Tony Allen ft: Skepta - Cosmosis + There Is No End (Album Announcement)

“I play yours, you play mine. The music never ends.” The wisdom of Tony's words was as deep as his grooves, and these two sentences, which announce the dozen songs that follow, truly capture the spirit of There is No End (out 30.04.2021). For a man “born into rhythms,” the thousands of grooves he recorded, the innumerable more he performed on stages the world over, the collaborations from Fela and Ginger Baker half a century ago to Damon Albarn and Bernard Purdie today, all make it clear that while the album before you marks the coda of a legendary career, it will inspire generations more musicians, artists and fans who hear it.

Making that tradition even more alive was the fact that “Cosmosis” is the one song on the album that was recorded live with all the main instruments playing together. Indeed, the groove came together just as Tony, Damon Albarn and Nigerian-British rapper Skepta had finished tracking their collaboration, “How Far?” for the Gorillaz. Okri wrote the lyrics “in a way as a tribute to Tony because it was written to ask 'How do you absorb a cosmos or integrate a cosmos, enrich a world, infiltrate in the highest possible way and change the mentalverse, the spiritverse – it's by cosmosis.