A much sought-after Kristin Hersh side project. Black Vinyl LP. Back on vinyl for this bracing, ever twitching opus made of seven fluid pieces that fold into one continuous mantra. An essential release from the Throwing Muses’ offshoot helmed by Kristin Hersh and Bernard Georges, with Chalk Farm’s Rob Ahlers on drums. “Menacing, stalking, spirals of lean, hungry riffs.” Drowned In Sound 9/10.
Black Truffle is pleased to announce World in World, the latest solo offering from prolific Berlin-based guitarist-composer Julia Reidy. Where the recent trilogy of LP releases – brace, brace (Slip, 2019), In Real Life (Black Truffle, 2019), and Vanish (Editions Mego, 2020) – focussed on increasingly lush electronic settings for Reidy’s propulsive fingerpicking and auto-tuned vocals, arranged into wide-ranging side-long epics, World in World finds Reidy refocusing on the core elements of their approach while simultaneously pushing into challenging new areas. Comprising nine pieces ranging between two and seven minutes in length, the album’s opening title track promptly introduces the distinctive palette of just-intoned electric guitars, subtle electronic processing, and voice that is rigorously explored throughout. Where much of Reidy’s guitar work on previous recordings explored rapidly pulsed cycling figures, here notes often hang in the air in a more spacious, lyrical fashion. The elasticity of rhythm and non-linear repetition of pitches initially suggests improvisation until the listener becomes aware of the precise arrangements of spatialised lines. At times, World in World suggests classic bedroom electric guitar works of the 1990s such as Loren Connors’ Airs or Roy Montgomery’s Scenes from the South Island; like those works, Reidy’s possesses a wonderfully live ambience, with frequent pedal clicks adding to the music’s powerful sense of intimacy. In Reidy’s case, however, the yearning, melancholic mood of Connors or Montgomery is tempered by the unorthodox guitar tuning, which at points produces a unique and uncomfortable effect somewhere between the hyper-precision of Harry Partch or Lou Harrison and Jandek’s slack-stringed descent into the void. While World in World plots out its terrain with a bold single-mindedness that allows some pieces to appear almost as variations on a common theme, subtle changes in emphasis distinguish each track. Tactile percussive interjections skitter across the tremolo tones of ‘Paradise in Unrecognisable Colours’, while ‘Ajar’ ramps up the role played by the electronics, with glitching pitch-shifted and back-masked textures threaded through the guitars and thickly harmonised vocal layers. Ranging from autotuned melodic lines to buried murmurs, Reidy’s voice is a frequent presence throughout these nine pieces, at times creating the impression that a more conventional series of songs lurks underneath the chiming microtonal guitars. On the stunning ‘Poised’, whispers and distant, ghostly wails surround the layers of guitars, at times suggesting the foggiest outer reaches of Liz Harris’ Grouper. Both rigorously experimental and emotive, World in World is undoubtedly Julia Reidy’s finest work yet.
Tom Tykwer discussed the composers’ work on The Matrix Resurrections. “There’s a powerful and distinct musical legacy here. In my opinion, The Matrix Trilogy is one of the great scores of all time. And what’s particularly fantastic about it is that it was also, to my knowledge, one of the first film scores that so implemented electronic music and connected it with progressive late-modern orchestral music. It started a movement, which we are paying tribute to with this music. And yet, this film is playful and emotional with complex development, open in every direction. Johnny and I felt our challenge for the music was to pay tribute to The Matrix lineage and also support this cinematic endeavor of expanding that legacy to explore new directions. That needs to be represented in the music and that is what we are trying to investigate musically.”
Johnny Klimek elaborated, “We spent several months working on material for The Matrix Resurrections, building the main themes, crafting alternative arrangements and electronic variants. We had a lot of fun mixing electronics with classical orchestra. The technology has come so far since I started scoring film.”
