Sled Island & connectFirst present: Sudan Archives

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Sudan Archives

Though the word “mythology” connotes a bygone era of dusty legends and pagan zealotry, powerful myths are still being made right now, today. Sudan Archives (mortal name: Brittney Parks) and her visionary debut album Athena are living proof.

Parks is a self-taught violinist and vocalist who belts from the depths of her being, breathes out sound with ragged elegance and on standout track “Icelandic Moss” uses words to make the texture of moss in Iceland an analog for just how little people understand her. Her violin playing, block-rattling low-end and precise command of electronic slipstreams build the world where this makes perfect sense.

In response to her first self-produced two EPs — Sudan Archives (2017) and Sink (2018) — she was labelled a mix of electro-folk and R&B. These words aren’t exactly wrong, but they’re more effective in describing themes within Sudan Archives than they are at containing her. The electro-folk part is shorthand for the way her music lives across eras of sound, while the R&B influence describes the way her tremendous voice disobeys structural convention to jaw-snatching effect. What Sudan Archives is, quite simply, is a contemporary musician with a clarity of voice rendered with a natural intuition for the sound textures from her life that are the most true.

Originally selected for Sled Island 2020 ahead of its cancellation, she has curated — perhaps unconsciously — pieces of a life spent in church choirs, at fiddle club, digging up her musical ancestry and at electronic-scene fringes into a context wholly new. There’s a spritz of Post-era Björk volatility here, a tinge of Stones Throw Records-forebear J Dilla texture there, but Sudan Archives is best summed up by her ability to do what a curator does best: create an entirely new story in the places in between where no one else has explored. It’s for this reason that we are most excited to welcome her as the guest curator for Sled Island 2022.

Queens D. Light

Bay Area-rapper Queens D. Light waxes poetic over dreamy, trip-hop inspired beats. She is also an organizer with The House of Malico, a “creative hub offering contemporary art, production services and public programs.” Following her stellar 2018 EP Flavor of Green, Queens D. Light has more recently released singles like “1111” and the addictive “Make it Shake,” alongside Turkana and Suzi Analogue.

AllCityJimmy

Formerly known as Nocando, rapper AllCityJimmy developed his craft at Low End Theory and in the battle scene of South LA over the last two decades. Released this past October, his first LP under the new name, 1/2 Child 1/2 Devil, is a blend of lyrical ferocity and production that splits the difference between digital haze and punk rock. He has also recently collaborated with Sudan Archives and Open Mike Eagle.

Uyemi

Singer-songwriter Uyemi’s debut EP The Butterfly Effect announces a stunning new talent, an artist who is both fresh and fully formed. Across four slinky, after-hours productions, her soulful vocals effortlessly glide between ethereal R&B runs and smoldering coos. 

 

UPSTAIRS

SPRLUA

A collaboration between producers Samito and Haig V, SPRLUA is a commentary on the music movement known as amapiano, a style of house music originating from South Africa. The duo’s debut album MAGNUM DOPUS runs on a base of smooth 4/4 grooves upon which global vocal styles and rhythms flourish.

Janette King

This gifted R&B vocalist makes the kind of neo-soul that would be at home on Saint Records. With productions that draw upon classic sounds of the genre while remaining exploratory, her serene cooing can waft from a whisper to an all-out run with a natural ease. Her 2021 album What We Lost — which is a gentle, transfixing exploration of grief — is a must-listen ahead of the festival.

 

Cat 500

Self-described as "a torrential downpour of psycho pop," Cat 500 makes experimental electronic music that somehow sounds both like the soundtrack to the early days of the internet, with glitchy, highly compressed, low bitrate thumps, and that of a future where genres have folded in on themselves, through layered, near alien-like vocals. It's a disorienting cacophony of otherwise familiar sounds that creates one hell of a trip through the unknown.

About Sled Island

The Sled Island Music & Arts Festival is a five-day, multi-venue festival taking place June 22 - 26, 2022. The full lineup and schedule is available at SledIsland.com. 

Everyone has the right to feel safe and included at Sled Island. All festival attendees agree to abide by Sled Island's safer spaces and inclusion policy, which can be found here.

Sled Island acknowledges Calgary as the traditional territory of the Blackfoot and the people of the Treaty 7 region in Southern Alberta, which includes the Siksika, the Piikani, the Kainai, the Tsuut’ina and the Ĩyãħé Nakoda First Nations, including the Chiniki, Bearspaw and Wesley First Nations. Calgary is also home to Métis Nation of Alberta, Region III.

Please note: This is an 18+ event.