The rock supergroup Beck, Bogert & Appice was formed in
1972 by Jeff Beck, evolving from the Jeff Beck Group. In addition to Beck, the trio consisted of bassist Tim Bogert and drummer Carmine Appice, who had previously played together in Vanilla Fudge and Cactus. They only released one studio album, Beck, Bogert & Appice, which came out in 1973 and features a mix of (hard) rock, blues and funk. The album contains Beck’s version of “Superstition”, written by Stevie Wonder. It was produced by Don Nix, who is one of the more obscure figures in Southern soul and rock and has worked with Freddie King and Furry Lewis amongst others.
To celebrate its 50th anniversary, Beck, Bogert & Appice is available as a limited edition of 1500 individually numbered copies on translucent red coloured vinyl.
Toots Thielemans was a jazz harmonica virtuoso from Belgium. Together with pianist Karel Boehlee, bassplayer Hein Van De Geyn and Hans van Oosterhout on drums Toots recorded, as the European Quartet, the album 90 in
2012. The album features two compositions from Antonio Carlos Jobim, “Wave” and “One Note Samba”, “Dat Mistige Rooie Beest” from Rogier van Otterloo, “In Your Own Sweet Way” from Dave Brubeck and 7 more tracks.
90 is available as a limited edition of 500 individually numbered copies on white coloured vinyl.
Jetzt wieder auf Vinyl erhältlich. Das vierte Studioalbum der amerikanischen Experimental-Rock-Band Tomahawk um Mike Patton (Faith No More, Mr. Bungle), erschienen im Januar 2013.
Das Album ist das erste mit dem neuen Bassisten Trevor Dunn, der das vorherige Mitglied Kevin Rutmanis ersetzt hat. Oddfellows wurde nach einer kurzen Probenphase live im Easy Eye Sound Studio in Nashville, Tennessee, aufgenommen.
Nowadays Records has never lost its taste for compilations. And after having released dozens of them to date, the label is planning to release new ones for the occasion, directly from the Club Nowadays' aerial nights, where artists from different scenes, lesser-known heads and label figures are mixed together, always with this key word: openness.
More than just a name for a party or a compilation, Club Nowadays is also becoming a real artists' collective.
On the 1st compilation "Club Nowadays, Vol. 1" released in June 2022, we found house and techno sounds in the Nowadays style by the artists Chien Méchant, Grand Soleil, La Fine Equipe, Fulgeance, Trifouille1er, Ténéré and Vect (who also signed the whole visual DA of the project).
Nowadays is back with "Club Nowadays, Vol. 2", with other artists such as Phantom Traffic, Le Bag, Jeff The Fool,... In a word, Nowadays gives us its definition of club music. It may not be universal, but it is unique and inseparable from the label's image.
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Angel numbers: a series of recurring numerical patterns or sequences which those who believe in such things invest with cosmic significance.
Also, the name of the forthcoming album by Hamish Hawk – an apt title for an artist who bounces between scepticism and wonder, who alchemises the quotidian, who is engaged in a constant quest to outwit and outflank the ordinary. With the release of Heavy Elevator in September 2021, Edinburgh-based Hawk established himself as a writer of heartfelt, headstrong, unashamedly literate songs to stimulate both pulse and psyche. Heavy Elevator offered words to savour and tunes to relish. The songs were filmic and romantic, blending wit, wisdom, resignation and beauty with a kind of sceptical joie de vivre, delivered in a rich baritone that has drawn comparisons to everyone from Jarvis Cocker to Scott Walker. A singer of style and guile peddling accessible intelligence: what’s
not to love? Heavy Elevator established a powerful artistic imprimatur which nonetheless felt neither defining nor confining. While the album has been justly lauded, Hawk’s next steps have moved the story considerably further forward. Angel Numbers meets growing expectations head on, with panache and aplomb.
ASSASSINS did what many bands do: they grabbed a moment out of the air and slammed it onto tape machines and hard drives with relentlessness, cunning, and an attitude.
It was in Chicago, mid 2000’s, and though there was energy in the music scene, it wasn’t coalescing into anything you could use as a heading in the musical encyclopedia. Drag City, Thrill Jockey, Bloodshot, Tortoise, Andrew Bird, 90 Day Men – amazing labels and bands, but discrete and siloed and separated by boundaries that weren’t very real.
In the midst of that complicated morass, ASSASSINS generated a collection of songs that became the album YOU WILL CHANGED US. And it did.
There was confidence built into the fabric of the project: 5 members, 2 singers, massive synced video walls and samples streaming from laptops swirling in three dimensions around the stage. They could go from subtle atmospheric moments to a gargantuan wall of sound instantly. It was hard to do- months in cold practice rooms troubleshooting sections of songs or reworking synthesizer patches put the band through a self-imposed boot camp. And it brought them together as a sort of hive-mind focused on one thing: that these songs could connect. They could cut through the noise and share a state of mind with other human beings.
And it worked. Those early shows were mind bending. It was fun, loud, drunken, and rewarding- that time together, before the record deal, before the tragic let down of being traded and gobbled up by the major label system. The years after that got more difficult, more complicated, more human.
Leading us here: the musical journey of the Assassins has ended. With the up-coming release of their second and final album THE YEAR THAT NEVER CAME, we finally get to hear, and feel, the final statements of their inspiring chemistry.
In July of 2021, founding member, songwriter and singer Joe Cassidy unexpectedly passed away. THE YEAR THAT NEVER CAME is the culmination and end point of a collaboration that started in the early 2000’s with a chance meeting and excited conversation with Aaron Miller at a gig in Chicago. Quickly joined by David Golitko on keyboards, Merritt Lear on vocals and guitar, and Alex Kemp on bass.
It was Miller who saw Joe Cassidy’s song writing in a new context. Cassidy had been known for his beautiful, post- pop inflected BUTTERFLY CHILD, a thoughtful, regal project where Joe’s emotions could soar. Miller saw a different context for that voice- not dreamy, but immediate, not just hopeful, but demanding. He took Joe’s open hand and suggested that it could be a fist, raised in the air, with a crowd of other people doing the same.
At the time of his death legendary composer and songwriter Jimmy Webb (who wrote such hits as ‘Wichita Lineman and MacArthur Park) said Joe ‘was a creative and generous producer but, more importantly, he was a creative and generous friend.’
With the release of THE YEAR THAT NEVER CAME, this band, this relentless creative force, has to finally relent. No one in the band could see a future ASSASSINS that doesn’t include Cassidy. So in one last act of will, for the love of their friend, they did the rigorous work of finishing the songs that they had started together for the second album.