The Matrix Resurrections - Original Motion Picture Soundtrack Includes all 24 tracks composed for the film by Johnny Klimek and Tom Tykwer, mastered for vinyl and pressed on 2x 180 Gram Black vinyl, with original artwork by Mondo's creative director Mo Shafeek
Joona Toivanen Trio makes their We Jazz Records debut with their new album "Both Only", out 25 Feb 2022. A landmark work for the long standing group, the album showcases a new sound for the band, trekking deep into new ideas for an acoustic jazz piano trio. Since their formation as teenagers in mid-1990's, the trio of pianist Joona Toivanen, bassist Tapani Toivanen and drummer Olavi Louhivuori (of Superposition, Ilmiliekki Quartet and Linda Fredriksson "Juniper") has developed their remarkably coherent band sound step by step, touring the world over. Nowadays, the trio is geographically split between Gothenburg, Sweden (Joona), Copenhagen, Denmark (Tapani), and Helsinki, Finland (Olavi), but the unit has never sounded so together as one, and as adventurous as on "Both Only".
"Both Only" by Joona Toivanen Trio is a cocoon, a welcoming shelter of sound that opens up naturally for the listener to inhabit. The album is moody and introspective, even dark at times, but by the time you get to the closing track, "This and This", you'll likely notice something hopeful brewing up. This is not music dealing with nostalgia or a world lost. Instead, it's a body of work with delicate dynamics, taking a minute just to listen and to look inwards to learn something, to move forward.
The first single "Enlightened" is perhaps the most traditional piece on the album, yet it flows like a vessel beyond genre, conveying a mood, a feeling and an idea. Listen to how the piano, bass and drums discuss, how the groove moves with the instruments having their clear roles but also supporting each other and documenting a musical aging process exactly as that of a quality bottle of red wine. As a song like "Direction" proves, the melody is there all the way, yet there is nothing obvious about how it's carried by the trio. Things remain surprising, fresh and moving at all times. "Except For" keeps its intensity, while nearly erupting into a full on 4-to-the-floor banger. Nearly! The key here is how the energy sustains itself, building the intensity within the music.
"Both Only" is a powerful statement from a band ready to renew itself time and again, and one willing to do it slowly, outside of the hype. This process makes the impact enduring, nuanced and lovely.
WJLP37 Joona Toivanen Trio "Both Only" is available on vinyl as a black vinyl edition and as a LP+7" bundle also including WJ0716 "Except For (7" Edit)" / "Keyboard Study No. 2".
“More excellent poetic soundscapes from We Jazz! Love the flow through the tracks here – textural pieces moving into more rhythmic jazz abstractions. Beautifully recorded too.”
Quinton Scott — Worldwide FM
“Following on from the excellent Linda Fredriksson album We Jazz extend the journey with this innovative Joona Toivanen Trio set.”
Paul Bradshaw — Straight No Chaser
“You’ll look in vain here for extravagant splashes of color or bright swathes of sound, but what you will discover are a finely-chiselled set of compositions that make the most of the trio’s limited palette: flint-sharp melodies hewn from the ice, crisp and crackling rhythms.”
Cal Gibson — Ban Ban Ton Ton
“Incredible album from Joona Toivanen Trio and a strong start to the new year from We Jazz.”
Kerem Gokmen — Dubmission
“Encapsulating a new movement in jazz.”
Jay Scarlett — Sounds Supreme
“Interesting listen on the shortest day of the year. They have a very definite and saturated style.”
John Chacona — All About Jazz
“Airplayed the track”
Tom Ravenscroft — BBC6 Music
“Jazz album of the year released already in February?”
Ralf Sandell — Hufvudstadsbladet
“★★★★★”
Iida Simes — Voima Magazine
Mondo, in partnership with Walt Disney Records and Lucasfilm, are proud to present an all new 4XLP expanded edition soundtrack to 2016's ROGUE ONE: A STAR WARS STORY.
In anticipation of its 5th anniversary, Michael Giacchino unearthed nearly over an hour of previously unreleased music and recording sessions from the film.
Featuring all-new original artwork by John Powell, new liner notes by Michael Giacchino, mastered for vinyl, and pressed on 180 gram black vinyl, this collector's set is essential for Star Wars fans.
