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Originally released in September 1997 on Eternal Records and includes writing and production work from Ian Masterson and David Green, Xenomania (Matt Gray, Brian Higgins, Stuart McLennan, Tim Powell), Metro (Paul Barry, Graham Stack, Mark Taylor, Steve Torch) and DNA (Nick Batt, Neal Slateford).

This Special Edition 2LP pressed on clear vinyl, boasting the original cover design (originally by Gerard Saint), with photography by Steve Shaw. The original ten track album is presented over side A/B, while the three contemporaneous non-album cuts 'Someone New', 'Keep Up With The Good Times' and 'Coconut' are featured on the bonus 12" single sides C/D.

Packaged in a lavish gatefold sleeve with deluxe finish printing, each record is housed in a beautiful inner bag, featuring rare photographs and full album lyrics.

Together, they veer from pummelling odd time signatures and downtuned riffs into ascendant, widescreen climaxes that subvert tired black metal tropes.

Ballantyne is an in-demand performer, playing guitar for DEBBY FRIDAY's breakout album GOOD LUCK (Sub Pop), writing and performing electronic music as City, and performing endurance performance art with Chinese collective TRANCE. The result is an ideological and sonic crystallization that pushes Anti- God Hand's cosmic black metal into something still more emphatic, distinctive, dynamic.

First Vinyl Release for 1994 Britpop outfit Salad, fronted by Dutch vocalist and former MTV VJ Marijne Van Der Vugt (vocals and keyboards). Originally released on Island records as a compilation made up of their early singles , b-sides and EP material.

Comes with an exclusive hand-signed insert from Marijne.

Paul Kennedy (Guitar, Vocals), Pete Brown (Bass) and Rob Wakeman (Drums).

Supported Blur back in 1993 where they rose to prominence after a couple of EP releases. This compilation takes the best of their early years material. A must have for fans of Brit-Pop, British Alternative Rock and 90’s Indie.

140g Black Vinyl with exclusive signed print.
Features the tracks ‘Diminished Clothes’, ‘Kent’ and ‘On A Leash’.

Second studio album from MORTICIAN.

The Evening Sons wear their powerpop credentials like a badge of honor; crunchy barre chords, big choruses and multi- layered harmonies hark back to those halcyon days when 3-minute songs ruled the world.

Als 2017 Ilgen-Nurs Solo-EP No Emotions erschien, war die junge Songwriterin schnell in aller Munde. Ihr damaliger Slacker-Sound wurde als die neue Coolness im deutschen Indie-Pop gefeiert, es folgte eine Europa-Tour und Supports für Bloc Partys Kele Okereke und Tocotronic. Für Ilgen wurde ein Traum wahr, den sie von Kindheitstagen an geträumt hatte: Mit ihren eigenen Songs auf die Bühne!

Sie gewann Musikpreise, wurde zu Features eingeladen, ihre Songs wurden für erfolgreiche Netflix-Produktionen genutzt. Ilgen brach zwei Studiengänge ab, ging von Hamburg nach Berlin. 2019 kam dann ihr Debut Power Nap raus, das sie gleich auf dem eigens dafür gegründeten gleichnamigen Label selbst veröffentlichte. Die Kritik reagierte begeistert.

2022 dann also: Mit einer Handvoll Songs im Gepäck ging Ilgen schließlich mit ihrem Wahlproduzenten Jon Joseph in dessen Studio in San Pedro. Maximilian Barth, ihr neuer Gitarrist, flog über den großen Teich, Sessionmusiker wurden eingeladen. IT‘S ALL HAPPENING nun, das Resultat dieser Zeit, zeigt eine neue Ilgen-Nur, die herausgefunden hat, wer sie sein will, wer sie ist. Es klingt warm und melancholisch, gibt ihrem dunklen Timbre genau die Fläche, die
es verlangt. Und zeugt von gewonnener, hörbarer Reife.

Tube Alloys have made a type of record that is in short supply these days. A record that is untethered to prevailing musical trends, punk or otherwise, in either their native Los Angeles or further afield. It's in keeping with a tradition, sure, one pioneered by bands like Wire, Swell Maps and This Heat, who sought to combine the vitality of punk music with an omnivorous ear for the avant-garde. But Tube Alloys honour this tradition with their disinterest in nostalgia and their ability to cast an irreverent eye towards our present and - crucially - our future, rather than endlessly rehashing our past. In short, Tube Alloys are adventurous where many of their contemporaries are content to play it safe. In doing so they tick a lot of boxes for those with open minds and open ears, while simultaneously making sense of the innate contradictions found in any great work of art. Their songs are muscular without being boneheaded, clever without being nerdy. A dry Australian humour is barked with an American sense of self-assuredness. Songs end before you've had a chance to digest their brilliance, or they explode right when you think they've already peaked. And just when you think you're comfortably along for the ride, the songs disappear altogether, and the record's centrepiece abruptly takes shape as an oblique spoken riff on Time. And Time it is, for something a little different. Finally! If you are in need of refreshment, then look no further, you have found your Oasis!

