A pinch of Sault

Another guest post from jon der. The band is totally new to me and sounds intriguing, to say the least!

Sault is a collective of British and American performers whose first album (entitled 5) was released in May 2019, and was followed four months later by a second album (7).  No credits identified the singers, musicians, or songwriters.  Sault had no social media presence, a rarity in this era of relentless self-promotion.

 

 The identities of Sault’s primary participants have since been discovered, but as a group Sault has no image. There is no “Lead Singer” or “Lead Guitarist”, so the sound can shift as singers & players drop in and out.  

5 and 7 incorporated soul, Afrobeat, disco and the minimal funk sound of 80’s bands like ESG and Liquid Liquid.  The social commentary in songs such as “Foot On Necks” is as current as the Black Lives Matter movement, but is also reminiscent of What’s Going On and its doppelganger, There’s A Riot Goin’ On.

One female singer sounds sophisticated and accomplished; others are charmingly unaffected.  One accent is clearly African American; others sound British or Afro-Caribbean.  Sometimes a man sings in a distorted, almost wordless voice.  

 

Two new Sault albums appeared in 2020. Untitled (Black Is) was released on Juneteenth, and Sault made its first statement:  “We present our first 'Untitled' album to mark a moment in time where we as Black People, and of Black Origin are fighting for our lives. RIP George Floyd and all those who have suffered from police brutality and systemic racism. Change is happening… We are focused.” Untitled (Rise) was released three months later.

 

In 2021, the album Nine appeared with the announcement, “Nine will only exist for ninety nine days” – after which it was removed from digital platforms.  In 2022, the orchestral album Air was released, followed by 10, a ten minute reggae-influenced single. Five new albums appeared simultaneously, free to download for five days in November, as “an offering to God”.  

 

 Writing for BoingBoing, Elías Villoro described these five Sault albums as “Soundtracks for space travel and Underground Railroads, chants, incantations, operas, protest anthems, historical invocations, stories of the daily thriving and struggle of Black people on planet earth.”  One of the albums was orchestral; another ventured into punk and hard rock.  One album featured children’s voices; another was sung by a gospel choir; yet another consisted of intimate duets.

Sault contains multitudes.

 

Links coming in the comments below!