Louca’s narrative begins with music we all know, albeit in circumstances that most of us can’t imagine. Born in Cairo in 1982, he started on guitar at age 12, and became immersed in the music of the MTV era, as well as such 60s psychedelic mainstays as Pink Floyd, Hendrix, and the Doors. These were pre-Internet years in a country with state-run media, so access was scarce, but Louca, just in his early teens, was able to rehearse with his bands and explore his burgeoning interest in songwriting. But booking gigs was almost impossible, and he witnessed older generations playing rock and metal become targets of the authorities. “It was a very, very depressing time to be a musician,” he reflects. In recent years, Louca has become something of an ambassador for his nation’s thriving experimental music scene, via two previous solo records Salute the Parrot and Lekhfa and an evolving lineup of genre-defying collaborations like the Dwarfs of East Agouza, his mesmeric unit with Sam Shalabi and Sun City Girls’ Alan Bishop. On Elephantine, his new Northern Spy album, Cairo-based Maurice Louca guides a 12-piece ensemble through a 38-minute masterwork that might best be described as panoramic. Elements of free improvisation, Sun Ra’s cosmic jazz, gorgeous Arabic melody, trancelike African and Yemeni music and minimalism meet in his wholly unique compositional vision.