Vathres is the new project by Swedish-based keyboardist and composer Alex Zethson, who usually
performs with acts such as Angles 9, Fire! Orchestra Goran Kajfeš Tropiques, Sven Wunder and
Mariam the Believer, in addition to his own ensembles and solo projects. Record consists of three
extended pieces of cinematic, minimalist post-rock featuring a large ensemble and appearances by
guitar-wizard Reine Fiske (Dungen), keyboardist Tomas Hallonsten, former Meshuggah-bassist
Gustaf Hielm and Cult of Luna-drummer Christian Augustin, among others. LP comes in a Tip-On
sleeve with artwork by Michell Zethson.
Memory is malleable. The day you met the person you love, what color shirt was she wearing? At precisely what angle did the sunlight strike his face? How exactly did they glow? These little details are precious, but the strange thing is, the more you cherish them, the more they change. Each recollection is another potential touch point where stories can shift—each replay degrades the truth. Reality's rough edges smooth, with time. Objectivity is a myth: cameras and recording devices all contort image and sound. There's no way to know exactly how things were. And yet we still tell the stories, to try to capture how things felt, even though the truth is always slipping through our fingers.
Lemon Quartet's second albumArts Festseems to unconsciously circle this thematic territory. Full of loose, yet lush repetition, it seems to function like memory—each dizzy melody recalling and rewriting what came before, subtly shaping each piece as time passes. Not that they seem especially concerned with the passage of time anyway. They space out, they work in the realm of feelings, scribbling melodious abstractions that feel familiar. Rich with compassion, harmony, and gestures toward ecstatic—if not objective—truth, it's full of the sort of pieces that demand you return to them, but sound a bit different each time, new details overtaking familiar comforts. Are you hearing them for the first time? Or just for the first time in a long time? Either way, drift away, and try to remember…
Unrelenting and direct, Bristol's Hypothetics have a sound that pushes the four to the extremes. Produced by Mercury nominated Andy Savours (Black Country, New Road, my bloody valentine), this concept EP sees the quartet escape the stereotypes of young rock musicians today and instead they introduce listeners to a world of therapeutic escapism and cinematic immersion.
Talking about the EP, the band elaborate, "by fixating on sounds and images from the seventies American cinema era, it gave us an angle we weren't getting from the reality of rural Gloucestershire. We try to limit the effect the industry has on us, as it's easy to start doing things for the wrong reasons and become disillusioned".
Mixing song- structures with open- ended ambient compositions, melodies with sound- collage, the seven individual tracks invoke a range of genres while a breadcrumb trail of sounds and motifs scattered throughout the album builds a sense of continuity, suggesting a sonic reckoning with the natural world.
Recorded by visual artists and musicians in Montreal, Toronto, and rural Ontario, these songs were constructed in a call- and- response fashion with audio sketches, drawings, photographs, text, and video sent back and forth between the players - a conversational process that began during the winter of 2020 and continued off and on over the next 2 years
Bob Dylan was at several crossroads in the mid-1970s. Artistically, he was largely written off as being past his prime. Emotionally, he was suffering through a painful divorce from his then-wife Sara Lowndes. Creatively, he appeared at a stalemate, his previous decade's unprecedented run of transformational brilliance finished. Then came Blood on the Tracks.
A start-to-finish cycle that documents a lover's pursuit of, entanglement with, and loss of a woman, the bracingly intimate 1975 effort remains one of the most encompassing break-up albums ever made and ranks as the most personal statement of the Bard's career. To hear it is to experience the agony, frustration, trauma, highs, lows, confusion, sadness, and, ultimately, requisite redemption associated with intimate relationships gone astray. Dylan maintains it's a work of fiction, but it's evident close-vested autobiographical premise is what helps make it universal: It's the icon singing through tears, going out of his mind, battling hallowing emptiness, firing shots across the bow, and accepting culpability. It is, in short, a consummate expression of love's darker sides and the consequences of what happens when dreams unravel.
As part of its Bob Dylan catalogue restoration series, Mobile Fidelity is thoroughly humbled to have the privilege of mastering the iconic LP from the original master tapes and pressing it on dead-quiet LP at RTI. The end result is the very finest, most transparent analogue edition of Blood on the Tracks ever produced – and the first-ever proper analog reissue. Fantastically presenting both the solo acoustic and band-supported songs with the utmost clarity, dynamics, presence, immediacy, spaciousness, imaging, and balance, this version shines a high-powered light on the fluid vocal phrasing, timbral shifts, functional rhythms, and inward-looking strumming that contribute to every song here serving as a wound-exposing confessional.
For all the melancholic pain, unresolved questions, shattered memories, wasted times, unrequited dialogues, and weary regret within, Blood on the Tracks remains as daring as it is reflective. Rather than follow for a monotone caustic vibe, Dylan's songs burrow into the subconscious for the manners in which they are even-keeled, mellow, and occasionally, even peaceful. Dignity, honour, poignancy, and fairness – all traits uncommon in any situation in which partners dissolve histories, change hearts, and attribute blame – instil the record with equilibrium on par with the consistency of the flowing melodies.
Throughout, tunes come on and proceed as if they could continue forever, Dylan spinning poetic verses and conversations amidst finely tied knots of acoustic notes, chords, and fills, the deceivingly simple architecture conjuring the intertwined refractions of a bezeled jewel, various angles, colours, and textures conjoining into a gorgeously inseparable whole. Backed by Tony Brown's flexible albeit subtle bass, Buddy Cage's country-streaked pedal-steel guitar, and Paul Griffin's soul-baring organ – an instrument used to shadow, tuck-point, and illuminate here as effectively as any time in rock history – Dylan pours soulful emotion, open his veins, and bleeds.
Ranked 16 on Rolling Stone's list of the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time, and replete with existential thought, piercing directness, raw singing, and majestic arrangements,
Given the sonic and artistic merit of this album, we anticipate huge demand.
Mit der ersten Single "Under Cover of Darkness" war "Angles" die erste neue Veröffentlichung der Band seit "First Impressions of Earth" (2006) und verbindet die Ambitionen dieses Albums mit der Unmittelbarkeit der früheren Alben "Is This It" (2001) und "Room on Fire" (2003). Jetzt erhältlich als Limited Edition Purple Vinyl.
Tom James Scott holds a unique position in experimental music. With a soft brush approach Scott, who currently lives on the North-West coast of England, has explored delicacy in music with a variety of sublime releases on a variety of labels. Predominantly known for gentle investigations of guitar and piano, Scott has shifted to incorporating different technology and tactics over time. All of this, either in performance or recording, is embedded with a spirit that is quintessentially his own. Nightshade is the latest in his expanding catalogue, one which ignites an alarmingly new take on his approach to music. Echo on Water initiates proceedings with the unmistakable sound of tape.
Any instrumentation is buried amongst the woozy sway of the medium itself, with its rough dynamics soon morphing into an overwhelmingly swirling mass of emotionally decayed sound. The movement of matter takes on a haunted shape with sounds looping and falling apart as the physicality of the medium holds it all together. The second track Blue Mist furthers this approach with its smeared haze of gorgeous emotion. This is deep exploration of ideas meeting matter. Wasting Stars takes up the entire flip side with the sound of tape recoiling a bit to allow the delicate glow of instruments to come more to the fore, with gentle effects that weave the musical matter. As a skewered take on Scott’s earlier piano explorations the atmosphere here is a subdued soundscape evoking the spiritual sadness found in the piano works of Gurdjieff/De Hartmann, with a modern lo fi angle.
