Multi-instrumentalist Leila Abdul-Rauf shares title track from upcoming album ‘Andros Insidium’

Through her work across five Vastum albums, LEILA ABDUL-RAUF has been a sonorous contributor to 20 Buck Spin’s discography for more than fifteen years now. Concurrent to that, she’s also amassed an impressive body of solo work whereby she could showcase the full range of her multi-instrumental artistic and vocal talents. 20 Buck Spin now welcomes that part of her output to the label, showcasing her darkest and most confrontational material to date with the new album, Andros Insidium.

On Andros Insidium, LEILA ABDUL-RAUF draws us into a ceremonial descent, through the architecture of shadow itself. Unfolding like a ritual text etched in obsidian, each movement traces the violent and sacred geometry of transformation. The presence and wisdom of the feminine divine looms throughout, as an ancient and uncompromising force, in conflict with everything buried, exiled and made monstrous by the machinery of societal pressures and unrealistic expectations. The album delves deep into the dark vastness of the psyche of woman: wild, ugly, vulnerable, and powerful.

Sonically, Andros Insidium is a mutation of the cinematic dark ambient, industrial, and ritual folk expressed in prior releases, now sharpened into something far darker, more narrative, and intimate. ABDUL-RAUF’s vocal work becomes a new focus with a wider variety of styles and characters, exorcising the demons of patriarchal fragmentation and revenge fantasy as lived myth. In its most potent moments, Andros Insidium suggests that wholeness is not purity or light, but the terrifying act of reclaiming everything that was discarded, learning to speak with its voice.

Composed, recorded, and performed by LEILA ABDUL-RAUF, Andros Insidium features guest contributions from Samuel Foster (ex-Saros, ex-Weakling), Kienan Hamilton (Cartilage, False Figure), Gregory C. Hagan (ex-Common Eider, King Eider, ex-Thomas Carnacki), and Drew Zercoe (Field Of Fear), adding to the album’s intense sound. Andros Insidium was mixed and mastered by Greg Wilkinson at Earhammer Studios (High On Fire, Autopsy, Vastum), with cover art by Justyna Koziczak, layout by Chimere Noire, photography by Samuel Foster, and calligraphy by Gregory C. Hagan. Anybody who enjoys the works of Dead Can Dance, Diamanda Galas, Arcana, Amber Asylum, Jarboe/Swans, and Chelsea Wolfe, make LEILA ABDUL-RAUF’s Andros Insidium a priority album to hear.

The first preview of Andros Insidium arrives in the form of a captivating and haunting video for its title track, a Tritonia Films production, directed and produced by Marcelle Marais.

ABDUL-RAUF reveals,

“Conceptually, the title track is a revenge fantasy of a survivor against their abuser through castration and sodomy, which in this particular story, is enacted by a vengeful goddess. It speaks to the rage-filled fantasy the individual has against an attacker as well as the collective rage caused by systemic abuse through sexual, political, relational, emotional control. The goddess’s acts of revenge symbolize a reckoning against patriarchal harm and an imagined dawning of a new age where feminine power and wisdom are restored – violent and unapologetic. Marcelle Marais and Co. of Tritonia Films created the video and did an incredible job, truly capturing the raw emotions of the song with scenes that are cinematically gorgeous and disturbing.”

Andros Insidium will be released on LP, CD, and digital formats on April 17th. Preorders have been posted at the 20 Buck Spin webshop HERE and Bandcamp HERE.

Additional videos and previews of the album will be emitted over the weeks ahead. LEILA ABDUL-RAUF has already begun performing live in support of the record and will announce new dates throughout the year.

Andros Insidium Track Listing:

1. Descent Into Kur
2. Stripped Before The Eye Of Death
3. Eros Anima
4. Senex Rule
5. Fractured Body
6. Andros Insidium
7. A Requiem For Ishtar
8. Return To Anu