Music

new music: afropunk member charcoal sketches of the invisible man de-stigmatizes aspergers syndrome on ‘humanbeyondrepair vol. 1” #soundcheck

April 17, 2015

Charcoal Sketches of the Invisible Man (known to some of us as Lightning Pill), has been an active and vocal member of the Afropunk community for years. The prolific writer and musician has been releasing music under various monikers since 2009, often honest, frank, and defiantly homemade. His latest record, part of his so-called Aspergers Trilogy, humanbeyondrepair vol. 1 finds the DIY musician opening up about Aspergers syndrome and inviting the listener to take a tour into his world view. The songs nod equally to Afrofuturism, lofi, and antifolk, all sounds deeply rooted in a feeling of disconnection.

By Alexander Aplerku, AFROPUNK Contributor

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The best tracks in the set are the ones where he holds nothing back. “Mr. Spock’s Illegitimate Children” and “The Anxiety Bridge” both open up about the feeling of alienation and disconnection. On the spoken “UTF1127 Speaks,” CSOIM talks about embracing and accepting Aspergers and demystifying and destigmatizing it. “Don’t be afraid, don’t be fearful of the overall idea of having Aspergers,” he says to anyone recently diagnosed. The power of this record is in his honest discussion of something that tends to be shuffled under the rug because of fear. By opening up, and reclaiming the term Aspies, Charcoal Sketches of the Invisible Man makes an important stand.

The record is free through bandcamp, so check it out. CSOIM explains the impetus for the album on his site:

“The reason I created humanbeyondrepair was my way to try and get into the mind of people who have Asperger’s Syndrome. I was diagnosed with this since I was 3. Since then, I have been obsessed with music (mostly, listening to it), and wound up finding out through the internet that there are many artists from Gary Numan to Craig Nicholls to Ladyhawke who have Aspergers. While the far latter wrote about her experience with Asperger’s, I felt like not enough artists give people a good idea of what it is actually like to have it. In this poses a problem.

The problem is that it would be impossible for me to try and write from various perspectives. (It was hard enough trying to stay in touch with the few Aspie people I know.) So, I kept my attempts to write songs about others to a slight minimum and settled for writing about it from, mostly, my point of view, in hopes that some parts of it matches the truth of other Aspies.

humanbeyondrepair, to me, does not mean I am broken, damaged, or anything of that ilk. It means that I think of myself as a complicated upgrade of humanity. You know how upgrades or improvements of certain products are complicated to people at first, but they eventually get into it? Well, I won’t sit here and say that I am a very simple guy, but I can offer you a cheat sheet, provided that you are willing to pay attention to it.”

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https://twitter.com/lightningpill

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