Nightshade is a deeply effective journey and one of the most exquisite examples of Scott’s delicate approach so far. Two sides of form which inhabit contrasting yet complimentary clouds of sound communicating in an stunning emotional flow. As music with only trace elements of melody, Nightshade is a beautiful take on tools being used to explore paths both highly idiosyncratic, deeply moving and discreetly personal.
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With his solo band Mammoth WVH, Wolfgang Van Halen consistently challenges himself as a songwriter, vocalist, multi-instrumentalist, and producer. After a monumental breakthrough-with a GRAMMY® Award nomination for his first-ever single, #1 debuts on multiple charts, television performances, and sold out shows over a two-year span-it would’ve been easy to settle. Instead, he consciously tested himself to further develop his sound from every angle on his second full-length offering, Mammoth II.
Now here's a cover album with a few interesting angles to it -
First there is the fact that Matthews Southern Comfort have a, let's call it:
Woodstock history - Well over 6 million spotify streams confirm the
legendary status of Matthews Southern Comfort's global hit
And of course: although this collection is called the Woodstock Album, the song
itself is not featured on this album as it was written post festival and therefor
never performed at Mac Yasgur's farm.
In 2022 MSC were looking for a way to reactivate the band as a viable and touring
unit again. The concept they came up with was a Matthews Southern Comfort reinterpretation of songs that were all performed at the Festival by artists like Joe
Cocker, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Jimi Hendrix, John Sebastian and The
Grateful Dead
The songs very much speak for themselves, as do these new versions with a
distinct Matthews Southern Comfort signature.
We only have a small handful of these great discs from our friends at Ace Tone. A real nice slice of underground uk dub history, with this first-time-on-wax reissue of two low-slung dubwise pieces from Arkology, who came at dub in the late 80s and 90s, with a UK hip hop angle (and even had a production/mix hand from Aba Shanti-I at some point back in the 90s). Niceness.
Tresor is proud to present the debut split 12" from Chloe Lula and Ireen Amnes. Meeting in the darker, harder-edged side of the Berlin techno scene in 2019, the pair have regularly collaborated and performed together, but Synergy marks the first time they've shared a record sleeve. Amnes describes Synergy as "the world we built while thinking about our journey as friends and the connection we share as people and artists," and while the record highlights their relationship and shared influences, it also showcases how each has grown into their respective lane.
Amnes' tracks lean into significantly more distorted territory, characterized by a dense fog of grainy pads punctured by sharp, expertly-programmed percussion. On "Our Bodies," these fragments are sculpted into driving hardware gear, replete with distant vocals and acidic squelches, where "Fragments of Desire" makes space for a more somber attitude, descending into murky, psychedelic electro.
In counterpoint to Amnes' deep atmospherics, Lula's contributions are driven by intricate sound design and a focus on dancefloor
impact. Taking cues from Regis and the Birmingham techno sound, she reins in the distortion of 2021's Errant Bodies for aufnahme + wiedergabe in favor of rolling techno and breakbeat-inspired rhythms that nod to her EBM influences. Making use of the extra space, she builds tension through heaving, textured basslines and crescendos of noise, and on EP closer "Event Horizon," she carves through the beat with her own metallic vocals.
Synergy includes a digital bonus track from each artist. Lula's sees her pushing deeper into finely-tooled techno territory, her drums at a swift, driving gallop, surrounded by ominous swaths of reverb. In contrast, Amnes crafts a gritty warehouse trip, sharpening the angles of her drums and detuning her synths until they sound bent and alien. Complete with the EP's physical cuts, these tracks are a testament to how the pair can simultaneously complement and contrast with each other, departing from their shared sonic origins and ending up in wildly dierent destinations.
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I Shall Die Here / Earth Triumphant is an expanded edition of the fourth full-length album by The Body, first released to widespread acclaim, and terror, in 2014. Sharing their moribund vision with Bobby Krlic, aka The Haxan Cloak, the tried and true sound of The Body is shred to pieces on I Shall Die Here, mutilated by process and re-animated in a spectral state by the collaboration.
This double album set is expanded with the previously unreleased Earth Triumphant, a full-length companion album that would become I Shall Die Here, showcasing The Body's brutality in its most primal form. With both albums revisited by The Body and Seth Manchester at Machines With Magnets and remastered by Matt Colton at Metropolis Studios, this is the definitive edition of a shocking classic of unbridled bleakness and innovation. Formed by drummer Lee Buford and guitarist Chip King in Little Rock, Arkansas in 1999, The Body soon relocated to Providence, Rhode Island. The duo remained in Providence for a decade before moving west to their current home of Portland, Oregon. Their debut self-titled album (Moganano, 2003) and on the widely-acclaimed, classification curtailing of All the Waters of the Earth Turn to Blood (At A Loss, 2011) readied the band for even more experimentations. The employment of the Assembly of Light Choir's classical chorales on All the Waters, alongside more industrial music techniques such as vocal sampling and drum programming, prompted RVNG to inquire with King and Buford which darker corners of the electronic universe they were presumably interested in exploring.
The undertaking of I Shall Die Here was aided by Seth Manchester and Keith Souza, The Body's long standing engineer and creative collaborator, and noted producer Bobby Krlic. Krlic's own work as The Haxan Cloak struck a similarly despairing chord to The Body with the celebrated Excavation (Tri Angle, 2013), itself a minimalist evocation of the afterlife. I Shall Die Here shares similar nether space with the morbidly deviating darkness of Excavation, but remains sculpturally frozen in a sort of earthen purgatory.
The Body's musical approach, engraved by Buford's colossal beats and King's mad howl and bass-bladed guitar dirge, became something even more terrifying with Krlic's post-mortem ambiences serving as both baseline and outer limit. I Shall Die Here sonically serrates the remains of metal's already unidentifiable corpse and splays it amid tormented voices in shadow. This expanded edition gives us a window into the creation of a classic with the inclusion of its in utero twin, Earth Triumphant. Recorded as a nearly finished album by Buford and King before The Haxan Cloak's transformation, it stands as a raw statement of intent, the original DNA for what would soon mutate into something wholly new.
Fans of I Shall Die Here will find familiar sonic fragments in a more primitive state - like seeing an out-of-context photograph of a family member taken well before you knew them - but the album stands on its own in its minimalist brutality, a natural bridge to what The Body was soon to become. The Body's I Shall Die Here / Earth Triumphant will be released in digital and vinyl formats on June 30, 2023. On behalf of The Body, The Haxan Cloak, and RVNG Intl., a portion of the proceeds from this release will benefit Intransitive, an organization that works to advance the cause of Trans liberation in Arkansas through art, education, advocacy, organizing and culture in order to create effective systemic change and on-the-ground impact.
I Shall Die Here / Earth Triumphant is an expanded edition of the fourth full-length album by The Body, first released to widespread acclaim, and terror, in 2014. Sharing their moribund vision with Bobby Krlic, aka The Haxan Cloak, the tried and true sound of The Body is shred to pieces on I Shall Die Here, mutilated by process and re-animated in a spectral state by the collaboration.