All Analogue Audiophile 180g Vinyl LP!
Remastered & Cut to Lacquer by Kevin Gray from the Original 1961 Analog Master Tape!

Mastered with the Original Analogue Master Tapes by Kevin Gray at Cohearent Audio!

Impex Records is pleased to announce a new, audiophile HQ-180 LP release of Bud Shank's pivotal 1961 classic, Barefoot Adventure.

Featuring original compositions arranged by Shank for Bruce Brown's surf film of the same name, this is a swinging, hard-driving jazz session by six top-flight musicians at the height of their careers: Bud Shank (alto and baritone), Bob Cooper (tenor), Carmell Jones (trumpet), Dennis Budimir (guitar), Gary Peacock (bass), Shelly Manne (drums).

The original Pacific Jazz recording features excellent sonics and showcases Shank at his most adventurous, playing with an advanced confidence and sophistication.

Remastered and cut to lacquer by Kevin Gray from the original 1961 analogue master tape, this ultimate vinyl edition of Barefoot Adventure will satiate the most demanding audiophile and jazz enthusiast alike!

The long-awaited repressing of THE WARRIORS. This deluxe double LP features the re-mastered 1979 original soundtrack, in addition to, the vinyl debut of the complete film score by Barry DeVorzon.

Directed by Walter Hill and based off the 1965 novel by Sol Yurick of the same name, THE WARRIORS is the absolute definition of an influential cult-classic film. THE WARRIORS has permeated the landscape of pop culture, music, film, fashion, comics, and video games.

Waxwork worked directly from the original master tapes of both the original 1979 soundtrack and film score to bring audiences a brand-new transfer of every musical cue heard in the movie, for the very first time on vinyl.

Features artwork by Marvel Comics artist Dave Rapoza, Double LP 180 gram “Warriors” red and rust vinyl, printed insert, and deluxe packaging.

Repress on a new colour - Red/clear half-and-half vinyl with black splatter. Kingston-upon-Hull’s The Black Delta Movement return with their stunning new album ‘Recovery Effects’ – 8 tracks of immersive, groove-heavy garage rock released April 21st 2023 on Fuzz Club Records. Determination and a commitment to musical development are writ large across Matt Burr’s personal and artistic journey as the main creative force behind The Black Delta Movement. His most collaborative work yet, ‘Recovery Effects’ sees Matt recruiting highly lauded UK guitar-slinger and Little Barrie frontman Barrie Cadogan and bandmates Lewis Wharton (Bass) and Tony Coote (Drums) to provide musical backing on the album. With legendary producer, The Heliocentrics’ co-founder and drummer extraordinaire Malcolm Catto also helming production duties. “The album’s a love letter to the band and all the emotions that come with it,” explains Matt when talking about the period of adversity that led to its creation. Finding himself without his former bandmates following the release of their highly-praised 2018 debut ‘Preservation’ and that record’s subsequent live shows, the pandemic-induced lockdown periods throughout ’20 and ’21 initially gave time for reflection before proving to be a time of productivity. Giving Matt the breathing space to fine-tune the new songs alongside Cadogan before hitting the ground running when entering the studio in late 2021 – the band cutting the basic tracks live and Malcolm Catto providing invaluable input when it came to moulding the music you hear contained throughout. The results of this creative melting pot of such talented and seasoned musicians see The Black Delta Movement delivering that ring thing: a layered, honest and deeply entertaining rock’n’roll record. There are a myriad of moods and textures, whether on the garage-blues grooves of opener and first single ‘Fourth Pass Over The Graveyard’, follow-up single ‘Zip-Tie’ which explodes from its moody intro into punk-rock motorik, or the psychedelic slow-burn of ‘Hiding In The Tall Grass’ which manages to channel the likes of The Doors and Spacemen

A musician's life becomes a patchwork of places and fleeting connections. Playscapes is an inner journey from Estonia to Sweden, Finland, England and Japan. Staking out new territories for the accordion and redefining Tuulikki Bartosik as an innovative composer.

20 albums and 25 years into her recording career and only now does Thea Gilmore feel enough of herself to make the self-titled album that renews her vows to music - her first love. The album is released on 6th October. The album was entirely written, played and produced by Thea. Thea Gilmore is absolutely the record she wanted to make. In many ways the record she had to make. Sustained by the very public dissection of her personal life laid bare on her last full-length release, the stunningly intimate Afterlight, Thea's hard-earned reputation as one of the most distinctive, strident and bold singer songwriters of her generation propels her to reach for new ground and this new release feels like a great leap forward into tomorrow. "That's why this is my first self-titled album," she explains. "On my last album I changed by name to Afterlight and drew a line under everything I'd done up to that point. Not to invalidate it, but to put an end to the 'before'. It was a very inward-looking record that was rooted in the darkness of everything that happened to me up to 2019, whereas this album has its head up and is eyeing the world as a challenge. It's a logical forward motion - the emergence from the shadows of Afterlight into the relative lightness of Thea Gilmore - in a renewal of my vows to music; my first love. In a weird way it feels like a debut of sorts so it made sense to make it eponymous." Across 12 tracks Thea delves into the cracks between the paving slabs of life's big themes. She's exploring the understanding that comes with experience, choosing her battles and finding out who she is now. The stunning 'She Speak In Colours' is a song for love and loss written as part of BBC Radio 2's critically lauded 21st Century Folk project; while 'The Next Time You Win' with its simple piano figures and its collage of spoken and sung lines seems to both accept the way the world works while reaffirming the pledge to stand on the frontline of change. Thea is also excited to bring the album to the stage. She will play London’s Union Chapel on 12th October and then an 11-date tour around the UK in early 2024. Full dates below. Thea Gilmore has made 20 albums since the release of her first, Burning Dorothy, in 1998. The veteran of hundreds of festivals, she has sold out shows across the globe.

Northern California psychedelic sorcerers Carlton Melton are brain surfers, mind trippers, … “psychlists,” if you prefer. The band will take your head for a ride, occasionally rushing at superluminal speeds through a wormhole or gliding softly on a gentle breeze in a leafy glade. Sometimes your brain needs to rage, and sometimes it needs to repose. For a decade and a half, the band has yo-yo’ed, almost schizophrenically, between these two modes: walloping space jams with furious guitar solos in one hemisphere of the brain and ethereal, feather-light splashdowns in the other. Not to mention a track here and there that builds from the latter into the former. But with two new releases in 2023, the band has evolved. Whether psych rock or ambient trance, their sound remains driving, organic, and flowing. With the addition of Anthony Taibi (White Manna, DDT), however, the group’s metal freak-outs are Hawkwindier and their droning kraut trances are Spacemen 3-er. In January, the quartet released the playfully spacey Resemble Ensemble, recorded in Taibi’s home studio 3D Light. October now sees the band Turn To Earth, a work with scents of Autumn, a season of death and transition. The cover art evokes a vine-covered, electric crucifix. The sound is, well, earthy but also gritty and striving towards change. The album was recorded in Fall 2022 and now harvested in Fall 2023. Phil Becker (Terry Gross, Pins Of Light) contributed drums and percussion to a few tracks on Turn To Earth, recording the album at El Studio in San Francisco.

With Becker at the helm, the synths have become more prominent (“Cosmicity,” “Roboflow,” “Migration”) and the tone heavier on the doom (“Cloudstorming,” “Unlock The Land,” title track): several moments could even serve as background music for epic dark fantasy films like Conan the Barbarian, Fire and Ice, or Heavy Metal. As exquisite as Turn To Earth is, Melton are best appreciated as a live act: their recordings as well as their gigs are largely improvised – not so much composed as birthed. And yet their most recent tour ended abruptly and perilously. The group had to cancel its final three shows once members were admitted to Arnhem hospital in the Netherlands. Five years later, reinforcements have strengthened the band and restocked its arsenal of great tracks. After the rockus interruptus of that 2018 tour and the tantric tease of the intervening Covid lockdown, Melton have some unfinished business. An October 2023 tour is poised to set the freshly minted quartet back onto the stages of Europe and within the cerebral folds of its fans. Turn To Earth, sure … but keep your head in outer space. Carlton Melton is: andy duvall – drums/gtr; clint golden – bass; rich millman – gtr/synth; and anthony taibi – synth/gtr.

Rare Jazz-Soul-Funk Fusion From Milwaukee.
Originally released as a private pressing in 1982.
First Ever Vinyl Reissue.
Released in collaboration with the Numero Group.
180g BLACK vinyl limited to 500 copies w/obi strip. Non-Returnable.
James Dallas is a talented producer, songwriter and saxophonist from Milwaukee. He started playing the clarinet in Junior High School at the age of thirteen, during this time public schools would loan students an instrument who could not afford their own. James originally requested an alto saxophone but none of those were available. In 1967 he got his hands on a baritone saxophone…and it became his main instrument for the next 15 years.

Dallas decided to pursue a career in entertainment (influenced by his parents who allowed him to play in a professional R&B band at the age of 14) and was possessed by an exceptional drive to excel in music. James wanting to showcase his talents as a multi-instrumentalist led him to his pursuit in playing the flute, various forms of the piano…and of course all the saxes & clarinets.

Soon he started playing with local bands and solo artists in the jazz & blues scene, he even participated on several recordings (mostly as part of the horn section)…but things really started to take of when James (together with his brother Chris and his cousin Kevin) started the outfit Heavy Weather. Most of the other bandmembers where his friends and would later become regular players on Dallas’ two solo albums ‘Life Forms’ (1982) and ‘Here And Now’ (1984).

The album we are proudly presenting you today: Life Forms (1982) was James Dallas debut album. Recorded at Mauer Brothers’ Studio and completely self-funded with the help and encouragement of his peers and family. Dallas paid for all the recording time and the privately pressed 1000 copies of the album…back then he could not have imagined that decades later it would become a much sought-after collectible that fetches high prices.

On Life Forms James Dallas is joined by a top cast of musicians such as Earl Thompson on percussion, Myron McClain and Noland Clark on drums, Rick Lacey and Robert Walls Jr. on guitar, Jake Simmons and Kevin Whitehead on bass. Kevin Whitehead (who is James’ cousin and known for his work with Ben Webster, Ella Fitzgerald, Miles Davis, Sun Ra and Pharoah Sanders) also wrote a track for the album. The whole venture truly is a family affair because James’ brother Christopher can also be heard on keyboards and the album design was handled by his other brother Calvin.

James Dallas surely deserves the title of ‘multi-instrumentalist’ because not only did he compose the majority of the songs (and produced the whole album) but next to his trademark soprano saxophone work, he also took care of playing the electric piano, flute, vocoder and keyboards.

The six songs on the fantastic Life Forms album are a heavy mix of mind-blowing funk, fusion and Vocoder/Odyssey synth extravaganza. If you are a serious collector or a smooth jazz underground enthusiast, then this is the thing for you! Also included is the magnificent ‘Sidetrack’ song that was included on the Numero compilation ‘NuLeaf’ released in 2020.

It is with great fanfare that we proudly announce the return of the esteemed improvisational chainsaw blues trio Young James Long. Young James Long formed in Dallas in 2003 with a weekly residency at a local (and appropriately named) dive bar called Muddy Waters. PW Long (guitar, vocals) and Kirkland James (guitar) had known each other socially since the 90s when Long was fronting Quarterstick Records’ Mule, and James was playing with Tenderloin. Long would go onto make a series of incredible solo records under his own name and that of PW Long’s Reelfoot and James would play with Alejandro Escovedo (among many others) before their paths finally crossed again. They recruited Taylor Young (Hi-Fi Drowning, Young Heart Attack, The Polyphonic Spree) on drums and a raw, blues-punk-rock-and-roll band emerged fully formed, songs flying out of them with enthusiasm and ease. They recorded the You Ain’t Know The Man EP with their friend (and eventual Grammy winner) Stuart Sikes not long after. The EP came out via Southern Records in 2007, and thanks to the tasteful ears of the people this side of the pond, a European tour followed. If you saw that tour, you’ll agree that it felt like the band were really hitting their stride. However, here we are in 2023, so what happened? Answer: geography - the age-old enemy of creativity. One member left Texas and the others (being the extremely able and skilled musicians that they are) were perpetually wooed away to play in other bands. Everyone’s got bills to pay, right? And with that, things just kind of fizzled out. Long even insists he quit playing music around 2010. One of the most recognisable voices in underground music: out of the game. Incredible. Inconceivable.
Then, last year we at Wrong Speed got an email asking if we’d be interested in some new music Young James Long had been working on. We thought it might be a joke. They sent some mixes through, and it became very quickly apparent that it was anything but. Turns out the trio had started chatting about music again in 2020 (before the world had other plans) and had finally made their first full-length album Orogeny in the summer of 2021. Orogeny sounds live and thrillingly immediate, as though all obstacles between their delivery and your ears have been removed and discarded as irrelevant. There is no filler, no treading of water at any point. Amps buzz, songs teeter on the edge of collapse, you feel like you’re sitting in the middle of the band as they play and it’s a pretty sweet place to be. The album contains a whopping 17 songs, most under 2 minutes long. They don’t want to waste your time, or most importantly (after sixteen years away), theirs. If you’re familiar with Long’s previous bands, you’ll know he has a rare gift for pairing extreme volume with extreme tenderness and it’s thrilling to find that gift present and correct after over a decade away. And that voice – holy shit, that voice. He can go from a Beefheart howl to the sweetest country baritone in the space of a single line. In James and Young he’s found the perfect foils, a power trio of instinctive and soulful musicians able to conjure shining gems of magic out of the grit and the dirt. Young James Long is risen from the ashes – it’s a miracle!

