Sign up for our mailing list Real artists creating records on their own terms

Press

Thursday, May 24th, 2018

Rafiq Bhatia Bio (2018)

Breaking English, the Anti- Records debut of New York composer and guitarist Rafiq Bhatia, seeks to shatter preconceptions about how much can be said without a word—and, for that matter, who can say it. Bhatia’s audacious first album as a producer sets out to challenge existing musical vocabulary with a language of its own.

In 2012, Bhatia issued two improvisation-driven recordings whose surreal sonics “set them miles apart from the vast majority of records by jazz musicians” (New York Times). These releases earned immediate acclaim; the Washington Post observed, “Instead of haggling over jazz’s traditional perimeters, both recordings employ the sonic language of hip-hop and electronic composition to press toward a more interesting future.” But with his next project, Bhatia felt compelled to find a more personal path forward. For most of his listening life, he’d loved records in which familiar sounds were refashioned into wonderfully alien strains, where iconoclastic ideas met cutting-edge technology to yield a new lexicon. Making music like this would mean reaching beyond his six strings and customarily collaborative approach, especially his reliance on outside producers. To get where he needed to go, he would need to learn how to sculpt sound for himself.

It was during this period of reinvention that Bhatia joined Son Lux, a studio-centered project in which producer Ryan Lott used software to warp found sounds into dazzling electronic experiments. Son Lux afforded Bhatia the chance to record with the likes of Lorde and Sufjan Stevens, but, more important, it gave him the support he needed to develop his voice as a producer—the process that ultimately yielded Breaking English.

The resulting album ruptures the hermetic vernacular of ambient sculpturalism with the emotional intensity of avant-garde jazz, using the techniques of the former to achieve the feeling of the latter. Its language is centered on contrast, with opposing strains juxtaposed in order to throw each other into sharper relief—the organic feels more vibrant in the context of the mechanical, the otherworldly more ethereal in light of the ordinary. Throughout, Bhatia’s guitar is just one part of a teeming, much bigger picture. Tense violin, exhaled gospel vocals, ricocheting drums and foreboding bass also populate Breaking English, all characters in an enveloping piece of musical cinema.

Bhatia is the first-generation American son of Muslim immigrant parents who trace their ancestry to India by way of East Africa. Early influences such as Jimi Hendrix, John Coltrane, and Madlib—as well as mentors and collaborators including Vijay Iyer and Billy Hart—prompted him to see music as a way to actively shape and represent his own identity, not limited by anyone else’s prescribed perspective. Bhatia’s embrace of the electronic realm bolsters his ability to express hybridity. At times, he uses the studio to destabilize, twisting the stereotypes of Indian music he heard as a child into noise beyond recognition. But frequently, he exaggerates the human qualities of the sound he mines, conveying intimacy and tension through elements many producers would scrub clean.

All told, Bhatia seamlessly integrates dozens of different ideas throughout Breaking English. Take the title track, a marvelous chimera of deconstructed soul, where skittering drums dodge explosions of white noise as a detuned choir gasps for air. Trips to the Great Rift Valley of Africa and the mosques of Istanbul inspired the swirl of sculpted noise that begins the album. His horror with the news of these last several American years and his empathy for the Black Lives Matter movement supercharge the menacing “Hoods Up.” A fascination with avant-garde cuisine actually helped to shape “The Overview Effect,” a breathtaking piece that expresses the overwhelming fragility of the Earth as seen from outer space. The contaminated orchestra of “Olduvai II — We Are Humans With Blood In Our Veins” bottles the nightmare of waking up brown in America on November 9, 2016.

From start to finish, Breaking English suggests one very deep breath, one instant capable of carrying so much. Beauty, violence, death, rebirth—it’s all tucked into the two-movement “Perihelion,” an eight-minute descent into the sun that uses distance and perspective to ponder the line where what dazzles us can destroy us, where something so sustaining can turn sinister. That Icarus-like enticement speaks to Breaking English, an album that required an already-accomplished musician to abandon what he knew and test his own limits. That risk rewards repeatedly here, on a record that funnels a universe of anxiety, hope, and inspiration into one singularly provocative and mesmerizing statement.