This double album set is expanded with the previously unreleased Earth Triumphant, a full-length companion album that would become I Shall Die Here, showcasing The Body's brutality in its most primal form. With both albums revisited by The Body and Seth Manchester at Machines With Magnets and remastered by Matt Colton at Metropolis Studios, this is the definitive edition of a shocking classic of unbridled bleakness and innovation. Formed by drummer Lee Buford and guitarist Chip King in Little Rock, Arkansas in 1999, The Body soon relocated to Providence, Rhode Island. The duo remained in Providence for a decade before moving west to their current home of Portland, Oregon. Their debut self-titled album (Moganano, 2003) and on the widely-acclaimed, classification curtailing of All the Waters of the Earth Turn to Blood (At A Loss, 2011) readied the band for even more experimentations. The employment of the Assembly of Light Choir's classical chorales on All the Waters, alongside more industrial music techniques such as vocal sampling and drum programming, prompted RVNG to inquire with King and Buford which darker corners of the electronic universe they were presumably interested in exploring.
The undertaking of I Shall Die Here was aided by Seth Manchester and Keith Souza, The Body's long standing engineer and creative collaborator, and noted producer Bobby Krlic. Krlic's own work as The Haxan Cloak struck a similarly despairing chord to The Body with the celebrated Excavation (Tri Angle, 2013), itself a minimalist evocation of the afterlife. I Shall Die Here shares similar nether space with the morbidly deviating darkness of Excavation, but remains sculpturally frozen in a sort of earthen purgatory.
The Body's musical approach, engraved by Buford's colossal beats and King's mad howl and bass-bladed guitar dirge, became something even more terrifying with Krlic's post-mortem ambiences serving as both baseline and outer limit. I Shall Die Here sonically serrates the remains of metal's already unidentifiable corpse and splays it amid tormented voices in shadow. This expanded edition gives us a window into the creation of a classic with the inclusion of its in utero twin, Earth Triumphant. Recorded as a nearly finished album by Buford and King before The Haxan Cloak's transformation, it stands as a raw statement of intent, the original DNA for what would soon mutate into something wholly new.
Fans of I Shall Die Here will find familiar sonic fragments in a more primitive state - like seeing an out-of-context photograph of a family member taken well before you knew them - but the album stands on its own in its minimalist brutality, a natural bridge to what The Body was soon to become. The Body's I Shall Die Here / Earth Triumphant will be released in digital and vinyl formats on June 30, 2023. On behalf of The Body, The Haxan Cloak, and RVNG Intl., a portion of the proceeds from this release will benefit Intransitive, an organization that works to advance the cause of Trans liberation in Arkansas through art, education, advocacy, organizing and culture in order to create effective systemic change and on-the-ground impact.
FELT summon the hand of two of the most uncannily suited producers around to remix cuts from Civilistjävel!’s "Järnnätter" album one year on from its initial release.
As a regular collaborator with SVN and Dynamo Dreesen as well as having a slew of experimental techno 12”s to his name, A Made Up Sound immediately got the memo. The Dutch producer takes the foggier, subdued angle of his own craft into wildly captivating effect when tasked to build upon the stems from the “civilian bastard”.
Whilst the A Made Up Sound remix constantly builds in intensity, Ossia’s “Disoriented Dub” explores a much more radiophonic, lost-at-sea headspace with echoes of early concrete compositions and a spectral approach to dub; an olive branch of muggy hauntological weirdness extending from Bristol up to Scandinavia and back via the lowlands.
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Iyer's 2020 full-length KIND was the result of years of touring, connecting
with community, and an ethos based in self-love
But rest is approached from a different angle - Rest is in many ways a reflection
of myself, asking the question, "Who am I when it all stops?", explains Iyer,
referencing, of course, the early pandemic and its halting effect on the world.
Being stuck at home indefinitely allowed Iyer to examine her relationship to rest
on a more critical level. With this newfound downtime, Iyer began to realize an
active pursuit of rest, with deliberate and kind intention, eventually turning to back
songwriting as part of her new practice. The resultant five songs that comprise
rest explore Iyer's mindful intentions through a graceful amalgam of tender pop
with inflections of jazz, backed with orchestral experimentation.
"Kicking off another chapter, The Album marks Jonas Brothers’ first body of work since 2019’s Platinum-Certified Happiness Begins, which debuted at #1 on the Billboard 200 and spawned the GRAMMY® Award-nominated, 5x-Platinum, Billboard Hot 100 #1 smash hit “Sucker.” Jonas Brothers notably wrote and recorded The Album with sonic visionary artist Jon Bellion Justin Bieber, Maroon 5, Halsey.
With Bellion at the helm, together, they unlocked the next level for the band, embracing formative influences and igniting their sound from every angle. They delivered an unpredictable, undeniable, and unstoppable record uplifted by their inimitable chemistry and endless creativity. This is The Album. This is Jonas Brothers in 2023."
This set of remixes is already much sought after for the incredible New Decade version of "I'll Take You". But all the remixers bring new angles to these classic tracks, making for a stellar follow up to Remixes Volume 1.
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Unreleased but perfectly formed "hidden" album, recorded in 1989-90 by Nuno Rebelo on the wake of his "Sagração Do Mês De Maio" double LP (composed in 1988 as soundtrack to the third Manobras de Maio fashion event in Lisbon). The tracks convey a sense of investigative curiosity regarding computer composition and they sound wonderfully artificial. Titles as "Moon OK", "Tiny Space Ships" or "Dança Das Creaturas Elásticas" ("Elastic Creatures Dance") embody this idea of otherworldness, a kind of music actually coming from another place, composed and played by elastic creatures. It displays the functional qualities of Library Music, illustrating playful as much as moody and dense moments. In this way the album comes across as a soundtrack for moving images, sure, but with unusual framing and sharp angles. A unique object in the Portuguese avantgarde, keeping its distance from Academia but also from contemporary independent releases ("Plux Quba" by Nuno Canavarro comes to mind). António Duarte's 2019 mastering enhances this collection of music liberated from the archives of one of the most brilliant, active and challenging musicians of his generation.
Nuno Rebelo was born in 1960, graduated in Architecture, founded Street Kids and Mler Ife Dada, played in the "transitional" line up of GNR in 1982. His creativity expanded into improvised music. Performances and recordings with other musicians multiplied. He composed music for theatre, dance, jingles and, on an almost contradictory scale to his underground credentials, soundtracks for the Expo 98 and Porto 2001 mega events.
“Improvisações Cristalizadas” by Nuno Rebelo:
Short electronic pieces composed in 1989-90 using the Atari 1040ST computer with Steinberg Pro24 Software, Two Yamaha Sound Modules (TX81ZX and TG55) and Ensoniq Mirage Sampler with keyboard. The composition method for each piece evolved from a short improvisation on the Mirage keyboard, recorded in MIDI to the computer. Counterpoint permutations (inversion, reversion, inverted reversion, transpositions) were then applied through the software, distributing the variations of the initial improvisation by other timbres. No other musical material was used.
it’s a pleasure to bring together, on this album, musicians with whom we feel a very special connection, namely Felicia Atkinson, Büþra Kayýkçý, Carmen Villain, Kuniyuki Takahashi, Pavel Milyakov,
KMRU, Ana Quiroga, Abul Mogard and Pedro Vian. All of them have been very generous in their willingness to participate in an artistic experiment: to build bridges between architecture and music.
