Abby Power and SamXVI Find New Meaning in What The Fire Couldn’t Take

Some records arrive with a story their songs could not have anticipated. Abby Power and SamXVI’s What The Fire Couldn’t Take, released on 23 October 2026, brings earlier recordings into a new sequence shaped by friendship, faith and survival.

The North West London rapper and songwriter’s press kit describes a collection of previously released and unreleased music and spoken word. Producer and engineer SamXVI selected and ordered the material, finding a thread through songs made across different periods of Power’s life. The collaboration is as much about what those pieces mean beside one another as when they were originally made.

Older songs, a changed perspective

Power explains on the project’s official Bandcamp page that the music was written and recorded before her breast cancer diagnosis in November 2025. SamXVI delivered the completed collection before her surgery the following year. Material already concerned with perseverance, gratitude and hope acquired another meaning as her circumstances changed.

That account gives the project its central distinction: these are earlier songs understood from a later point in life. Power presents the title as a statement about what adversity leaves intact, including love, purpose and human connection.

A sequence built around breathing

The ten-track collection opens with “Breathe Out” and closes with “Breathe In.” Between them are “Has The Light Gone Out For You,” “Sundown,” “Flashes Before Your Eyes Interlude,” “Problems,” “Count Blessings,” “Have Faith,” “The Constant Interlude” and “Ghosts.” Several appear as re-releases, placing familiar titles inside the larger sequence.

The official release credits SamXVI as engineer and producer throughout, with writing and vocals on the first three tracks. Power supplies vocals across the project and writing on the remaining tracks; hennessey_tk is credited as co-producer on “Count Blessings” and “Have Faith.”

Power has been writing and recording since 2010. This release gathers that ongoing practice into a collaboration whose context changed after the work began—and whose story she and SamXVI can now share together.

Listen: What The Fire Couldn’t Take on Bandcamp · Official listening links

Release information and project background supplied by Abby Power and checked against the artists’ official release pages. Photography: Arjun M Shah, used with permission.