Young Fathers :: Heavy Heavy
The multi-dimensional Edinburgh, Scotland-based hyper-funk, hip-hop, and sinister soul outfit Young Fathers first formed in 2008. With a friendship that dates back even further, the group released a few singles before their 2018 full-length LP “Dead” on Big Dada Recordings, and have since captured the world’s eager ears, while simultaneously carving a spectacular shape out of the sonic stratosphere with their ritualistic rhythms and tribal tones. With two more albums to follow the release of their highly anticipated 2023 album, “Heavy Heavy,” the band pushed forward with seductive soundscapes and trepidation timing, similar to the atmospheric aesthetic of TV On The Radio and Flying Lotus. While fully establishing a feverish foundation that ultimately expands on the depths of textures, liberating layers, and critical communication between the numbingness of notes, it members Alloysious Massaquoi, Kayus Bankole, and Graham 'G' Hastings culturally capture the electrifying essence of mystic melody and the grounded sound it takes to fill the surreal stadiums of the subconscious. While the band’s 2018 release “Cocoa Sugar” shows just how poetically powerful their eternal engine drives the biblical beast of creativity to the meditative max, it wouldn’t be until the release of the trio’s fourth studio album “Heavy Heavy” that the world would soon bow at their feet in an alchemical attempt to seek sonic salvation from the emptiness of existence. Where the mountains of the mind stand tall, and linger in lavish latitudes of an unsuitable universe, Young Fathers salvage that silence within their work, and desperately capture the captivating contents like no other group of their time.
Photo: Fiona Garden
“You let the demons out and deal with it, make sense of it after.”
Dancing across the public petals within a metaphysical meadow with vibrancy and atmospheric accuracy, Young Fathers carefully conjure the melodic magic by inventing the eager energy of folks such as Raven Bush, Tapiwa Mambo, Nomasonto Mthembu, and Liam Hutton, to name a few, to help bring together the tribalistic temperatures of the album’s rich aroma to life. Similar to the whispering winds of an ancient attitude from past centuries, the trio universally unites the ancestral atmosphere of the album by connecting culture with community, and pushing forward the shadows of sound and memory into this melodic masterpiece. With tracks like the album’s marvelous opener “Rice,” “Drum,” “Tell Somebody,” and the spellbinding opus that is “Geronimo,” “Heavy Heavy” epically drowns out the soulful sorrows of the human experience, and quickly embraces listeners with this worldly warmth that explodes with love, comfort, and ethereal empathy. Cosmically combining the cinematic climate with their meditative mixtape motivations, most successfully expressed on the soundtrack for the 2025 masterpiece, 28 Years Later, Young Fathers bravely breathe into the lyrical lungs of the past, present, and future in an almighty attempt to transcend the story of man.
