Drexciya

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Drexciya
Origin Detroit, Michigan, U.S.
Genres
Years active1992–2002
Labels
Past membersJames Stinson
Gerald Donald

Drexciya was an American electronic music duo from Detroit, Michigan, consisting of James Stinson (1969–2002 [1] [2] ) and Gerald Donald. [3] [4] [5]

Contents

Career

The majority of Drexciya's releases were in the style of dance-floor oriented electro, punctuated with elements of retro and 1980s Detroit techno, with occasional excursions into the ambient and industrial genres. They had 3 releases on the highly influential Underground Resistance Detroit record label. Tracks were mostly centered around the Roland TR-808 drum machine, Roland D20 synthesizer, Kawai K4 synthesizer, Roland SH-101 synthesizer, and Roland TR-909 drum machine. [6]

In 1997, Drexciya released a compilation album, titled The Quest. [7] The duo released three studio albums: Neptune's Lair (1999), Harnessed the Storm (2002), and Grava 4 (2002). [8]

Drexciya, which eschewed media attention and its attendant focus on personality, [9] developed around a nautical afrofuturist myth. [10] The group revealed in the sleeve notes to their 1997 album The Quest that "Drexciya" was an underwater country populated by the unborn children of pregnant African women who were thrown off of slave ships; the babies had adapted to breathe underwater in their mothers' wombs. [11] The myth was built partly on Paul Gilroy's The Black Atlantic: Modernity and Double Consciousness (1993), according to Kodwo Eshun. [12]

Stinson died suddenly on September 3, 2002, of a heart condition. [13] Gerald Donald continues to produce music under other names such as Dopplereffekt with To Nhan Le Thi and Japanese Telecom. [1]

Legacy

In 2019, with support from Gerald Donald and Helen Stinson, the mother of James Stinson, visual artist Abu Qadim Haqq created The Book of Drexciya, Volume I (and later The Book of Drexciya, Volume II in 2021), which was inspired by the mythos of Drexciya’s work. [14] The books chronicle the origins of Drexciya and the rise of their first ruler, Drexaha. [15]

In 2023, "From the Deep: In the Wake of Drexciya", a multimedia exhibition by American photographer and contemporary artist Ayana V. Jackson opened at the National Museum of African Art. The exhibit took inspiration from the founding myth of Drexciya and directly featured music by the group. [16] [17]

Discography

Studio albums

Compilation albums

EPs

Singles

References

  1. 1 2 "James Marcel Stinson - Biography". AllMusic .
  2. ↑ "James Stinson 1969-2002 - An Appreciation".
  3. ↑ Rubin, Mike (October 1998). "A Tale of Two Cities". Spin . pp. 104–109. Retrieved December 19, 2014.
  4. ↑ Scales, Helen (January 25, 2021). "Drexciya: how Afrofuturism is inspiring calls for an ocean memorial to slavery". The Guardian. ISSN   0261-3077 . Retrieved February 17, 2025.
  5. ↑ Contributors, Ars (February 28, 2021). "Inside the stunning Black mythos of Drexciya and its Afrofuturist '90s techno". Ars Technica. Retrieved February 17, 2025.{{cite web}}: |last= has generic name (help)
  6. ↑ Gaskins, Nettrice (2016). "Deep Sea Dwellers: Drexciya and the Sonic Third Space" (PDF). Shima: The International Journal of Research into Island Cultures. 10 (2). doi: 10.21463/shima.10.2.08 .
  7. ↑ Beta, Andy (June 22, 2012). "Drexciya's Imaginary Soundtrack for Science Fiction". MTV . Archived from the original on March 14, 2017. Retrieved March 13, 2017.
  8. ↑ Beta, Andy (October 16, 2014). "Drexciya / Transllusion: Neptune's Lair / The Opening of the Cerebral Gate". Pitchfork . Retrieved March 13, 2017.
  9. ↑ Samuels, A. J. (May 30, 2013). "Master Organism: A.J. Samuels interviews Gerald Donald". Electronic Beats . Archived from the original on January 4, 2015. Retrieved December 19, 2014.
  10. ↑ Womack, Ytasha (2013). Afrofuturism: The World of Black Sci-Fi and Fantasy Culture. Chicago Review Press. p. 70. ISBN   9781613747995.
  11. ↑ "Interview with Kodwo Eshun of the Otolith Group". Art Practical. February 15, 2012. Retrieved December 5, 2014.
  12. ↑ Eshun, Kodwo (2003). "Further Considerations of Afrofuturism". CR: The New Centennial Review. 3 (2): 287–302. doi:10.1353/ncr.2003.0021. S2CID   13646543 . Retrieved December 19, 2014.
  13. ↑ "DREXCIYA MEMBER DIES". NME . September 9, 2002. Retrieved May 6, 2019.
  14. ↑ "The Book Of Drexciya Vol 1 published this week". The Wire . May 19, 2020. Retrieved August 27, 2024.
  15. ↑ Brown Jr., DeForrest (2022). Assembling a Black Counter Culture. Primary Information. ISBN   9781734489736.
  16. ↑ Milbourne, Karen E. "From the Deep: In the Wake of Drexciya with Ayana V. Jackson". africa.si.edu. Smithsonian National Museum of African Art. Retrieved June 16, 2024.
  17. ↑ Jenkins, Mark. "A watery mythological realm is given flesh at the Smithsonian". The Washington Post. Retrieved June 16, 2024.

Further reading

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