London, UK based emcee/spoken word Artist/educator Christian Foley is proud to present his brand new album EXCOMMUNICATION

Excommunication means to be exiled from a community of believers. In simpler terms, it means that you have alienated yourself, those around you have lost faith,  you no longer belong to them. It is the process where a Christian is no longer a Christian. In a literal sense, this is a problem faced by Christian Foley, across this album, he portrays a man who destroys his own identity until he asks on the outro,

“How do you reverse Excommunication? / How do I become Christian once more / the little boy who laughed by the swings”.

Foley also plays with the phrase Excommunication and adds another layer to it, that is Communication with an Ex or as it seems, more than one. This is the album of someone who has gone too far, to the point that the bloody blindfold on the album cover, is Foley’s way of avoiding his own reflection.

Excommunication, musically, does the opposite. It is an album steeped in reflection. An inwards look, in excruciating detail, which not only leaves no stone unturned, it picks up every stone and casts it in sin and anger. The conclusion of a trilogy, following the EP’s of ‘Ex‘ & ‘Communication‘ – ‘Excommunication’ itself can also be divided into two distinct acts, three short of the Shakespearean tragedy that it is.

Act 1. The Club. Tracks 1-7. After the intro, which is some foreshadowing from Christian’s mother, telling the story of him mistaking a glass bauble for an apple and biting the shards of glass from a tree (a story of temptation and pain, replayed throughout), the songs are all about excess. ‘Girls’, ‘Temptation’, ‘Clubs’, It’s a story that’s evident from the titles.

“My mistakes get made with clubs, drove by drink like Tiger Woods”.

The production matches this, trap drums and woozy samples make for the late night storytelling.

Act 2. The Morning After. Tracks 8-16 The following half of the album is a change in tone. ‘Forgiveness’, ‘Mirror’, ‘Worry’, ‘Broke’, ‘Shadow’. The titles tell their story. After tales of hedonism. There is a reckoning. And the reckoning for Christian Foley is that

“Incidentally my enemy is glass, meaning my reflection when I see it I crack”.

In fact, ‘Shadow’, a center point of the album, has Foley rap battling himself:

“Yes you’re very arrogant, exaggerate your talent and, maybe you aren’t balancing good and bad Samaritan”.

There are clearly two sides to this artist, and both of them, like the album as a whole, exist in symmetrical opposition. Shadow boxing.

By the album’s cinematic conclusion, ‘Excommunication‘ has told a story of Icarus proportions, a swift drunken rise, and a slow agonizing fall. The drug-like arc of the album has a come up that is paid for with a brutal come down, and this experience sees Foley narrate shame, the loss of his loves, ruinous heartbreak, alienation from his family and on Suicide, the dramatic climax of the album, an attempt on his own life.

“In my Bedroom Church / I search for Salvation / for my soul’s recuperation / from my excommunication”,

mutters Christian on the redemption-seeking ‘Father’. A spoken word piece which weaves in all of the track titles in order, samples school children he teaches, an Italian prayer from Pope Francis on hope, Christian’s father and the voice of his Grandmother, drifting ghostlike at the end. The closing of the album reveals its true purpose. It is a search for hope, for recovery, and for a reason to suffering. As a sample points out, ‘Excommunication’ is medicinal, it is not a punishment solely, it is a means to reform who has done wrong.

As Christian says:

“To be reborn, I have to die”.

Christian Foley – Excommunication via iTunes/Spotify

Also, check out Urban Vault Interviews – Christian Foley

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