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2LP
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TRESOR 380LP
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TYGAPAW (aka Dion McKenzie)'s first full-length album on Tresor Records, is titled Together You Gather All Power Applied Worldwide. An acronym of its creator's name, TYGAPAW's third studio album is a deeply personal collection of music building worlds where Black queer and trans siblings can thrive, while unifying dancefloors worldwide. The album unfolds as the latest chapter in TYGAPAW's ongoing techno opera opus, continuing to center the voices of Black women, which surface as layered incantations rather than lyrics. With the process of creating the album starting in 2023, as TYGAPAW (Dion McKenzie) was in the first year of their transition, the music reflects the intensity of that period, where they were experiencing deplatforming as a response to the shift in their physical appearance: Tracks like "M32 Riddim" and "Helicopter hovers over my Crown Heights Apartment" feature high-paced rhythms intersecting with intense siren-like synths to form demanding compositions echoing a heightened sense of alert. Yet throughout the album, relief comes in the form of TYGAPAW's vocal features, co-conspirators, and chosen family, whose voices are treated with reverb and echo, a sonic fingerprint that leads back to the pioneers in the legendary studios of TYGAPAW's native land, Jamaica, an important reminder that the past will always inform the future. Expect a bass that permeates your soul and melodic synthesized sequenced phrases echoing the dancehall eras of TYGAPAW's youth, reshaped into hypnotic melodies that glow over industrial kicks designed to command attention, reasserting Jamaica's pioneering yet often overlooked contribution to electronic music. In the opening track, "Can I Live", Precious Okoyomon's words feel like the beginning of a ritual. Ms. Carrie Stacks continues this thread of support in "Don't Panic" with heavily processed vocals on top of a beat that takes inspiration from another important ingredient in the antidote to the oppression of isolation: Ballroom culture. Echoes of NYC Black queer nightlife scene also permeate in the energetic drums of "Exorcise the Language of Domination", in which Julianna Huxtable's spoken performance complements the various movements and tones of the music. London's SUUTOO contributes the album's only musical collaboration on "B2B". The album closes out with a double hit of emotion in the form of "Effects of Resistance" and "Black Trans Masculine Experience". The former features South African scholar Khanyisile Mbongwa drawing connections that exist between Africa and the Black diaspora, whilst looking to the future and calling for a shared sense of community. The latter piece, an instrumental version of the piece which featured on the IMMIGRANT EP (2025). Gatefold sleeve; includes download card.
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