Composed by Michael Giacchino and John Williams
Artwork by John Powel
Standard Edition[26,68 €]
‘Heart Under’, Just Mustard’s second album and first for Partisan Records
(IDLES, Fontaines D.C., Laura Marling), is an album that asks you to forget
what you know. At every turn, this remarkable record reconfigures and
stretches the ideas and ambition of a rock band and turns a year of lockdown
and personal struggles into a breath-taking artistic statement.
Across its 10 tracks, the album presents a coherent style and ethos - those
scything guitars, Katie’s magical vocals - but still incorporates a wide and
untethered vision. There are brooding, atmospheric rock songs (‘Still’, ‘In
Shade’) and others that apply a lighter, dreamier touch (‘Sore’, ‘Mirrors’), all
tied together with impeccable instrumentation and a united vision.
On debut ‘Wednesday’, the band played with dreamier soundscapes and
production techniques, and ‘Heart Under’ serves as the next stage of this
development, with every instrument brilliantly pushed to its limit and every
boundary of the band stretched.
After the band had finished recording and producing the album, ‘Heart Under’
was pushed even further into singular territory when the band worked with
mixer David Wrench, whose previous collaborators include Frank Ocean,
Let’s Eat Grandma, Jamie xx, FKA twigs and beyond. “We wanted someone
who had done pop and electronic records and didn’t just work within rock
music,” Katie says.
“Ireland’s buzziest new band” - The FADER
“Their rapturous reception here at SXSW is a testament to their startling
evolution as well as the excitement that can only come from watching a band
just beginning to realise the full extent of their powers.” - NME
“They have well and truly mastered the art of atmospheric rock” - Loud And
Quiet (9/10)
Supporting Fontaines D.C. on their European and US tours this year. They
were handpicked by Robert Smith to support The Cure in Dublin in 2019.
Eire headline tour in June, UK headline tour in September, including Village
Underground, and EU headline tour in October.
Choice Music Prize nomination for Irish Album Of The Year for their debut
album, ‘Wednesday’.
CD housed in a cardboard wallet with lyric and photo insert.
LP pressed on black vinyl and housed in a single sleeve jacket with lyric and
photo insert.
In the post-pandemic era that we now live in, some artists have used its abnormal reality as an abstract muse or a reason to expand their repertoire into unseen territory or styles. Fortunately, the Charlotte, NC native with the gritty, gospel-flecked croon does neither. Instead, Hamilton returns with familiar collaborators (9th Wonder, Jermaine Dupri, James Poyser) and his signature Southern grit and lyrics, planting those winning elements, ten toes down, into contemporarily-rendered, yet unabashedly-influenced,1970s-era soul. Sometimes those aspects are shimmering and glossy, such as the awe-struck, surrendering ode, "White Hennessy," the buoyant Curtis Mayfield-channeling title track and "Real Love," a boom-bap-heavy groove with a mellow, half-spoken and half-sung tribute to the emotion (with FL's Rick Ross anchoring the bridge). His Generation X roots are also in display on the bass-dropping and ice-flossing "I'm Ready," with ATL's own Lil Jon.
