Shabazz Palaces’ critically acclaimed Lese Majesty is available now on CD/ 2xLP / DL worldwide from Sub Pop. The 7-suite, 18- track album features the highlights “They Come in Gold,” “#CAKE,” “Forerunner Foray,” “Motion Sickness” and “Ishmael.”
We’d love for you to read this fantastic interview with Shabazz Palaces’ Ishmael Butler and Oliver Wang for Bandcamp, where they discuss Lese Majesty, the creative processes behind the album, and more (see July 29th feature).
Fans can also hear Lese Majesty in it’s entirety through the Sub Pop Radio station on TuneIn, once a day, every day this week – beginning today at 1PM PST.
Shabazz Palaces 2014 North American tour schedule in support of Lese Majesty is now underway, with a show tonight, July 29th in Oakland, CA at The New Parish and ending on September 22nd in Boulder, CO at the Fox Theatre. Shabazz Palaces have also scheduled a European trek, which begins October 22nd-26th in Helsinki, FI at Supermassive Festival and currently ends November 16th in Munich, DE at Feierwerk. Please find a current list of tour dates below.
Lese Majesty is available for purchase from Sub Pop Megamart, iTunes, and Amazon now. The double vinyl version is housed in a “shark skin” embossed jacket and includes a fold-out poster, and an etching on side D. CD and LP purchases from megamart.subpop.com will receive a seven-inch of exclusive non-album track “The Palace Slide” and “The Palace Slide (Instrumental)” while supplies last.
TOUR DATES:
Jul. 29 – Oakland, CA – The New Parish
Jun. 30 – Los Angeles, CA – The Roxy
Aug. 01 – Seattle, WA – Neumos*
Aug. 21 – Washington, DC – Black Cat**
Aug. 22 – Philadelphia, PA – Union Transfer**
Aug. 23 – Brooklyn, NY – AFROPUNK @ Commodore Barry Park**
Aug. 26 – Carrboro, NC – Cat’s Cradle
Aug. 27 – Atlanta, GA – The Basement
Sep. 13 – Chicago, IL – Lincoln Hall
Sep. 14 – Bloomington, IN – The Bishop
Sep. 15 – Little Rock, AR – The Rev Room
Sep. 16 – Austin, TX – Red 7
Sep. 17 – Mc Allen, TX – Cine El Rey
Sep. 19 – St. Louis, The Firebird
Sep. 20 – Kansas City, MO – The Riot Room
Sep. 21 – Lincoln, NE – Vega
Sep. 22 – Boulder, CO – Fox Theatre
Oct. 22-26 – Helsinki, FI – Supermassive Festival
Nov. 04 – London, UK, Illuminations Festival at The Laundry
Nov. 14 – Berlin, DE – Kantine Berghain
Nov. 15 – Cologne, DE – Club Bahnhof
Nov. 16 – Munich, DE – Feierwerk
* w/ Porter Ray
** w/ clipping.
What people are saying about Lese Majesty:
“After countless hours spent driving around bumping the new record, we’d agree with those that heard it for the first time dodging lasers that Lese Majesty is the future of hip-hop, if we thought that anyone else was capable of doing something this revelatory.” [Lese Majesty] – Gorilla Vs. Bear
“These aren’t condescending “Real Hip-Hop” platitudes: this is a call to arms for hip-hop’s creative fringe to snatch the reins from a power structure more interested in self-preservation than the advancement of the culture. The soul of Shabazz Palaces is pairing next-gen sounds with classic brass-tacks show-and-prove emceeing, and Lese Majesty tugs those extremes as far as they’ve ever been pulled; that it never shows signs of wear speaks to the strength of the bond.” [Review, 8.2/ 10] – Pitchfork
“Shabazz Palaces have made the best album of the year…not so much a mysterious transmission from some unknown point in deep space, but more like echoes from the future ghost of our planet. Earth used to be here, where the music is, but now it’s gone. Planets can become extinct, but raps can live on, disembodied and numinous.” [Review] – The Stranger
“The lovely sense that you’re listening to an album genuinely unlike any other is pretty overwhelming.” [Review, 4/5 ] – The Guardian
“The Sub Pop duo cement their place as the most forward thinking act in hip-hop” [Review, 9/10] – The Line Of Best Fit
“Lazarro actually uses extraterrestrial language in his already cryptic lyrics, which, combined with production that recalls the rap-informed loops of Flying Lotus or even the Floyd-isms of Nicolas Jaar’s Darkside project, creates an endless-seeming atmosphere of synth trickles, distant drums, sinkhole vocals, and various stereophonic blip-bleep-bloops. Call it planetarium rap.” [Review, B+] – Consequence of Sound
“A zero gravity dreamworld with a galaxy of beats.” [Review, 8/10] – Drowned in Sound
“Raw, graceful tunes…”Dawn in Luxor” opens the 45-minute document with a line about “throwing cocktails at the Führer,” and the album’s title comes from the French phrase for sacrilege against royalty. The sentiment can be interpreted in several ways, with Butler lyrically protecting what’s precious to him — blackness, hip-hop, eccentricity — and going hard at oppressors… As melodic as much of Lese Majesty is, the words might be the album’s most important element. Close listeners will find brilliant inventions and plenty of quotable passages.” [First Listen] – NPR Music
“Shabazz Palaces are often as mystifying as they are mind-bending, but they’re in a class all their own.” [Review, A-] – Pretty Much Amazing
“The group’s 2011 breakthrough, Black Up, thrilled and flummoxed critics with elements of Phillip Glass minimalism, Brian Eno ambience, and George Clinton cosmic weirdness. On the new follow-up, Lese Majesty, the sonic bushwhacking appears destined to continue.” – All Things Considered
“…The laudable legacy of the past lays the groundwork for endless possibilities in the future, and Lese Majesty stands as the best application of those ideas within a unique musical ecosystem since Sun Ra. Monolithic and magical, the album exists in a fantastical space just outside the genre’s usual perimeter, keeping its references odder and more compelling, crafting an inimitably consistent musical experience.” [Review, 4.5/5] – Slant Magazine
“You could happily waste days trying to categorize the music Ishmael Butler and Tendai Maraire make, but you’d be better advised just to go with their mysterious flow.” – The Sunday Times
“An agreeably spacey and expansive trip” [Review, 4/5] – The Daily Mirror
“It’s a grander, more ambitious record than their debut – made in the group’s new studio, they “had the time and space to realise much more than we have before”. But it’s also a record that never spirals into pure indulgence: put simply, just like countless hip-hop classics before it, it knows that all the experimentation in the world doesn’t mean shit if the beats don’t bump and the rhymes don’t hit. Lese Majesty is rooted in tradition without ever feeling trad, and perhaps that, more than anything, is what makes it succeed.” [Album premiere] – FACT
“Hip-hop is constantly being tweaked and nudged in new directions, but rarely is it reconfigured as radically, and thrillingly, as on this second album from Shabazz Palaces.” [Review, 5/5] – The Observer
“Few words can do justice in paying tribute to a record that is one of 2014’s only true greats.” – Loud & Quiet
“Shabazz Palaces offer an ethereal conglomerate with a prophetic voice, a gutsy move that’s more than paid off here.” [Review, 8/10] – Exclaim
“It’s a much quieter album than its predecessor, more interested in fingering the tears and rips in its luxurious, ambient textures than Black Up’s intergalactic boom-bap. It pulses and shimmers like light bouncing off gold, burnishing Palaceer’s radiant visions.” [Review] – The Wire
“If you’re after blunted beats and wordplay that reaffirms your belief in rap as urban folk music, then you’re in for a shock. But for anyone looking for a mind-expanding trip to the outer edges of the solar system, these rap futurists are your guides.” [Review, 8/10] – CLASH
“Shabazz Palaces operate without paying much attention to any expectations of what a hip-hop record should be; as a result, this is without a doubt the greatest thing to happen within the genre all year, and likely to stay that way. It’s hard to disagree with the sentiment that Lese Majesty is the future of hip-hop, for that very reason.” [Album of the Week] – Treble