Each of these artists chose a space and translated it into a piece of music, and the result is a sonic kaleidoscope through which specific territories can be gazed upon from unexplored points of view. The
compositions that make up this compilation are synaesthetic windows through which we can observe with our ears. To look through them, all we have to do is listen and we’ll be able to contemplate, in a unique
way, spaces located in such different places as Vilches (Chile), Istanbul (Turkey), Oslo (Norway), Sapporo (Japan), Nairobi (Kenya), London (England), Rome (Italy), Berlin (Germany), or even in imaginary universes.
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More in tune now with the rhythm of the sun and moon, Xylouris White (Dirty Jim White and George Xylouris) speak to each other across great distances with the intuition and fellowship that can only be found over years in each other"s company. With fewer distractions, appreciative of the freedom to play with new sounds and spaces, they carve The Forest In Me from unbelievably thin air. Once you set the needle down on the record and hear for yourself, the intimacies and impressionism, abstraction and unfiltered emotion found in The Forest In Me, you may wonder what was the mood of the room in which this music came to be. George, Jim and long-time producer (and secret third member) Guy Picciotto share their thoughts: Guy Picciotto: "In late 2019, we had begun taking steps to working on new material. In a haphazard fashion, Jim and I started tracking drums in my basement, cutting them up into shapes with no set landing in mind. Some of it we sent to Giorgos in Crete - he responded with his lyra and his lute. Without intention we had initiated a process that would soon become more ruthlessly mandated by the world events that separated and isolated us to three corners of the globe in the following year." Giorgos Xylouris: "While we were recording, I noticed that the music had a certain solitude about it, both from the title and from inside. That led us to find more music from within that we had not yet discovered." Jim White: "The idea emerged, naturally nourished and nourishing a record with none of our usual angles and themes, no verbal language, no angst nor sudden dynamics, a more subtle structure. And we found The Forest In Me." The first revelation from The Forest In Me is "Latin White", in which Jim"s jaunty pattern sets the stage for George"s Cretan lyra and lute figurations, giving this short dance piece the feel of a welcome hoedown around the campfire, warding off the encroaching darkness of an emptied world. The repetitions, gathered to induce joy, have a glassy-eyed mechanical drive to them; their dervish-istic seeking betrays any suggestion of balm.
"Lovoscope" is the second album of the Parisian band Polycool. After the obsession with lemons of their first LP "Lemon Lord", the band changes course to talk about love, quite simply.
Each song on the album tells the story of love from a different angle. Lovoscope is the only way to access all the faces of love: happy, toxic or even virtual. The album is a bubble of 11 tracks in which we go through rhythmic ballads (Spiral, Leaves, <3), tracks with electronic sounds (Computer Love, Start), sharp melodies and refrains (Unlike You, Please Babe), and even unidentified sound objects (Odijk).
We find the Anglo-Saxon influences of LA Priest, Unknown Mortal Orchestra, Connan Mockasin, but also Metronomy or Sam Evian, all in a French musical sauce. This album was recorded in the summer of 2021 in an attic studio, surrounded by fields, in a free DIY tradition.
Five years since his last solo outing, Pev makes a very welcome return on his own label for Livity Sound's 60th release.
Having focused on expanding the innovative scope of Livity through a prolific release schedule, frequent label nights and the 10th anniversary Molten Mirrors compilation, on the 'Pulse E.P.', Pev delivers on his reputation for inventive, sharply-focused club music with four lean, focused club tracks across the tempo range.
From the crooked formation and pointillist bleeps of ‘Pulse I’ through the light-footed percussion and airy melodies of ‘Pulse II’ to ‘Pulse III’s strafing techno synths and ‘Pulse IV’s surefooted, bass-loaded house jack, it’s an EP of variation and consistency in equal measure. From the infectious, alien melodic lines to the elegant angles of the drums, not to mention the weighty subs, it’s all strikingly fresh and unmistakably Pev.
Livity Sound is a label set up by Peverelist in 2011 as a vehicle for a raw and exploratory strain of UK techno, rooted in the heritage of UK dance music and sound system culture. It has since become one of the UK's foremost protagonists for cutting edge underground electronic music.
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Brazilian experimental multi-instrumentalist Carla Boregas follows plates for Bokeh Versions and Hive Mind with a ghostly set of deep listening electronics that plays like a symphony for an imagined woodwind orchestra.
Carla Boregas is best known from her tenure in São Paulo's genre-bending experimental post-punk scene, playing in long-running outfit Rakta as well as other related offshoots. Her solo material has been knottier to unpick, here developing ideas from a collection of unfinished fragments and notebook scribbles exploring the possibility of finding a wind instrument that could be played collectively by several musicians. Coinciding with the pandemic, however, she soon realised the inherent risks involved with sharing breath and so the concept took a different direction, with added resonance.
Boregas developed a synthetic alternative, layering vocals and environmental recordings to suggest wind instrumentation without attempting to mimic it. The sounds here are airy, but rarely diegetic - on the title track, Boregas uses analog arpeggios and plucked, sustained tones to approximate the kosmische world of Ash Ra Tempel or more recently Emeralds, as if trapped in a wind tunnel, moved forward by an unseen force.
There's a whisper of the ancient past that harmonises with Wojciech Rusin's speculative medieval gasps, and Bloedneus & de Snuitkever's severely underheard ‘Milli Mille’, an examination of the ancient Greek aulos. On ’Grafia Do Invisível' the sound is completely different again, but the concept remains, using precise analog drones and minuscule timbral shifts to imitate the character of a wind instrument and simultaneously harmonise with the deep listening meditations of Éliane Radigue and Kali Malone.
A voice enters the frame on 'Sopro’, chopped into deviated gulps and syllables, creating a language that's unfamiliar and percussive. The use of breath is subtle, and vocalisations criss-cross between synths and faint whistles, forming an expression that's different from its predecessors but intrinsically interlinked. This is where ‘Pena Ao Mar’ excels, by viewing breath and its application in electronic music from multiple angles simultaneously. Fans of Lucy Duncombe, Lucrecia Dalt, or Sarah Davachi - don't miss this one.
A year and a half ago, THE MFA returned to the fore once more, when we released their "Oranges and Lemons EP".
Their new album, “Lights Out”, which could be described as a long time coming, is definitely THE MFA’s most ambitious work to date.
As they put it in their own words: “The album is very special to us. It’s a long ambition brought to fruition. It’s an album that is at home on the dancefloor or at home. We’ve always been influenced by 90s rave culture and the club scene of that era and the explosion of creative freedom through electronic music that happened back then.”
The album sums up what THE MFA stands for; their love of electronic music intertwined their love of songs and melody, sometimes banging, sometimes pensive, sometimes longing, occasionally up-beat and happy. Melodic techno-pop-rave then.
The album opener "My Desire" pins down the essence of the album, showing some pop sensibility and a healthy dose of that early 90s spirit with longing vocals by Rhys Evans. The track shows from many angles of the intensity of what club culture was about. The track has, for sure, that pop quality which sets it apart - it is a very complete and rounded and in the true sense, a hit.
"Identify This" kicks off with blissed-out sci-fi sounds but commences with 90s rave chords that gets under your skin and creates a fantastic kaleidoscopic picture of moody UK rave with these spurts of emotional uplifting moments which are worth every penny.
