Citizen of Empire

Why this album exists.

Citizen of Empire began with the feeling of being continually asked to explain an identity shaped by three migrations. The questions sound simple—where are you from, which tribe, what kind of Indian?—but the answers lead through Britain, East Africa, South Asia, the United States, imperial routes, employment systems and family memory. Instead of accepting the narrow categories, the album uses wit, political hip-hop and historical detail to challenge the premise of the questions themselves.

I wrote this music to answer reductive questions in my own voice: with satire where the questions deserve it, and with history where the explanations have been flattened or forgotten.

NARRATIVE ARCSelf-definition → confrontation → imperial systems → diasporic intimacy → the final reply.