Rupa & the April Fishes – BUILD

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Rupa & the April Fishes – “Build”
BUILD

San Francisco-based Rupa & the April Fishes are back with their third album, BUILD (produced by Todd Sickafoose), available now in North America and October 15th in the rest of the world. The ever-eclectic five piece band are known for their genre-defying music sung in a multitude of languages, from Hindi to Tzotzil to French. The lead singer-songwriter of the group, Rupa Marya, is also a practicing physician. The title track is an homage to Marya’s father, an immigrant from India who would tell her “If we lost everything, I wouldn’t worry. Because I know how to build.” In the liner notes, author Rebecca Solnit describes how the music on BUILD is a resource itself.

“Words and sounds are also tools, singing and playing music are also labor, and these too can help build everything again, ourselves, our lives, our villages and cities and democracies and dreams and loves…That’s how the music goes here.” – Rebecca Solnit

The album addresses many of the situations going on around the world during this heightened time of global revolution. “Cochabamba!,” speaks of the water wars of Bolivia. In Cochabamba (“City of Eternal Spring”) the people stood up to a multinational corporation looking to privatize their water and won. “Electric Gumbo Radio” gives a hearty nod to the protests for global change going on around the world and uses samples from Tahrir Square, Athens, and the Occupy movement in Oakland, California. Rupa Marya, Aaron Kierbel, Safa Shokrai, Misha Khalikulov and Mario Alberto Silva deliver a timely album dedicated to the spirit of people around the globe who strive for independence and human rights.

The band is currently on tour in North America before they travel to Europe, South Africa, India and Bali. They have been traveling with Benjamin Farher, the internationally recognized Permaculture designer, consultant, educator, activist and farmer, who is conducting an heirloom exchange in participation with the global action on the freedom of seed. The first ten farmers who arrive at a show with seeds to exchange get in for free. Check out the tour dates to see when Rupa & the April Fishes will be in your neck of the woods. Listen to “Build” above or on soundcloud and take a look at their first video from the album, “Metamorphosis” (directed by Dagen Merrill), on youtube.