"Back in the black." "Black Power!" "Give me five on the black-hand side." "Always bet on Black." In a literal sense, the color black is created by the complete absence of light or the total absorption of all shades. It represents solemnity, sophistication or literal all-encompassing darkness. But for the people residing within its varying hues, blackness signifies all that is meaningful, fly and pertinent to their culture and way of life. The rich contrasts of black life, and the layers of emotion in-between, are what Anthony Hamilton is exploring throughout his seventh studio album, Love Is the New Black
Justin K Broadrick (Godflesh, Jesu, JK Flesh) breathes new life into his FINAL project for an album on Helm’s ALTER label. Formed in 1984 out of an obsession with the industrial, noise & power electronics acts of the early eighties, FINAL made its public debut at the legendary Mermaid pub in Birmingham when Broadrick was just 14 years old. A string of cassette releases via his Post MortemRekordings label established the name within the underground noise scene of the time until increased activity with his various groups (Napalm Death, Head of David and later Godflesh) meant that FINAL naturally fell by the wayside before the end of the decade. Broadrick reactivated the project in 1993 during the British ambient “isolationism” period and FINAL's sound became focussed more on texture, producing beatless ambient work with a number of albums for labels like Sentrax, Utech, No Quarter and Neurot. ‘It Comes To Us All’ is the first FINAL album to appear on vinyl since 2015’s ‘Black Dollars’ on Downwards and continues to explore the textural nature of Broadrick’s ambient work - this time through a filter of blown-out harmonic noise that reconnects the project with its harsher roots. Rather than channelling the angst of early power-electronics, the noise here rumbles along blissfully through 8 untitled tracks, sombre in tone and at times beautiful. Melodies sampled from pop music are put through a process of decay, stripped of their form and worn down with a rusty, melancholic afterglow. Reducing all its parts to slow-motion shadows of their former selves, ‘It Comes To Us All’ is an exploration of the decay of all living things that we face collectively, day after day.
Featuring Squirrel Flower and Liam O’Neill (SUUNS). Recommended If You Like: Mount Eerie, Low, Richard Swift, the Weather Station, Lomelda, Fleet Foxes, Squirrel Flower, L’Rain. Cedric Noel is a songwriter, bassist, collaborator and producer currently based in Montréal, Québec. The newest longplayer from Tio'tiá:ke/Montreal staple Cedric Noel lands with a stunning sense of surety and self. Hang Time stands as a high water mark for a songwriter who's spent the past decade quietly expanding the borders of his music. Longtime fans will recognize the fluid elements of the album’s open-ended rock formations: reflective strumming, soaring choruses, searing guitar lines, subtle bass grooves; all occasionally dissolving into pools of pure ambience. New listeners will find surprises throughout: threads of folk pop, ambient and sound collage fasten the foundations of this expressive whole. However, what’s most striking on Hang Time is Noel’s newfound sense of voice, both literal and metaphorical. Written primarily in 2017-18 during an intense period of self-reflection, this collection of songs finds Noel wrestling profoundly with his sense of identity, self and place. The album’s material was captured faithfully at The Pines, a beloved downtown Montreal studio whose doors shuttered shortly after amidst the strain of the pandemic. Noel worked closely and patiently with friend and engineer Steve Newton, ensuring the songs had the time and space needed to come fully to fruition. Hang Time features subtle rhythm work from drummer Liam O’Neill (SUUNS) and guest spots from Brigitte Naggar (Common Holly) and Tim Crabtree (Paper Beat Scissors) among others. The album opens in mid-air with ‘Comuu’, a song that implores a becoming-more while hovering triumphantly. Then follows a suite of songs (‘Headspace’, ‘Keep’, ‘Stilling’) that recall the heart-rending power of y2k-era Low, albeit with a more vigorous beat. On ‘Bass Song’, an intimate duet with musician Ella Williams (Squirrel Flower) that explores the depths of interpersonal constriction. At the crux of the album sits ‘Born’, a deceptively pleasant-sounding song that explores the confounding emotionality of adoption before fading into a distended soundfield. Throughout the back half of the album, Noel double’s down on this commitment to his genuine, proud, Black self. The most confrontational track, ‘Allies’ finds him refraining “Are you on my side?” as a trailing guitar solo interweaves a Malcolm X soundbite, eventually engulfing the composition. Glorious lead single ‘Nighttime (Skin)’ traces the artist’s sense of ancestral dissociation through to a triumphant moment of pride in self-acceptance. Throughout Hang Time, Noel finds a way to ask hard questions (both of the listener and himself) in ways that are compassionate, open and honest. The ebb and flow of tension and tenderness that moves within these tracks helps to grow the heart and redefine what Black music can be in 2021.
Rumours about death metal band To The Gallows
have already existed in the (Dutch) metal
underground for some years now, but an official
release has never seen the light. Until now.