Assassin’s obsession with the notion of time, from YOU WILL CHANGED US to THE YEAR THAT NEVER CAME, flows from the most natural question we all have to ask ourselves: what do I do now? Because: how we react today to life’s unpredictability - that is the tomorrow we build for ourselves.
"Hungarian guitarist Gabor Szabo (1936-82) issued only three live recordings during his lifetime. Significantly, the first of these, The Sorcerer (1967), remains the most popular album in the guitarist’s all-too abbreviated discography. But there were also More Sorcery (1968) and Gabor Szabo Live with Charles Lloyd (1974), offering Szabo totally in his element and at his bewitching best.
Several more of Szabo’s concert recordings have surfaced in the intervening years, including this one, superbly captured for radio broadcast live in 1976 at the 600-seat Agora Ballroom in Cleveland, Ohio. It is a revelation. There is a sense here that concert patrons may have been hearing an altogether different Gabor Szabo than record buyers.
For one thing, Szabo is heard fronting what is likely his own group, rather than an army of studio musicians. In 1976, Szabo was leading a tremendous quartet with George Cables (or Joanne Grauer) on piano, Tony Dumas on bass and Sherman Ferguson on drums. Szabo had not had a band with this much jazz clout since his famed quartet with Jimmy Stewart in 1967-68 – and it is a union worth savoring: Szabo’s records during this period were light, at best, on jazz.
It’s unclear if any of these musicians are on the Agora date, but as Dumas’s “It Happens” opens the program, it’s a good bet, at least, that the bassist is on board here. But as Szabo’s ’76 quartet is not known to have recorded a studio record, Live in Cleveland is the closest thing to what a mid-seventies Szabo jazz album would sound like.
Gone, are the strings, vocals and concessions to commercial consideration so prevalent on so many of Szabo’s studio records at the time. What is present, though, is fine craftsmanship, tremendous interplay, and the exciting improvisation that good jazz always yields.
This particular concert was part of Sansui’s “New World of Jazz,” a series of 13 hour-long jazz concerts recorded at Cleveland’s iconic Agora Ballroom and broadcast over 40 FM radio stations. The series was sponsored by Sansui Electronics, a Japanese manufacturer of audio and video equipment, which previously sponsored a similar series of rock concerts recorded at the Agora as well.
Sansui was promoting its matrix QS 4-channel sound system – offering, what was considered at the time, superior diagonal separation and stereo compatibility. The firm, partnering with Agora Ballroom and Agency Recording Studio owner Hank LoConti (1929-2014), was looking to take advantage of what they rightly felt was the then-current jazz renaissance.
Each show’s 16-track master tape was mixed through the Sansui QS 4-channel encoder,” according to an August 1976 Billboard article detailing the arrangement, “for distribution to the 40 FM stations throughout the United States that bought the series” – allowing for three commercial spots for local dealers to advertise."
The recording is available for the first time on CD and VINYL. Mastering by grammy-nominated Jessica Thompson.
After almost two years of work, we're glad to invite you to a new journey through the fog of time and enjoy the upcoming reissue of the great Ambient/Folk record from 1984. A well-known to collectors but extremely rare record by Jon Iverson a multi-instrumentalist from Palo Alto and his college friend, mandolinist Tom Walters. They shared a love for singer/songwriter fare and gigged around campus playing covers of Neil Young, CSN, and Loggins/Messina in the late '70s.
"First Collection" was recorded during the Spring of 1984 in a small garage that had been converted to a one-room apartment in the seaside community of Los Osos, California.
With an instrumentation of 12-string guitar, piano, mandolin, analog synthesizers, and sampler, the duo has recorded nine bright, weightless, and diverse compositions where electronic experiments mix with ethnic rhythms, sweeping through inspired folk reminiscent of the work of William Ackerman, John Fahey, Master Wilburn Burchette, and Robbie Basho, to homemade pastoral space folk exuding sophisticated, pale, lunar sonic moods that somehow might remind of the work of Roedelius from the early 80s.
Equipment used for tracking included a rented 1/2" 8-track Otari MX5050 analog tape machine and assorted mics. With only a few thousand albums pressed, First Collection has become a collectable in some circles.
Now, almost forty years later, First Collection has been remixed and remastered from the original 1/2" tapes for this release.
The “Heaven” EP features producer-extraordinaire Leonard Charles at the helm, collaborating with prodigious artists from New Zealand (his home country) and the USA, to create an wildly eclectic E.P. project with the common underlying thread of basement funk knitting it together. This presentation of funk is truly a legitimate foundation for the heads that need it: built upon solid soul/jazz chord progressions and played on original musical equipment/gear from the 80’s and 90’s. The record features an exclusive remix of the song “Nine Lives” that he co-wrote with boogie/funk legend Leroy Burgess, and additionally features stellar collaborations with Guilty Simpson, Zyah Belle, Reality Jonez and A.C. Freezy. Jeremy ‘Leonard Charles’ Toy is a producer / artist / musician from Auckland New Zealand who has played on records for Mark De Clive Lowe, Recloose, Julien Dyne and Ladyhawke. He has performed music with Randy Crawford, Hugh Masakela, Kimbra, Maynard Ferguson, Ronald LaPread (the Commodores) and has collaborated with Grandmaster Caz, Guilty Simpson (The Leonard Simpson Duo), Georgia-Anne Muldrow, Dudley Perkins and Wildchild. He has released music on his own imprint, From The Crate Records and Jakarta Records, Hit + Run, Wonderful Noise, Hobo Camp and now CQQL Records.
The next album release on Goldie's fast-rising, boutique label Fallen Tree 1Hundred, The Day Out of Time by The Degrees is the Acid Jazz/Soul and Trip Hop long-player from drum and bass man of the moment Break, alsongside singer songwriter isha Campbell, heavily inspired by their home town of Bristol.
The album follows a year of lead-in singles nicely supported by Mary Anne Hobbs, Huey Morgan on BBC Radio 6Music, Mi-Soul, Solar and playlisted on the legendary Jazz FM.
Apparel Music Review:
Perhaps it's nostalgia for that wonderful time when making music was more challenging, at times laborious, and the more tiring was the process that led to the creation the more the final product acquired value, but this album brings you back to those times, without sounding outdated.