Joni Mitchell Archives, Vol. 3: The Asylum Years (1972-1975) is the latest entry in Rhino’s ongoing, GRAMMY-winning series exploring the vast untapped archives of rare Joni Mitchell recordings — a project guided inti-mately by Mitchell’s own vision and personal touch. Joni Mitchell Archives, Vol. 3: The Asylum Years (1972-1975) will be available as a 4 LP with an accompanying book featuring photos and a conversation about this period between Joni Mitchell and longtime friend Cameron Crowe.

The collection begins with an early cut of “Cold Blue Steel And Sweet Fire,” one of two songs (along with “For The Roses”) test-driven during a visit to a Graham Nash David Crosby recording session at Wally Heider’s in Hol-lywood.

From there, listeners are treated to early demos and alternate versions from sessions from For The Roses, Court & Spark, and The Hissing Of Summer Lawns; historic live show recordings, including the entirety of Mitch-ell’s triumphant 1972 return to Carnegie Hall and a definitive gig with her Court And Spark backing band Tom Scott & the L.A. Express; and tracks from sessions cut alongside James Taylor, Graham Nash, and Neil Young.


















q 5. Sunrise Raga [3:41]

Throughout their legendary, decade-long run, the Shadow Ring were an enigmatic force on the international musical sub-underground. Before their disbandment in 2002, this shambolic rock outfit, formed by a group of rowdy teenagers in southeast England, left behind a mighty run of eight LPs, a handful of 7"s, and a spate of raucous live shows and cryptic zine appearances on both sides of the Atlantic, all which have bolstered their enduring word-of-mouth mystique. Beginning this year with the first-ever vinyl pressing of the self-released pre-Shadow Ring tape The Cat & Bells Club (1992), Blank Forms Editions is conducting a systematic retrospective of the storied group, including a multi-year LP reissue effort and a forthcoming comprehensive CD box set and an over five hundred page book. Recorded and self-released by the group's own Dry Leaf Discs in 1993, City Lights is the debut record of the then duo Graham Lambkin and Darren Harris_an assured arrival statement teeming with stripling angst and ambition. Lifelong chums Lambkin and Harris were barely nineteen and living at home in the seaside town of Folkestone, Kent, with few overhead expenses. The two were freshly employed as a forklift operator at a hardware store and an aide at a home for children with disabilities, respectively, affording them the time and funds to commit to a proper full-length release. Frontman Lambkin describes the album as a "microscopic examination of leisure activities, this time centered around a nightclub," a conceit surging through its lyrics, song titles, cover art (depicting an audience of cats and mice at the Leas Club, a Folkestone fixture), and flip side (replete with fictional bandmates and pseudonymous liner notes). On a recently-acquired secondhand guitar, Lambkin plays repetitive, brooding licks that form the record's backbone, weaving in and out of sync with Harris's free-form percussion and the pair's sing-song poetry. Tracks range from unraveling nursery-rhyme ditties to extended jams awash with Casiotone and toy piano noodling. The duo's musical hobby-horses work themselves in: the influence of Mark E. Smith's breathless deadpan, the headless outer-edges of ESP-Disk's back catalog, the eerie atmospherics of Hirsche Nicht Aufs Sofa, and the deconstructed rock tunes of the Dunedin scene are all detectable, although there is a sui generis quality to the Shadow Ring's artless temerity. "I've got to see and taste those city lights," intones Lambkin on the album's title track_indeed, this is a record of naked drive and pent-up desperation, and a shimmering glimpse of what's to come. For Fans of The Fall, Royal Trux, The Dead C, Shirley Collins, '70s British progressive rock, Dean Blunt.