In 2013, the ‘underground super group’ To The
Gallows was formed by Swedish metalwundermaster Rogga Johansson (Heir Corpse
One, Paganizer, Stygian Dark, Massacre, Blood
Gut, Dead Sun, Megascavenger, Ribspreader,
Putrevore, Revolting), Eric Daniels (Asphyx,
Soulburn, Grand Supreme Blood Court), Bob
Bagchus (Soulburn, Asphyx, Infidel Reich, Siege
Of Power) and Henri Sattler (God Dethroned).
Master plans ended when Daniels and Bagchus
re-started their career with Soulburn. The ‘match
made in Hell’ duo Johansson and Sattler continued
with To The Gallows and ‘Fury Of The Netherworld’
is their debut-album.
Brutal blackened death metal for fans of
Dissection, Zyklon, Belphegor, Hate, Necrophobic,
Archgoat and God Dethroned.
Rumours about death metal band To The Gallows
have already existed in the (Dutch) metal
underground for some years now, but an official
release has never seen the light. Until now.
In 2013, the ‘underground super group’ To The
Gallows was formed by Swedish metalwundermaster Rogga Johansson (Heir Corpse
One, Paganizer, Stygian Dark, Massacre, Blood
Gut, Dead Sun, Megascavenger, Ribspreader,
Putrevore, Revolting), Eric Daniels (Asphyx,
Soulburn, Grand Supreme Blood Court), Bob
Bagchus (Soulburn, Asphyx, Infidel Reich, Siege
Of Power) and Henri Sattler (God Dethroned).
Master plans ended when Daniels and Bagchus
re-started their career with Soulburn. The ‘match
made in Hell’ duo Johansson and Sattler continued
with To The Gallows and ‘Fury Of The Netherworld’
is their debut-album.
Brutal blackened death metal for fans of
Dissection, Zyklon, Belphegor, Hate, Necrophobic,
Archgoat and God Dethroned.
Rumours about death metal band To The Gallows
have already existed in the (Dutch) metal
underground for some years now, but an official
release has never seen the light. Until now.
In 2013, the ‘underground super group’ To The
Gallows was formed by Swedish metalwundermaster Rogga Johansson (Heir Corpse
One, Paganizer, Stygian Dark, Massacre, Blood
Gut, Dead Sun, Megascavenger, Ribspreader,
Putrevore, Revolting), Eric Daniels (Asphyx,
Soulburn, Grand Supreme Blood Court), Bob
Bagchus (Soulburn, Asphyx, Infidel Reich, Siege
Of Power) and Henri Sattler (God Dethroned).
Master plans ended when Daniels and Bagchus
re-started their career with Soulburn. The ‘match
made in Hell’ duo Johansson and Sattler continued
with To The Gallows and ‘Fury Of The Netherworld’
is their debut-album.
Brutal blackened death metal for fans of
Dissection, Zyklon, Belphegor, Hate, Necrophobic,
Archgoat and God Dethroned.
With their duo debut, Dean Spunt and John Wiese invite you to experience
the frenzy of percussive space and discreet sound found inside ‘The Echoing
Shell’.
This is the first official collaboration between the two veteran music-makers,
though their connection goes back to 1999. As John recalls, “Dean was in a
high school arts program at CalArts. A friend and I were recording the first
Sissy Spacek demo in the design studios there, and taking a tape to my car
over and over again to check the mix. Dean was walking through the parking
lot with a Locust shirt on, we said hello, and he immediately got into a car
with two strangers to ‘listen to a tape’.”
The tape-listening ended well, apparently. Dean and John became friends
and fellow travellers in LA circles and beyond: in 2005, John did a remix for
Dean’s first band, Wives; in 2007, Dean played percussion with Sissy
Spacek’s 13-Tet Los Angeles; John toured with No Age several times and
collaborated live with them in 2010.
Under the Sissy Spacek name as well as his own, John’s recordings for his
own Helicopter label and many others kicked things off for him around the
end of the century; since then, he’s been constantly engaged in solos and
collaborations on record, performances, and installations around the world.
