Exclusive Premiere: maũ - Chances

maũ - Kenyan born, Brooklyn based, but instructed by no tradition. This week sees the release of his most recent composition ‘Chances’ assuredly coming in the wake of previous release ‘Haba Na Haba’ which amassed 75k streams. They were deserved. This artists’ flow is like biblical verse, it feels like it was written thousands of years ago, almost worn smooth.

There is a reason maũ has gained attention. It is so easy to instantly gauge the quality of the work, despite it being deliberately difficult to grasp at first and containing psalms of harsh realities.

“They rob clean but a fortune make”

Forgive my relating to the bible, but I cannot get past the way this flow is spoken so quickly and yet resonates so calmly. An artist chastising the fallacy of hypnotising gold. It is present in all acts, blind-sighted by privilege within any stratum including families - human follies that exist everywhere in the wake of years of habitual atrocity. We are all constant metaphors of guillotine culture. He disagrees? Take his head.

We have been taught our morals by wicked men. Artists constantly networking themselves into a web of hell full of other identical spiders spinning the same yarns. 

The beat is curious and in perfect synaesthetic harmony with the visuals. Coby Sanchez has taken a great deal of effort to direct the video in a very personable manner. Dark tones and absence of light replaced by metaphorical blues set the mood for maũ meeting three protagonists - 

The Conman - “The evil spirit of a man is a man”

The Truth - “It is better to lose your eyes than your heart”

The Mirror - “He who renounces his ancestry is a slave”

Finally, meeting a version of himself at full artistic potential (This actually blew me away) 

This serious-minded, multidisciplinary artist will sit comfortably at the table when the revolution of truth comes. The project provides a multitude of sensations, both emotional and superficial. The production and mastering are absolutely sublime. 

maũ will be returning to Kenya in December to perform live and promote his upcoming album ‘Habits’ which will be released in the New Year. Undoubtedly it will be as multi-faceted as he is.