LEILA ABDUL-RAUF: Andros Insidium, The Sixth LP From Vastum Member’s Dark Ambient/Ritual Folk Solo Project, Now Streaming; Album Drops Friday On 20 Buck Spin + Release Show Announced

photos by Samuel Foster

“…this is an angry album. It’s teeming with a rage that has been building in me over decades. There is also vulnerability, grief, awe, and the perpetual back-and-forth between hope and hopelessness…” – LEILA ABDUL-RAUF

Oakland, California-based multi-instrumentalist LEILA ABDUL-RAUF presents her intense sixth solo LP, Andros Insidium, now streaming in its gripping entirety, on the verge of its release on 20 Buck Spin.

Through her work across five Vastum albums, LEILA ABDUL-RAUF has been a sonorous contributor to 20 Buck Spin’s discography for more than fifteen years now. Concurrently, she has amassed an impressive body of solo work whereby she could showcase the full range of her multi-instrumental artistic and vocal talents. The label now welcomes that part of her output to the label, showcasing her darkest and most confrontational material to date with Andros Insidium. Here, she draws us into a ceremonial descent, through the architecture of shadow itself. Unfolding like a ritual text etched in obsidian, each movement traces the violent and sacred geometry of transformation. The presence and wisdom of the feminine divine looms throughout, as an ancient and uncompromising force, in conflict with everything buried, exiled and made monstrous by the machinery of societal pressures and unrealistic expectations. The album delves deep into the dark vastness of the psyche of woman: wild, ugly, vulnerable, and powerful.

Sonically, Andros Insidium is a mutation of the cinematic dark ambient, industrial, and ritual folk expressed in prior releases, now sharpened into something far darker, more narrative, and intimate. ABDUL-RAUF’s vocal work becomes a new focus with a wider variety of styles and characters, exorcising the demons of patriarchal fragmentation and revenge fantasy as lived myth. In its most potent moments, Andros Insidium suggests that wholeness is not purity or light, but the terrifying act of reclaiming everything that was discarded, learning to speak with its voice.

Composed, recorded, and performed by LEILA ABDUL-RAUF, Andros Insidium features guest contributions from Samuel Foster (ex-Saros, ex-Weakling), Kienan Hamilton (Cartilage, False Figure), Gregory C. Hagan (ex-Common Eider, King Eider, ex-Thomas Carnacki), and Drew Zercoe (Field Of Fear), adding to the album’s intense sound. Andros Insidium was mixed and mastered by Greg Wilkinson at Earhammer Studios (High On Fire, Autopsy, Vastum), with cover art by Justyna Koziczak, layout by Chimere Noire, photography by Samuel Foster, and calligraphy by Gregory C. Hagan.

ABDUL-RAUF reveals, “Andros Insidium delves into the deep, dark vastness of the psyche of woman: wild, ugly, vulnerable and powerful. Conceptually, the album is an invocation of the feminine divine and wisdom, metaphorically expressed through the Sumerian myth of the goddess Inanna-Ishtar, and her journey to and from the underworld, where she confronts and is murdered by the goddess Ereshkegal, and then resurrected. Largely inspired by Jungian psychoanalyst Silvia Perera‘s book Descent To The Goddess; It’s a calling long overdue for the restoration of feminine power and wholeness, fragmented and decimated by patriarchal systems. From a personal standpoint, this is the album I’ve always wanted to make, but for the longest time was afraid to – afraid of further marginalization and ostracization from communities that never understood or accepted the full range of my creative expression or the emotions behind it, but those fears are long gone. In lots of ways, this is an angry album. It’s teeming with a rage that has been building in me over decades. There is also vulnerability, grief, awe, and the perpetual back-and-forth between hope and hopelessness…”

Fans of Dead Can Dance, Diamanda Galas, Arcana, Amber Asylum, Jarboe/Swans, and Chelsea Wolfe, make LEILA ABDUL-RAUF’s Andros Insidium a priority album to hear.

**Stream LEILA ABDUL-RAUF’s Andros Insidium early on the 20 Buck Spin YouTube channel RIGHT HERE**.

Andros Insidium will be released on LP, CD, and digitally this Friday, April 17th. Preorders are available at the 20 Buck Spin webshop HERE and Bandcamp HERE. If you missed it, watch the incredible video for “Andros Insidium” HERE.

A hometown release show for Andros Insidium has been booked for May 30th, which will include a screening premiere of the video’s title track. June 11th will see ABDUL-RAUF performing at Stanford Center for Computer Research In Music And Acoustics which will be livestreamed on the CCRMA website. Additional shows will be announced shortly, including an East Coast Fall tour and more.

LEILA ABDUL-RAUF Live:
5/30/2026 First Church Of The Buzzard – Oakland, CA *record release show and “Andros Insidium” video premiere w/ Bat Noise, Godgifu
6/11/2026 An Evening With LEILA ABDUL-RAUF @ Stanford CCRMA – Stanford, CA