Show #2592: Saturday 4th May 2024 - Rufus Mufasa / Ynys / Y Niwl
Show #2592: Saturday 4th May 2024 - Rufus Mufasa / Ynys / Y Niwl
Adam Walton, BBC Radio Wales, 4th May 2024: Rufus Mufasa interview / The Long Song - Ynys 'Aros Amdanat Ti' / Behind The Track - Y Niwl 'ungedpedwar' + more
Listen again via BBC Sounds here: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m001yw8d
PLEASE NOTE: This isn’t an official BBC / BBC Wales post. All words / opinions expressed here are my own.
I have been writing a long, acerbic piece about brands, cookie cutters, compliance and the unhealthy effect that we - the music media - can have on music itself, but it's a can of many bitter worms that probably says more about the chips on my shoulders than it does about the state of music itself.
Probably.
It felt cathartic to vent but I'll sit on the piece for a while before I re-consider whether to publish it or not. I love my job and I don't want to jeopardise it, or ruffle well-intentioned feathers with my sanctimonious cloud-barracking... suffice to say that our brands should always be subservient to the music. Anything else serves us better than the music-makers. Artists can barely scrape a living from their art and - therefore - feel compelled to do what they’re asked to do, regardless of whether it’s right for them or their music.
”Hey suckers, how about you let us put your music on our platform for free, we’ll pay you fractions of a penny for your blood sweat and tears, and we’ll profit to the tune of hundreds of millions of pounds every year?”
”Oh, OK. No problem. Not much choice, really.”
They've been moulded into this mindset by twenty years of a warping industry model that puts all the power and money into we parasites and little into the wonderful beast we all subsist off.
Yes, I think that is vague enough for now.
Rufus Mufasa has received nowhere near the attention or recognition she deserves from 'us'. Her current album 'Trigger Warnings' (styled 'Tri(ger) Warnings(s)' on Recordiau Swnywraig) is original and often remarkable. It's fierce in its intelligence, its defiance, its poetry and its sense of community, whether they're the communities in which Rufus grew up and lives in (Ammanford, Pontypridd, Cardiff) or the wider community of womankind.
Musically it throws shapes that I haven't heard before. There's folk, jazz, R&B, disco and electronica blurring any simple labelling of her work. But that's the case for so many of the artists you and I get excited about.
Who - these days - is resolutely one dimensional? It's weird when I hear something that ploughs one furrow... almost quaint to hear an indie band who are just that; folk artists who just follow traditions; metallers whose musical compass is entirely plugged into Marshall stacks cranked up to 11.
Rufus has woven a patchwork of influences round her as she's grown up, lived and faced the challenges of existence… a soundtrack of integrity; music that has been integral to her life; songs of experience, rather than merely aping influences.
Her love of rap music is the fabric upon which she embroiders and freestyles her razor sharp poetry. Everything is woven together tightly enough for it to sound only and resolutely like Rufus Mufasa.
This is a considerable achievement but it doesn't make for easy pigeon-holing and despite avowed broadmindedness, new music champions - labels, streaming platforms, the music media - still prefer the artists they 'discover' to fit pre-conceived moulds. The audience we already have is the one we aim to serve, potentially alienating them by broadening the canvas is a risk that just isn’t worth taking.
Artists who identify as female have it even harder.
The music industry still prefers young, beautiful ingenues (fulfilling a male stereotype or fantasy). The business isn't really geared up for working class single mums from The Valleys. Same old same old. But aren't we supposed to be thinking differently now?
Richly experienced, wise and shamanistic actual artists don't fit into this model, unless their genius has already changed the landscape and transcended such barriers and limitations (Bjork, PJ Harvey, Queen Latifah, Kae Tempest, St Vincent et al at al).
You're probably less likely to explode on TikTok unless your you-ness can be sold in a 30 second clip. I spoke with Rufus for 30 minutes on Saturday night and I barely got a glimpse of the sides.
In an era when being able to afford to dedicate your life to music-making is increasingly restricted to a privileged few, working class voices like Mufasa's are rare and need to be encouraged. That's not patronising, it's essential, and I write it as the child of an electrician, one generation removed from the poverty that my dad and his sister grew up in and grew out of due to application, curiosity and intelligence.
As well as her considerable musical chops Rufus is also an academic, exploring feminism, language, religion and folklore. All of these subject - and much more - enliven and enrich her music.
Rufus Mufasa is one of the most compelling musical artists representing herself and her communities in Wales right now. If the future ever wants to understand more about the chaotic and blurred times we're living through, 'Trigger Warnings' is a compelling and fascinating time capsule that will teach them much about our lives. And it's a stunning listen.
Aberystwyth is one of my favourite places on earth: a town that sets my imagination free, feels like a second home, perched on the edge of something mystical and other. I can feel stories in its streets and wonder in the jewels of seaglass that my partner and I scour for on the beach.
It's no surprise to me that so much of my favourite music comes from there: Murry the Hump - back in the day - with their lysergic pop postcards; The Hot Puppies stridently Romantic indie; Georgia Ruth's glimmering Cantre'r Gwaelod folk, and - of course - the vibrantly hued, playground melodic psych pop of Radio Luxembourg -> Race Horses.
Dylan Hughes was a co-founder and integral member of Radio Luxembourg and Race Horses. In his current role as cult-leader of Ynys he's responsible for some of the most beautiful and arresting baroque pop music this side of The Left Banke, Love, The Beach Boys and - of course - those other beachcombers of unfettered Welsh progressive pop, Gorky's Zygotic Mynci.