We know how much work goes into a record of this kind and, even if today's music world runs fast, presenting hundreds of thousands of releases a day, it is important to remember that records can still be timeless. Well, this is the first thing I thought while listening to this LP for the first time: it is timeless. It sounding ageless is perhaps ascribable to the fact that it recalls that famous sound coming from South-West England in the late 90s/early 00 but, having that musical wave had such an impact and therefore created a sonic standard, it can easily be revived and revisited in a current key without sounding obsolete. In addition, this album is full of different influences coming from R&B, Soul, Hip-Hop which, over the years, have grown and developed to become the daily bread of many listeners who have refined their taste with time, and can now perfectly incorporate the multiple sound stimuli coming from it, as 'The Day Out Of Time' satisfies every type of taste
AD INFINITUM - Die heißeste Band im Modernen Symphonic Metal
2023 heizen AD INFINITUM erneut die Szene auf und melden sich mit ihrem spannungsgeladenen dritten Studioalbum, Chapter III – Downfall, zurück, das am 31. März über Napalm Records erscheint.
Der unverkennbare Sound des Quartetts aus druckvollen, fast progressiven Riffs, symphonischen Nuancen, mitreißenden Refrains und Melissa Bonnys einzigartigem stimmlichen Facettenreichtum führte zu
einem unaufhaltsamen Aufstieg in der Metal-Welt, der nun mit Chapter III – Downfall eindrucksvoll vorangetrieben wird. Das neueste Werk unterstreicht den bisherigen Erfolg der energiegeladenen Formation
– bestehend aus Melissa Bonny (Gesang), Adrian Thessenvitz (Gitarre), Korbinian Benedict (Bass) und
Niklas Müller (Schlagzeug) –, der sich seit der Veröffentlichung des Debütalbums 2020 auch in Millionen
von Videoaufrufen und Streams weltweit widerspiegelt.
Produziert von AD INFINITUM und Jacob Hansen in den Hansen Studios, zeigt Chapter III - Downfall, dass diese aufstrebende Band das Genre mühelos auf den Kopf stellen kann, indem es ihm zeitgemäße
Vibes verleiht, ohne auf die musikalischen Ursprünge zu verzichten, und dabei alle Metal-Fans auf ihrem
Weg an die Spitze begeistert!
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Das Album Zappa ’80: Mudd Club/Munich kombiniert zwei historische Auftritte der Band aus dem Frühjahr/Sommer 1980. Der erste stammt von einem Auftritt in FZs Lieblings-Nachtclub in NYC - dem berühmten Mudd Club. Die Aufnahme basiert auf einem hochauflösenden Transfer des OriginalMasterbands. Die zweite Aufnahme entstand in der Olympiahalle in München und ist die erste LiveStereoaufnahme von Zappa, die direkt digitalisiert wurde. Das Mastering stammt von Bernie Grundman, 2022. Fotografien und Memoiren sind von George Alper, mit Linernotes von Arthur Barrow, Steve Vai, Vaultmeister Joe Travers.
Das Album Zappa ’80: Mudd Club/Munich kombiniert zwei historische Auftritte der Band aus dem Frühjahr/Sommer 1980. Der erste stammt von einem Auftritt in FZs Lieblings-Nachtclub in NYC - dem berühmten Mudd Club. Die Aufnahme basiert auf einem hochauflösenden Transfer des OriginalMasterbands. Die zweite Aufnahme entstand in der Olympiahalle in München und ist die erste LiveStereoaufnahme von Zappa, die direkt digitalisiert wurde. Das Mastering stammt von Bernie Grundman, 2022. Fotografien und Memoiren sind von George Alper, mit Linernotes von Arthur Barrow, Steve Vai, Vaultmeister Joe Travers.
Calisthenics is the first album by Institute for Certified Nomadic Illicit Sonic Practices (ICNISP), the Berlin-based duo of Brazilian musicians Marina Cyrino (flute) and Matthias Koole (el.guitar).
With a mixture of electronic and acoustic sound sources, objects and preparations, inside amplification and no-input mixing, the duo leads guitar and flute towards a common hybrid terrain. Sound perspectives are shifted, instrumental identities are displaced. The piccolo can function as a noise generator and a percussion instrument, the guitar can sound like a bird, the alto flute can be played by an external balloon that moans. Partly inspired by drawings of the Handbook of Calisthenics and Gymnastics: A Complete Drill- book with Music to Accompany the Exercises by J. Watson, first published in 1864, ICNISP came up with a series of musical exercises to stay healthy and fit during the several lockdowns over the past few years. In a playful way, the title Calisthenics also translates an agitation present in many of the duo's energetic playing modes.
On Side A, Calisthenics comprises 7 tracks - or exercises - of different lengths, with a focus on specific instrumental materials or preparations. Side B consists of one track in which a larger form unfurls, with elements of the exercises concatenated into a Full Arch.
No cuts or overdubs.
Marina Cyrino - Amplified Piccolo and Alto Flute.
Matthias Koole - Electric Guitar.
Recorded and mixed by Rabih Beaini at Morphine Raum in Berlin.
Mastered by Paulo Dantas in Rio de Janeiro.
Cover art by Sara Lambranho.
Pressing Info: 180g clear blue vinyl, printed inner-sleeve. Based between Brussels and Berlin, Golden Hours is comprised of past and present members of Gang Of Four, The Brian Jonestown Massacre, Tricky, The Fuzztones and The Third Sound, to name just a few. A band with mileage and stories, they trade in rock'n'roll missives that are at times dark, tense and hypnotic, at others sweaty, relentless and danceable. Made up of Hákon Adalsteinsson (Guitar/Vocals), Rodrigo Fuentealba Palavacino (Guitar), Tobias Humble (Drums/Vocals) and Wim Janssens (Bass/Keys/Vocals), Golden Hours' self-titled debut album is due for release March 31st 2023 on Fuzz Club Records. Wim says of the project and its incoming debut: "The musical backgrounds of each member are pretty broad but somehow when we come together there's a pretty clear definition of what our music should sound like. There's a beautiful friction between the noise we produce and the love for melody that seems to overtake at just the right moment. There never seems to be a lack of ideas when we come together. In silent agreement, every idea gets tried and will be further developed into a song or skipped in a heartbeat. No time is wasted. It all happens pretty automatically."
