Kamara Thomas Announces Debut Full Length Album 'Tularosa: An American Dreamtime'

Durham, N.C.-based songwriter Kamara Thomas is readying the May 13 release of her first full length album Tularosa: An American Dreamtime. The musician, performer, and activist will debut the record in culmination of a multidisciplinary project nearly two decades in the making. Today, Wide Open Country premiered the first single, "Tularosa," which will be available on streaming platforms on Friday, March 18.

Tularosa is an 11-part song-cycle that chronicles the legacy of the Tularosa region of New Mexico. The territory - fought over for centuries by indigenous Apaches and Comanches, Mexican farmers, Texas ranchers, railroad capitalists, and now mostly a U.S. missile range - bears a chilling history that has become the subject of myriad works of literature and media.

Today, rich stories still permeate the land and provide a well of lasting inspiration to inquisitors. "My obsession with the American West began as a kid, faithfully watching Clint Eastwood westerns and reruns of 'The Lone Ranger' and 'The Cisco Kid,' on a tiny black and white TV," says Kamara. "The Wild West stories and mythologies embedded themselves deeply into my identity as an American and affected my identities as an artist, Black woman, and heroine of my own story."

Throughout the record, Kamara introduces an ensemble of characters akin to the communities who once called Tularosa home. Rendering a more expansive vantage than originally presented by the commonly accepted history, the project gives voice to a multitude of inhabitants that demonstrate the vastness and complexity of the American West.

"I needed a way to insert myself meaningfully into the story of America. As a songwriter and storyteller I get to do this - for myself, and hopefully for a few of the legions of forgotten and marginalized people who most certainly inhabited and shaped the wild, open, mysterious places and mythologies we associate with our American landscape and culture."

Kamara's study on Tularosa transcends musical expression. As the songwriter's interest in the region's history expanded, so did her use of various storytelling forms, with theater and film becoming fixtures of her creative output. Kamara explains, "Over the past five years I have been creating various multidisciplinary performance works as containers for the telling of a larger story."

Integrative pieces developed in conjunction with the album include the video "Oh Gallows" (2016), the public-space group performance "SOAPBOX" (2018), the video "Good Luck America" (2018), and "#9" a performance for nine surveilled social distancers that premiered at Shadowbox Studios in 2020. An immersive, spellbinding collection of folklore and creative assertion, her latest effort seeks to reimagine ancient mythology as a snapshot of present-day America.

This summer, Kamara will present a developmental performance of Tularosa as part of a residency at the Sante Fe Art Institute, in collaboration with the Band of Toughs theater company. Kamara has also been named a Princeton University Arts Fellow for 2022-2024 by the Lewis Center for the Arts and will begin two years of teaching and community collaboration in September. She also continues to spearhead Country Soul Songbook, an artist-driven media platform and production team that supports marginalized voices in the country and Americana sphere.

Tularosa: An American Dreamtime, the debut album from Kamara Thomas, is set for release on Friday, May 13. The single "Tularosa" is available to stream on Friday, March 18.

Photo Credit & Art Direction: Derrick Beasley

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