Our imprint marks its five years anniversary this year and to celebrate it's offering up five special various artist packages across 2019 limited to 250 copies each,
featuring material from the likes of Vid, The Mole, Cinthie, Shinichiro Yokota, San Proper, Akiko Kiyama, Com Sin aka Cosmin TRG, Subb-an and more..
'Series 01', penciled for release in May sees Cosmin TRG return under his Com Sin guise with 'Glass Harps', a fluidly unfolding five and half minutes of pulsating subs, glitching percussion and sparkling harp tones before DJ Sodeyama aka The People In Fog's 'Chapter Zero' takes on a modulating hypnotic feel via psychedelic swells, tension building textures and a bumpy, robust rhythm.
UK duo Yard One join the roster with 'Dream Travel' on the flip-side, employing a more ethereal aesthetic with floating pads, winding chords and a heavily swung drum groove. This project also sees a new design concept for the imprint from London's David Surman's painting installation project 'Paintings For The Cat Dimension' which ''explores the motif of the cat as emblematic of internet aesthetics, a place where all painting styles and modes now exist non-hierarchically as pure information.''
Dina Summer is the Berlin-based collaborative project of Greek-German dark-disco couple Local Suicide and Bavarian electronic producer Kalipo. The supergroup began working together in 2019 and have since been refining their combined sound. It is a unique blend of their influences, drawing from 80s italo disco, new wave, EBM and early 00s electroclash for a dark retro-futuristic synth/wave pop sound that stands out with club-ready basslines, epic melodic hooks, and lyrics ranging from dadaist abstractions to empowering, thought-provoking themes.
The trio will return with their new mini album, “Children Of The Night”, bringing together all the elements that have defined their sound so far. From the disco infused synth pop of “Burning Heart” and “Bats In Paris,” recalling their debut album Rimini (2022), to the dark club driven tracks “Fuel”, “Komodo 3000”. and the title track “Children Of The Night,” which echo the atmosphere of Hide & Seek (2024), and the dark wave influenced indie songs “Rat Race” and “On The Road”, which would have felt right at home on “Girls Gang” (2025), the release showcases the full spectrum of the band's musical identity. The nine track record takes its title from and pays homage to Bela Lugosi's iconic line in Dracula (1931): “Listen to them. Children of the night… what music they make”.
Format: Ltd transparent clear vinyl
Dina Summer ist das in Berlin ansässige Gemeinschaftsprojekt des griechisch deutschen Dark Disco Duos Local Suicide und des bayerischen Elektronikproduzenten Kalipo. Die Supergroup begann 2019 gemeinsam zu arbeiten und hat seitdem ihren gemeinsamen Sound kontinuierlich weiterentwickelt. Dieser verbindet auf einzigartige Weise ihre Einflüsse und schöpft aus Italo Disco der 1980er Jahre, New Wave, EBM und Electroclash der frühen 2000er. Das Ergebnis ist ein dunkler, retro futuristischer Synth Wave Pop Sound, der sich durch clubtaugliche Basslines, epische melodische Hooks und Texte auszeichnet, die von dadaistischen Abstraktionen bis hin zu empowernden und zum Nachdenken anregenden Themen reichen.
Das Trio kehrt nun mit seinem neuen Mini Album „Children Of The Night“ zurück, das alle Elemente vereint, die ihren Sound bisher geprägt haben. Von dem Disco geprägten Synth Pop von „Burning Heart“ und „Bats In Paris“, der an ihr Debütalbum „Rimini“ (2022) erinnert, über die düsteren, cluborientierten Tracks „Fuel“, „Komodo 3000“ und den Titelsong „Children Of The Night“, die die Atmosphäre von „Hide & Seek“ (2024) aufgreifen, bis hin zu den von Dark Wave beeinflussten Indie Songs „Rat Race“ und „On The Road“, die ebenso gut auf „Girls Gang“ (2025) hätten erscheinen können, zeigt die Veröffentlichung die gesamte Bandbreite der musikalischen Identität der Band.