Guitar Legend! Songwriting Legend! Producer Legend! Blues Brother & Stax Legend!

Like the first words of a book, the opening notes of an album can make you lean in. Sometimes it’s like meeting a stranger who later becomes a lifelong friend, or on rare occasions, a spouse. Please drop your stylus on this record and say hello to your new best friend. Hear the confidence, hear the tone, feel the vibe.
—Robert Gordon (from his liner notes)

As a founding member of Stax house band Booker T. & The M.G.’s, Steve Cropper was involved in some of the most important music of the 1960s as a player, songwriter, and producer. The following decade introduced him to a new group of fans as guitarist for The Blues Brothers, appearing on both their records and film. A two-time Grammy® winner and Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee, Cropper has been an integral thread in the cloth of American music, writing, playing and producing into the 21st century to this very day.

In 1969, Cropper released his first solo album, producing and arranging its eleven tracks himself. His backing band? While there is no actual record of who played on the album itself, Grammy® winner Robert Gordon’s liner notes point to his fellow M.G.’s, Buddy Miles, Jim Keltner, the Bar-Kay’s James Alexander, and more as candidates. From original tracks to its well-known covers (including The Beatles classic the release shares its name with), it is a tour de force of pure Memphis rock and soul.

The core eleven tracks now appear again on an all-analog cut, new pressing of the LP as With A Little Help From My Friends returns for a new generation to experience. The CD version contains a whopping eight bonus tracks, including four tracks not included on the original release and alternate versions of four that do. Add in Robert Gordon’s notes and this release is as much a history lesson as it is a timepiece of pure musical magic.

Sermon On The Rocks is Josh Ritter's eight studio album, released in 2015. Singles from the album include "Getting Ready To Get Down" and "Homecoming." According to Ritter, the album is "messianic oracular honky-tonk." Produced by Trina Shoemaker and Josh, the 12-song album was recorded over two weeks at New Orleans’ The Parlor Recording Studio and features Matt Barrick from The Walkmen on drums, Zachariah Hickman on bass, Josh Kaufman on guitars, and Sam Kassirer on keyboards. Josh Ritter is the definition of an experienced songwriter. After graduating from Oberlin College in 1999 Ritter devoted his life to a songwriting career, releasing albums independently and garnering word-of-mouth popularity. He eventually caught the attention of Irish- songwriter Glen Hansard (writer of the song 'Falling Slowly' from the movie Once) and was invited to be the tour opener for his band The Frames. This then resulted in Josh gaining international success, with his third record 'Hello Starling', becoming a charting hit in Ireland. His songs have been featured on the TV show Parenthood, and in movies like The Other Woman and Typeface. Josh Ritter has so far released 7 studio albums, is an author, husband, father, and is considered one of the best living songwriters by Paste Magazine.

The Mapendo album of the Mighty Cavaliers, up to today, has been shrouded in mystery. If you look at the original cover of this very rare Kenyan funk-infused album all you will find are the names of the engineer and the producer, as EMI Kenya omitted the names of the musicians and the songwriters. Digging deeper a rather sinister story of deceit develops whereby Mapendo becomes symbolic for all what was wrong about the Kenyan record industry in the 1970s, and the music industry in Africa as a whole. As this maltreatment of artists proved endemic throughout the continent, although little talked about.

One of the three surviving members of the Mighty Cavaliers, bass player Bonnie Wanda - who started his career in 1971 with Gloria Africana - vividly remembers participating in the recording of the two albums the band made in 1976 and 1977 - Fisherman and Mapendo - and how they, especially on the last album, got short-changed by shrewd record label executives. In the 1960s it was mostly Indian and European record bosses that called the shots and usually gave musicians the chance of a one-off payment for their session time and recorded songs or wait for - hopefully - a generous royalty check. In most cases records didn't sell more than a thousand copies with an occasional hit selling in the tens of thousands, so musicians were reluctant to register themselves with the Music Copyright Society of Kenya. Although without doing so one couldn't receive royalties.

'For two years the Mighty Cavaliers performed five nights a week at the Starlight Club for five hour sets.

The re-release of Mapendo, the first of the German Want Some Records label, is another exciting puzzle piece in the tapestry of groovy Kenyan music. It proves that there are still great gems out there to be re-discovered for audiences worldwide.

Text written by Michiel van Oosterhout

This Album is dedicated to the musicians
Bonnie Wanda, Rashid Salim, Vuli Yeni, Juma Waweru Njuguna and Athmani 'guitar boy'."