Artist Q & A: Mustafa Rafiq

by Jesse Locke

Mustafa Rafiq is pictured with Takleef Ensemble, which they lead and play in.

An interview with Edmonton’s Mustafa Rafiq, in advance of New Works Calgary’s upcoming presentation of Takleef Ensemble. Mustafa leads and performs in the band.

How did you first become interested in music?

Good question! I spent a lot of time alone as a kid. I’m the youngest of four children, and there’s a 10-year age gap between me and the next youngest kid. I spent a lot of time on the internet and found a couple of artists I liked. At first it was really corny CanCon bands like Mariana’s Trench, who were the Canadian equivalent of a band like Green Day. 

You liked pop-punk!

100%. Fall Out Boy was the band that I wanted to stick in my veins. I grew up listening to that mostly, but also had one CD by a Muslim rap group called Native Deen. I sat around playing Runescape listening to that CD over and over again. It started like that, and then in high school some of my friends were in a band. I went to one of their shows and thought that I could do it too. I gathered people around me and we started making music ourselves, too. It really all started with Fall Out Boy.

Amazing. Was this in the early 2000s?

Yeah, it was probably 2002 or 2003.

Did you ever go to the Warped Tour to see the bands you liked?

I wish! I grew up in a super religious household. My mom is Muslim and she’s very devout. I went to a private school from grades one to nine, so I was there until 2009, and was limited in the amount of freedom that I had. My mom was very chill, but she didn’t want me to go to shows or concerts. I didn’t even know about the Warped Tour until it was too late. There were other bands coming through town at that time that were really influential for me, but I didn’t learn about them until years later.

How did you get into playing music? What was your first instrument?

It was a guitar. One of those Fender Squire combo packages. Funnily enough, it was my mom who asked if I needed a new hobby. I was in air cadets for five years, and I was super serious about it. I would go to all of these summer camps and training sessions. I didn’t do much outside of that besides watching movies and surfing the internet, so my mom asked if I wanted a guitar. 

I learned about five songs including “Smoke On The Water”, but I didn’t really take it that seriously. When I went to one of my first lessons at Axe Music, I was probably 13 at the time and the teacher couldn’t have been much older. He was definitely under 20, but I wanted to impress him. He asked me who my favourite bands were, so I said Weezer and Blink-182, and then for some reason I said Slayer and Metallica. Those weren’t bands I listened to, but I just wanted to impress him. He said “Oh my god!” and then asked if I wanted to learn a Slayer song, so he pulled up the tab for “Raining Blood.” I never went back to him. [laughs]

Who would you consider to be early inspirations, either locally or on a wider scale?

The first local shows I went to were artists like Doug Hoyer, Christian Hansen, and Jonathan Kawchuk’s old band with every member playing ukulele. It was serious indie stuff. I thought that was really cool. On a more global scale, it was Kyp Malone and Tunde Adebimpe from TV On The Radio. That was everything to me. At the same time I was really into bands like The Unicorns and The Strokes, but those guys from TV On The Radio just seemed to exist as Black people in what seemed to me to be a very white community. Obviously there were tons of Black and Brown people in New York making music, but I didn’t really think about how geography might affect that. In the Edmonton music scene, there wasn’t really anybody around that looked like me. 

There’s this video I go back to at least once a year where they play “Wolf Like Me” on Letterman. Obviously that’s their biggest song, but the energy they both had made me feel like I could be myself as a young kid. They’re just going for it. It’s so sweet.

I was a huge fan of the Young Liars EP and their first two albums.

So good. So fire. That was sweet, but also going to local shows when I was probably 18 and seeing people like Matthew Cardinal or Jenni Roberts around was really cool. It made me realize there were some people like me around here. I just saw them as people and less as musicians. I was basically in love with everything because I came from such a sheltered space. Everything blew my mind. It was so new and so inspiring. I became a promoter because I just wanted to help make it happen.

What kinds of shows did you put on when you were getting started? Were they all-ages punk shows?

I played all-ages punk shows with my high school band when I was 16, and that was really cool. But when I started putting shows on myself it was because I saw a really big divide in Edmonton. Not only was it an age or generation gap, but also a genre thing. Garage-rock bands only played with other garage bands, even though there were shoegaze and punk bands that would totally work. Being outside of it now and talking to you, someone who might understand this, I think I helped shift how people thought about local shows. It didn’t always have to be 30-year-olds playing with other 30-year-olds. I would take a risk and message popular local artists to propose things like setting up a show with a brand new band playing for the first time. The idea was always getting new people out so that someone might fall in love with the music like I had.

I loved mixed bills. They’re always a great way to bring different music communities together.

