Open Water

by Caleb Azumah Nelson

Hanif Abdurraqib wrote about this album, wondering how strange a life, to be presented to the world, through your flaws; through blood, swollen face, your bent body. How strange a life you and other Black people lead, forever seen and unseen, forever heard and silenced. And how strange a life it is to have to carve out small freedoms, to have to tell yourself that you can breathe. But how beautiful it is when those freedoms arrive, when you are breathing, when you’re matching Phife word for word, or singing the refrain, We got the jazz, we got the jazz. How beautiful, when you’re in a crowd, and you find your wandering gaze met by another, twenty, thirty metres away, both of you unaware that your shoulders and hips are moving to the bassline, because this is not something you have had to think about for once, this is something you just do, and understanding this, and the circumstances which brought you to this moment, you both raise a small hand of acknowledgement.