Das Album mit seinen neun Tracks trägt seinen Titel in Hommage an Bela Lugosis ikonische Zeile aus dem Film Dracula (1931): „Listen to them. Children of the night… what music they make.“
• Libertine is Gene’s final studio album released in 2001
• Highlights include the single ‘Is It Over?’ and ‘O Lover’
• Double LP pressed on 180g Heavyweight vinyl with original artwork and printed inner sleeve
• Inspired by the songs of The Smiths, The Jam and The Faces, Martin Rossiter’s literate vocals and Steve Mason’s fluid guitar lines were perfectly complemented by the intuitive rhythm section of Kevin Miles and Matt James. They released four studio albums and a collection of B-sides and radio demos between 1995 and 2001, were named Best New Act at the inaugural NME awards in 1995, and went on to score 10 Top 40 hits.
It’s time for Ahad’s biggest move yet: his first full-length album, P*KI. Powerful, deeply personal and unapologetic, the album is rooted in the dancefloor and in Ahad’s belief that club culture is a space where he can “exist completely authentically.” By reclaiming a word he has personally been confronted with, Ahad transforms P*KI (pronounced Pee-Star-Kay-Eye) into a statement of joy, pride, celebration and self-love. The album’s singles capture that spirit: ‘Put That Banger On Next’, featuring London MC Capo Lee, brings a high-voltage grime energy; ‘Make Space’ is a euphoric tribute to the diverse communities who find solace in London nightlife; while ‘Left / Right’, made with Dismantle and Jam-akabi, delivers a dark, futuristic breaks sound built for warehouse dancefloors. Across the record, Ahad’s signature UK club sound is pushed further, with tracks drawing on everything from gqom and drum’n’bass to South Asian classical instruments, Punjabi folk and devotional music such as qawwali.
Sweet Apricots presents its first vinyl release: Daniel Masson – Baul Dimension EP.
In the early 2000s, French composer and producer Daniel Masson travelled to Dhaka to record musicians and singers from Bangladesh’s Baul tradition, a mystical musical culture centred on freedom, inner exploration and universal love.
Originally released as a 13-track album, Baul Dimension appears here on vinyl for the first time through a carefully selected four-track EP. The record brings together the original version, Daniel Masson’s hypnotic Anniversary Version, and two remixes by Lucas Desmottes, aka Roy Vision.
A regular guest at Sweet Apricots parties, Roy Vision translates the spirit of the dancefloor into two deep, percussive and jazz-informed versions: the uplifting Higher Self Mix and its spacious, powerful dub counterpart.
Between organic voices, traditional instrumentation, electronic textures and hypnotic rhythms, Baul Dimension EP is a journey made for attentive listening as much as for adventurous dancefloors.
Cut at The Carvery, London and pressed with particular care by Disques Garcia
French composer, artist and co-founder of Transversales Disques, Jonathan Fitoussi has developed a distinctive body of
work over the past two decades, blending analog synthesis, minimalism and electronic music.
Inspired by the mineral landscapes and luminous atmosphere of southeastern France, DELTAS is his fifth solo studio album.
Combining hypnotic drum patterns, flowing pulses, shimmering electronic textures and contemplative movements, it unfolds as a deeply immersive journey through space, light and motion.
A rich and evocative work from one of the most singular voices in contemporary electronic music.
Annie Bloch’s luvt is a quiet reorientation of the organ: away from its monumental image and ritualised spaces, towards the delicate mechanics of touch, air and friction. Across seven compositions marking her debut on OOH-sounds, the Cologne based organist and composer turns to the chest organ, a small and mobile counterpart to its larger relative, traditionally used to accompany Baroque music. On luvt, Bloch limits herself to just three stops of wooden pipes, using the instrument’s sensitive keyboard, mechanical subtle effects to crystalline sound world shaped by meditative strategies and fanciful detailing. Bloch’s approach sits at the crossroads of modern composition, new psychedelia, ambient and minimalist traditions, with occasional traces of an avant pop sensibility, while keeping the unique sound and physical character of the chest organ at its core.
