Mysterious London-based Avant Hip-Hop Artist Ubik MCDXCII Returns with Brooding Album Blackout Blinds (Solium Records)
Ubik MCDXCII is a mysterious London-based Avant Hip-Hop/musical artist and analog photographer. His second full-form project, Blackout Blinds was recently released on French tape label, Solium Records; Yoan at Solium, also, very recently released a double-tape dubbed SLAB attributed to Elyria Sequence, AKA CURTA, 4-Digit & Brotherhood of Machines. The Witzard recently premiered an exclusive offering from Cindy Bluray & CURTA called "N0153_W45H" and now, it appears as though, Bluray has mixed "Mythologies" from Ubik MCDXCII's Blackout Blinds. Otherwise, the rest of the record was tediously mixed by Riccardo "Rico" Gamondi of Italian Experimental Hip-Hop group, Uochi Toki. "This is a boisterous record. The ever-present clamor making life in London claustrophobic lifestyles, the Orwellian high-tech modernity clashing with an ancient past, the parenting of an Autistic child in an autistic society; these are all important themes in this album, illuminating the schizophrenic duality of present-day urban life," reads a brief Bio posted along with Solium's Bandcamp product description.
Blackout Blinds features collaborations with Eyebolt, Florian Ayala Fauna, Jirin, and Tobeats, as well as analog video art clip for "Rites & Ceremonies" created by Austin Settle & Philipp Haffner. "This record is a heavy and powerful piece of Hip-Hop. A noisy, atmospheric, and really personal collection of tracks all crafted into an oppressive and multi-layered album, assembled from field recordings, voice samples, beats, and instrumentals recorded here and there between London & Morocco. Vocals blend in this musical landscape to create an oppressive and overwhelming tape. This is a biting record, but definitely not the kind you'll bang your head to!" Solium continued. Blackout Blinds definitely does sound like something to the effect of a twisted stylistic mixture of dälek, Eric B. & Rakim, Death Grips, and Throbbing Gristle. Ubik MCDXCII's Blackout Blinds is now available to purchase, stream, or download in both Digital Album and Limited Edition Cassette formats directly from Solium Records' Bandcamp page.
"I've always been into Hip-Hop & Punk, but, I think the way that influence is expressed in my own unique way. Influences include classic innovators of British Trip-Hop (Massive Attack, Tricky,) Old School (Eric B. & Rakim, Large Professor) to "Outsider" Hip-Hop (RAMM:ΣLL:ZΣΣ, dälek, Cities Aviv,) Free-Jazz to Electronic and more extreme Punk, Industrial, and Noise (Rudimentary Peni, Septic Death, Discharge, Godflesh, and Throbbing Gristle) and not to forget legendary producers, like Madlib.
"Ubik" is a Science Fiction reference, a Phillip K. Dick novel, in which this dark and crazy symbiotic God-like presence permeates over and throughout everything; a mist life moving through life, setting back in time whatever it reaches. "MCDXCII" is for the year 1492, when America was "discovered," bringing forth genocide. The same year, in Spain, Ferdinand & Isabella took control of The Keys of Granada, in Andalusia, the final vestige of The Kingdom of Moorish Andalus.
My Romany Gitano [Spanish "Gypsy"] heritage is important to me, as is Sufism and the occult. One of the big motifs is that conflict between darkness and light, deep macabre darkness, but, also, spiritual light; a spiritual combat that plays out in sonic collages that battle for redemption."
- Ubik MCDXCII (@ubik.mcdxcii)