The Unstoppable Force of Rufus Mufasa
Thoughts on a new album from a singular talent.
In 2017, a powerful, urgent new voice burst onto the scene with a debut album that forced us at Wales Arts Review, no questions asked, to make it our album of the year. That Fur Coats From the Lion’s Den is now lost to the ether, chewed up and swallowed by some legal wrangling or other, is a great tragedy. It was an album of rare authenticity and articulated rawness. That its creator, Rufus Mufasa, has gone on to make two more albums is testament to her drive, but also, her need, to be heard. As much as those lucky enough to hear Fur Coats… when it came out can be saddened by its erasing from the musical history books, we must also begin to wonder why it has taken so long for a second full solo album?
That is, of course, unless you consider the reality. Mufasa wrote about her experiences as a freelance professional for Wales Arts Review here in 2019, just as she was providing the highpoint for The Pride’s album Magic and Molecules. She writes poignantly of the struggles of the unglamorous life of an artist.
… with me working full time hours, I still do the majority of the laundry, the shopping, the organising, the sorting, the sock matching, the folding, the clothes rotating, the charity shop bagging, my fair share of mopping, the plotting, the planning, the scheduling, the packing, the listing, 50% of the cleaning, the hunter-gathering, the Christmas nesting, party organising, the accounting… I still worry with my eyes closed.
I’ve turned up to events and people have gasped in horror -“Where are your children?” I give them an equally panic stricken look in return. People have commented “You’re so lucky that your partner cooks”, as if I’m living it up. Even in the trenches of parenting I still have to work, to meet deadlines, have to make difficult choices… and we have both thought it, although it has even been said out loud: “When is this going to pay off?” It is in these moments that I think maybe this is pretentious? Maybe I should just throw my efforts elsewhere… then I send the thing, the thing that feels impossible to get in on time, I get on top of the admin, and the invoicing, and the build up of emails and messages, and I remind myself that it is paying off; I’ve had funding to give me time to write and have secured other opportunities in abundance… but this game feels like a constant battle between blind audacity and crippling self-doubt, and in the chaos of our house, that we’ve made home, our way, on our terms, my girls pull me on to the kitchen floor, and I stop, I really stop, to play, and just be, until someone wants me to get something, or to do the laundry, or the washing, or the kettle I forgot I put on starts screaming… and I’m learning that sometimes the dishes can wait, but sometimes they really do need doing.
Personal strife has come after that album release and the penning of that article for WAR, but here she is, refusing to be a footnote in a book about albums that vanished.
You’re going to struggle to find a more visceral, beautiful album in 2024 than Trig(ger) Warning(s). It has Mufasa back where she belongs - as performer, writer, deliverer. Her book, Flashbacks and Flowers (Indigo Press, 2021), brought with it many of the hallmarks of Mufasa’s work and the preoccupation of an artist who strives to turn the domestic into poetry; but for all of its strengths it contained one fatal flaw: it was not performed by its author.
Rufus Mufasa is the whole package, and having just a part of her is better than nothing, but it is not the same. To have her back with this album, doing what she was born to do, is a cultural highlight of the year for Wales, and I hope she gets the attention she deserves for it.
Gary Raymond is a novelist, author, playwright, critic, and broadcaster. In 2012, he co-founded Wales Arts Review, was its editor for ten years. His latest book, Abandon All Hope: A Personal Journey Through the History of Welsh Literature is available for pre-order and is out in May 2024 with Calon Books.