We are pleased to offer our support to writer, poet, performer, and soulhead contributor Carl Hancock Rux, who is currently working on Homeostasis, his latest project due out next Spring. Carl recently contributed a very informative essay on the Black music history of the Fort Greene neighborhood of Brooklyn, where Carl lives.
According to his management, Carl will be joined by an impressive list of guests and the album promises to be his “most ambitious album album yet.”
Here is what Carl has to say about the project:
When my first record, Rux Revue, came out in 1999 on Epic, I got a lot of attention. I know it wasn’t only because of the big name label or the people who helped make it like Nona Hendryx, the Dust Brothers and others. It was due to the great reviews. Ann Powers, who was the New York Times rock critic at the time raved: “This literary young lion found the balance between hip-hop cool and the poetry slam’s pretensions on his debut collection of funk-powered, soul-searching rants forming a panorama reaching from the neighborhood to the universe.”
I’m very proud of that record, as I am of the follow-ups, Apothecary Rx and Good Bread Alley. People said some equally nice things about both my other records, and we had a chance to tour in the US and overseas. I was particularly humbled to be included in the book, “Great Black Music: Un Parcours En 110 Albums Essentiels by French music critic Phillippe Robert, listing my second album, Apothecary Rx as one of the greatest records ever made by black artists in America (right there with Miles Davis, ray Charles, Billie Holiday, Otis Redding, Nina Simone and other great masters…Wow! I’m still getting over that one! )
Now I’m making my next record. It’s not easy…but anything worth doing never is. The old model of making music is giving way to a new blueprint. Unlike the old days, when some fat cat was happy to write a check, this time I need friends and allies to help in advance. This may sound tough, but I prefer to see the upside. There’s a freedom to making music this way…it’s actually liberating. Artists get to make the music they want to make and audiences get to support the music they want to hear. The relationship between artist and audience is so much more personal. I’ve got a great cast of collaborators – some new ones and some I’ve worked with before, from Vernon Reid to Nona Hendryx to Vijay Iyer and Brian Jackson (of Gil Scott Heron fame). It’s REALLY exciting. The tracks are starting to come together. The only way to describe it is as an exploration of jazz and 1960s /70s psychedelic vinyl…lush arrangements—a return to music beyond the cookie cutter format of beats and the omnipresent vocoder vocals. I need your help to do it and hope you’ll want to take part in this project of which I am extremely proud.
Once you pledge, you get instant access to the ‘pledger-only’ part of the site. Here, I’ll bring you into my world. You’ll hear streams of new songs, videos of me recording in the studio, picturess of me at home and much, much more. You’ll be fully immersed in this album as its being made.
Best of all, a portion of your pledges will go to Razia’s Ray of Hope Foundation, a nonprofit organization dedicated to improving the lives of women and children in Afghanistan through community-based education. Founded with the belief that education is key to positive, peaceful change for current and future generations, the foundation strives to provide opportunities to learn and grow in a safe, nurturing environment. Help me support this incredible organization.
I’m excited to make Homeostasis and hope you’ll join me in this new chapter of my career.
Carl
We are certainly looking forward to this project and invite you to click below and check out Carl’s video about this project, which he created with the director Onome Ekeh, where he shares the inspiration behind the making of Homeostasis.
Click here to check out what Carl is offering in appreciation and gratitude you for your support.
Join the project on Facebook.
Support the project at pledgemusic.com/projects/carlhancockrux