180g clear vinyl. This is for Indies only. Milan/London experimental band Throw Down Bones are returning with their new album 'Three' on February 24th. A towering body of work that feels both apocalyptic and jubilant, 'Three' is Throw Down Bones' eagerly-awaited return following 2018's 'Two' and the tragic passing of founding member Dave Cocks in a motorcycle accident in 2019. Choosing to continue the band in honour of Cocks, in February 2020, surviving co-founder Francesco Vanni returned to London's New River Studios with long-term collaborator and producer James Aparicio (Spiritualized, Nick Cave) and a new band in tow, made up of bassist Marion Andrau and drummer Raphael Mura. Working in the studio with the new band for the first time, several hours of improvised recordings were captured over the course of those early New River sessions, which were then expanded and pieced together between Aparicio in London and Vanni in Milan. Ready to lacerate eardrums and send into a trance once more, the result is a 9-track album spanning feedback-blasted industrial psychedelia, heavy electronics, krautrock and dark ambient. Overcoming huge psychological and practical difficulties, 'Three' is a powerful and moving record in more ways than one - a post-industrial triumph that's at once hedonistic, cathartic and poignant. Describing 'Three' and its intentions, Vanni says: "This album tries to reverse the usual band-listener interaction. We hold no truth and we're not willing to serve any universal answers to anything. Instead, we question the listener who, according to their experiences and sensitivity, will find a reply for themselves. That's the role of instrumental music and why we love it so much. It brings the listener to the centre of the project, giving them an active role in translating music into meaning. Every single note in this album is dedicated to our brother Dave Cocks."
Es ist mittlerweile längst kein Geheimnis mehr, dass die TrinkundSinggemeinschaft (TSG) aus dem Oxo86-Umfeld kommt! Sänger Willi und seine Bernauer Freunden schreiben Songs rund um Fußball, Stadion, Zusammenhalt und Anekdoten, die ein wahrer Fan so auf den Platz, davor und danach erlebt. Mit "Fußball & Blues" erscheint nun endlich der Nachfolger des legendären TSG-Debuts mit 12 neuen Folk-Punk-Akustik-Shanty Hymnen. Geschichten über "Abstiegskampf", "Liebe auf den ersten Blick" und weitere Liebesbekundungen für das "Mädchen aus der Kurve" oder "Unser Sportplatz - Unser Revier"! Sucht- und Ohrwurmgefahr garantiert.
Fans of the Escapers know the love of Rock Steady and Reggae Music. This time they pay homage to a Johnny Taylor sung Stax classic and transform it into a Lover’s Rock thriller. A bass heavy Roots rhythm combined with Colton’s haunting lead guitar create a perfect platform. Johnny Ruiz to express his love. Hey baby “Ain’t That Lovin You”? Definitely, and for “More Reasons Than One”
More of a double A-Side release, the b-side has The Escapers calling on The Heavyweight Dub Champion himself...the mighty Scientist to reinterpret their biggest single “Stay”! Overton “Scientist” Brown gives this tune a classic style “version” with all the echo and distortion any reggae fan would want. A real privilege to work with one of the true legends of dub music!
Rootz Lions Band share the love for conscious roots reggae music & are dreadicated to taking the music forward in these times.
Bassplayer Carlos Silva is the founding member of the band. In 2016 he gathered some of the Dutch reggae scene's most experienced musicians, each of them having previously played with top local and international artists - most recently the band have performed with Army, Prince Jamo, Donovan Kingjay, Black Omolo, Iyiapo Tafari, Chezidek and more.
MLK is a singer from Sierra Leone, based in the Netherlands. He performs regularly live with bands and in 2018 released the acclaimed LP 'The World Is In Trouble' with The Breadwinners on the Bionic Dread label.
King Cooper (AKA King Kooper in the Jazz world) from Amsterdam has a long & fascinating career, playing reggae, jazz, funk & soul with the likes of Doe Maar, Sister Sledge, Coopertest & many, many more... proving himself as one the world's top saxophonists.
Hornsman Coyote from Belgrade, Serbia is one of the leading Trombonists in the modern reggae scene and works regularly with top producers & labels internationally, such as, Lee Perry, House Of Riddim, Rolling Lion, Jah Works, Earth Works, Jerry Lions to name but a few. His career started as the front-man for Belgrade Hard-Rock-reggae crossover band, Eyesburn & is a singer songwriter in his own right with a huge catalogue from over 20 years of continued performance & recording.
Plunder was recorded and mixed at Earth Works Studio, Amsterdam
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Laszlo Umbreit's album Pas de Regrets combines electronic sounds with recorded memories and various materials to create a unique listening experience. The album features complex soundscapes and techniques of layering and editing, drawing on Umbreit's experience as a sound designer for films. Pas de Regrets is an immersive and rich listening experience, with a narrative quality that places it between prospective electronics and experimental radio.
Laszlo Umbreit (*1986) is a Belgian sound designer and musician based in Brussels. Laszlo's work is anchored in sound research yet usually dialogues with the moving image, whether as present or absent. His musical practice mixes improvisation on electronic instruments, field recordings and a long meticulous editing and mixing process of sonic materials.
Das sechste Album der New Yorker Band The National ist der Nachfolger des gefeierten Meisterwerks "High Violet" (2010), das sich weltweit über 600.000-mal verkaufte. Sänger Matt Berninger beschreibt die Songs auf "Trouble Will Find Me" im Vergleich zum bisherigen Schaffen der Band als "intuitiver und direkter". Tatsächlich ist der Sound des Albums unmittelbarer und zugänglicher, sodass man förmlich spürt, wie die Band bei sich selbst angekommen ist. "In den letzten zehn Jahren waren wir immer hinter etwas her und wollten etwas beweisen", so Berninger. Nach der fast zweijährigen Tour zu "High Violet" hätten sie sich diesbezüglich nun endlich mal entspannen können. Das Ergebnis ist gleichzeitig so neuartig wie familiär, der Höhepunkt einer künstlerischen Reise, die The National sowohl in neue Sphären als auch zurück zu ihren Anfängen bringt. Bassist Aaron Dessner: "Auf der einen Seite sind die neuen Songs die bisher komplexesten, aber auch die schlichtesten und "menschlichsten". Es fühlt sich einfach an, als hätten wir unsere gemeinsame Chemie gefunden."