The title luvt derives from the German luven, “to turn to the wind” and Luft, “air”, a gesture Bloch extends beyond the mechanics of the chest organ towards what cannot quite be grasped or put into words. Bloch follows the organ into quieter, more intimate territory, letting its monumental potential fade into the background while exploring the sensual its sound. luvt is a gentle and immersive meditation on the sound of the chest organ, revealing the instrument’s contemporary relevance while pushing its expressive possibilities into new territory.
Annie Bloch (*1994) is an organist, composer and songwriter based in Cologne, Germany. As an organist she performs solo and in alternating constellations with an improvisational and situational approach. The reality that every pipe organ as well as the space it speaks in is unique, is something she not only adapts to, but actively works with. The resulting composed improvisations explore states of change. Her pieces focus on the in-between-spaces, that are already leaning towards the next event. Searching for the ambivalences in a sound and lingering on them, her music resists singular truths. The musical material she draws from is informed by her engagement with the experimental music scene, but also by compositional styles of pop and ambient music. She has performed at Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival, Orgelpark Amsterdam, Philharmonie Köln, Moers Festival and others. As an indie-folk artist Annie Bloch released the album „I DEPEND“ (Papercup Records) with a chamber orchestral band, that she regularly performs with.
From the fires and floods of the Australian bush on her debut, Soon, which Phil Elverum reissued via his label, P.W. Elverum & Sun, tiarn now takes us to the shores of the Pacific Ocean where classical and electronic arrangements move with an ever-present longing for connection and nature. Stretton has weaved a new world, set on the brink of night, when the world is soft and suspended in blue. Living in isolation near the ocean, overlooking the winter migration of whales, Stretton would regularly swim during the brief 20-minute period known as the blue hour. Ideas would come to her in the icy salt water, and walking home in the dark, she would carry melodies back to record that night. At its heart, tiarn reflects ecological grief and the search for connection in a changing world. tiarn is also inspired by a piece of home camera footage Stretton found of her family in Japan where they lived in the ‘90s before she was born.
It shows the distant mountains, and Stretton’s young family looking over the valley in the soft static of one summer evening. Decades later, using the untouched synth her parents had bought in Tokyo in 1991, Stretton began recording music directly to that footage, letting the images dictate the melody. Voices, insects, weather, movement, and the ambient sounds of the valley are woven throughout the record itself, blurring the line between documentation and composition. The result is an album that feels less created than uncovered — something remembered rather than made. Stretton’s work continues to carve a singular path in contemporary music, balancing environmental awareness, experimental composition, and deeply personal storytelling.
Since its original release, Aging has taken on an interesting wider significance. OCA’s music came to the attention of Kelela, who featured the duo in her Aquaphoria mix before later working with Yo van Lenz and Florian T M Zeisig in their Berlin studio. Those sessions would go on to play an important role in shaping the sound of her acclaimed 2023 album Raven, on which both artists are credited.
2019 Press Release:
Berlin based duo OCA present Aging, their sophomore album and first for Métron Records. Following up last year's Preset Music (recently featured in Kelela's Aquaphoria mix) Aging is an album that focuses on memory, experience and the passing of time.
A collaboration between producers Yo van Lenz and Florian T M Zeisig, OCA formed after the pair met and became friends while studying in Berlin. Originally from small towns in Bavaria, the duo now live and work in the German capital.
Through a series of 10 vignettes, Aging transports the listener on a trip across a series of life events that retain a special personal importance to both of the artists. These emotional touchstones range from the profound to the prosaic - the discovery of something new, the relief from annoyance or the familiarity found in an old companion - and have been fully explored with playful sonic introspection.
Whilst the concept retains a certain ambiguity, it is the sound palette, created solely on an Alesis QS6 synthesiser - that brings these experiences to life. OCA blend and weave classic dance music motifs with shimmering synths, Japanese wet ambient, and even anthemic 80s rock to create a soundscape rich with texture and sensation.
