The first seconds of “States of Matter” belong to Ridley Road Market in Dalston, East London: stallholders’ calls, haggling and clashing music, the “accidental blend and clash” that drew Giuliano Modarelli to the place. Then Raag Madhuwanti takes over, a late-afternoon raga of North Indian classical music named after madhu, honey. Suhail Yusuf Khan, an eighth-generation Hindustani musician from Delhi, sings it within the raga’s strict rules, while Modarelli’s production sets dubstep bass and the four-to-the-floor kick of UK steppers dub beneath his voice.
The single’s title, “States of Matter”, plays on the physical states of matter and on what Modarelli calls “conditions shaped by power and resistance”, a description that fits Ridley Road itself. Trading off Kingsland High Street since the 1880s, the market grew from a handful of fruit and vegetable barrows into around 150 stalls, run over the decades by newcomers from the Caribbean, Turkey, Kurdistan, Bangladesh, Poland and beyond. In the late 1940s it was where the anti-fascist 43 Group fought Oswald Mosley’s followers in the street. Today its traders and the Save Ridley Road campaign are resisting eviction and redevelopment, and Modarelli dedicates the album to their fight.
Born in Milan in 1977, he studied jazz at Leeds College of Music before two decades of training in Hindustani music under the sarod master Buddhadev Dasgupta and his senior disciple Prattyush Banerjee. He co-founded the London trio Kefaya with Al MacSween. Kefaya drummer Joost Hendrickx plays on the single, alongside Aref Durvesh on tabla and Camilo Tirado on bombo.
“States of Matter” came out on 21 October through Bucks Music Group as the first single from Ridley Road, Modarelli’s first solo album since Englobed in 2012, due on 12 February. A new single will follow each month until then.
Stream and buy “States of Matter” HERE