Death Cab For Cutie haben es geschafft mit ihrer dritten Platte einen Klassiker des "Quiet Rock" zu veröffentlichen. "Transatlanticism" ist all das, was wir zur Zeit an Rockmusik lieben. Seitdem das Klavier bei Rockmusik wieder mitmachen darf. Große Melodiebögen, die erst nach dem dritten Mal ihre Schönheit offenbaren, leuchtende Ernsthaftigkeit. Eine herrliche Platte. "Transatlanticism" beginnt mit dem Satz : "So this is the new year!" Jedes Mal wenn man diese Platte auflegt ist Neujahr, 4 Minuten nach 00:00 Uhr. Die Band hat die Option, uns durch das ganze Jahr zu begleiten. Mit ihrer Schönheit, Melodie, Vielschichtigkeit... Death Cab for Cutie haben sich 1997 in Bellingham/Washington gegründet. Der Sänger Benjamin Gibbard, dessen Stimme vielen durch sein Wirken bei der Sub Pop-Band Postal Service bekannt sein dürfte, wird von seiner Band - Christopher Walla (Gitarre), Nicholas Harmer ( Bass) und Michael Schorr (Schlagzeug) - durch dieses Album getragen. Wenn Sie schon mal ein wenig verliebt waren, dann hören Sie auf das Titelstück. Das epische 7:55 min lange "Transatlanticism". Und er singt:" I need you so much closer! So come on!"
Over the past 20 years, The New Pornographers have proven themselves one of the most excellent bands in indie rock. The group’s ninth album and first for Merge establishes them alongside modern luminaries like Yo La Tengo and Superchunk when it comes to their ability to evolve while still retaining what made them so special in the first place. A dazzling and intriguing collection of songs, Continue as a Guest finds bandleader A.C. Newman and his compatriots Neko Case, Kathryn Calder, John Collins, Todd Fancey, and Joe Seiders exploring fresh territory and shattering the barriers of their collective comfort zone. Newman began work on Continue as a Guest after the band had finished touring behind 2019’s In the Morse Code of Brake Lights. Themes of isolation and collapse bleed into this album, as Newman tackles the ambivalence of day-to-day life during the COVID-19 pandemic. But Newman says that Continue as a Guest’s title track also addresses the concerns that come with being in a band for so long. “The idea of continuing as a guest felt apropos to the times,” he explains. “Feeling out of place in culture, in society, being in a band that has been around for so long—not feeling like a part of any zeitgeist, but happy to be separate and living your simple life, your long fade-out.
Living in a secluded place in an isolated time, it felt like a positive form of acceptance: find your own little nowhere, find some space to fall apart, continue as a guest.” Newman discovered new vocal approaches within his own talent. There are new and rich tones to Newman’s voice throughout Continue as a Guest, from his dusky lower register over “Angelcover” to his slippery slide over the glimmering synths of “Firework in the Falling Snow,” to bold tones he embraces on the soaring “Bottle Episodes.”
Another sonic change comes courtesy of saxophonist Zach Djanikian, whose tenor and bass luxuriate all over Continue as a Guest’s alluring chassis, especially on the menacing build of “Pontius Pilate’s Home Movies.” Along with Newman’s usual collaborators, several songwriters contribute. The bursting opener and first single “Really Really Light” is a co-write with Dan Bejar (Destroyer, the New Pornographers). Then there’s “Firework in the Falling Snow,” a collaboration with Sadie Dupuis of Speedy Ortiz and Sad13. “I was feeling like I wanted some help, so I sent it to Sadie and she sent me back this complete song that had these great lyrics,” Newman says. “She included the line ‘A firework in the falling snow,’ and I was like, ‘Yeah, that’s great.’ Sometimes you need that one thing to center the song, and even though I only used a few lines of hers in the end, I couldn’t have finished it without her.”
Even as Newman embraces a collaborative spirit more than ever, Continue as a Guest is a testament to his ability to discover new artistic sides of himself. “I started out as a songwriter more than as a singer, but at some point, you have to sing your own songs,” he says with a chuckle. “For a long time, I felt like the idea of changing a song because I couldn’t hit a note wasn’t okay—I could just get someone else to sing it. But I’m learning now that my songs can actually be a lot more malleable than I thought.” And it’s in that spirit that Continue as a Guest sounds like a thrilling path forward for The New Pornographers, with songs that generate a contagious feeling of excitement for the future as well.
Tape Runs Out's debut album, Floodhead On 180GSM, River Green Vinyl, with beautiful matt varnish artwork, Green vinyl strictly limited run of 350 ,. Floodhead is an exploratory sonic journey from the mind and soul of long-time band leader, Liam Goodrum-Bell (guitar, vocals). Tape Runs Out’s experimental sound comes in part from their excellent array of instrumentation - the band members bring violin (Clare Myerscough) and the hammered dulcimer (Ellie Winter), as well as bass (Takeshi Kanemoto) and drums (Laurence Moore). Recorded and produced by Liam and Dan Dawson (band’s guitarist) at Dan’s home studio over the course of a year, the album thrives off experimenting with different textures and sounds, with each song seeking to be its own microcosm of creativity, delivering its unique part within the whole. The painstaking detail and time spent by Liam and Dan between the initial recording session during the summers of 2021 and 2022 has resulted in an incredible production, and one that takes the listener through the Tape Runs Out universe. The first single from Floodhead, Souvenir made God is in the TV's track of the week and was heaped praise on by Steve Lamacq on his BBC 6 Music afternoon show and new music fix.
The undisputed kings of garage rock are back! It’s been 22 years since the last Headcoats album, but now Billy, Bruce, and Johnny return with a brand-new studio album!
Recorded last year at Ranscombe Studios in Rochester. Billy, Bruce, and Johnny kindly answered some pertinent questions…You got back together recently as Thee Headcoats Sect to make the ‘Tribute to Don Craine’ EP. What was it like working with each other again after all this time? BILLY: It was 'fab' and 'gear.' BRUCE: The weirdest thing for me was how weird it wasn't.
It was like time compressed, but to the 'good old days', early on. I was wary that it 'wouldn't be like Thee Headcoats', but it was. JOHNNY: I'm with Bruce and Billy on that one. I think we were all surprised how it all just worked. If I remember correctly, we kicked off role playing like we detested each other. Then we got started and well, you can hear the result.
What were the first songs you ran through when you got in the studio? BILLY: That’s a very good question. No idea. BRUCE: I can't remember. They all sound the same to me. JOHNNY: Bill had stuff on his phone that went “KSSHHCCCKSSHHHH”! So, we did that first. You’ve also paid tribute to Don with a track on the Irregularis album – ‘Oh Leader We Do Dig Thee’.