That was always it. I would go to shows and not see anyone I knew, or see someone that I wanted to be friends with, but they would be with all their friends. I would come to shows by myself, smoke a joint, and not really be able to talk to anyone. [laughs] I want to make friends and I’m not shy in that way. I’m always happy to present myself and say what’s up. But there’s a limit for everybody, even if you are a very sociable and excited person. I would talk to people who were older than me, who were all on bands, and who had gone on tour. At that point I didn’t even know what touring was. When I realized the reality of what they were doing, I was like “Oh, they were in the van together for two weeks and now they hate each other.”

They’re just driving around to shows in different cities. It’s hard, but it’s not a big deal really. Anyone can do it.

Exactly! That’s always how I would encourage new local bands. If you want to play Calgary, go play Calgary! It’s not that far. If I can do it, you can do it. I wanted to not only test what I could do as a musician, touring a little bit, but also encourage others to do it. Then people started doing album release shows on their own, but I realized that they would be just as successful as I would if I were the one putting it on. Setting people up for success is exciting to me, and it’s less emails for me to send! [laughs] 

How did you become interested in experimental and improvised music?

I had a really amazing turning point when I went to Austin Psych Fest in 2014. I was going there to see psych-rock bands from the US and Asia that would never play here. I think I had just turned 18 and was still living at home, so this was the first vacation I got to go on with friends. We landed at the airport and immediately met King Gizzard and The Lizard Wizard. They asked if we were a band, and we said no but kept chit chatting. Tunde Adebimpe from TV On The Radio was also playing a solo set that year with his project Higgins Waterproof Black Magic Band. It was him on his own doing vocal loops, and that was amazing.

One day my friends were lounging so I decided to go see some music on my own. I went to a stage in a covered tent where the band MONO from Japan were playing, and my jaw dropped. I didn’t even know that rock music could be instrumental, outside of stuff like Apocalyptica that I listened to when I was a kid. [laughs] This was a LOT cooler and it seemed a lot more authentic. They were communicating with each other while they were improvising. I had never heard music like that before, and it totally blew my mind open. It actually blew my heart open because it opened me up to so much more than what I was listening to at the time. Kikagaku Moyo from Japan were so good too. It’s funny because if you look at the videos from their set at that festival, you can see me in the audience!

I came home from that trip and looked up MONO on YouTube, and that led me to Jefre Cantu-Ledesme. His album Love Is A Stream was the next step. I was like “what is this?” I looked up videos of him and Paul Clipson, the visual artist who passed away a few years ago, and thought “OK, this is what it is. This is what art should be.” I was obsessed for years and years, and still am. Just the fact that he was playing guitar but it didn’t sound like a guitar totally blew my mind. As far as albums go that are monuments in my life, Jefre Cantu-Ledesme’s Love Is A Stream is a huge one. Paul Clipson was also a huge influence on my project Pyramid//Indigo when we started using a school projector set-up.

Did Pyramid//Indigo start around the same time as the Saw Whet Records label?

Sort of kind of. I started Pyramid Indigo with my friend Josh Tokarsky. We were high school friends and did theatre improv together, then started playing improv music together. It was actually pretty composed because we were inspired by artists like Tim Hecker or MONO where things have to be set. I probably hadn’t even met Ethan [Bokma] from Saw Whet Records yet. He’s from Ontario and moved to Edmonton. He started that label purely for his own output, and I think the first release came out in 2016. 

Josh and I had been making music together as Pyramid//Indigo for a little bit at that point. We had played one show in Montreal and played Sled Island. Ethan came out to one of our shows and finally introduced himself. He told me that he never expected to hear the kind of music we were playing in Edmonton, and asked if I wanted to play guitar on his new album. I said “sure!” I didn’t really understand what that meant at the time or how it would be literally solidified. I had never released vinyl before because it just didn’t seem possible. A lot of the people I was working with were a bit more punk or DIY. Instead of releasing records they were just playing shows and hanging out, which is super healthy too. I think that’s a great way to make work also.

Ethan invited me over, I played some guitar, and the album came out on wax. He gave me a copy and I was like “Oh my god, I’m on vinyl.” Then he just started working from there. The second release he put out was this jam space-rock kind of thing called Nebula Wave, then the Holy Drone Travellers records came out. Ethan is a very wonderful, open hearted person. He grew up in a very religious household like I did, so we’ve had some great conversations about that. Coltrane is his god, even though he went to school for guitar and only picked up clarinet a few years ago. He knows the theory and understands the instrument, and he’s dedicated to his practice in that way.

I was a huge fan of your last solo release, If I Were A Dance. How did that project come together?

