Dave Okumu & The 7 Generations
Many musicians find creative freedom working alone in the seclusion of their room, but for Mercury nominated singer-songwriter and producer Dave Okumu, the most fruitful moments in his career have occurred in crowded rooms. “In my teens I was already on this journey where I was reflecting on the significance of relationships,” Okumu explains, sitting in his South East London studio. “I want to learn how to connect with people and how to communicate because this is what life is about.”
Rather than release solely under his name, Okumu has chosen the moniker ‘Dave Okumu & the 7 Generations’, which Okumu sees as “my actual ancestors, the ancestors of others, my musical ancestors, and my descendants”. Sonically the album hits a kaleidoscopic frenzy of notes, rocketing through bass heavy rhythms, neo soul-tinged cries and frenetic spoken word passages.
Okumu’s search into the past continues on ‘7 Generations’ where over a sorrowful, electronic landscape that transitions into a rumbling, skittish dance track, Grace Jones declares we should “feel the resilience of seven generations.” Elsewhere on the record, ‘Blood Ah Go Run’ tackles the horror of the New Cross house fire in 1981 that killed 13 Black teenagers in South London. The lyrics reflect the Black community’s feelings of the time, crying out, “Blood ah go run / if no justice no come.”