One year after the release of her innovative and boundary-pushing first full-length album, ‘Strangers Love Me,’ Cincinnati vocalist Abiyah is set to perform in celebration of the occasion at a show at the historic Southgate House Revival in scenic Newport, KY on December 28, 2024 at 9:30pm. She will be joined by her Dayton friends RADAR, who will open the show, as well as Beth Harris (The Hiders, Heartless Bastards) and Dana Hamblen (Fairmount Girls, Culture Queer) on backing vocals on several songs. The FREE event will be held in the Southgate House Revival’s beautiful and welcoming first-floor Lounge. 

The Eugenius-produced ‘Strangers Love Me’ showed Abiyah (uh-BEE-yuh) returning to her new wave roots, singing more than delivering other vocal styles while also diving deeper into the avant-garde and experimental sonic waters that she’s visited in the past. “As a musician, you wish that your music has enough range and understanding to create a personalized approach to an amalgamation of various styles that speaks to the sum of your influences but still retains a voice that is uniquely your own,” says Beans of the legendary alternative/electro hip hop group Antipop Consortium. “Look no further than Abiyah.”

Abiyah is a genre-bending Cincinnati-based vocalist and songwriter whose sound is based upon a highly workable concoction: she fuses her punk ethos with her love of new wave and post-punk, trip hop, indie rock, alternative hip hop, dancehall reggae, floetry, and experimental noise with the fierceness of a free wild muse. “I would say my sound is like a curveball,” she muses. “Because you don’t know what you’re getting next.” Some of Abiyah’s ‘Recommended If You Like’ artist comparisons might include Santigold, Massive Attack, Portishead, New Order, Alice Bag (who appears on the album on the ageism-confronting track ‘Still’), Mike Patton, Thievery Corporation, Ari Up (The Slits), Kraftwerk, MIA, Sonic Youth, and Björk.

For fans who can’t make it to the show that evening, Abiyah will also have the album, as well as other merch, available for sale at the Southgate House Revival’s Local Music Merch Market on 12/8, from 1-6pm, in the Sanctuary.