"Bear Likes To Rave" takes us back to the warehouse days and reminds us of the acid warehouse parties with fanned stroboscope beams and dry ice cannons. It’s like looking down on a rave party happening from above, from a bird's eye view, which is in full swing where the euphoria spills over into the audience. "Girl Ahead" is a vocal track exclusively on the digital version of the album, again with Rhys Evans on vocal duties. Here they ponder all the possibilities of the future and the mistakes of the past. Features space toms and grand piano rave chords to evoke a housy feel within.
With "Freedom24" a Hi-NRG melody meets nightcrawler sounds ala "Klang De Familie". This is a soundtrack for the night.
"Lammas Day" has the chilling exotic quality of 808 State "Pacific State" if you grant us this comparison, paired with some phantastic Dr Who sensibilities! This track is quite a voyage!
"Warehouse"... Make Some F-...ing Noise... A TV presenter speaks about Acid house...... This is a wild mash up of impressions which nicely go together due to the melodic string composition and the 303 sequences.
"The Snapping Branch" starts with a mash up of sounds and then dives into an episodic snapshot of "happiness" when the serotonin shoots in (just before it drops). Experiencing a perfect flow that does not want to end. Every clubber knows that feeling.
"You Make Me Smile" is the third vocal track on the album featuring Rhys Evans on vocals. It has fantastic radical stark mood changes and blatant shifts, therefore throws the listener from one corner to the other. Just like the contrast of day and night. Bits here and there might conjure a Radiohead spirit, but really this is all MFA.
"Lights Out” certainly puts across the feeling you get at the end of the night - the club has closed; you are walking home. These are the sounds and feelings in your memories as you chase the vibe that is dwindling as the club becomes ever further away.
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Last delivered 2 years ago available to reorder, subject to availability
Zurich’s Elvis Cassetta delivers a dazzling four-track debut EP to his brand-new WhyNot imprint. Complete with a refined deep house sound, this is an expertly crafted body of silky smooth grooves to get floors shaking.
'Down With Us' instantly displays Cassetta’s effortless ability to create a hot house swing using just a handful of elements – subtle groove, skittish percussion and a sultry vocal sample. The whole track is thrown out wide in the breakdown, but then as the bassline is brought back in, Cassetta draws it all back in close for an intimate dancefloor moment. Definitely one of those hands-in-the-air peak-time scenes.
Dreamy synth pads steadily build under a thunderous kick drum pattern on the EP’s second track, 'Focals Finest', which takes the tempo up a notch for a real sweat inducer.
Finally, it’s all about a raw bassline on the metallic and techy 'Jupiter Groove'. Contorted slices of spoken word dip in and out throughout to create another level of leftfield, danceable percussion. While the low end is the main focus on the original, in Silat Beksi’s remix, we hear a brighter take on the deep groove. There’s a swirling sample, more prominent key stabs, eerie vocals and a teasing smattering of melody. Percussive elements are thrown from all angles, and they pulsate up into the rafters of the lofty house track, leading you further into a state of hypnosis.
Overall, these are house tracks made right – a classy release fit for warming in crowds in style.
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Last delivered 2 days ago available to reorder, subject to availability
In Zusammenarbeit mit dem Indie-Game-Publisher Fabraz (u.a. Slime-san und Demon Turf) veröffentlicht Black Screen Records den gruselig-schönen Soundtrack zum Action-RPG Skellboy von Björn Schellin auf Vinyl. Der Soundtrack erscheint als limitierte Doppel-LP auf marmoriertem Skelett-farbenem Vinyl. Das Artwork des Gatefold Sleeves stammt von der Designerin @sabbi_tabbi von Umaiki Games.
Cosmic Romance is the first LP from Los Angles producer MoodHay that beams down to planet Earth in a swirl of lush synthesisers, hypnotic melodies and warm grooves. It’s a journey of emotions, contemporary and classic all the same. The album orbits around earthly elements of R&B, funk and house, seamlessly blurring in a unique way that MoodHay pulls off with an endearing ease here in the early 21st century. It’s a sonically beautiful love note with a lot of attitude that pilots right to the center of your soul, while keeping your body rocking out real smooth.
MoodHay’s hilltop studio is like a hidden oasis out in the desert, mystical and soothing, where he brings gems (like the ones you’ll hear on this album) to life. He sings and plays all the instruments on this record (minus the hot sax on ‘Melodies’) and is truly blooming as a songwriter.
MoodHay has such a fresh energy around him that is certainly felt throughout Cosmic Romance and these songs were methodically crafted to maximise the vibe out on the dance floor on this planet and others out there.
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Last delivered 6 years ago available to reorder, subject to availability
BASSIST/COMPOSER PETROS KLAMPANIS LOOKS TO PAST AND FUTURE AS HE TRANSFORMS TRADITIONAL GREEK MUSIC WITH TORA COLLECTIVE
Unique instrumentation bridges Greek folkloric and modern jazz worlds, with Klampanis (bass, artistic direction), Areti Ketime (vocals), Thomas Konstantinou (oud, laouto), Giorgos Kotsinis (clarinet), Kristjan Randalu (piano), Ziv Ravitz (drums, electronics, co-production) and more.
Following up his acclaimed recent outings Rooftop Stories and Irrationalities, bassist and composer Petros Klampanis creates one of his most inventive musical settings to date with Tora Collective, his sixth album as a leader. For Klampanis, who grew up in Athens, Greece
surrounded by the confluence of Mediterranean and Balkan folk cultures, making music has always meant navigating cultural crossroads. With Tora Collective (“Tora”=“Now”) he puts traditional Greek music at the centre, even as he presents it from a bold new angle.
In addition to the two new originals “Disoriented” and “South By Southeast,” Klampanis and his compact hybrid jazz/Greek folk ensemble interpret popular Greek songs such as “Xehorismata,” “Sybethera,” “Hariklaki” and “Menexedes ke Zoumboulia.” These songs, Klampanis asserts, are “not just part of Greek cultural heritage or a fragment of the past, but also as part of the future: they live into the present, breathe into the ‘here and now,’ while constantly evolving in a dynamic state and in dialogue with contemporary music.”
“For me it’s a personal thing,” he says. “I want to reflect on what Greek music and culture offer the world. How can music from the Aegean to Epirus and from the Ionian Islands to Crete, meet and speak to the hearts and minds of musicians and audiences from different parts of the world, different traditions and backgrounds?”
To that end, Tora Collective draws on regional characteristics, as Klampanis explains: “Every region has a strong identity. In Epirus the clarinet is more prominent and the music has this slow, groovy, meditative vibe. The islands are lighter sounding, Macedonia is groovier, faster tempos and energetic dances. Music from Asia Minor or Istanbul is more sophisticated. Greeks often refer to Istanbul as ‘Poli,’ from Constantinopoli, so the songs from there are called ‘Politika.’”
There is magic in the clear and consistent voice of Areti Ketime throughout Tora Collective, as can also be said for the supremely voice-like articulation of Giorgos Kotsinis on clarinet. Ziv Ravitz, on drums and electronics, also plays a pivotal role as coproducer: “He added so much in the orchestration,” says Klampanis. “His knowledge of electronics, all these non-acoustic sounds and keyboards, treatments of the acoustic instruments, it’s all because of Ziv. He brought a new perspective on the whole thing.”