He was, along with the other members of Downliners Sect, a big inspiration to Thee Headcoats. When did you first become aware of his music and what was he like to work with? BRUCE: We were given (or possibly lent) a reissue of the Sect's first LP around 1977, marketed as 'Punk From The Vaults', which certainly floated our boats and definitely popped our corks, due to the somewhat aggressive yet carefree nature of the tunes and sound in general. Ollie, our old bassist, found an ad in a trade magazine for them with a contact number for a Michael O'Donnell, which I excitedly called almost immediately.
T'was none other than Don his'self and we managed to convince him into venturing down to Rochester to record some tunes with us which became the first Headcoat Sect EP. We were fairly starstruck and presented him with a brand new 'dearstalker' (or 'Headcoat', as they were now known). He was very accommodating and a great laugh and spent the evening with us, regaling us with tales of yore. I recorded a lot of it on cassette, which I may still have somewhere. Gawd bless Don
First time available on cassette. Gap Girls led by Jacob Rubeck of Surf Curse. Gap Girls is the synth-pop project of Los Angeles DIY scene mainstay Jacob Rubeck. As half of the electrifying indie rock duo Surf Curse, Rubeck is no stranger to a good hook, but when he trades jangly guitars for synths, an entire new world opens up. On his new album Forever Love, Forever After, that world is one of love, hope, and welcomeness. In contrast to the shadowy wistful sounds of Gap Girls’ previous effort ‘Street Desires,’ ‘Forever Love, Forever After’ sounds like an uplifting triumph of love, in all its mysterious shapes and forms. With punchy drum machines, shimmering synths, and chest-rumbling bass, these songs are pure synth-pop bliss for letting love in.
Porto-based trio 10 000 Russos will release their new ‘Live In Berlin’ double LP on March 24th 2023 via Rubber Duck, a new live album imprint by Fuzz Club Records. The record captures the band storming through their subterranean motorik psych-drone live at Berlin’s Astra Kulturhaus on October 16th 2021. Recorded whilst out on a European tour, ‘Live In Berlin’ finds 10 000 Russos performing their 2021 ‘Superinertia’ LP in full the album’s five songs expanded and taken to even more transfixing and hedonistic heights in a live setting. These shows were 10 000 Russos’ first with the new, more-electronic line-up and sound, with newly-recruited synth player Nils Meisel making his debut on the ‘Superinertia’ LP and completing the line-up alongside founding members João Pimenta (drums/vocals) and Pedro Pestana (guitar). Across the hour-long set, Pimenta’s deadpan sprechgesang vocal and machine-like percussion, Pestana cascading psych guitar-loops and Meisel’s repetitive synth basslines all combine on a performance that will pull you into a trance at times and get you on your feet at others.
Introducing a brand new artist on Skep Wax Records, MARLODY releases debut album I’m Not Sure At All. Limited edition white vinyl LP plus digital DL and signed postcard. Marlody’s first album I’m Not Sure At All takes anxiety, weakness, fear - and turns them into strength: powerful melodies, the sweetest harmonies you ever heard, and lyrics that insist on the possibility of hope, without losing sight of the possibility of despair.
Dominated by her extraordinary keyboard playing, Marlody’s songs are illuminated - and sometimes made sinister by occasional bursts of programmed percussion, submarine bass and distant, chiming digital bells. These are deep, darkly beautiful pop songs. When she was a girl, Marlody was one of the higher-achieving classical pianists of her generation, winning competitions and destined for greatness.
She hated it, and threw it all away. In the intervening years, putting more and more distance between herself and her classical origins, she listened to Yo La Tengo and Shellac and a hundred other things that took music to new, untutored extremes. I’m Not Sure At All is the outcome. Marlody’s painful personal journey is not glossed over in the lyrics: Words is about the debilitating effect of psychiatric medication; Malevolence is about the horrible urge to commit inexcusable violence;
Friends in Low Places is a remarkable hymn of solidarity with all those people who’ve contemplated taking their own lives. But the songs are strangely uplifting: they offer up their truths so calmly and are so generously wrapped in harmonies that they feel like gifts. There are great stories here too: Summer takes a child’s point of view, describing the beginnings of new life after the loss of a parent.
Wrong relates the history of an adulterous affair, with a piercing sympathy for the emotional state of the adulterer. There are musical echoes: the infectiousness and daring of some of the vocal melodies might remind you of Kate Bush, the intimacy might remind you of Cate Le Bon, the stabs of anger and pain might remind you of Liz Phair. The keyboard is sometimes as smooth as Fleetwood Mac; other times it’s as raucous and distorted as Quasi. The harmonies are from another place again – you could imagine hearing them in an Unthanks recording. I’m Not Sure At All will be released by Skep Wax on limited edition white vinyl and all digital services.
. Follow up EP to 2022s ‘Barbara’, which was praised by The New York Times, NPR Music, KEXP, KCRW, Stereogum, The Line Of Best Fit, Billboard, Consequence, Under The Radar, Clash and more. Fresh off support tours with Alex G in the US and Japanese Breakfast in the UK. Barrie will be showcasing as an offcial artist at SXSW 2023. New EP expands on the sound of ‘Barbara’ while taking a fresh approach to songwriting and collaboration. Brooklyn-based musician and producer Barrie Lindsay, known simply as Barrie, has a passion for creating left-of-center pop music. She spends her days writing songs and tinkering in Logic, stockpiling her creations in a vast archive of folders and hard drives. When it came time to select the songs for her sophomore LP, ‘Barbara,’ she narrowed it down to sixteen tracks. As the record came together, it became clear that there would be two separate projects - the first being ‘Barbara,’ an emotionally charged collection of songs dealing with the loss of a parent, the love of a new partner, and finding one's own identity. The remaining five tracks, which were more light-hearted and o the cu, were compiled into a new project titled ‘5K.’ As an avid runner, Barrie named the EP after the common foot race. The aptly titled lead single, "Races," is a delightful synth-pop track in a unique 12/8 time, built around a bombastic drum kit and giddy key ris. "Nocturne Interlude" acts as a segue between ‘Barbara’ and ‘5K,’ showcasing a haunting melody amidst dark brass-like synths. Second half highlight "Ghost World" has a distorted guitar ri and classic drum pattern that evokes a forgotten 90's radio b-side. The song was recorded entirely by Barrie herself, serving as her own band on guitar, bass, keys, and drum kit. Even though most people would finish listening to the project front to back before finishing a 5k run, the short, sweet, and melodically rich EP begs to be replayed over and over. With ‘5K,’ Barrie showcases her versatility as an artist, closing the loop between the sounds found on her debut LP ‘Happy To Be Here’ and her follow-up ‘Barbara’