Dylan is the pebble Beach Boy... glittering jewels of tunes with a hiraeth heart. Ynys' eponymous debut album crystallised that sense of yearning for home past when you arrive back after a long period away, realising you're back where you should be but that things have moved on, changed subtly. A discombobulating and humbling notion that is fertile ground for any artist seeking to capture the riddles of existence tugging away at the centre of all of us.
Ynys' new single - 'Aros Amdanat Ti' - is The Long Song this week, and is a more gloriously joyous and extroverted beast than the music on their debut album. It's 'In It For The Money'-era Supergrass hot-wiring Todd Rundgren, The Appletree Theatre and Foxygen. It's yesterday, today and tomorrow. An impeccably dressed earworm having the time of its life. For those of us of a certain vintage, there's a keyboard that sounds exactly like the organ on the theme from The Rockford Files. James Garner would - I hope approve. It's a great escape, and a tantalising glimpse of what's to come on album II when it arrives on Libertino in July.
Please do send new music excellence to me via the BBC Introducing Uploader or as a download link to my BBC email address. You'll work it out. It has a dot between my first name and my last name.
Keep on trucking x
THIS WEEK’S PLAYLIST
Lizzy Farrall - 'MadHotel'
Cynwyd / Wrexham
http://facebook.com/LizzyFarrallmusic
Axel Boy & Natty Lou - 'In The Future (Ft. Emilie Rachel) (Bren master)'
Cardiff
http://www.nattylou.com
Benji Wild - 'Cardiff Bus'
Cardiff
http://facebook.com/iambenjiwild
WRKHOUSE - 'Time Again'
North Wales / Cardiff
http://facebook.com/profile.php?id=100092008124615
Adwaith - 'Mwy'
Carmarthen
http://facebook.com/adwaithmusic
The Loves - 'Honey'
Cardiff
Helen Love - 'Stay With Me'
Swansea
http://ilovealcopop.co.uk/collections/helen-love
Squidge - 'Falling Through The Ceiling'
Bath / Ceredigion / Pembrokeshire
About Bunny - '7 to 11'
Neath / Wrexham
Obey Cobra - 'Blank Tape'
South Wales
Parking Non-Stop - 'Flying Machines'
Menai Bridge
Rona Mac - 'showmehowyoumourn'
Pembrokeshire
http://ronamacmusic.com
THE LONG SONG
Ynys - 'Aros Amdanat Ti'
Aberystwyth
http://facebook.com/YnysMusic
Twst - 'Catch Me (Glimji’s Illusion) ft. Bayli & MEYY'
Barry
http://instagram.com/twstwstwstwst
Sybs - 'Limbo'
Cardiff
http://facebook.com/SYBSband
LA Priest - 'Apple'
Montgomeryshire
http://earthwindow.org
Em Koko - 'In Nowhere'
Cardiff
http://facebook.com/profile.php?id=61555557547871
Reem Muhammed Selects…
Niques - 'Mate'
Cardiff
http://facebook.com/Niquestheartist
Sam Sully - 'Dinosaurs'
Cardiff / Melbourne
http://facebook.com/samsullymusic/
HARD DRIVE DEEP DIVE
The Joy Formidable - 'Badlands'
Mold
http://thejoyformidable.com
A.R.K - 'You Can’t Dent My Soul [radio edit]'
Cardiff
BEHIND THE TRACK #012
Y Niwl - 'Undegpedwar'
Gwynedd
http://yniwl.com
Body Horror - 'GOODBOY'
Knighton, Powys
http://facebook.com/bodyhorrorband
Pickle Head - 'Deeper Thinker'
Cardiff
http://pickle00head.bandcamp.com
Luv Foundation (UK) and Ashley Paul - 'Hearts Up'
Abercynon / Mountain Ash
Emma Bucknor - 'Sticker'
Aberystwyth
http://instagram.com/emmabucknormusic
Dying Habit - 'Echoes'
Beaumaris
http://facebook.com/dyinghabit
Melys - 'Diwifr (John Peel Session)'
Capel Curig / Betws Y Coed
http://facebook.com/melysmusic
Kwame Stranger - 'Ko fie ko wu'
Cardiff
http://facebook.com/kwame.stranger/
The Allergies - 'Koliko (feat. K.O.G)'
Cardiff
INTERVIEW WITH RUFUS MUFASA
Rufus Mufasa - 'Foxglove'
Ammanford / Pontypridd
Rufus Mufasa - 'Calculated'
Ammanford / Pontypridd
Rufus Mufasa - 'Oce Cŵl'
Ammanford / Pontypridd
Telefair - 'The Usual Things'
Bodelwyddan
http://myspace.com/joetelefair
The Brass Bambees - 'Failures Behaviour'
Merthyr Tydfil
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100087747879825
Melda Lois - 'Symbiosis'
Llanuwchllyn / Cardiff
http://meldaloisgriffiths.wixsite.com/meldalois-1
EYE - 'The Other Sees'
Cardiff / Wrexham
http://eye-uk.bandcamp.com
TRIBUTE TO MY DAD FOR HIS 80th BIRTHDAY
Roy Orbison - 'In Dreams'
Texas
SHOW STATS
600 diff songs/ 675 Total. 425 Artists in 18 shows since 1st, Jan '24 (~Songs per:38, Unique artists per:24) Welsh:99% Cymraeg:11% (feat. lyrics in Welsh); Source: Uploader:42%, Direct:17%, Bought:17%, Plugger:21%, Commission:2%
Comprehensive Session / Interview List: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1w-rIPj0l0QhUcbEm08PUPLUWh-416mwlteG_8wpNWtQ/edit?usp=sharing
Subscribe to my Substack: https://adamwalton.substack.com
Adam Walton