In addition to Dean’s ever-growing discography with No Age, he curates his
own label, Post Present Medium. In 2018, Radical Documents released
Dean’s solo debut ‘EE Head’, which explored concrète and experimental
techniques in a four-part, album length piece.
‘The Echoing Shell’ is born of Dean and John’s shared understanding, using
John’s process common to Sissy Spacek: elaborate sound-collage works
using source material originating from punk, hardcore and improvised music.
A series of impositions, tape manipulation and edits recompose the material,
cracking open the crust of the source, freeing its implied guts to steam forth
in gushes of extreme noise. On ‘The Echoing Shell’, this is as often noise as
it is extreme intimacy, seeming at times to be sourced from within Dean’s
drumkit, at other times appearing to emanate from the capsules of
microphones and the circuits of the signal path itself.
One may read these collaged sounds as abstraction, but there is a unique
language conveyed in their assembly, forming something like word-shapes
and meaning. And intention: the two side-long pieces, comprised of many
short sections, form a linear whole, creating alternately ripping and
discriminating music - and meaning - in the process.
‘The Echoing Shell’ is a fantastic conception in contemporary musique
concrète, combining incendiary post-rock power, dry humour and astonishing
depth of field. Whether projecting the sound through headphones, ear buds,
bookshelf speakers or your own personal amp stack, crank up ‘The Echoing
Shell’.
Just as one can smell a storm swelling on the horizon, the cataclysmic tremor that is IMMOLATION approaches to unleash its latest, immense creation: ACTS OF GOD. Due to be released in winter of 2022, this 11th studio album serves as the next chapter of IMMOLATION’S Death Metal epic. With 5 long years passed since the most recent studio album, ATONEMENT, ACTS OF GOD vigorously showcases IMMOLATION’s ability to consistently create fascinating sounds, while still keeping their feet firmly rooted in the old school, New York Death Metal for which they are renowned.
Emblazoned with a haunting new masterpiece by artist Eliran Kantor, ACTS OF GOD displays a trifecta of angelic beings desperately trying to prevent one another’s flesh from melting in a blackened light from above. The muted colors and ethereal images will ring familiar to fans of IMMOLATION’s previous album covers. “We wanted this cover to feel much darker; more melancholy and hopeless. The music has always been very dark, and a lot of Kantor’s work had the feeling that we were going for; the semi-surreal colliding with a classic, almost renaissance feel,” explains founder and vocalist/bassist Ross Dolan. “It’s unnerving. It really reflects the music perfectly,” agrees founder and guitarist Robert Vigna.
The album’s third track “The Age Of No Light” is a powerful, hard hitting song with an extreme yet catchy melody. “It’s quick, hits hard, and gets straight to the point” explians Vigna. Consistently changing speeds and patterns throughout, the song is short but remains both dynamic and memorable.
“Blooded” has all the usual IMMOLATION elements: the slow, the fast, the explosive, the big overlaid sections of groovy harmony eventually dropping into evil, ripping guitar work. “It’s a little powerhouse,” describes Vigna, “it’s straightforward, and it has all the elements you would expect from us in a nice, neat package.”
A song like “Immoral Stain” is a slightly mid-paced track with an intense, creepy atmosphere. Equipped with plenty of unusual moments, the beat is catchy, dark, and echoing. Searing guitar starts to recite a story and then quickly begins a conversation with thunderous vocals and a vociferous beat. “That whole section of build up just needed to be done exactly as it is. That’s what makes it sound different and interesting,” describes Vigna. Much like the rest of the album, while the lyrics cover the usual, general topics of genuine evil and the great deception of religion, the specifics are most certainly left to the listener’s interpretation. Fortunately for IMMOLATION fans, there is no shortage of corruption and catastrophe in this world.
Fittingly, the concluding track “Apostle” was the last song written for the album. “Some of those chorus sections have a weird almost dream-like quality,” describes Dolan. Its steadily growing momentum discharges rounds of guitar solos and relentless vocals which eventually lead way to an explosive finale to the album.
