Experience the Yearning of Yonnas Abraham at Extinguisher: The Party

Over the span of several decades in the music industry, Yonnas Abraham has been the frontman for the math rock-influenced alternative band The Pirate Signal, a “goth rap” innovator as part of the hip-hop supergroup BLKHRTS, and a solo artist redefining dream pop for a Black audience. But throughout the years and across genres, the crux of his musical identity has remained the same: “If I were to say what I am, I’m like a sampler-songwriter,” he declares. “The thing that stood the test of time in all of these different iterations is that it was always extremely sample-based. I love making songs, and I love producing them, and I use the art of sampling to do that. And, all of the producers that I work with are heavily sample-based.”

Born and raised in Denver, Abraham released his debut solo album, FÉVEN, in 2022. He’s currently working on two follow-up projects: GIORGIO MICHEAL, named after both ‘80s pop icon George Michael and his own dog, Giorgio, and one as-yet-untitled collaboration with producer August Fanon. Last summer, Abraham dropped “Extinguisher,” the infectious bass-driven single off GIORGIO MICHAEL, with a fiery music video directed by Blake Jackson. On Thursday, February 12, Abraham is throwing Extinguisher: The Party at Two Moons Music Hall, alongside a team of creative all-stars and his newly-formed band, Yonnas & Yearning.

Framed as “A Party for a song,” Extinguisher: The Party expands on the track’s music video, which itself came from an idea Abraham had for a live performance series. “Initially,” he explains, “even before we did the music video, I always had this thing I wanted to do called ‘White Room Sessions.’ It would be me and a band performing theoretically a whole set, in a white room. And periodically throughout the set, based on certain lyrics and things, full-on live projection would occur and thrust the white room into a completely different context.”

He brought that idea to Jackson, one of his most trusted collaborators. “My only idea for the video was very much like the most atomic nugget of an idea that I brought to him, and he fully fleshed out,” Abraham recalls. “In this particular situation, I said, ‘For “Extinguisher,” I want to have the band in a white room and project fire onto us periodically,’ And he turned it into what he turned it into.”

After seeing the finished product, featuring Yonnas & Yearning performing covered in digital flames, he knew he wasn’t done pushing the concept yet. “Seeing that, I was like, ‘Oh, my God, this is actually super fucking potent.’ I kept looking at this music video, and seeing the full realization of that initial idea, and I was like, ‘I just want to do that again.’ So for me, Extinguisher: The Party is bringing that music video to life,” he says. 

Abraham enlisted a roster of his favorite local artists to help him create Extinguisher: The Party. R&B songstress Danae Simone, whom he calls “my favorite songwriter and recording artist in the world,” will host the evening and perform a few songs. DLZMKSBTS, who produced “Extinguisher,” will be doing a live beat set. Jackson will team up with Cosmic Dommy to handle the live projection, and artist Sky Welkin will be doing live art. DJ Precious Blood will open the show, then DJs Hex Kitten and Low Key will close out the night following Yonnas & Yearning’s performance. “They just sort of embody the world. They are very literally the people who expanded the potentiality of this world,” Abraham says of the team he assembled. “Somebody like DLZMKSBTS, who is a world-maker unto himself, if I put him in the same red room – I’m imagining red flights on him while he’s doing his beat set – it’s very much a fuller realization than even beyond what I had possibly hoped.” 

Live projection throughout the night will give Cosmic Dommy and Jackson the unique opportunity to basically “perform” alongside Abraham and his band: “Cosmic Dommy is the person I know to be the best at live projection. So for him to work with Blake, Blake is essentially taking that ability to make film, and do it in the closest thing to a live performance context. While I’m performing, he’s performing,” Abraham says, adding that the duo will be pulling from a library of filmed material, but it will still be somewhat improvisational. “For every song, there will be a unique motif that we’ve discussed and worked out, but it won’t be super pre-planned. It’ll be generally rooted in what he’s already shot, or is going to shoot, based on these conceptual ideas. Then in the moment, he’s going to be performing with it and expressing himself. That’s what Cosmic Dommy does. All of the resources, all of these different things may be at the ready, but how they choose to express them in the moment is reactive to the room.”

Sky Welkin, who designed the “Flame Out Baby” (an anthropomorphized fire extinguisher that’s become part of the song’s visual branding), will be doing live art at the event. “Sky was introduced to me by [DJ] Low Key,” Abraham recalls. “He said, ‘I see some sort of aesthetic continuity between what you have going on and what he’s doing.’ It was just this real vibrant animation style that really captures Black joy, or even a Black whimsy, that I just really identified with.” At the party, Abraham will be releasing merch featuring Welkin’s design, as well as a second design by Goat Witch Goods.  

DJs Hex Kitten, Precious Blood and Low Key are real fans of “Extinguisher.” “All three of them supported the record a lot,” Abraham says. “Hex did the remix, Precious Blood would play it at [goth dance party] Possessor, Low Key would play it at [his parties] The Solution and Goodness, and I got to perform at Goodness. So they de facto became part of the story.” Abraham is especially grateful to DJ Low Key, an old friend whom he calls a “50/50” partner in the event: “Low Key is the other person who helped me bring this together. We grew up together. He’s been there for all that shit. So one of the things that’s most meaningful to me is, through all these iterations, he’s shown me a degree of genuine interest, support and love. He is essentially an institution in building and throwing parties.” 

Rather than present this as his own headlining show, Abraham wanted to focus on the overall experience. “It’s not necessarily about the artist. It’s about the song,” he says. “A lot of times with the shows I’ve thrown for myself, I haven’t really been like, ‘This is Yonnas performing at XYZ!’ I’ll give it a name, and make it a whole concept, because I think fundamentally I’m just trying to craft the experience, top to bottom. There is a curation of the entire night.”

With the DJs spinning after his performance, the idea is to break down the barrier between audience and performer: “With the DJ and the audience, it’s much more symbiotic. It ceases to be this thing of, ‘I am the performer and you are the audience and you shall worship me.’ We’re all just going to be in some sweaty, dance-y ecstasy, just partying and enjoying being in the room. It’s more about the collective experience we’ll be having. So right after the performance, that wall gets broken down.”

Extinguisher: The Party will be the debut of Yonnas & Yearning. The “Yearning” consists of Brooke Young on guitar, LaShea Campos on bass, Franki Grinage on drums, and Emmanuel Calvin Luna on the synths. They’re the same musicians who appear in the “Extinguisher” video, except for drummer Jazz Dillion, who has since moved out of state. Besides the obvious alliteration, Abraham decided to call the band “Yearning” because he found it to be a constant in his music. “I’m going to be really honest. One time I was on Instagram and that was someone’s bio: ‘Yearning,’” he admits. “I used to just think about that all the time. Why did that hit me like a ton of bricks? It just occurred to me that whether we’re talking about interpersonal things, or political things, the core essence of what all my songs are about is yearning.” 

He defines yearning as “the space between what it is I have and that which I desire, and how badly I fucking want it.” 

Like all of his favorite artists, Abraham writes music from the viewpoint of “the yearner,” for his fellow yearners: “For instance, Morrissey is the quintessence of yearning. It’s the person who does not have what they want. That’s the narrative perspective all of my music is coming from. I cannot think of a single song I’ve ever written that was self-satisfied. What is for me is for me and I will get it along the way, but I am in a position of pursuit. That’s who I am. I’m a real fucking yearner.”

Whether it’s romantic or not, yearning is the undercurrent throughout all of Abraham’s music. “When I talk about Black liberation, I yearn for Black liberation! It’s a deep, burning desire. It’s visceral. It’s physical,” he emphasizes. 

Even his songs that do express joy stem from unfulfilled desires, like the next single from GIORGIO MICHAEL, “SPEND ALWAYS.” “It very much seems like I’m saying, ‘This is it, whatever is going on right now, I want it to be this way. I’m content.’ But I think that’s more like the crystallization of desire than any kind of recounting what’s actually happened. That song doesn’t come from a memory,” he says. He’ll be releasing the singles “SPEND ALWAYS” and “(USE) SOMEBODY” together, as he considers them two sides of the same coin: “‘SPEND ALWAYS’ is like that illusion or fantasy of that which you desire, and having it for a fleeting moment. ‘(USE) SOMEBODY’ is more like the actual abject position of loneliness.” 

Abraham will perform all three singles at Extinguisher: The Party, as well as favorites from FÉVEN and other unreleased songs from GIORGIO MICHAEL. Expect a George Michael cover, too. “I always like to do this one George Michael cover, ‘Fastlove.’ That song, more than any other song, sort of crystallized to me whatever it was that I sought to capture in the album GIORGIO MICHAEL. I’m not saying I did it as well, because I’m telling you, ‘Fastlove’ is one of the best songs ever made,” says Abraham, who adds that he was particularly inspired by the contrast between the upbeat funk sound of the song and its harrowing lyrics. “It’s like a fucking bop, right? A super duper bop. But that shit is tragic. It is deep. It’s basically this guy who’s just lost the love of his life, out there on the street, and we are in ecstasy dancing to this song. It’s like a beautiful ballad on a funky ass beat. That shit changed my life.” 

In his past musical lifetimes, Abraham’s performances were often fueled by aggression, but now he’s drawing energy from the songs themselves instead. “When I was in Pirate Signal or BLKHRTS, the shows were high-energy, and I think sometimes the high energy was just from the aggression, or the ferocity,” he explains. “Now when I think about high energy, I think it’s because it’s so boppy. It just bops!”

He hopes that Extinguisher: The Party will be a night of love, joy and community, even if the crowd starts off the night as strangers: “I’m imagining, even if it’s all strangers, it’s going to feel like a room full of close friends having a great night,” he says. “Obviously, I think a lot of people that I know and love will be there, but I don’t think that’s a necessity to have that experience. That’s something that continues to happen at the shows that I help produce. I’ve really noticed a communal ecstasy. There will be so much love in the room.” 

Extinguisher: The Party, 8 p.m. Thursday, February 12, Two Moons Music Hall, 2944 Larimer Street. Tickets are $20 in advance.