‘Generation Left On Read’, the latest single from Murkage Dave’s upcoming album Brut Thoughts, opens with a scattering, pitched-up, yet hazy production. Featuring a spoken verse from KONOPINSKY, aka James Smith of Yard Act, the song explores millennial disaffection and disconnectedness of the present day, where hard work doesn’t pay and internet irony is all-encompassing.

“You tell em light work / Secretly you treat it like the World Cup final / And yeah we do a dance for perception / Members of the left on read generation,” Dave sings, with typical ethereality.

It’s a glimpse into an album which across 13 tracks explores a fractured British society, while finding pockets of hope in daily life. From the heroes & villains art pop of ​‘Swordfirght In A Chicken Shop’, to the introspective-yet-otherworldly ​‘RNA’ – written in the wake of his father’s death – the album cements the singer as one of the UK’s most incisive fablers, which he has consistently been since he emerged from the Manchester underground scene in late 2000s.

In October, Dave predicted on Instagram: ​“The offline world is coming. Quite soon a lot of us will move away from social media and getting our news/​entertainment through an algorithm.” It intrigued us, of course, as lovers of physical media. So we invited him to take part in Analogue Appreciation, our series championing physical culture in an ever more digital world. See his picks below.

• **Read next: **Analogue Appreciation: Searows

Mystery Boombox

I have no memory of buying it, but it’s always been in my house. I guess I inherited it from one of many guests back when I lived in Manchester. I opened up for Young Fathers at The Royal Albert Hall using the boombox as my backing band, walked on stage with it like at the beginning of Stop Making Sense. Then the next month I did the same thing opening up for Yard Act on tour all around Europe for a month. It’s served me well.

Long Walk To Freedom

The church I grew up in was a cult. On Sundays television, sport, secular music and books were all banned and breaking these rules came with a heavy punishment. In between church services I used to sneak and read Nelson Mandela’s autobiography at home while my parents were having their afternoon nap. My thinking was it was relatively easy to put back because of how prominently it was positioned on the bookshelf, plus if my parents caught me reading it how mad could they actually be? Been meaning to read it again now I’m older.

Chess Set

I fucking love chess. When I was in primary school our headteacher was a proper chess nut, I remember going to compete with other schools at chess when I was like 10 years old. My secondary school was a different story, such a racist place, and I was one of maybe fifteen black kids in the whole school. I remember going to check out the chess club the first month I’d gotten there and realising that hitching my wagon to these nerds while black was going to be a suicide mission. I always think about how good I could have got had I not given up. I’ll probably spend my dying days trying to get better.

Jean Dubuffet: Brutal Beauty

Seeing the Jean Dubuffet exhibition at the Barbican just after the pandemic was the jump off point for what would become my new album Brut Thoughts. I was fascinated to learn about this guy who was born in 1901 and died in the 80s, influenced Basquiat and Keith Haring, and constantly reinvented himself across his life. His Art Brut collection especially motivated me through the dismantling of the idea of art as a craft that required institutional approval to something which every human can make; championing prisoners, the mentally ill, and African artists at a time that their work would not have been considered valid.

Dean Blunt’s Cîroc Boyz: Vol. 1

Back when I was knocking about in studios finding my sound I remember doing a few sessions with my mate Mickey Lightfoot at an apartment in Dalston. I remember having a few chats with one of the guys who lived there only to realise years later that I’d been talking to Dean Blunt. One day he gave me a copy of this little black book he’d been working on which (now quite controversially) said Cîroc Boyz on the cover. Inside on each page there’s a scan of a receipt of someone spending a disgusting amount of money in a nightclub or restaurant. I keep it at the highest point in my house underneath my Bible & Quran.

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