Mission Two

(Clipped from Rolling Stone 130, March 15, 1973, p. 12)

MANSA DREAMS OF A BLACK PLANET

The Oakland funk-rock pioneers' 4th LP is a bubbly odyssey through a hidden Black history.

By Ben Fong-Torres

"The first explorers from outside America to set foot in what's now Oaktown were Black. They were sailors from Gabon who sailed around Tierra del Fuego to trade with the Ohlone People in the year 613 After Hijra. That's the lost history. That's the true history."

Conversations with E.L. Moore, charismatic trumpeter, vocalist, composer and overall bandleader for the massive 13-person Oakland psychedelic soul collective Mansa (named after the medieval emperors of Mali) really do go like this, with Moore bubbling over and bouncing from one esoteric topic to another. It's the secret sub-Saharan linguistic codes embedded within Egyptian hieroglyphics one minute, the forgotten sea journeys of West African navies to visit ancient America the next. Inside Moore's head is an entire history of the world, one where white Europeans lived in a barbaric backwater while African explorers traded with (and yet refused to colonize, Moore makes sure to note) the rest of the world. But it's no science fiction story to Moore and his bandmates in Mansa. It's more an article of faith.

"We know this history is a lie," Moore says, as we sit outside a soul food joint in his longtime Oakland neighborhood, Lower Bottoms. "We walk through this world the white man created and ask if it's always been this way and why. Well, it's not only not always been this way, but even now we know there's another history, sideways from this one, where the Black man is king. Where the Indian was never massacred by the white man's weapons and diseases. Where the yellow man was never hooked on the white man's drugs, bombed with napalm and A-bombs. We aim to find that history and if we can't find it, we'll motherfucking create it."

Unlike the cosmic voyages to Saturn, UFOs, and voices from beyond channeled by artists like Sun Ra, Moore's mythology is far more earth-bound. It's Moore's belief that the real history of Black humanity on planet Earth has been systematically hijacked and hidden by white people, that the various Black empires of sub-Saharan Africa ruled their subjects with benevolence and had nothing but peace and goodwill for all the other peoples of the world. And it is with his music, especially Mansa's upcoming fourth album Ikenga that he hopes to awaken Black Americans in 1973 to this ancient history.

"You can say there's no historical record of African visits to China, India, America: well I ask you who wrote that history? In his Pedagogy of the Oppressed, Brother Paulo [Friere] says it's human beings who both create and are the Subject of history. Black people in this country get to do neither. We aim to change that, on wax."

Mansa have been a Bay Area dance hall favorite since they emerged onto the scene in 1970 with their self-titled debut "wax." Their bold and brassy sound hearkens back to the Big Band era (Moore's parents, both local jazz musicians themselves, named "E.L." after Edward "Duke" Ellington and Louis Armstrong), but with a generous slab of funk on top (the band boasts three full-time percussionists). That first album was a trippy post-Summer-of-Love experiment in soul psychedelia, sounding more Dead than Duke. But evident even back then was Moore's thematic love of astrology, magic, and the beginnings of his obsession with "true" African history.

Mansa signed to a major label, Warner, after that first album was released on local Black-owned label Dominoe. Moore negotiated the deal so that Dominoe, owned by old family friend Josh Williams, would receive funding and support from Warner, and would co-release all of Mansa's albums, including Ikenga, their fourth full-length, coming out nationwide April 3. It's a stew of brassy funk and African rhythms and instrumentation. The entirety of side A is given over to a sixteen-minute, multiple-movement jam called "Ukerewe," the Swahili name for Lake Victoria. It's a suitably aquatic odyssey full of fuzzy Hammond organ, muted horns, and bubbling bass, driven by an insistent onrushing backbeat. Miles and Sly and Herbie are clear influences, but Mansa is charting its own path forward. This isn't head music to be listened to privately, this is resolutely party music, bandstand music, community music... neo-swing.

"[Ikenga] is named after a horned Nigerian totem, it represents power and competence and community," Moore says, "plus I'm a Taurus, so I dig the symbology." The cover art is being done by renowned West German surrealist artist Sebastian Keiner. "He's a real cool cat, a very sympatico cat," Moore says of Keiner, who is showing an exhibit of his Middle Eastern-inspired installation art at the Asian Art wing of the de Young Museum in San Francisco. "He's been a big part of the visual element of this and our last album. He shares Mansa's vision of a better world, and what's even better, he can paint it."

As Moore and I walked through Lower Bottoms across to the Acorn Housing Projects, observing the effects of a decade of well-meaning urban neglect, talk of a better world turns sour. "I never could understand the cruelty," Moore says. "I get not wanting to share—I don't agree with it, but I get it—but the idea that we're animals to be penned up in a cage, it's not human. I can't understand it."

Moore's activism is no secret in this neighborhood; he regularly helps organize block parties and community activities like baseball leagues. More controversial is a young Moore's involvement in the activities of the Black Panther Party. "Shit, it's no secret, and it's no ancient history," Moore says about his two years as a member of the Black Nationalist organization's "Ministry of Education." "See, I already taught music to kids in the neighborhood—horns, piano, guitar, even voice lessons—and when I saw the righteousness of the Panthers' approach to education, I signed up to help feed and teach the kids." But soon the group had splintered, with police violence killing prominent Panthers like Fred Hampton and internecine squabbles killing both Panthers and innocent bystanders. "I was against the violence, but trust me: none of that shit was coming from inside the organization. The cops and their provocateurs caused all that violence." Still, Moore left the Panthers in 1970 and within weeks had brought together the core of what would become Mansa.