New Music Edmonton! They paired three poets with three musicians. I’ve known Shima [Robinson], who’s Dwennimmen, for years through music and activism. She came over and I learned a lot about her and her family. Her mom is a sculptor, so they’re both artists but also incredible academics. Shima is super into linguistics, so a lot of her poetry goes over my head, but it’s heavy stuff always. 

After we got together and made that music, I realized that it was already a funded project that was ready to be released in some format. The other side of the album was a recording of a live show that we did. We decided to break the ice and just do it, and it went really well. The first cassette edition sold out locally, and now an Australian label called Ramble Records is going to release a second edition. I’m glad it’s getting another life, and I’m going to try to do an Australia and New Zealand tour. I have a lot of family down there because they’re from Fiji. I haven’t been back there in a while, but I have been there a bunch of times. It would be amazing to perform this music in Fiji, so we’ll see if that can happen.

Did the combination of improvised music and poetry on your last album inspire the formation of Takleef Ensemble?

Pretty much. I’ve also been listening to Mantana Roberts a lot over the last few years, and I’ve also been very inspired by Land of Kush, Irreversible Entanglements, and everything that Moor Mother is doing. Her records are so bonkers. I’m still absorbing everything she’s been doing, like the 700 Bliss album. I see people like Moor Mother, Mantana Roberts, and Robert Aiki Aubrey Lowe as what I want to be like when I’m older. They’ve all defined their practice and don’t need to stray. They’re being paid to work as artists in their generation. I don’t want to be rich, I just want to pay for my rent and groceries and make art.

I’m also inspired by the way that Crack Cloud interacts with the world. I know there has been some stories about them, but what impresses me is that they’re a band who I consider local that have been able to build a project out of more than musicians. I’m curious about that because I find myself burnt out on music all the time. I want to do this music and poetry thing, but I also want to do a group gallery show with the members of Takleef Ensemble. Everyone is a visual artist or has something we can do in that way. I want to see if we can reach different plateaus. I’ve done the touring thing with experimental music, and played a lot of amazing shows with amazing artists, but what else can we do? A gallery or installation show would be really cool.

When I was in the world of pop-punk, I just wanted to start a band and go on tour. Now that I’ve defined and established myself as a different kind of artist, the goals have shifted. Everything has changed in the last 10 years. I feel fortunate and grateful for that change, because it’s a lot more realistic for not burning out. I got COVID right before Sled Island and the band was still able to go and play without me. That was an amazing moment for me because it showed that the band is shifting. It’s very dynamic and open. Of course we always want the poetry to be there, but if it can’t be we can shift to a different kind of set. Maybe it will be a multimedia performance, and I’ve daydreamed about painting while the band plays. Now that I’m well enough known that people know who I am, it gives me the opportunity to try out some shit on a stage. 

At the same time, we’re not going to push it in a way that the audience can’t grasp. I feel fortunate that I’m not into harsh noise, because that music can be very alienating, and can make the gap between the artist and audience even larger. Yes, I’m into free-jazz and super skronky weird stuff, but there’s also an awareness that we carry. We’re not going to go too harsh at a gig if there are kids there. Maybe they’ll love it and become inspired, but they might also freakin’ hate it and have to leave.

What can people expect from your performance with New Works Calgary?

We’re coming with a different formation of the band. Parker [Thiessen] and Jenna [Turner]’s house flooded recently, so they’re taking a break for the summer. Sean just had to step away from the band as well. They’re going through a lot of stuff in their own personal life, so they’re going to come back to us in the fall when we record the album. It’s going to be Ethan, myself, Shima, and Joseph [Hyde Burbank], who’s our second drummer. He joined us after our initial performances. 

We’ll also be playing with Jairus Sharif from Calgary. He and I just met over the last couple of years. He got Ethan super into dub, and now Ethan has a shitload of reggae and dub records. The thing about Takleef is that it doesn’t need to be an Edmonton-based band. We’ll be playing in Winnipeg as well and also bringing Jairus. I want to reach out to someone in Winnipeg to ask if there are any other free music players who would want to join us.

For the Calgary show, we’ll be playing the set we’ve been playing recently, but reformatted to be slightly less intense. Sean is a heavy, precise drummer, so it’s different without them playing. They’re also an incredible mathematical drummer, and often play super far out time signatures that the rest of us usually don’t really follow along with. It’s going to be a very grounded performance. I think it will be soft, droney, and a little more free than what we’ve done at our last few gigs. 

I didn’t intend to be the face of the band or the bandleader, but because I brought everyone together and named the band, I kind of fell into that position. Now I have to move forward with that role and I’m OK with it. I’m the bandleader, but almost in the sense of Sun Ra or the Art Ensemble of Chicago. I’ll take the bandleader position so everyone else can feel like someone is directing us. Yeah, I’m arranging, but they’re not just my compositions, they’re our compositions.