The string element in Tora Collective is also strong: in addition to Klampanis’ bass there is Thomas Konstantinou on oud and the traditional Greek laouto, as well as Kristjan Randalu (the pianist in Klampanis’ Irrationalities trio) providing an anchor and bringing Klampanis’ inventive arrangements into harmonic focus. Additional guests appear: Alexandros Arkadopoulos on clarinet for “Disoriented,” Laura Robles on percussion for “South by Southeast” and trumpeters Sebastian Studnitzky and Andreas Polyzogopoulos on “Milo Mou ke Mandarini” and “Hariklaki,” respectively. (“Milo Mou” is slated as a post-release bonus track.)
Using traditional Greek music to discover a common new voice, the project aims to build dialogue, spark creativity, cultivate respect for the past, pave a path forward, discover a new musical storytelling powerful enough to reach and touch audiences in many countries. This is an experiment that bridges worlds: the east and the west, the traditional and the modern, the nostalgic and the forward-looking, using the power of music and improvisation.
Kode9's most ambitious work yet as a multi-disciplinary artist, `Escapology' is the soundtrack album to the sonic fiction `Astro-Darien', itself soon to be released on Hyperdub sub-label Flatlines. Already available as a special edition CD and digital album, we now offer a 1000 piece limited pressing on lucent orange vinyl, in spot-gloss sleeve with additional artwork by Optigram. `Escapology' reconfigures `Astro-Darien's tense, off-world atmospheres into slices of high definition, asymmetric club rhythms, woven through thrilling sound design and vertiginous sonics. "A record brimming with ideas and novel sounds, departing from genre exercises to offer something genuinely different." - Album of the Month -DJ Mag "Kode9's most dextrous and intuitive club music yet, full of mind-bending rhythmic nuggets. He's still the brilliant master behind the scenes, quietly one-upping everyone else." - Resident Advisor "The 15 tracks become proper dancefloor scorchers _ `Escapology' builds a futuristic jumble of aesthetics and sound design." - The Wire
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Last delivered 3 years ago available to reorder, subject to availability
We would like to invite you on an excursion of sorts:
Close your eyes, leave the grey wash of daytime TV and ready meals behind, and let the whiskey-soaked Automatic Tasty be your spirit guide.
Slowly you will drift over multi-coloured hills, then over vermilion seas, rising in the sky following the Sun until you reach the very edges of Ideaspace itself. What lies beyond that boundary is entirely up to you.
Returning to Realplace temporarily, you should find a burning desire to turn something in your life upside-down. Again you will dive thru the mists of imagination. This time bring back gifts: shining, lustrous pearls; seeds which may grow to provide brain-fruit if properly tended to.
On future journeys, gather your friends around the twin-headed god of music and invite them to join you & Automatic Tasty, for this is truly Social media.
out of Stock
Last delivered 17 months ago available to reorder, subject to availability
We would like to invite you on an excursion of sorts:
Close your eyes, leave the grey wash of daytime TV and ready meals behind, and let the whiskey-soaked Automatic Tasty be your spirit guide.
Slowly you will drift over multi-coloured hills, then over vermilion seas, rising in the sky following the Sun until you reach the very edges of Ideaspace itself. What lies beyond that boundary is entirely up to you.
Returning to Realplace temporarily, you should find a burning desire to turn something in your life upside-down. Again you will dive thru the mists of imagination. This time bring back gifts: shining, lustrous pearls; seeds which may grow to provide brain-fruit if properly tended to.
On future journeys, gather your friends around the twin-headed god of music and invite them to join you & Automatic Tasty, for this is truly Social media.
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Last delivered 3 years ago available to reorder, subject to availability
1000 black vinyl LPs. London-based ‘indie-supergroup’ SUEP announce their long-awaited debut mini-album Shop, a collection of 6 oddball, car-boot-sale pop songs with a sprinkling of theatrical storytelling. Led by Georgie Stott (of Porridge Radio, Garden Centre) and Josh Harvey, SUEP was born out of a near-decade of playing in sheds and barns with like minded personnel, holding a mutual love for Paul McCartney, Jona Lewie, the B-52s, Devo and other performative freaks enjoying themselves. Following a move to London from Brighton, the pair added George Nicholls (The GN Band, Joanna Gruesome, The Tubs), Will William Deacon (PC World, Garden Centre), and Ollie Chapman (Boil King) to the line-up. The 5 piece take turns writing songs and taking the lead vocal duties in a wonderfully playful but coherent collaboration, with their debut being a kaleidoscopic off kilter pop ride, taking the listener through haunted castles, deprived encounters, days lost to the imagination in bed, and through the integral friendships that give SUEP the energy to keep dancing to their own beat. The album was arranged and recorded in the Red Lion Boys Club, an ex-youth centre in which Georgie and Josh both lived. Using equipment collected by Josh in his travels as a bootsale and market trader, the sports hall was transformed into a makeshift studio for a few days, with sessions conducted by producer Matthew Green (Sniffany & The Nits, The Tubs, etc.) Mark Riley (BBC 6 Music) described SUEP’s debut single and album opener, ‘Domesticated Dream’ (2021) as “perfect pop music.” The joyfully kitsch track brims with a 70s Yamaha disco beat, deep bass, nostalgic drum machines, and hooky melodies. Possibly the most psychedelic and infectious track born out of lockdown, it tackles homelife, drinking too much, and making big plans that never come to fruition, but with a big technicoloured positivity for the future of the human-race, with the chorus’ refrain, “the psychedelic 4000s,” predicting the return of the psychedelic Age of Aquarius in a couple of millennia time. The following single ‘Misery’ (2021) is pure cosmic swing-pop wizardry in part inspired by spy music and The Supremes. Ollie, The track’s baritone vocalist, describes it as “A love song disguised as a song about loss. It's about cherishing the things that matter but it’s also about having the courage to say goodbye,” with each line of the song a small story about a different character. Whilst latest Shop taster ‘In Good Health’ is darkly euphoric like a pleasantly strange meeting of Siouxsie Sioux and Jona Lewie. It’s a playfully discombobulating mix of 80s jangly guitar, chirpy keyboard and moody post-punk tackling mental health, drug addiction, and the power of friendship, written after the song’s vocalist Georgie came out of hospital following a mental health crisis. “I wanted to write a song that encapsulated how important my relationships with my friends and boyfriend were at that time” she explains “…and one that also felt dark like I did at the time. I couldn’t go outside due to anxiety surrounding my health so I stayed inside for weeks. People would visit and watch films with me or let me tattoo them or make music with me. My community helped me recover.” Elsewhere on Shop is ‘Just The Job’ fronted by Harvey and described by him as “About the relief of accepting a menial existence, and allowing life to be boring - but (within that) how the small things are the important ones, how pulling a sicky or extra long lunch break are important things to do for yourself. It’s an anthem for working people who’ve had enough - and a crowd favourite at SUEP gigs. The darker undertones and post-punk angles of the Georgie-fronted ‘Onions’ is inspired by the crapness of cliques, with the band calling the song “A cry of welcome to all;” and finally the hooky ‘Friend of Mine,’ described as “A love letter to all the people that come and go throughout your life no matter how long you know them”. SUEP have received coverage in Independent & Clash, (among many others), with big support from Mark Riley and Steve Lamacq (BBC 6 Music) for early singles.
