The ambitious 2019 debut of Damon Locks’s Black Monument Ensemble, Where Future Unfolds, was one of the best Chicago albums not just from the past year but from the past decade. Last week, the collective dropped the single “Stay Beautiful,” recorded live at the Garfield Park Conservatory during Red Bull’s 2018 Chicago festival. Scrappers Film Group made a video using intimate performance footage from that show: it opens with a monologue from Locks, in the voice of a vulnerable patient alone in a hospital who finds solace in an anonymous message of hope, and ends with clips of ensemble members at home with friends and family, thriving during the shelter-in-place order. The song’s message of resilience and mutual support takes on new urgency and power during this pandemic.
CINNAMON by NONE OF YOUR CONCERN
