#afrofuturism — Public Fediverse posts on home.social

offbeat amsterdam @[email protected] · 2026-09-09 · 20:29 UTC

The Magic City: Birmingham according to Sun Ra (2025)

Melkweg, Wednesday, November 25 at 07:00 PM GMT+1

Together with Amsterdam music platform we will go back to the early years of Sun Ra. Before the world (and the cosmos) came to know him as the Afrofuturist pioneer of "space jazz", he was born Herman Poole Blount in Birmingham, deep in the heart of Alabama. The Belgian documentary The Magic City - Birmingham According to Sun Ra sheds light on how this often-overlooked yet magical music city helped shape the enigmatic visionary in his formative years. Filmmakers Guillaume Maupin and Pablo Guarise closely involved the city and its residents in telling not just Sun Ra's story, but that of their community. Inevitably, that story is marked by a legacy of slavery, segregation, and racism. Yet Sun Ra's gaze remained fixed on a more harmonious future. As he says at the start of the film: "My story is not part of history. Because history repeats itself, but my story is endless."

Melkweg often hosts different types of programmes at the same time, such as concerts, club nights and films. Please note that there may occasionally be some noise pollution from other programmes during the screening.

https://offbeat.amsterdam/event/the-magic-city-birmingham-according-to-sun-ra-2025

#afrofuturism #jazz #film #leidseplein #amsterdamcentrum #musicdocumentary

Proto Himbo European @[email protected] · 2026-07-10 · 13:28 UTC

I'm going to get back to work any minute now, but posting The Deep led me to play the Clipping album "Splendor & Misery" (2016) while I made and ate breakfast. Here's All Black, a sentient spaceship narrating the experience of an escaped human "cargo" in her decks.

[Click above to hear the song. If you want more info about it, read on.]

The album is not always an easy listen, but damn is it ever good. It's a whole-ass concept album: 15 tracks in 37 minutes. You get Daveed Diggs rapping like a motherfucking house on fire, fluently switching hip hop styles, flowing through feelings, characters, and themes until you (or I, anyway) forget that it's just one guy's voice and the timbre doesn't vary much. You get the beats and soundscapes of William Hutson and Jonathan Snipes behind and around every track. You get a few full-on gospel numbers sung beautifully by the group Take 6. All in 37 minutes.

The story is of an enslaved Black man (Cargo Number 2331), the sole human survivor of a mutiny/uprising on an interstellar slave ship. This ship is, of course, sentient--Clipping plays with #SciFi tropes like a child with a Lego set and a blowtorch--and it becomes sympathetic to his situation.

I don't know a ton about #Clipping. I know this album and one or two other songs. This one is full-speed-ahead #afrofuturism and I'm here for it. It's gorgeous, punchy, political as hell, and (for me, anyway) various kinds of emotional.

#music #rap #hiphop #clipping

#scifi #clipping #afrofuturism #music #rap #hiphop

Proto Himbo European @[email protected] · 2026-07-10 · 11:38 UTC

Clipping - The Deep

About 3 people saw this when I posted it yesterday as part of #ThursdayFiveList, but this song... damn, this song hits hard. It's also a pretty great listen if you like brainy rap.

Based on a concept album by Sun Ra. An undersea society evolved from the children of enslaved mothers thrown overboard when pregnant during the Atlantic slave trade. The undersea society gets sick of our shit.

Lyrics below because why not?

Our mothers were pregnant African women thrown overboard while
Crossing the Atlantic Ocean on slave ships. We were born
Breathing water as we did in the womb. We built our home on the
Sea floor, unaware of the two-legged surface dwellers until
Their world came to destroy ours. With cannons, they searched
For oil beneath our cities. Their greed and recklessness forced
Our uprising. Tonight, we remember

Y'all remember how deep it go
Started from the bottom
Y'all remember how deep it go
'Fore y'all had to come back, deep
Y'all remember when it used to be deep
So deep, so, so deep, ay
When y'all swim up out yo' mama while y'all mama was asleep
So deep, so, so deep, ay
And y'all remember when y'all had the dance floor lit, dark
No two-step, deep, y'all don't even sweat, deep
As deep as it gets
Dreaming dead asleep and keeping time
Y'all heartbeat, deep, y'all heartbeat, deep
And all the fishes had they eyes bugged out
Cause y'all dancing underwater and y'all don't get wet
And the dark smelled sweet and y'all tails touch reef
Y'all feed off the bottom, but now y'all remember
Y'all remember
Y'all remember
Pressure outside the vehicle: 832.2 bars