First Album on Peur Bleue ! Alextrem and his fresh style :)
Hardtek oldschool with one idea per track is the vibe here :
Never too much, in constent evolution... Sober sound accepted through various angles : Hardtek, Hardcore (Hyro) or Electro tribe (On UFO Are Back)... Loud and clean sound:).
The Visual here is very important too :
If the sleeve is released by our FDB Vestee crew the Photos are here done by Yamoy... Mr Little Freaks Society organized a Party for Peur Bleue near London ! All these photos on the sleeve were made there, at the Peur Bleue party... except that...
This is not real humans, it's a figurine party ^^
Maximum fun and big respect for Yamoy !
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Last delivered 6 years ago available to reorder, subject to availability
One of our all-time favourite artists and extended Circus Company member The Mole returns to the label for a proper presentation of his album The River Widens. Originally a limited, cassette-only release via fellow Canadian Eddie C’s Red Motorbike, we are proud to offer this album in its full glory for the first time on all formats.
Never one to shy away from synth deep dives, or raw sample flip collaging, this collection of 21 works checks all the boxes. Ambient trippers to straight up neck-snapping instrumental beats. Not forgetting tastes of the more uptempo, highly-assured and hypnotic dance floor feels the world has come to love The Mole for. Moments of casual chillin are interspersed with effortless, emotive angles, some evoking the charm of his Little Sunshine release for us in 2017.
X-pert Profat opens the set with sly statements that give way to relaxed and subtle keys over gentle, midtempo rhythms. Things switch up nicely into easy, Northwest Coast boogie-meets-beatdown feels inBreak For Ma, followed by a solid array of almost Jaylib-schooled boom bap twists, like the aptly-titled Drums 2002 and Jo Barker. Ambient cuts like AR Dayand New Family offer a refreshing tap of the brakes, setting the scene for the gorgeous, Jarre-esque Weak Stranger. We also get treated to Repepepater’s nod to Detroit house, urban-mode Balearic feels on They Work For Mr. O, and sneak
attack lo-fi future funk in the form of UFOs Over Egypt, with Montreal co-pilot Cristobal on a wild shisha-lit vox narrative, earlier versions of which have blessed many of our label comrades’ DJ sets, from Dave Aju to Vincent Lemieux.
The River Widens expands beautifully on the breadth of unique musical directions The Mole is capable of taking us in, now spread across fresh 2x12” vinyl and available digitally for the first time, along with another limited edition cassette run - we hope you enjoy the ride as much as we do!
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Last delivered 3 years ago available to reorder, subject to availability
One of These Nights occupies an important, unique place in the Eagles' discography given it represents the final album the group made before releasing the bajillion-selling Their Greatest Hits (1971-1975) compilation. The timing is telling. A coming-out party for Glenn Frey and Don Henley's songwriting skills, the studio record – the band's fourth, and its first to hit #1 on the charts – signifies the group's ascent to superstar status. Home to three massive singles (the title track, "Lyin' Eyes," and "Take It to the Limit") and nominated for four Grammy Awards, the quadruple-platinum 1975 effort solidified the Eagles' Southern California-reared sound and made the band a household name.
Mastered from the original analog tapes, pressed on MoFi SuperVinyl, and limited to 10,000 copies, Mobile Fidelity's UltraDisc One-Step 180g 45RPM 2LP vinyl box set takes One of These Nights to the limit. And then some. Playing with reference sonics and a practically indiscernible noise floor thanks to MoFi SuperVinyl's special formula, it provides a rich, dynamic, transparent, and three-dimensional view into a release that moved country-rock ahead by leaps and bounds – and paved the way for the Eagles' ascendancy to global superstardom. The opportunity to zero in on the particulars of the Eagles' golden harmonies, distinct vocal timbres, and cohesive interplay has never been better.
Visually, the premium packaging and presentation of the UD1S One of These Nights pressing befit its esteemed status. Housed in a deluxe box, it features beautiful foil-stamped jackets and faithful-to-the-original graphics that illuminate the splendour of the recording. From every angle, this UD1S reissue exists as a curatorial artefact meant to be preserved, touched, and examined. It is made for discerning listeners that prize sound quality and production, and who desire to fully immerse themselves in the art – and everything involved with the album, from the renowned cover art to the meticulous finishes. As much as any Eagles LP, the connection between the imagery and the music and the band on One of These Nights runs deep. No wonder it led to a Grammy Nomination for Best Album Package.
Devised by West Texas artist Boyd Elder, the striking skull-and-feathers themed piece gracing the front of One of These Nights represents where the Eagles have been and where they were headed. Album art director Gary Burden explained: "The cow skull is pure cowboy, folk, the decorations are American Indian-inspired, and the future is represented by the more polished reflective glass beaded surfaces covering the skull." Moreover, Elder had met the group years earlier when Henley and company performed at one of his gallery openings in California. MoFi's UD1S box set allows Elder's vision (and Burden's debossed treatment of the image) to pop and appear as if it was a stand-alone object.
Of course, what's inside the sleeves, and in the grooves, proves equally compelling. Though One of These Nights marks the final appearance of band co-founder Bernie Leadon on an Eagles LP and contains three of his tunes, the record's tremendous success owes to Frey and Henley's timeless contributions. Taking the next step in their maturation and evolution, the pair crafted several songs while living together as roommates in a rented house in which they converted a music room into a recording studio.
The duo's bond and chemistry pulse throughout the record – particularly in the tight arrangements, tasteful instrumental flourishes, and seamless blending of the folk, country, and rock elements. The musical combinations and partnership not only produced the Eagles' first million-selling single (the slow-dancing "Take It to the Limit," co-written with bassist-vocalist Randy Meisner) and the Frey-led cheating classic "Lyin' Eyes," but the famed title track, which nods to the era's nascent disco scene as well as Kenneth Gamble and Leon Huff's Philly soul platters.
Frey named "One of These Nights" as his favorite Eagles composition of all-time; Meisner's high harmonies alone send the track into a galaxy of its own. Speaking of the latter, Leadon's instrumental "Journey of the Sorcerer" ventures into another universe and was soon used by Douglas Adams as the theme to his "The Hitch-hiker's Guide to the Galaxy" radio series. Inspiration and creative experimentation also dragged the Eagles into the blues. Another Frey-Henley gem, the self-probing "After the Thrill Is Gone" serves as a response song to B.B. King's signature track and more evidence the band was turning the lens inward for lyrical narratives. Like everything on One of These Nights, the song confirms the Eagles were breathing rare musical air.
More About Mobile Fidelity UltraDisc One-Step and Why It Is Superior
Instead of utilizing the industry-standard three-step lacquer process, Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab's new UltraDisc One-Step (UD1S) uses only one step, bypassing two processes of generational loss. While three-step processing is designed for optimum yield and efficiency, UD1S is created for the ultimate in sound quality. Just as Mobile Fidelity pioneered the UHQR (Ultra High-Quality Record) with JVC in the 1980s, UD1S again represents another state-of-the-art advance in the record-manufacturing process. MFSL engineers begin with the original master recordings, painstakingly transfer them to DSD 256, and meticulously cut a set of lacquers. These lacquers are used to create a very fragile, pristine UD1S stamper called a "convert." Delicate "converts" are then formed into the actual record stampers, producing a final product that literally and figuratively brings you closer to the music. By skipping the additional steps of pulling another positive and an additional negative, as done in the three-step process used in standard pressings, UD1S produces a final LP with the lowest noise floor possible today. The removal of the additional two steps of generational loss in the plating process reveals tremendous amounts of extra musical detail and dynamics, which are otherwise lost due to the standard copying process. Every conceivable aspect of vinyl production is optimized to produce the most perfect record album available today.