The bass notes and tentative lead of ‘Baby’s First Blade of Grass’ reference the memory of first consciously or subconsciously experiencing something new, whilst the decaying ripples of ‘Stretching in Water’ paired with sounds of flowing streams conjure up images of tranquil pools. Their most developed work to date, Aging showcases OCA as rising stars of progressive pop and modern ambient.
Repress 2026
Two years after releasing the acclaimed Crash Recoil, Anthony Child aka Surgeon returns to Tresor with new LP, Shell~Wave. Retaining the minimal equipment list and studio-version-of-live-show-sets approach of the previous album in order to focus on the work itself, Shell~Wave is a deeply personal document of both where Surgeon is and has been, converging three decades of experience with a continued curiosity in the untested.
“To make this project, I had to dig really deep in terms of what my relationship was to techno; I’ve been involved with it for a really long time and there’s a lot about it I feel dislocated from, so I had to really think hard about what techno is to me. I often get asked “what is techno to you?” but I can’t answer that with words; this album is the answer.” From the complex, twisting track Infinite Eye to the caustic Soul Fire, the eight tracks that make up the body of the album are single-take explorations of the vast, hard yet minimal techno Child is synonymous with.
Neatly dividing the record in two, the emotional centre of the record comes in the form of Dying, a vibrating, beatless piece that with a mantra-like vocal loop steeped in reverberating effects. Further echoes of dub production appear throughout the record as tracks like Divine Shadow, and Empty Cloud have an almost ever-present mist of reverberation, driven by the appearance of a new delay unit in the equipment list; while much of the philosophy of Crash Recoil’s creation is present, the process and the instruments have changed as Child again switches up his approach to studio work.
This insistence on trying novel techniques doesn’t preclude returning to old ones, as this use of modern digital machines with live, hands-on takes that are as inspired by 60s producer Joe Meek and 70s reggae as they are by this year’s synthesiser expos.
“For me, it’s an interesting experience returning to old techniques again after 30 years. I’m always exploring and finding myself back at the beginning. Connecting the present with the past.”
This philosophy of ‘time travel’ is inherent to the music itself as the synchronised loops repeat while the delay and effects branch out, forming unique eddies; distinct quantum moments within the circular whole; the future leaking through the spaces between the sounds. All of the concepts on the album are perfectly communicated through the painting by Taiwanese artist Jazz Szu-Ying Chen which suggests the movement of water, sound waves, and the chitinous shells of sea creatures.
YL Hooi returns with 'Running Around (83)', the project's first release since 2019's Untitled. Valya Ying-Li Hooi and Tarquin Manek finally commit a long road-tested live favourite to tape, welding together engine room doom, disembodied vocals, cryptic lyricism and a smouldering dub-techno bassline, recast and overdriven.
The hand-stamped white label 12" honours its roots with three heavyweight remixes. After corrupted audio files erased YL Hooi's recent live collaboration with Mad Professor, the Ariwa boss gives their encounter lasting form with a percussion-dripped halftime stepper featuring veteran Black Steel and new blood Karmelody.
The flipside immediately detours with Ulla's full-scale tear down and rebuild, layering woodwind, keys and subtle percussion into an improbably elegant convergence of ambient, minimal jazz and modern classical. John T. Gast's Midas touch then drags it into bardo dancehall territory, a rugged soundsystem destroyer that's scuzzy, screwed and wired with punk instinct.
Celebrating ten years of independent music, Nerang Recordings returns with its sixteenth vinyl release, A Decade of Nerang Recordings - Mix Selections. Bringing together six artists from across the label’s history and extended community, the compilation showcases the diverse sounds that have shaped Nerang over the last decade. Featuring DJ Swagger, Nasty King Kurl, Subjoi, DOS, Low Tape and Moody McIvor, the release moves effortlessly between UK Garage, House, Tech House, Lo-Fi House, Electro and Synthwave while maintaining a clear identity throughout. Since its inception, Nerang Recordings has never been interested in following a single genre, scene or trend. Instead, the label has always focused on releasing music based on quality, individuality and atmosphere. Over the years that philosophy has resulted in a catalogue that crosses stylistic boundaries while remaining connected by a shared spirit. A Decade of Nerang Recordings - Mix Selections serves as both a celebration of the label’s first ten years and a statement of intent for the future. Each track represents a different corner of the Nerang universe, reflecting the sounds, influences and artists that have helped shape the label’s journey so far.
