L.A. SALAMI - KID CRUISE

"un rap classieux, aux lyrics poignants, métaphoriques et politiques"

Lookman Adekunle Salami’s third album opens with the title track, an ambitious 10-minute rollercoaster of a song that peaks and dips and swerves and takes the listener’s breath away. It’s the foundation stone on which The Cause of Doubt & A Reason to Have Faith is built, a song that marks a renaissance in Lookman’s own life after a period of personal turbulence and, as is often the case with L.A. Salami, it asks big questions about where we are in the world right now, posed with philosophical wonder, with candor, with humour and with plenty of humanity.

This isn’t the music of a virtuoso: it’s explorative, daring, meditative and sometimes wild. For the first time, Lookman has embraced the world of multi-tracking, though the record still retains a raw energy and an integrity. Often it feels like anything can happen and that it probably will. “That's what I was going for!” says Lookman, sipping neat whiskey out of a tumbler in a Shoreditch bar as he contemplates this great new edition to his body of work. “I listen to a lot of polished music out there... I get it, but that's not my style. I'm not a good enough musician to be like that for a start! I like the idea of thoughtfully putting music together, but I also like the honesty of things almost falling apart.”

London-born Lookman spent years in foster care when he was growing up, and would put headphones on at night to listen to storytellers like Bob Dylan as a means of escape and as a voyage of discovery. He couldn’t afford to buy a guitar for himself until he was 21, which has perhaps informed his poetic, peripatetic, troubadour style. He subsumes the blues and rock and roll on The Cause of Doubt & A Reason to Have Faith, but thanks to his musical autodidacticism, he takes the songs to places new, throwing in influences from the worlds of hiphop, ambient dance and unvarnished English folk along the way. It’s a glorious mishmash of styles that carries the inimitable Salamian stamp.

KID CRUISE

Growing up in the North of England (via Florida), Kid Cruise is now based in South London, carving out a unique & brutally honest style of writing. His previous single, ‘Chipped Teeth’ was produced by James Dring (Sorry, Jamie T, Gorillaz...), with airplay following on BBC Introducing & NTS Radio. A debut EP, ‘Still Cruising’, is set to build on those foundations in 2023. Kid Cruise & his band recently played to sold-out audiences all across the UK supporting long-time friend & collaborator Greentea Peng, coming off the back of writing ‘Free My People' for her album; a song that’s been remixed by Mike Skinner of The Streets, plus featuring on the TopBoy & FIFA 22 soundtracks.