JAY-Z's Magna Carta... Holy Grail Collaborator Sumach "Gonjasufi" Valentine Re-emerges with "Maniac Depressant" & "Surfinfinity" from Forthcoming CALLUS (Warp Records)
"GOING INTO THE SPACE... I GIVE SO MUCH OF MY HEART... OPENING MYSELF UP TO THE WORLD... AS MY SOUL BECOMES PUBLIC DOMAIN, [WHICH IS] A BEAUTIFUL THING... BUT WITH THAT ALSO COMES [YOU KNOW] HATRED [AND SH*T]... I'VE HAD TO GROW THIS
CALLUS
[AROUND MYSELF] TO PROTECT MY HEART," vocalist, producer, DJ, and yoga teacher
Sumach "Gonjasufi" Valentine
warbled within a crackly, baren
Warp Records
message dubbed
, which additionally included a fragment of his as-yet-unreleased song,
"Surfinfinity."
For those who may be largely unfamiliar,
Sumach
's biggest claim to fame would likely be working alongside
Jay Z
and producer
Kyambo "Hip Hop" Joshu
on his genre-eschewing
(which samples
"Nikels and Dimes"
) and was once described by
Pitchfork Senior Editor Ryan Dombal
as "a scraggly, scary, smoked-out croak that creeps like the spiritual offspring of
George Clinton
and
Leadbelly
."
Gonjasufi
has recorded and self-released a wide array of thought-provoking music under a number of aliases including
, Randy Johnson,
Plant Lyphe
, Kilowattz,
Masters of The Universe
, and most recently, Gonjasufi around the
Los Angeles
area since 1994.
"That's the callus. How can you not be in pain? It ain't about getting past that sh*t. It's about growing into it. I peeled through all these layers to get to the core. I channeled all the misunderstanding and misery and torment—that's what it is, torment—into this,"
Gonjasufi
revealed within a statement issued along with his soon forthcoming
Warp Records
follow-up to his
untitled
7-inch recorded with fellow
Brainfeeder
affiliate
Ras_G
,
CALLUS
; "written and recorded over four years, split between
Las Vegas
and
Gonjasufi
's home in the
California
desert,
CALLUS
is arguably the musician's most soul-baring and cathartic collection," which seems to have been a rather self-reflective album creation process wherein Valentine was forced to embrace his inner feelings of hurt and anger, channeling them to create something eerily beautiful.
"Maniac Depressant"
is our first full-length preview of
CALLUS
since
Sumach
's self-produced baseball-themed 2011 solo effort,
. It's a feedback-driven stripped down affair wherein he painfully croons, "Once in a while I feel I'll krack. Once in a while I feel I can. Once in a while I feel I can't... I'm a manic depressant."
CALLUS
is currently available for pre-order in 2-LP, CD, and digital formats from
subsidiary
Bleep
ahead of its fast approaching August 19th world-wide release.