Circassian-Turkish Producer Sine Buyuka debuts new solo project Sinemis with lush, graceful album ‘Dua’, gently combining the ancestral Sufi music of her homeland with sophisticated techno-inflected ambient. Dua’s life began with a life-threatening illness. “I started feeling unwell last year and no one could figure out the reason,” Sine writes. “It was a scary time, not knowing and trying to manage symptoms while they slowly worsened. In late 2021, while I was visiting my family in Turkey during the Christmas break, I was taken into A&E. After more tests, I had a diagnosis and had surgery in January.” Following this, within the healing process - highly emotional as well as physical - Sine was drawn to the traditional Sufi music of Turkey and the Middle East. Ritualistic music to accompany ancient sema ceremonies, in which whirling dervishes enter a transcendental consciousness through ecstatic movement and repetition. With this influence at heart, Sine began work on ‘Dua’, with a newly-formed artist name to signify new, unfamiliar music from a celebrated electronic producer. For her, the album marks a significant step in her recovery. But it is also a potent marriage of contemporary and ancestral trancestates, interweaving sci-fi synthesis and floor shaking bass tones with mystic imagery, textures and timbres. A meditative, spiritual balm that melds field recordings, found sounds, ambient soundscapes, electronics and acoustic instrumentation to celebrate life and survival in challenging circumstances. The breathy, cinematic tones of album opener ‘Dua’ hover and shiver in preparatory stasis as broken-machine punctuation begins to dot rhythmically through the space. A yearning, repeated vocal sample - a living, beating heart inside the machine - characterises a crucial theme for the album: the marriage of digital instrumentation with the analogue, the human and the organic. Later, ‘Elegy’ reflects its title with heartbreaking chordal shifts and glitching birdsong, conjuring a sound world somewhere between KMRU and Max Richter. Key track ‘Gazel’ moves in glacial slo-mo, like whirling dervishes frozen in time at the peak of their trance. Euphoric ceremony made haunting and poignant without losing a mote of power…Across the album, the timbres of Sufi ritual are often captured by the otherworldly presence of the historic ney flute, said to be as old as the Holy Books. “Sufi music can be created using several different instruments but the ney flute is at the heart of it. The sounds emanating from this fascinating instrument kept capturing my imagination,” Sine tells us. Working both with samples and with Turkish musician Omar Faruk Tekbilek, Sine achieves a rare balance of reverence and recontextualisation for such a time-honoured instrument, here performed by a lifelong student of its intricacies and mysteries. In Sinemis’ hands, the processing and sonic treatment of the ney even sometimes renders it indistinguishable from Dua’s synthesis and sound-design
For over 30 years Richard Adams has been quietly documenting his own particular corner of the English countryside both with Hood, the post-rock band he formed with his brother in 1991, and since 2007 with The Declining Winter. Recorded over a five year period and inspired by rustic English alternatives such as Talk Talk and Robert Wyatt, The Declining Winter’s latest work ‘Really Early, Really Late’ is a collection of beautiful songs, immersed in a richer sonic spectrum incorporating strings, horns and lush electronic textures, alongside Adams’ own unique guitar tones and characteristic dubby bass. Though it retains the homespun scratchiness of previous The Declining Winter records, ‘Really Early, Really Late’ is also their most ornate. A remotely collaborative effort, the record is scattered with decorative embellishments from violinist Sarah Kemp (Brave Timbers), cellist Peter Hollo (Tangents), and guitarist Ben Holton (epic45), among many others. Adams’ distorted whisper of a voice has never been more exposed leading to a brutally emotive and intensely personal song-suite, both raw and beautiful in equal measure. The storybook curiosity of Mark Hollis’ work is a particular influence. Like Hollis, this music is imbued with magical realism: beholden to nature, it hints at the mysteries lurking in mundane local landscapes and the more remote Yorkshire moors and valleys. A record to hold close to your heart, ‘Really Early, Really Late’ sees Adams and his collaborators emerge from the shadows with their most complete work to date. Home Assembly are proud to present the album on lush crystal clear, double vinyl, bundled with a CD housed in an oversized vinyl-style sleeve.
Free The Robots intentionally marries various electronica genres into a joyous, machine-like syrup that swims between the currents of deep introspection and the depths of the dance floor. 'Kaduwa' is his most recent manifestation, born out of his travels around the world. Especially inspired by his time between Los Angeles, Barcelona, and the island Siargao in the Philippines, Free The Robots translates his experiences into electronic, jazz-centric and sample based beats with sublime tinges of psych, rock, house, and hip-hop. For the most part, these compositions are blunted, funky, and psychedelic. There are tracks for club nights, tunes for early morning comedowns, and songs that are suitable for both. Once more adding new ripples to his sound, Free The Robots continues to explore new frontiers while keeping the torch burning for the L.A. beat freaks
Now available at a new lower price. Pressed On Opaque Yellow Vinyl With Japanese Stylized Insert And Deluxe Obi Strip. Remastered From The Original Analog Tapes. The first live Miles Davis electric band release since 1977’s very dark and heavy Dark Magus. The album features live performances from shows at Boston’s Kix Club. The double vinyl release contains reimagined versions of songs from The Man With the Horn (1981), tunes from the pre-electric Gil Evans collaboration Porgy and Bess (1959), and a dedication to the Boston venue called Kix. While this was one of the first live Miles Davis performances in over half a decade it certainly did not show!!! This album features R&B legend Marcus Miller on bass, Mike Stern on guitar, Bill Evans on saxophone, Mino Cinelu on percussion, and electric band alumni Al Foster on drums. Produced and edited by long time Miles collaborator Teo Macero
Balancing traditionally timeless grit with 21st century gusto, Judiciary hammer out hardcore grooves at breakneck thrash speeds. The Texas quintet—Jake Collinson vocals, Kyle Calfin [bass], Austin Looney [drums], Jimmy LaDue [guitar], and Israel Garza [guitar]—wield a searing signature style unlike anything in heavy music. With calculated intensity, it bludgeons without compromise, draws back for a breath, and strikes again even harder. Piling up millions of streams and inciting the applause of Stereogum, Revolver, and more, the group perfects this incendiary hybrid of metal and hardcore on their 2023 second full-length LP, Flesh + Blood [Closed Casket Activities]. “It’s a mashup of old school heavy metal with contemporary energy,” says Kyle. “We didn’t just change anything for the sake of change—we’ve elevated everything in every way.
