Last week, Chicago Latinx artist collective and label Future Rootz teamed up with Toronto counterpart Canal Sounds to reissue Yoyi, a trippy Afro-Cuban album that Cuban multi-instrumentalist Jorge Soler León released under the name Grupo los Yoyi in 1977. Yoyi originally came out on the Areito imprint of EGREM, which for decades was Cuba’s only label after the country nationalized its music industry in the 1960s. “This record is one of the most rare records that has come out of the catalog of EGREM,” says Future Rootz member and DJ Harold “AfroQbano” Medina.
Medina grew up in Cuba, but his voracious appetite for music didn’t make it any easier for him to find a copy of Yoyi. “This record wasn’t on my radar growing up in the 80s and 90s,” he says. “But there was a lot of talk around record collectors in Havana where I grew up—and even for Cubans, that record was rare.”
Medina says that Jorge Soler León’s music, which blends Afro-Cuban rhythms with jazz and psychedelic, synth-driven funk, strayed far from local traditions and chafed certain people in power. “He did stuff that nobody was doing at the time,” Medina says. “His record—he sounded too Western for the government at that period, so they took it out of the stores.”
Sony began licensing EGREM’s catalog internationally after striking a historic deal in 2015. According to Medina, though, Sony’s control over that catalog hasn’t been exclusive since at least last year. The new Yoyi reissue is licensed through Canal Sounds, since its standing as a Canadian company allowed it to work out an arrangement uncomplicated by the remaining U.S. government sanctions on Cuba. Yoyi is Future Rootz’s second EGREM reissue with Canal Sounds: in August, they put out two Afro-Cuban songs recorded in 1973 by influential trombonist Juan Pablo Torres with his project Los Caneyes.
“To me, this is a pretty important move,” Medina says. “I’ve been living in the U.S. for the past 15 years, and I’ve seen many labels licensing Cuban music. But nobody on those labels are Cuban. We went ahead, and we’re like, ‘We know this music—we grew up with it.’ It’s Cuban music released by Cubans.”
Future Rootz and Canal Sounds have issued Yoyi only on vinyl—there’s no digital version—and for now they’ve pressed just 300 copies. It’s available via Future Rootz’s Bandcamp and at 606 Records and Dusty Groove. According to Medina, the labels are working to get the LP into more local shops. “We’re trying to share all this amazing music from the place where I grew up,” he says, “and hope that people like it.”
In 2014, Reader writer Miles Raymer profiled Chicago artist James King, aka the GTW, a Nigerian American producer, singer, and rapper whose sound combined the music of his parents’ homeland with “Chicago house, Brazilian samba, and the broad range of electronic subgenres that fall under the umbrella term ‘global bass culture.’” (At the time, King was also a member of R&B group Jody, who unfortunately haven’t released anything since their sublime 2015 EP Oasis.) In that same Reader story, King mentioned that he was working on a new GTW EP, Chigeria, which he tantalizingly described as taking “street sounds and making them pop.” In the years since, King has dropped new tracks in fits and starts—in 2023 they’ve included remixes of Stonie Blue, Kelela, and DJ Nate—but that EP never materialized.
Last week, though, King announced on Instagram that he’ll be releasing tracks from his archives each Friday under the hashtag #chigeria. “There are so many songs in my vault I would love to share with you all,” he wrote. “Hope you enjoy this new journey as much as I will.” Last Friday’s drop was the stellar “I Got Company,” which mixes his trademark vaporous vocal melodies with clanging dance-floor-ready production. This wolf hopes the #chigeria series keeps going for a good long time!
The September 22 release in the GTW’s Friday #chigeria series
With a stellar roster that includes genre-obliterating weirdos such as Fire-Toolz, Moth Cock, Quicksails, and Wobbly, local label Hausu Mountain is among the most adventurous imprints in indie music. HausMo’s out-there aesthetic comes right from the top of the organization, and last week label heads Maxwell Allison (who records and performs as Mukqs) and Doug Kaplan (aka MrDougDoug) both of them released new albums that exemplify the label’s distinctive brand of absolute sonic chaos. On SOS Forks AI REM II, Kaplan blends warped video-game scores, minimalist composition, and dense, percussive electronics that sound like abstracted gamelan music. On Stonewasher, Allison sounds more outwardly calm, but despite the occasionally lulling production (imagine Art of Noise making nebulous vaporwave tracks) he keeps things off-kilter with bursts of rudely pure electronic noise. Both albums are available on CD and cassette and as Bandcamp downloads, and you can buy them together on CD as the “HausMo Honcho Batch” for $18.
New albums from Hausu Mountain label founders Doug Kaplan (MrDougDoug) and Maxwell Allison (Mukqs)
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