Y'all remember when the deep got hot when y'all move on up
How y'all used to argue 'bout the water getting warmer
Still y'all loved a little bit of light up in the deep
So deep, so, so deep, ay
Y'all remember saying how it couldn't be them two legs
Cause y'all came from two legs
And y'all mamas would've loved y'all if they could've breathed
But they wasn't ready for the deep
So deep, so, so deep, ay
Y'all remember when the first blast came
And the beat fell off and the dreams got woke
And the light bent bad and the fishes belly up
And them coral castles crumbled 'cause they wasn't quite enough
And conversation used to break, like the floor quake
Like the bleached bones and the fin friends fled from they home
But the blast wouldn't stop 'caused they wanted black gold
And them no-gills had to feel it 'cause they couldn't be told
Y'all remember
Y'all remember
Ocean salinity: 35 PSU. Water pH: 7.91

Y'all remember when the raging changed that no please, no calm seas
Let the water rise
So deep, so, so deep
Oil slick upon the sleeper was an awful thing to realize
If the two legs wanna wake the dead
They gon' have to bring more fire, y'all is closer to the earth
So deep and y'all was talking how to get up in they heads
And got them real inspired circumstances of the birth
Has got y'all feeling like an army, better yet a navy
And Dagon gave y'all the blessing now y'all going crazy
They live with green up on the surface but they ain't deep
That pistol shrimp could knock a two leg off his feet
Y'all perfecting the steam void to rip up they ships
They using sonar as second language, y'all fluent with it
And all the dreamers is woke now, but nightmares swim
But everybody hear that "bloop" know y'all coming for them
Y'all remember
Y'all remember
Surface water temperature: 308 Kelvin

Y'all remember when the call went out, ay
No deep, no more deep, sunshine
Y'all remember when the call went out, ay
No deep, no more deep, sunshine
Y'all remember feeling wind up on your skin
No deep, no more deep, sunshine
Y'all remember how it burned in the beginning
No deep, ride on 'em, ride on 'em, ride on 'em
Y'all remember seeing sun across the surface on the day that
Y'all first came up out the water, so, so deep
How the breaking of the surface showed the sky without a border
And the air is so much hotter, so, so deep
How the woke dreamer screamed and it rose tides
And the waves stretched up like a mountain high
And the no gills gasp and they closed eyes
And they pray to they gods and they ask why
And they all cry too 'cause y'all recognize mama in the faces
Of the ones that y'all were terrorized
They were sisters and brothers
They were the babies born up out the water
Not connected to each other
Not in knowledge of the one dropped
But they had to learn today
Y'all had one shot, let the sun burn today
Let them feel the dark even deeper today
Make a two leg a believer today
Let them know that they done woke a sleeper from a sleep
So deep
That y'all been dancin' without any feet, so, so deep
Here's the nerve that they struck with a blast
That they broke with a drill that they burnt with the gas
Y'all remember, so deep, sunshine, ride on 'em
Y'all remember, so deep, sunshine, ride on 'em
Y'all remember, so deep, sunshine, ride on 'em
Y'all remember when y'all had to let 'em breathe
Ride on 'em, ay

Initiating tidal wave sequence Uniform Romeo 0-3-0

#music #rap #DaveedDiggs #Clipping #Afrofuturism

#thursdayfivelist #music #rap #daveeddiggs #clipping #afrofuturism

DoomsdaysCW @[email protected] · 2025-11-02 · 19:11 UTC

#BlackPanther

By Ryan Coogler, 2023

"Black Panther is a #solarpunk, #afrofuturist superhero film that helps spark discussions about three aspects of climate literacy: access to #NaturalResources, especially #RareEarthMetals like the fictional vibranium; the interconnectedness of #RacialJustice and #ClimateJustice, including one’s responsibilities to other people and nations across the globe; and the role of #GreenTechnology, including urban design, to create a #sustainable, just, and #ecological civilization."