One of those block parties will be happening the weekend before the release of the new album. There's going to be an outdoor listening party for the new album, live performances by up and coming West Oakland musicians (the young musicians will split the gate receipts with a library literacy drive and a local "food bank"), and the unveiling of Keiner's cover art in its full form: an 30-foot long, 10-foot high tapestry depicting a Black capital city in that "sideways" 1973. Moore smiles when he describes the painting and the idea behind it.

"It's the same city that I see in my dreams. The float-cars that jet from tower to tower are powered by the sun. The traditional totems and statues on the skyline are giant robots that help Black humanity build beautiful homes for everyone. The fields are green, the children fed and strong and healthy, the Black women and men proud. It's where I want to go," Moore says, nodding to himself, "but more importantly it's what I want to make. Right here." With a copy of that LP in every record shop in America, one could say Mansa is getting closer to that dream being a reality.

(Carbon copy from files of FBI Field Office, San Francisco)

TO: DIRECTOR, FBI (100-448006) DATE: 2/16/70
FROM: SAC SAN FRANCISCO
COUNTERINTELLIGENCE PROGRAM
BLACK NATIONALIST - HATE GROUPS
RACIAL INTELLIGENCE
BLACK PANTHER PARTY (BPP)
FILE on subject EDWARD LOUIS ("E.L.") MOORE
DOB 4/30/47

Subject MOORE was born in Oakland California in 1947 to ARTHUR MOORE, a jazz musician and leftist fellow traveler, and CINTHIA MOORE (née JOHNSON), a jazz vocalist. Subject MOORE is an only child. He attended local Oakland schools, excelling in music from an early age. MOORE's draft status was determined 4-F in June 1965 due to a mild case of infantile paralysis (poliomyelitis). MOORE became a practicing musician and instructor upon graduation from McClymonds High School. Before 1968, had no known affiliations with Black Nationalism or gangs; no arrest sheet.

In 1968 Subject MOORE fell into orbit of BPP "Minister of Education" Raymond HEWITT, became a volunteer for BPP educational programs and Free Breakfast for School Children Program in 1969. In May of 1969, Agent [REDACTED] approached Subject MOORE to become a confidential informant for law enforcement (Agent [REDACTED] posed as an Oakland PD intelligence officer) due to his stable, law-abiding history. Agent [REDACTED]'s offer was, "to just let us know if the Panthers start moving weight (i.e., narcotics) or guns; we both know we don't want the kids to get hurt." Subject MOORE dismissed Agent [REDACTED], saying, "I'm not going to let them do that, but I'm not about to become a [Uncle] Tom either." Subject MOORE remained close to HEWITT and the BPP until the death of BPP Deputy Chairman Fred HAMPTON in December 1969. Agent [REDACTED] made contact yet again in January 1970 to see if Subject MOORE was interested in becoming a CI under the new circumstances and was rebuffed once more. Subject MOORE should be considered a possible witness in investigations and/or legal proceedings against BPP going forward, but should no longer be approached for recruitment as a confidential informant.

Mansa Discography

Studio LPs

Mansa, 1970

A debut album with one foot in the psychedelic '60s and one in the funky '70s, Mansa's self-titled LP from 1970 is a meditation on paradise, fusing American traditions of utopianism going back hundreds of years through the gospel tradition with the by-then curdling dreams of late-'60s revolution.

Song of the Griot, 1971

Mansa's afrocentrism came to the fore on their sophomore release, with more African instrumentation, rhythms, and themes making their way into the psychedelic stew. Minor local Bay Area radio hit with "Open the Cage," the second single, a harder-hitting fuzzed-out funk jam.

Mirrored Sky, 1972

First album to feature cover art from West German surrealist Sebastian Keiner, Warner famously paid handsomely for reflective material to be used as the titular "mirrored sky" on the cover's surrealist landscape painting on the album's first printing.

Ikenga, 1973

Singles

"Easy Times" b/w "Treasure," 1970
"A Singing Heart" b/w "Golden Dusk," 1971
"Open the Cage" b/w "The Lioness" 1971
"Khalam Groove" b/w "Balhib's Riddle," 1972
"Ukerewe (Movement 2)" b/w "Muddy Funk," 1973

Personnel (constant across all four albums with occasional local guest musicians)

Lillian Macy: vocals
Loretta Wise: vocals
Deanne Wrentham: vocals
Clive Xasan: tenor saxophone, percussion, vocals
Ralph Dorty: clarinet, flute, alto saxophone
Edwin Bryson: trombone, percussion, guitar, vocals
E.L. Moore: trumpet, congas, percussion, vocals
Charlie Nash: organ, vibes, piano, synthesizer, percussion, clavinet, vocals
Bernard Thandeka: bass, acoustic guitar, percussion, vocals, piano
Memphis Harlow: lead guitar, percussion, vocals
Roderick Jones: drums, percussion, vocals
Cordell Miley: vocals, congas, percussion
Tommy Michaels: vocals, drums, kalimba

Ed Douglas: Production