Anti- Records will release Breaking English on April 6, 2018.

Rafiq Bhatia's artist page

Browse by Artist

2430All Artists 67Mavis Staples 57Neko Case 56Dr. Dog 55The Milk Carton Kids 52Son Little 51Sean Rowe 50Tinariwen
44Glen Hansard 43Lost In The Trees 41Andy Shauf 37Saintseneca 36Delicate Steve 33Galactic 33Michael Franti and Spe... 32Xenia Rubinos 31Jolie Holland 30The Drums 30Calexico 29Tom Waits 28William Elliott Whitmo... 28Doe Paoro 28Madi Diaz 27Half Waif 27Man Man 27Yves Jarvis 26Christian Lee Hutson 26Girlpool 25Bettye LaVette 23Foxwarren 23The Antlers 23Jason Lytle 23Christopher Paul Stell... 22Sage Francis 22Booker T. Jones 22Gary V 22Cass McCombs 21Leyla McCalla 21Danny Elfman 21Islands 21Lido Pimienta 21Japandroids 20DeVotchKa 20Jeremy Ivey 20Daniel Lanois 19Purr 19The Dream Syndicate 19M. Ward 19Combo Chimbita 18Joe Henry 18Wilco 18So Much Light 17Grinderman 17Moor Mother 17Darrin Bradbury 17Jade Jackson 17Tim Fite 16Porter Wagoner 16Peter Silberman 16High Pulp 15Rafiq Bhatia 15Alfa Mist 15MJ Lenderman 15Glitterer 15Yann Tiersen 14James Brandon Lewis 14John K. Samson 13The Coup 13Rain Machine 13Ben Harper 13Busdriver 12Hey, King! 12Josiah Johnson 12Waxahatchee 12The Melodic 12Deafheaven 12Richard Reed Parry 11Kelly Hogan 11Ryan Pollie 11Beth Orton 11Bonny Doon 11Keaton Henson 11Curtis Harding 10Roky Erickson 10Jasmyn 10Dead Man's Bones 10Fleet Foxes 10The Tallest Man On Ear... 10Xavier Rudd 10Os Mutantes 10Beat Connection 10Katy Kirby 10Wynonna 10Ben Harper and Charlie... 10Bob Mould 10Slow Pulp 9The Locust 9Mose Allison 9Marketa Irglova 9Cameron Avery 9Kate Davis 9Kate Bush 9Ezra Furman 8Deradoorian 8Art Moore 8The Frames 8Sam Akpro 8Kristine Leschper 8Greg Graffin 8A Girl Called Eddy 7sunking 7Alec Ounsworth 7The Field 7Solillaquists of Sound 7Scott McMicken and THE... 6Sparklehorse 6Marc Ribot 6Kronos Quartet with Br... 6The Good Ones 6Ramblin Jack Elliott 6Broken Twin 6N.A.S.A. 6Pete Philly & Perquisi... 6Pops Staples 5The Swell Season 5Jackson+Sellers 5Mothers 5Cadence Weapon 5Walter Wolfman Washing... 5The Weakerthans 5Tweedy 5Plains 4Arc Iris 4Antibalas 4Muggs 4case/lang/veirs 4Petra Haden 4One Day As A Lion 4Eddie Izzard 3Mavis Staples & Levon... 3Danny Cohen 3Simian Mobile Disco 3Marianne Faithfull 3Sierra Leones Refugee... 3The Book Of Knots 2Savath & Savalas 2Lyrics Born 2Chuck E. Weiss 2Blackalicious 2Spoon (Europe only) 2Billy Bragg 2Screaming Lights (Euro... 2Title Fight 2Jeff Tweedy 2Various Artists: RANGO 1Rogue's Gallery 1Taylor Vick 1Solomon Burke 1Various Artists: ROGUE... 1Nick Cave & The Bad Se...
See Full List+