WATCH / SHARE “CODES OF THE FALLEN | C.O.D.” HERE
VOX.INFOLD, AVAILABLE EVERYWHERE TODAY
BUY / STREAM VOX.INFOLD HERE
“Mesmerizing, vibrant…Singh isn’t just crossing genres, he’s straddling astral planes….Vox.Infold is an immersive experience of looped beats, breathing and vocals that deserve placement on a Dune soundtrack.” - Globe and Mail
"Ruby Singh keeps on dropping dynamic sonic experiments. The cross-cultural a cappella project brings together vocalists from Indigenous, Inuit, Black and South Asian backgrounds to unite myriad musical traditions in new and unique ways." The Vancouver Sun
“Lush polyphonic worlds…atmospheric, haunting, ethereal” - Stir Vancouver
“Truly immersive, exciting experience…wildly experimental..fresh and vital.” - The Manitoban
Vox.Infold, the new album from Ruby Singh, is an a cappella offering, composed and (remarkably) recorded at a time when singing together was something that could kill us. Against the backdrop of the Covid-19 pandemic and amidst potent social unrest, this powerhouse vocal ensemble of Indigenous, Inuit, Black, and South Asian voices, reimagined how to sing together. The resulting work is so much more than a convergence of diverse vocal traditions but a complex rendering of what’s possible when we can hold each other's humanity. The album dives into a full bodied, resonant and sensuous expression housed in polyrhythm, lush harmonies, mimicry, and polyphonic poetry.
To celebrate today’s release of Vox.Infold, Singh is sharing the new video for “Codes Of The Fallen | S.O.S.”, a song which leans into “the grief we’ve all been feeling through the Covid 19 pandemic - grief for the loved ones we’ve lost, the ones we miss, the disconnected lives we’ve lived,” says Singh. “Sorrow drenched melodies rise from the opening of the song, collecting voices that carry our individual and collective sorrow (you can hear a haunting “help me” coming from the edges of the chorus). Injustices perpetrated on Black and Indigenous kin, the climate crisis ravaging our planet, the opioid epidemic laying siege to the most vulnerable and ongoing economic inequities entwine together to inform the symphonic, wailing crescendo. As the song builds, embracing the pains of this world, it offers the saltwater tears of our ancestors. Gently, gently we remember to breathe. Respite. It’s important to lean into grief and pain - it gives us the opportunity to expand our humanity, our empathy and our understanding. ‘Codes Of The Fallen | S.O.S.’ is an urgent call to expand into possibility, stretching us to reach for a just world.”
The song’s VR Dance video features new media/dance artists Sammy Chien and Caroline MacCaull of Chimerik 似不像 and is accompanied by a binaural spatialized version of the song. Shot in both the beautiful west coast of Turtle Island on Galiano Island and the ancient temples in Siem Reap, Cambodia. Chimerik 似不像 integrates their dance project We Were One, investigating the invisible interconnectivity between our souls and beyond what seems to be tangible in this physical reality. In this dark time may light shine the brightest, as an ongoing human experience of suffering and grief that reminds us to cherish true joy, love and kindness, these are some of the greatest powers within us.”
WATCH / SHARE “CODES OF THE FALLEN | C.O.D.” HERE
MORE ABOUT VOX.INFOLD
The resulting sonic landscape encompasses a non-linear journey in which we may find and care for each other. Evoking loneliness, joy, the mysterious and supernatural, Vox.Infold brings together musical luminaries, Dawn Pemberton, Inuksuk Mackay and Tiffany Ayalik of PIQSIQ, Russell Wallace, Tiffany Moses, Shamik Bilgi and Ruby Singh. They remind us that the human voice is an adaptation of the metabolic activity most crucial to our existence – breathing. This is how the atmosphere enters our beings and how we know we are intimately connected to our world.
WATCH AND SHARE “NAKSHATRA” HERE
“Not only the pandemic but the severe racial inequities faced by the Black community and the genocidal origins of Canada were really coming to light in the mainstream media and that takes a real toll on those racialized communities,” says Singh. “I wanted to see what it might mean to make music outside of the lens and influence of white supremacy and capitalism. This work is really a testament to how these incredible artists came together to lift each other's spirits in these challenging times.” Brewed in uncertainty this crew held steadfast to their callings, protected by shields and masks, distanced over 20ft, armed with microphones, loopstations and studio space at the Western Front in Vancouver to create a complex, potent and innovative album. The album was recorded and mixed by John Raham at AfterLife Studios on the unceded territories of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm, Sḵwx̱wú7mesh, and səl̓ílwətaʔɬ/Selilwitulh Nations.
Ruby Singh’s Vox.infold album will be pre-released in traditional stereo and in a special binaural mix on Bandcamp on January 31, 2022 and will be released on all major DSPs on February, 18, 2022. You can hear it presented at the PUSH festival in Vancouver BC running from January 20-30, 2022 at the groundbreaking LOBE spatial sound studios. An array of speakers run across the ceiling and under the floor in conjunction with custom-designed vibroacoustic floor panels, entirely surrounding the listener in an immersive and haptic listening experience. Using 4D sound technology, their voices ebb and flow, forming sonic environments holographically and without perceivable sources. LOBE studios is one of three of its kind on the planet and the only one in North America.
WATCH / SHARE “HORIZON”
FEAT. PIQSIQ, TIFFANY MOSES, DAWN PEMBERTON, RUSSELL WALLACE
Ruby Singh is a multi award winning composer and producer that has been a longtime beloved member of the Vancouver artistic community. His creativity crosses the boundaries of music, poetry, photography and film, engaging with mythos, memory, justice and fantasy. Singh is an artist whose work is informed by sound found all around us, from the whirling planets and stars of distant galaxies to percussion of an umbrella under coastal rains, to the perpetual moving birdsong of the never ending dawn chorus, constantly circling the globe. The richly imaginative visual textures to his sound design have found kinship in the theatre, film and dance worlds, where he has been celebrated by multiple Jessie and Leo Award nominations. He believes in art’s ability to reimagine futures, to repurpose aesthetic freedoms toward civil and environmental justice. His distinct approach uses traditional and emergent sonic practices to create compositions that express the vast spectrum of the human experience. Singh’s artistic impulses gravitates in many directions, his previous works range from the ambient audio-visual worlds of the Polyphonic Garden to Jhalaak, a Sufi hip-hop album made alongside Manganiyar musicians recorded in the clay huts of the Thar desert in Rajasthan India, reinterpreting 13th century Sufi poetry.
