Nazar will release his debut album on Hyperdub, titled Guerrilla.

Nazar is a 25-year-old Angolan producer who grew up in Belgium until his late teens, when he returned after the civil war. He’s now based in Manchester, United Kingdom, and has coined the term “rough kuduro” to describe his own interpretation of the Angolan music and dance style. He released his first Hyperdub EP, Enclave, in late 2018, translating the normally upbeat style to expose the uglier side of what he saw in Angola.

On Guerrilla, Nazar uses “rough kuduro” to sensitively examine and digitalise his family’s collective memory and country’s past, threading together oral histories, political realities, and, significantly, re-imaginings of direct horrors.

“A couple of years ago, on one of many road trips I had with my father, we talked extensively about the conflict driving through Huambo and Luanda in Angola [where some of the events on the album took place],” Nazar recalls. These memories along with his father’s published wartime journal, “Memorias de Um Guerrilheiro,” planted the ideas for the themes of this album, and it began to take shape over trips back and forth, from Angola to his Manchester studio.

Tracklisting

01. Retaliation
02. Diverted
03. Bunker (ft. Shannen SP)
04. UN Sanctions
05. FIM 92 Stinger
06. Immortal
07. Mother
08. Arms Deal
09. Why
10. Intercept
11. End Of Guerrilla

Guerrilla LP is out on March 13, with “UN Sanctions” streaming below.