"Music hits our brain in a different way"

Damon Locks discusses his Black Monument Ensemble release NOW

I’m pretty in love with the latest Sound Off. This episode’s special guest is Damon Locks, bandleader for the genre-shattering Black Monument Ensemble. The group released the critically acclaimed album NOW in April of 2021 on the International Anthem label. It’s a viscerally poignant, joyous album created outside in the swelter of Chicago summertime at the height of lockdown, a tumultuous moment that coincided with the national protest movement following the police murder of George Floyd.

"Music hits our brain in a different way. It sparks emotion and it lives inside of us. It lives inside our bodies. It makes us move. It makes us tap our feet. It makes us sway our shoulders. We are engaging with music in a different way than we engage with language. So if you attach messages to those notes and rhythms we engage with them in a different way. I think that's why music is so important to our lives and our histories and to our movements."

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