Almost halfway through 2021 and life seems to be steering me into some of the most amazing and unexpected places, guiding and pulling me into a world where a year ago, I would have never expected to find myself. I am not yet able to share or disclose any further information on the matter at hand just yet (Perhaps in the next few weeks I will be able to share some, and if not, all of the good news).
In April 2021, the Southern African Music Rights Organization offered funding for eligible artists to create an album of new works, I applied for the project and a few weeks later I got the go ahead to begin the project, I immediately knew that I wanted to create something completely different to my usual work as a singer-songwriter, and began the process of conceptualizing a truly South African instrumental, leaning on traditional 'zulu guitar' record, I also knew that I had to release this album under a different name, mostly as I don't really want someone to hear this record and forever more think that Wren Hinds is an instrumental maskandi guitarist, I'm not at all, but I did grow up in KwaZulu, which must've ingrained the sound of the landscape and the history of this land right into the very fibre of my being, it's almost as if I got the chance to channel some great and wise ancestor who simply used me to express the soundscapes within the record.
My friend Andre Swart, an immensely talented photographer out of Durban sent me the perfect shot for the album cover, a typical scene from the Transkei, a kid standing looking right at the camera outside his family's wattle and daub hut, overlooking the majestic landscape of the Kei. - I am truly grateful to Andre for always being so enthusiastic and keen on collaborating with his photographs, he is a gem of a human being and an eternal friend.
'Incantations' takes the listener on a journey through the sounds of the 'African guitar' and follow's in the tradition of great mentors and ancestors in the maskandi lineage such as King of the Zulu Guitar, Madala Kunene. It is an album of invocation, initiation and exploration through the healing and naturally 'psychedelic' approach to music by our fore-bearers, it is medicine music and it truly embodies the culture of Southern Africa.
Incantations is available HERE.
