With so much exciting new music still on the horizon in 2015, one upcoming album in particular has the soulhead team disproportionately giddy with anticipation: Bilal’s In Another Life. Featuring production by the incomparable Adrian Younge and guest contributions from Kendrick Lamar, Big K.R.I.T., and Kimbra, the Philly-bred soul savant’s fifth studio LP is slated to arrive June 30th and promises to be one of the year’s very best.
To make the next few weeks of waiting a bit more bearable, Bilal has blessed our ears and eyes with another preview of the album, in the form of the stunningly powerful single “Satellites” and its accompanying video. Across a psychedelic organ & percussion propelled groove with vocals echoing the likes of Prince and Radiohead’s Thom Yorke, Bilal proclaims his disillusionment with his fellow humans’ penchant for cruelty, wearily lamenting “Just another day, in another life / I’m a satellite, watching the world watch people / as they do what they do to people.”
In the beautifully executed video, Bilal assumes the guise of an urban miracle-worker who observes people in need from a distance and lifts them up, in the process restoring at least a small piece of our faith in humanity. At the 3:15 mark of the clip, a more foreboding tone emerges and “Satellites” segues into the more frenetically hard-rocking “Lunatic,” another offering from the new album. Two police officers apprehend Bilal’s character and proceed to choke the life from him, a not-so-subtle nod to the tragic fate of Eric Garner and more generally, the recent wave of unarmed black men’s deaths at the hands of overzealous cops. Discerning eyes who watch closely enough will also observe passing references to the now-salient declarations of dignity “Black Lives Matter” and “I Am Not an Animal.”
A must-hear tune and a must-watch video, indeed.
Watch Here:
PRE-ORDER Bilal – In Another Life