# Megiapa’s Everyday Afrofuturism

- Link: https://gumm.digital/2026/11/02/megiapa-s-everyday-afrofuturism/
- Published: 2026-11-02T00:43:09-08:00
- Author: NuCreative Media LLC

![megiapa portrait photographed by Sam Lee.](https://gumm.digital/wp-content/uploads/
2026/11/gumm-nov-02-megiapa-sam-lee.webp)

megiapa photographed by Sam Lee. Source: International Anthem. [Source](https://www.intlanthem.com/artists/megiapa)

_Some futures arrive in chrome. megiapa’s arrives in hand-built synth patches, voice
notes, improvised grooves, family, doubt, patience and the decision to trust the
strange little connections other people overlook._

**▶ PRESS PLAY — HEAR THE STORY:** [megiapa — Intentions on International Anthem Bandcamp](https://intlanthem.bandcamp.com/album/intentions)

## Earth is the mothership

_Intentions_ is the International Anthem debut of Ohio-born, Los Angeles-based producer,
vocalist, visual artist and linguist megiapa. The record arrived September 25 after
years connected to Chicago’s underground beat scene, where she developed alongside
improvisers, producers and musicians who treated electronics less like polished 
machinery than something you could bend by hand. That history is audible. _Intentions_
moves through R&B, jazz, funk, downbeat electronics and psychedelic beat music, 
but the point is not to win a genre-counting contest. The music feels tactile. Loops
wobble. Voices arrive like internal notes. Instruments do not simply decorate the
production; they interrupt it, answer it and sometimes take over. Pitchfork’s review
connected the album’s cosmic imagery to a more grounded strain of Afrofuturism: 
not escape to a fantasy elsewhere, but freedom imagined from where Black people 
already are. That distinction fits megiapa. Her future is not a spaceship leaving
Earth. Earth is the difficult, beautiful mothership.

> **PULL QUOTE:** megiapa’s future is not chrome. It is handmade.

## The bedroom producer becomes a bandleader

The album credits reveal how much of the architecture remains hers. megiapa produced
tracks 2 through 14, handled vocals throughout, and recorded the project between
Chicago and Los Angeles, with additional musicians adding bass, drums, flute, percussion,
trumpet, keys, EVI and vocals. The collaborators include Mekala Session, Aisha Mars,
ghalani of Greenwood, Ahmad Muhammad, Will Miller and others. That shift matters.
Independent electronic music often celebrates self-sufficiency so aggressively that
collaboration can feel like surrender. On _Intentions_, collaboration becomes evidence
of confidence. The producer knows when to fill the room and when to leave space.
International Anthem’s notes describe the project as a record shaped across years
of upheaval, heartbreak and relocation. Its construction is slow enough to challenge
one of the digital era’s worst habits: confusing constant output with artistic development.

**G.U.M.M. TAKEAWAY:** A DIY artist does not have to do everything forever. Sometimes
independence means building the room, then inviting the right people inside.

## Afrofuturism that remembers the grocery store

What makes megiapa interesting for G.U.M.M. is the refusal to separate big Black-
future imagination from ordinary life. There are cosmic gestures here, but also 
relationships, uncertainty, protest, patience and the slow work of returning to 
yourself. The artist’s official Linktree goes one step further: alongside listening
and purchasing links, it includes mutual-aid resources and a directory supporting
displaced Black families. That placement is not proof that an album solves social
problems. It is more useful than that. It shows an artist treating audience attention
as something that can be redirected. That belongs in a Thanksgiving issue. Giving
back does not always arrive as a charity gala. Sometimes it is a link in the place
where the audience is already looking.

## Please dream with uncertainty

_Intentions_ ultimately asks for something algorithms dislike: patience. Sit with
the record. Let the songs reveal themselves. Let uncertainty exist without immediately
turning it into content. The future, megiapa suggests, might not be about predicting
what happens next. It might be about becoming trustworthy enough to meet it.

**CTA:** Press play. Then follow one connection the algorithm would never have suggested.

### Resources

 * [International Anthem — Intentions announcement](https://www.intlanthem.com/news/announcing-megiapa-intentions-debut-international-anthem-lp-out-september-25th-2026)
 * [International Anthem Bandcamp — Intentions](https://intlanthem.bandcamp.com/album/intentions)
 * [Pitchfork — Intentions review](https://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/megiapa-intentions/)
 * [megiapa official Linktree](https://linktr.ee/megiapa)

[← Previous story](https://gumm.digital/2026/11/01/concrete-is-an-ecosystem-big-flowers-and-shemar/)
[Back to November issue](https://gumm.digital/issue/november-2026/)

Show Somebody: