’ is the first track released from ‘Drum­mer War­ri­or Storyteller (Part Two)’ – set to drop May 19th as an EP and film. Both the track and EP sym­bol­ise a sig­ni­fic­ant change in the ideas and style expressed in the albums first part. The Kora is a tra­di­tion­al West Afric­an storytelling instru­ment, and Moussa Dembele’s vir­tu­oso musi­cian­ship and atmo­spher­ic vocals build the per­fect vibe for Apex Zero to chan­nel the tra­di­tions of the Gri­ot and Djeli, the story keep­ers of Afric­an oral histories. 

The lyr­ics of ‘Sev­enth Dimen­sion (On Per­spect­ive)’ were largely inspired by Apex’s jour­ney to the Venezuelan Amazon, where he exper­i­enced the sac­red Yopo cere­mony of the Piaroa people under the guid­ance of Great Sham­an Rufino Pon­are. Apex doc­u­mented this life chan­ging exper­i­ence in his film ‘Release the Fear: The Sac­red Jour­ney’ built around the album of Roots sing­er Natty. In ‘Sev­enth Dimen­sion (On Per­spect­ive)’ Apex reflects on how his world­view has developed in the years since in cre­at­ive, express­ive lyr­i­cism that shows his skill as both an emcee and spoken word artist.

In the spir­it of ‘Drum­mer War­ri­or Storyteller’, the cre­ativ­ity inspired by ‘Sev­enth Dimen­sion (On Per­spect­ive)’ is not lim­ited to music. Apex worked with two long stand­ing col­lab­or­at­ors, Chiba Visu­als and Slim Year­wood, to cre­ate stun­ning visu­als that sig­nal the next phase of the liv­ing album’s visu­al ele­ment. The world built by the film­makers, who have all under­taken sim­il­ar rituals with plant medi­cines, con­tains power­ful sym­bol­ism and visu­al effects to cap­ture the feel­ings, emo­tions and Spir­itu­al insights the exper­i­ences endowed them with. Shot between Venezuela, Peru, Bar­ba­dos and Lon­don, the visu­als work beau­ti­fully with the music and lyr­ics to cel­eb­rate life, hon­our Ancest­ors and The Most High, and express grat­it­ude and appre­ci­ation for exist­ence and creation.

‘Drum­mer War­ri­or Storyteller (Part Two)’ will be released May 19th 2023 as the second film and EP in the series, along­side more exhib­i­tions, screen­ings and live per­form­ances. Oth­er tracks on the EP — ‘You (On Love)’ and ‘Live Life (On Liv­ity)’ — were made with legendary UK Hip Hop pro­du­cer Mic­all Parkn­sun and Ghanai­an song­stress Elia-Naa. As well as those people and places men­tioned above, the film was made with vis­ion­ary film­makers Alicia Warner and Ekua McMor­ris, and con­tains foot­age from Uganda and Shef­field fea­tur­ing pion­eer­ing metal­s­mith Rox­anne Simone, cul­tur­al poly­math Muti ‘Mutiv­a­tion’ Musafiri, jew­ellery from rising star Lucie Gled­hill, Ugandan tra­di­tion­al drum­mers Nilotika Cul­tur­al Ensemble and foot­age from Break Fast Jam 2018 and Afri-cans Street Art Fest 2018 . The film also con­tains deeply per­son­al pho­to­graphs and foot­age of Apex’s imme­di­ate fam­ily across four generations. 

‘Sev­enth Dimen­sion’ (On Per­spect­ive) is out now on all stream­ing plat­forms, with ‘You (On Love) drop­ping on May 5th 2023, fol­lowed by the ‘Drum­mer War­ri­or Storyteller (Part Two)’ on May 19th 2023. All visu­als will be released on Apex’s new offi­cial artist channel. 

Apple

Band­camp

If you haven’t watched or listened to ‘Drum­mer War­ri­or Storyteller (Part One)’ check it out here:

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Rishma

Edit­or / PR Con­sult­ant at No Bounds
Rishma Dhali­w­al has extens­ive exper­i­ence study­ing and work­ing in the music and media industry. Hav­ing writ­ten a thes­is on how Hip Hop acts as a social move­ment, she has spent years research­ing and con­nect­ing with artists who use the art form as a tool for bring­ing a voice to the voiceless.

About Rishma

Rishma Dhaliwal has extensive experience studying and working in the music and media industry. Having written a thesis on how Hip Hop acts as a social movement, she has spent years researching and connecting with artists who use the art form as a tool for bringing a voice to the voiceless.