MoFi SuperVinyl
Developed by NEOTECH and RTI, MoFi SuperVinyl is the most exacting-to-specification vinyl compound ever devised. Analogue lovers have never seen (or heard) anything like it. Extraordinarily expensive and extremely painstaking to produce, the special proprietary compound addresses two specific areas of improvement: noise floor reduction and enhanced groove definition. The vinyl composition features a new carbonless dye (hold the disc up to the light and see) and produces the world's quietest surfaces. This high-definition formula also allows for the creation of cleaner grooves that are indistinguishable from the original lacquer. MoFi SuperVinyl provides the closest approximation of what the label's engineers hear in the mastering lab.
With its name indicative of the music's boundary-testing diversity and Southwestern inspiration, On the Border finds the Eagles leaving everything on the table and embracing a harder edge that takes the band out of more relaxed territory and establishes it as a group that knows how – and wants – to rock. Glenn Frey, Don Henley, new member Don Felder, and company immediately announce their intent on the defiant album-opening hit "Already Gone" and never look back, crafting a gem of a record that from start to finish is arguably their most consistent and balanced effort.
Limited to 10,000 numbered copies, pressed on dead-quiet MoFi SuperVinyl at RTI, and mastered from the original analogue master tapes, Mobile Fidelity's ultra-hi-fi UltraDisc One-Step 180g 45RPM 2LP collector's edition pays tribute to the record's significance and enhances the experience for generations to come. Playing with reference sonics that elevate an effort revered by audiophiles, it provides a lively, dynamic, transparent, and intimate view of a release whose contemporary importance continues to grow. The opportunity to zero in on the particulars of the Eagles' golden harmonies, distinct vocal timbres, and cohesive interplay has never been better.
Visually, the premium packaging and gorgeous presentation of the UD1S On the Border pressing befit its select status. Housed in a deluxe box, it features special foil-stamped jackets and faithful-to-the-original graphics that illuminate the splendor of the recording. No expense has been spared. From every angle, this UD1S reissue exists as a curatorial artefact meant to be preserved, touched, and examined. It is made for discerning listeners that prize sound quality and production, and who desire to fully immerse themselves in the art – and everything involved with the album, from the iconic Navajo cover painting to the meticulous finishes.
And with On the Border, there's plenty to take in and soak up. Declared by famed critic Robert Christgau as "the Eagles' best album," the 1974 set claims a rich backstory. Initially recorded amid tumultuous sessions with producer Glyn Johns in London shortly after the release of the group's sophomore Desperado set, On the Border took a new turn after the band elected to scrap most of the prior work, return to its native California, and team with producer Bill Szymczyk to give the material less of a smooth, polished sheen and more toughness. Szymczyk also afforded the Eagles more input and freedom in the arrangements, and suggested adding another guitarist to play on "Good Day in Hell." Felder got the call, and so won over the Eagles with his skills, he quickly became the fifth member of the band.
While the late-arriving Felder only plays on one other album cut, "Already Gone," his mates more than prove their muster on the remainder of a double-platinum affair that established the Eagles as a force whose range transcended the calmer country-leaning style it perfected on their first two LPs. Primarily written by Jackson Browne and shelved during the Desperado sessions due to its higher-energy nature, the throttle-twisting "James Dean" ricochets with barbed riffs and rebellious swagger. Listen without limits to how Szymczyk's raw production stamps the song with a leather-and-jeans cool befitting its protagonist. Similarly rugged, the slide-guitar-fueled "Good Day in Hell" boasts its own mean streak. And the funk-laced, boot-stomping title track cautions "don't you tell me 'bout your law and order." Throughout On the Border, the Eagles are in no mood to mess around.
Not that the band skirts sentimental territory. On one of the era's finest covers, the Eagles nail the bittersweet feelings and bring high-definition detail to the vivid scenery of Tom Waits' "Ol' '55," a song the group makes its own. The rustic ballad "My Man" serves as a tribute to the recently deceased Gram Parsons, with singer-guitarist Bernie Leadon taking the lead on the microphone as he pours his heart out to his former Flying Burrito Brothers mate. And when it comes to romance, is it possible to top "Best of My Love"? Graced with Henley's honey-dipped vocals, refined wordless group harmonies, brushed drums, and the gentle strum of acoustic guitars, the Johns-produced cut soared to Number One and set the stage for what would soon be the Eagles' reality: global dominance.
More About Mobile Fidelity UltraDisc One-Step and Why It Is Superior
Instead of utilizing the industry-standard three-step lacquer process, Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab's new UltraDisc One-Step (UD1S) uses only one step, bypassing two processes of generational loss. While three-step processing is designed for optimum yield and efficiency, UD1S is created for the ultimate in sound quality. Just as Mobile Fidelity pioneered the UHQR (Ultra High-Quality Record) with JVC in the 1980s, UD1S again represents another state-of-the-art advance in the record-manufacturing process. MFSL engineers begin with the original master recordings, painstakingly transfer them to DSD 256, and meticulously cut a set of lacquers. These lacquers are used to create a very fragile, pristine UD1S stamper called a "convert." Delicate "converts" are then formed into the actual record stampers, producing a final product that literally and figuratively brings you closer to the music. By skipping the additional steps of pulling another positive and an additional negative, as done in the three-step process used in standard pressings, UD1S produces a final LP with the lowest noise floor possible today. The removal of the additional two steps of generational loss in the plating process reveals tremendous amounts of extra musical detail and dynamics, which are otherwise lost due to the standard copying process. The exclusive nature of these very limited pressings guarantees that every UD1S pressing serves as an immaculate replica of the lacquer sourced directly from the original master recording. Every conceivable aspect of vinyl production is optimized to produce the most perfect record album available today.
Hungarian-born, Dublin-based Phil Robertson has some pedigree but Arbilla is a new name he's operating under, and indeed there seems to be a slightly more musical, less relentless angle to his once defiantly minimal sound to go with the new moniker too. He provides three of the four tracks here, from the chunky and dramatic 'Stranger Things' and the breezy, spacious 'Fragrance' to the EP's glorious title track, with its Plaid-like syncopation and spiralling melodies. Mysterious techno 'supergroup' from Detroit, Scan 7 remix 'Virtual Reality' and they whip it into thunderclapping Underground Resistance shape. Greatness in evidence whichever way you turn.
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Last delivered 2 years ago available to reorder, subject to availability
“After doing three solo albums, the challenge of interpreting Eric Satie’s music seemed challenging, appealing and also like a good way of finding new angles and flavours in my own music.
What struck me while digging deeper in his catalogue was how modern and progressive he still appears, beside the soothing and calming mellowness that I think we all associate his music with, I found very brave, sometimes stubborn minimalism and besides the blue harmonies that we now associate with jazz, I found really salty, almost cluster-like colours that must have been extremely challenging for the end of 19th century ears.
I humbly thank Satie for letting me borrow his music for a while (he didn’t have a say though), giving me both the meditative peace I hope you will also experience while listening and, like in the Nocturne, challenging my ears and fingers to reach new territories.” – Martin Hederos
out of Stock
Last delivered 3 years ago available to reorder, subject to availability