Celebrating the release of her fantastic 3rd studio album The BPM on Stones Throw, unique talent Sudan Archives returns to Berlin for a special live show at Silent Green’s Betonhalle this November.
On THE BPM, Sudan Archives – real name Brittney Parks – embodies the idea that following your own muse is the surest route to artistic and personal fulfilment. If her last two albums looked to the past – she was both goddess and muse on 2019’s Athena, and wrote a punky coming-of-age tale for 2022’s Natural Brown Prom Queen – THE BPM imagines a dazzling, chrome-plated future in which we’re all tapped into our own sense of rhythm.
THE BPM looks to Sudan’s mother’s roots in Michigan and her father’s in Illinois; it was partially completed in Chicago and Detroit, embracing the club sounds from those cities while taking in everything from Jersey club to contemporary global dance musics and experimental beatwork. The whole record is a family affair: Parks enlisted her sister, a cousin from Detroit and one of her best friends to assist, and exclusively worked with people she knew intimately for the first time, rather than bringing in producers from outside the fold.
THE BPM explores themes of mental illness, self-love, technology, romance and heartbreak even as it embraces a raucous, party-starting energy. It also introduces a more clarified Sudan – an executive producer and artist moving with grace and gonzo confidence through her most fun, freewheeling record yet.
