COLD SPECKS, “We Are Many (Revisited),” 2015

By Karen Bliss 5/2/15 | www.samaritanmag.com

Hands up/Don’t shoot/I can’t breath,” Cold Specks, a.k.a. Al Spx (born Ladan Hussein), sings on this powerful a cappella gospel/blues song “We Are Many (Revisited),” inspired by her own experience with racism and the killing of Eric Garner in Staten Island, NY. The track, which isn’t found on her critically acclaimed 2014 album, Neuroplasticity, is offered alongside another b-side to her new single, “Living Signs,” or sold separately. “I was in America when the Ferguson grand jury decision was announced,” the Somali-Canadian singer-songwriter tells Samaritanmag. “I was there again when it was announced the police officer who placed Eric Garner into a fatal chokehold would not be indicted. Many people, and certainly every black person in America felt something that day. For me, it was an overwhelming sense of sadness.” Buy the song here. — Karen Bliss