The creative journey for ACTS OF GOD began with years of notes, and an abundance of inspiration. With Vigna at the helm of the structural writing as usual, further composing and concepts were tossed back and forth amongst all 4 members. Eventually, they began to skeletonize the beginning of what would become a full length, studio album. While the recording process and entering the studio can be a very sterile experience for some musicians, the ferocity of the demos combined with the expertise of long time friend and recording counterpart Paul Orofino of Millbrook Studios (BLUE OYSTER CULT, BAD CO, GOLDEN EARRING), assured that this would not be an issue for IMMOLATION. “Having such a level of comfort is key,” remarks Dolan. Final touches were brought about on the mixing and mastering by Zack Ohren of Castle Ultimate Studios.
Firmly aligned with Nuclear Blast Records, the often coveted sound of IMMOLATION has reemerged from the depths of a cursed and cruel world to illuminate our minds and ears with exquisite, sonic destruction.
FOR FANS OF: Big Thief, Parquet Courts, Cate Le Bon, Elliott Smith, LVL UP. On their debut for Western Vinyl, recording engineer and multi-instrumentalist Nate Mendelsohn and his band use lyrical maximalism for the powers of good. Where Market’s previous home recorded releases shifted genre restlessly, on The Consistent Brutal Bullshit Gong Mendelsohn took a core band of longtime collaborators to a house in rural Massachusetts where they carved out space for his words to speak through with humor and intensity. Though he comes from a background in experimental music, Mendelsohn’s ear for pop has prevailed. Certain moments on Bullshit Gong reveal his stranger side, as on the thundering bridge of “Scar,” which sounds like a more unhinged Parquet Courts, or the angular “I Would Do That,” which takes cues from Cate Le Bon. On the whole, though, this band of close friends insists on directness, their arrangements clear despite the intricacies. Guitars and synthesizers tangle fluidly atop the rhythm section’s tight bedrock, evoking the tenderness and backbeat-centric qualities of Elliott Smith or Big Thief. After college, where he met most of the members of Market, Mendelsohn became an engineer and producer at the Brooklyn studio Figure 8 Recording. Through that community he’s recorded artists like Frankie Cosmos and Wendy Eisenberg, and played with Yaeji, Vagabon, Katie Von Schleicher (who co-produced Bullshit Gong with him), and Sam Evian, who mixed the album. Creating intimacy out of manic self-reflection requires a delicate balancing act, one Mendelsohn tackles with abandon. His words never skew too poetic or grandiose, and when he invokes the ugly it’s met with a sonic tonality that sets him right again. In tender moments, his voice is often flanked by bandmates Natasha Thweatt or Von Schleicher, who help skew his words toward the universal. Still, Bullshit Gong is an obsessive look inward, one in which Mendelsohn simply asks himself if he is good to those he loves. It’s an act of trust between the artist and the imagined listener he takes with him. UK press campaign by Silver PR. Mendelsohn has worked in the studio as an engineer and musician with Frankie Cosmos, Yaeji, Sam Evian, Wendy Eisenberg, Thor Harris, Rebecca Black, in addition to touring as a member of Katie Von Schleicher’s band. Market developed a cult following emerge after being championed by British comedian James Acaster, who featured the band’s first album in his book Perfect Sound Forever and his follow-up podcast for BBC Sounds.