Australian vocalist-guitarist Daevid Allen was a part of the highly experimental Canterbury scene, alongside the likes of drummers Robert Wyatt and Pip Pyle, before he relocated to Paris in the late ‘60s, formed Gong and made music that had a rare blend of on the fly creativity and off the wall humour. However, Banana Moon was a solo effort by Allen that saw him reunite with the aforementioned British kindred spirits as well as bassist Archie Legget and vocalist Maggie Bell, among others. The nine songs on the record run from interludes of just under a minute to epic suites that exceed ten, making it clear that Allen, as his work with Gong suggested, gave full vent to his imagination whether he was writing songs with a quasi-Beatles pop appeal or engaging in unrestrained sonic flights of fancy. With lyrical curveballs being thrown on every track, none more so than ‘Fred The Fish And The Chip On His Shoulder’, the music has a wry charm to match the performance skills of the band. This re-mastered version of Banana Moon brings Allen’s uncommon musical vision back in to view and serves as a reminder of the feverish and fearless energy that spurred on an artist whose work has lost none of its seductive shock value.
Liverpool-born drummer Aynsley Dunbar was one of the most respected musicians on the international rock scene of the late ‘60s. His work with trailblazers such as John Mayall, David Bowie, Lou Reed and Frank Zappa, with whom he had a lengthy association, have assured his place in history. But Dunbar also laid down a marker as a bandleader in his own right. His debut album, Doctor Dunbar’s Prescription was a confident set of electric blues that was full of snappy tunes and high energy riffing. Recorded in 1971, Blue Whale is considerably more experimental, though. It is really a case of Dunbar drifting towards a hybrid of progressive rock and pyschedelia not far removed from Zappa’s surreally comic, bitingly sardonic world. And indeed the cover of his seminal ‘Willie The Pimp’ is one of the highlights of the set. Accompanied by excellent rhythm section players and soloists such as guitarists Ivan Zagni and Roger Sutton, bassist Peter Friedberg, pianist-organist Tommy Eyre, and vocalist Paul Williams, Dunbar hit a creative peak here that is emphatically maintained elsewhere on the album, which has mostly long pieces full of notable light and shade. This newly re-mastered version of Blue Whale puts one of the highpoints of Aynsley Dunbar’s illustrious career back under the spotlight. He was rightly inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall Of Fame in 2017 and there could be no more fitting example of his achievement than an album that sounds impressively fresh 50 years after it was made.
With nothing more than a Gibson Les Paul slung over his shoulder, a warm amp turned all the way up, and a hot microphone on and ready, Jared James Nichols churns out the kind of rock that rips, roars and rolls without filter or apology. The Wisconsin-born and Nashville-based singer, songwriter and guitarist delivers a one-two punch of gritty vocals straight from the gut and incendiary fret fireworks. After earning widespread acclaim from the likes of American Songwriter, Guitar, Guitar World, Relix and more, tallying millions of streams, and packing houses at countless shows, he showcases every side of himself on his 2023 self-titled third full-length offering.
Darling West decamped for a tiny island on Norway’s west coast to begin writing what was to become Cosmos, their fifth studio album. For the first time, the band’s core – married couple Mari and Tor Egil Kreken – have included band members Thomas Gallatin and Christer Slaaen in the songwriting and production process. As a larger united, Darling West has really evolved. Cosmos is indeed the sound of expansion. West coast, cosmic folk, americana… Call it what you will – there are even hints of afro blues on here – but where the band once fit firmly in the folk/americana category, you might as well just call it pop these days. Cosmos was recorded and produced in its entirety by Darling West. Vocal guests on the album include Matthew Logan Vasquez (Delta Spirit) and Jarle Bernhoft, while David Wallumrød, Lars Horntveth and Torjus Vierli all excel on keys. Finally, the one and only Rob Moose (Paul Simon, Bon Iver, Sufjan Stevens, Phoebe Bridgers) provides strings on “Till Night Turns to Day” and “Old Man”. The listener is also awarded plenty of what we’ve come to love from Darling West: Mari Kreken’s gorgeous voice and Tor Egil Kreken’s incredibly versatile playing (guitar, bass, banjo, etc.) playing. The sum of these parts makes up a magical record, with songs and melodies that will stay on your mind for the unforeseeable future. While many struggled to keep their heads up during the pandemic, the band did their best to contribute positively, and came out on the other side with a growing, dedicated fanbase, due to their incredibly popular “Family Sessions” on Youtube. A recurring concept where they featured a host of friends and other artists, thus creating a community – or family – which is still going strong. The music on Cosmos searches outward, while the lyrics look inward. The resulting record includes elements of pop, while it pushes the envelope for what Norwegian americana can sound like. Cosmos is also about loving yourself, and there are of course a handful of love songs about shaky relationships – as we’ve come to expect from Darling West. The band continues to develop their unique musicianship and Cosmos is indeed another masterstroke from the band.
Gargantuan volcanoes erupting with primal force, fountains of molten lava bursting sky high and massive boulders hurtling capriciously through the air. These potent and violently alluring images in the documentary series The Living Planet captivated Raoul Björkenheim's imagination in 1986. The search for a band name had come to an end. -”I was mesmerised. The name Krakatau sounded like a drum fill to me”. After studying at the Helsinki Conservatory for a year and the Berklee College of Music in Boston for three, Björkenheim relocated to Finland where he played in bands with Jone Takamäki, Antti Hytti and Tom Nekljudow, and later went on to work with composer and drummer Edward “Eetu” Vesala (1945-1999). His always original and highly demanding Sound & Fury workshops were a pivotal hotbed in the local improvised music scene, but after four years of Vesala's strict leadership Björkenheim felt a need to leave Sound & Fury behind and direct all of his attention towards Krakatau. The lineup on the first album “Ritual” consisted of reed virtuosos Jorma Tapio and Tapani Rinne, the bassist Sampo Lassila and two drummers, Michel Lambert and Heikki “Lefty” Lehto. “Krakatau’s debut album was very challenging to make, as I felt that it might be my one and only chance to record my own music, so I wanted it to be as intense and effective as possible”, says Björkenheim, “I was lucky enough to work with an incredibly talented cast of musicians. I can still listen to the album and feel satisfied that it really works. The first guitar solo illustrates what was to become my modus operandi: to try and play the electric guitar in unexpected ways.” Svart Records will release an expanded double LP version of Krakatau’s Ritual. Limited to 500 copies and due out on March 24th, the album contains an album’s worth of previously unheard material recorded in 1987 in Studio Helsinki and at the Finnish Broadcasting Corporation studio.