Desire Marea - On The Romance Of Being (2LP)

Desire Marea’s second album feels like a threshold. On The Romance of Being moves with the gravity of ritual and the thrill of performance, the kind of record that comes from standing in front of an ensemble and letting your voice reach for something higher. Marea came to a lot of folks through FAKA, the Durban art and performance duo that rattled the fashion world and club culture alike, but this isn’t a club record. It’s a full-bodied, live-wired work that draws on spiritual jazz, choral music, and South African traditions to build a space where grief, ecstasy, and vulnerability can sit side by side.

What hits first is the scale. You can hear the air moving around strings, brass, and voices, the hush before a swell, the snap of hand percussion as it locks in with the drums. Marea sings in isiZulu and English, sliding between prayer, confession, and command. The writing lands in the body. Lines are carried by ululation and call-and-response, then answered by a saxophone that cuts through like a witness. It’s a sound that nods to church, to maskandi phrasing, to township jazz, yet it keeps slipping the net. One moment the arrangement opens like a sunrise, the next it coils into a tense, patient groove that refuses to rush the revelation.

Marea has spoken openly about training as a sangoma, and the album feels charged by that path. You can hear ceremony in the pacing. Songs gather people. They invite a chorus. There’s space for breath, for silence, for a phrase to land and be held. The production leans into those choices. Nothing here feels clipped or airless. Cymbals bloom. Basses thrum. When the horns arrive, they don’t just decorate. They carry the emotional spine, often in dialogue with Marea’s voice, which can switch from a near-whisper to a clarion belt without losing its center.

It’s easy to imagine this music filling a hall in Durban, the room leaning forward at each quiet passage, then erupting when the drums kick. That lived, ensemble feel is part of why the record rewards repeat listens. Melodic hooks do show up, but the most memorable moments are often textural. A bowed string that scrapes against a hymn-like chord. A choir answering Marea with a rising figure that sounds ancient and brand new at once. The drummer finding an off-beat accent that tilts the whole groove. You can map this music to reference points if you want, but it resists being treated like a collage. It feels rooted rather than curated.

Put simply, the album aches in a beautiful way. It sits with loss and lets rage burn clean, but it also honors tenderness. There are passages that sound like release after a long period of holding. Others feel like the careful work of stitching, voice by voice. When Marea reaches for the high notes, there’s no showboating. It’s about devotion, about giving the song everything it asks for. That’s why the choral elements are so moving. They frame the solo voice in community, which fits the themes of healing and belonging that run through the record.

If you’re crate-digging and you spot On The Romance of Being vinyl, don’t overthink it. This music wants room, and the low end breathes on wax. The quiet parts especially bloom on a good system. I stumbled on my copy at a Melbourne record store while flipping through new arrivals, and it’s the sort of pressing you end up playing for friends who swear they’re not into “vocal records.” They usually end up asking for the artist’s name before the second side. If you need to buy Desire Marea records online, you’ll find that Desire Marea vinyl doesn’t hang around for long. Plenty of shops that specialize in vinyl records Australia-wide have been reordering it because word of mouth keeps spreading. And with good reason. Among Desire Marea albums on vinyl, this is the one that captures the arc from intimate to grand without losing clarity.

What lingers after the final track isn’t just the power of Marea’s voice. It’s the sense of a world built with care. The arrangements respect silence. The musicians listen to one another. There’s a trust in the room, and that trust lets the songs take brave turns. You feel invited rather than impressed at. That’s rare. On The Romance of Being doesn’t chase crossover moments or force tidy catharsis. It lets the music do the work. Spend time with it, and it spends time with you back. That’s the magic. That’s why this album already feels like a touchstone, not just in South African music, but in the broader conversation about what a modern art-pop record can be when it’s made with a living, breathing band.