Funny to think there was a time not so long ago when Stiff Richards was a name that required explanation - but not to you, of course, o punk connoisseur. This is your territory, after all. Music is your oxygen and the sound of the underground is your clarion call. You can explain the distinction between ‘Know Your Product’ and ‘No, You’re Product’. Hey, you’re probably pretty good-looking too. You know your shit, either way. So no wonder you’re drawn to this relative holy grail of modern garage rock - the 2017 self-titled debut album by the aforementioned Stiff Richards. Originally released on their own Stiff Records (and again by Legless in 2020), it lays down all the elements that made last year’s mighty ‘State of Mind’ LP such an instant classic. OK, we’ve established you know the drill, but let’s recap: scintillating Aus-punk that recalls the heroic high-speed riffs of their countrymen The Saints and Radio Birdman. It sounds like Royal Headache covering Motörhead, or maybe the other way around. It’s a full-on riot in 30 minutes - the rawest of rock’n’roll bleeding into the grimiest of power chords with hooks for days. You already know you’re gonna love it. Whether going full-throttle and aiming straight for the nerve receptors that get your head a-nodding and your toes a-tapping - like on sub-three-minute highlight ‘Strung Out’ - or sludgin’ their way through groovier cuts like ‘Bustin’ Out’, they’re never less than a treat that’s guaranteed to get your serotonin flowing and your speakers up to 11 (or beyond). As a certain similarly-named record label once said, if it ain’t Stiff, it ain’t worth a fuck. Frightfully rude, but that’s rock music for you, I suppose. Get it in your ears.
Strut continue their deep dive into the archives of Black Fire Records with a new reissue of Oneness Of Juju's Bush Brothers & Space Rangers, showcasing the band at the peak of their powers in 1977. Primarily recorded at Arrest Studios in Washington DC, the album ispacked with landmark Oneness tracks including 'Be About TheFuture' ("possibly the first ecology-themed song that I know of") the George Clinton-influenced 'Plastic', an acoustic alternative version of 'African Rhythms' and strong covers of Caiphus Semenya's 'West Wind' and Bobby Womack's 'Breezin''. Plunky continues, "The album is composed of several different sessions featuring different personnel and only first came out as an album in its own right when Black Fire MD Jimmy Gray started working with P-Vine Records in Japan during the '90s. For me, it's one of the hottest periods for the band."
Strut continue their deep dive into the archives of Black Fire Records with a new reissue of Oneness Of Juju’s Bush Brothers & Space Rangers, showcasing the band at the peak of their powers in 1977.
Oneness had enjoyed two fruitful years with Black Fire prior to these recordings, breaking through with the African Rhythms and Space Jungle Luv albums. “When we recorded African Rhythms we didn’t use a guitar,” explains bandleader Plunky Branch. “So, when vocalist Jackie Eka-Ete and guitarist Ras Mel Glover came in in around ‘75, that moved our sound into a more soulful direction. The drummer on this album, Tony Green, was the drummer with Gil Scott Heron and he added a little more sophistication to our soulfulness. African percussionist Okyerema Asante was also fully incorporated into the band after joining in 1976. By 1977, we were in full production mode recording songs; one or two of the tracks here also feature Brian Jackson, known for his work with Gil.”
Primarily recorded at Arrest Studios in Washington DC, the album is packed with landmark Oneness tracks including ‘Be About The Future’ (“possibly the first ecology-themed song that I know of”) the George Clinton-influenced ‘Plastic’, an acoustic alternative version of ‘African Rhythms’ and strong covers of Caiphus Semenya’s ‘West Wind’ and Bobby Womack’s ‘Breezin’’. Plunky continues,
Strut present the first ever reissue of an essential lost classic from the Black Fire catalogue, Wayne Davis’ powerful self-titled gospel-soul album from 1976.
An accomplished vocalist and keyboard player, Davis had studied in Washington D.C. and had worked with Roberta Flack and she subsequently secured him a recording deal with Atlantic Records; he released the 'A View From Another Place' album in 1973 and Roberta contributed electric piano to one of the tracks. Davis was the dropped from the label and his subsequent album was released by Jimmy Gray on Black Fire. Produced by Jimmy Watkins and Bias Studios manager, Bob Dawson, the album line-up featured the celebrated poet and flautist Wanda Robinson and the horn section from legendary D.C. go-go pioneers Experience Unlimited. Wayne later returned the favour, appearing as a vocalist on Experience Unlimited’s seminal 'Free Yourself' album.
This first international reissue of the album features new sleeve notes including band member interviews and original illustrated artwork by Muzi Branch. Audio was transferred from the original tapes by the album’s engineer, Bob Dawson, and was remastered by The Carvery.
• First international reissue of Wayne Davis’ album from 1976
