“Superconsciousness is the highest state of awareness, transcending ordinary ego-driven thinking, the subconscious, and conscious mind to access intuition, creativity, and spiritual reality,” explains acclaimed Canadian singer-songwriter, guitarist, and composer IMAAD WASIF about the title of his new album. “It represents a ‘higher self’ or ‘soul’ level, characterized by expanded, blissful, and holistic perception. It can be achieved through deep meditation or calm, uplifted mental states.” The inaugural release of his imprint Voidist Records, Superconsciousness will be available on vinyl and digitally on March 18, 2026.
For any other artist, this transcendental explanation might seem a bit much, but for Imaad, this is an essential part of his being which flows freely throughout his music. With a career that spans collaborations with Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Lou Barlow, and fronting L.A. underground slowcore legends lowercase, his seventh album further cements his position as a visionary whose music expands beyond genre restraints. Fully realized and meticulously composed, its ten songs hold a warmth that feels familiar yet entirely new.
“I just want to clarify that this album is not a claim of having achieved anything close to superconsciousness,” he asserts. “I am searching for a path to try to get there. If anything, I’m just a mirror of the world and I’m attempting to project some kind of love between thought and expression. This album is a collection of songs that are simply meant to TRANSMUTE DARKNESS.”
The quietly anthemic “Believe” kicks off the album, his soaring vocals weaving in and out of a gentle piano arpeggio. Born from the darkness of experience, he chose to embrace hope, and it shows in the song’s pastoral lushness. “’Believe’ is a song of unification,” he explains. “I wrote it to honor the beauty of a relationship at its end and a decision to move towards positive change. In the last few years, I was going through a lot of personal upheaval and overwhelmed (like many of us) by a gnawing pervasive disillusionment with the state of the world. I felt it undergo a metamorphosis after I was displaced by the 2025 Altadena, CA wildfires. It became like a mantra to me. It’s taken on multiple meanings now, but you could say it’s about finding your love, your faith and your center after losing it amidst the chaos and the pain. But as I’ve said before, I’m a hardcore nihilist with a heaving heart and I heed the howling omens all around me.”
The tender and unguarded second single “Echoing” finds Imaad in a musical position he’s rarely explored. “In many ways, I think ‘Echoing’ is the most punk rock thing I’ve ever done,” he says. “It’s unapologetically raw, vulnerable and direct. I recorded it in one burst. Originally, I thought I’d capture it with a band but I decided that it was more powerful to keep it stripped back. I didn’t want it to be overproduced or hide behind layers.”
Recorded as a live piano and vocal take with Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ Nick Zinner on shimmering synths, “Echoing” creates an atmosphere of emotional tenderness. “It feels like a moment in a slow motion scene from Twin Peaks to me, a song you’d encounter in a dimly lit roadside bar sung by a singer who calls himself the ‘Dark Lord’,” he says. “You just happened to stop off there after getting bleary-eyed on the long journey to find yourself. I dedicated ‘Echoing’ to my friend the late great artist Silke Otto-Knapp, having written this shortly after her funeral. It serves as a reminder to me that every instance of joy is revolutionary.”
Written and recorded between 2022 and 2025, Superconsciousness took shape during a period of personal and global instability. In addition to touring as the fourth member of Yeah Yeah Yeahs for their Cool It Down album cycle, Wasif weathered the impact of the Eaton Canyon fire, which displaced him from his home in Altadena, CA. These experiences left a mark, but the resulting album is less a document of trauma than a testament to what can emerge from it.
Produced by Lewis Pesacov (Julius Eastman, Wild Up) who previously mixed Imaad’s previous release So Long Mr. Fear, the album blends early electronic influences, layered rock, and what Wasif calls goth-folk. “There were 34 songs at one point,” he recalls. “I wrote and recorded everywhere – hotel rooms, my house in L.A., at Bobb Bruno’s studio. Something about the haze of sleeplessness that comes on like a druggy film-it snags images and ideas from a distant but familiar place. When you can’t tell dreams from reality, that’s my hallowed ground.”
Recording sessions were woven between tours, with contributions from musicians Heather McIntosh (Neutral Milk Hotel) ), Nick Zinner (Yeah Yeah Yeahs), Dylan Fujioka (Meatbodies), and Garrett Ray (Vampire Weekend). The album was later mixed by Derek Coburn (Chelsea Wolfe, Willie Nelson) whose approach focused on preserving the emotional clarity of Imaad’s original demos which he explains, “The goal was to dismantle it and retain the god-spark, the origin source without losing the pure energy of the demos.”
Blending elements of minimalism, goth folk, Indian ragas and post-punk with psychedelic and exploratory guitar playing, Imaad has created a wide body of work that includes numerous projects (psych-rock mavericks alaska! and writing songs with Karen O for the soundtrack of Spike Jonze’s Where the Wild Things Are).
Superconsciousness will be released on March 18, 2026 via Voidist Records.