From rolling UK Garage rhythms and club-focused house cuts through to hazy lo-fi textures, cinematic synth work and darker electronic excursions, the compilation highlights the freedom that has always sat at the heart of the label. Rather than being confined by genre expectations, Nerang continues to embrace music on its own terms, allowing each release to find its own identity and audience. While thisrelease reflects on the past decade, it is equally focused on what comes next. The goal remains the same as it was on day one: support great artists, release music without limitations and continue exploring new territory wherever it may lead. Ten years in, Nerang Recordings remains committed to doing things its own way
CER015 sees Celestial Echo bring back one of the great modern soul 45s, Ramsey & Company – “Love Call”.
Coming out of New York in the late ’70s, Ramsey & Company was led by Mainor Ramsey, with the group originally playing the Catskills supper club circuit. Their only single was released privately on Ramsey’s own Ramco label, with copies sold at shows and barely making it into wider distribution. Like so many great soul records, it found its real afterlife much later, becoming a favourite across the UK modern soul and rare groove scene.
“Love Call” is the reason this record has carried such a reputation for so long. A beautifully arranged modern soul dancer, it has that perfect late ’70s balance of groove, song and musicianship. On the B-side, “Leg Grease” brings the funk.
Original copies are now almost impossible to find, often selling for serious money when it turns up and even the Lotus Land reissue has become expensive in its own right. This Celestial Echo edition puts the track back into circulation properly, cut loud and ready for the DJs and soul heads who have been waiting on a clean copy.
Celestial Echo is here to put proper soul records back into circulation — respectfully cut, properly pressed, and ready to play.
It’s not just since James Bond and the introduction of World Overshoot Day that we’ve known: The world isn’t enough. We need an Extrawelt! Arne Schaffhausen and Wayan Raabe have been tinkering with this celestial body for over two decades, and it seems to be slowly nearing completion. You certainly can’t accuse Extrawelt of lacking ideas. They are, so to speak, the legitimate descendants of the legendary planet designer Slartibartfast from Douglas Adams’ “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy”. No doubt, the downright insanely creative bossa nova-techno bastard “Honey Hunter” will be mentioned in the same breath as Slartibartfast’s award-winning Norwegian coastlines by future civilizations. The other three tracks aren’t half bad either. Take our word for it.
Nicht erst seit James Bond und der Einführung des world overshoot days wissen wir: Die Welt ist nicht genug. Wir brauchen eine Extrawelt! Die Herren Arne Schaffhausen und Wayan Raabe werkeln seit über zwei Jahrzehnten an diesem Himmelskörper und er scheint so langsam bezugsfertig zu sein. Man kann Extrawelt nun wahrlich keine Ideenarmut vorwerfen. Sie sind quasi die legitimen Nachkommen des legendären Planetendesigners Slartibartfast aus Douglas Adam’s “Per Anhalter durch die Galaxis”. Der geradezu irrwitzig kreative Bossanovatechno-Bastard “Honey Hunter” wird von künftigen Zivilisationen in einem Atemzug mit Slartibartfast’s preisgekönten norwegischen Küstenlinien genannt werden. Auch die anderen drei Tracks sind nicht von schlechten Eltern. Glaubt’s und werdet selig.
Downloads
The premise of this compilation is simple: music we’d like to hear at the airport.
The idea came after learning that Honolulu’s international airport has been playing AI-generated music over its speakers since November 2025. First reported by Civil Beat, the news has caused frustration and disappointment among residents and visitors, as well as within the local music community.
Everyone knows Hawaii is one of the most musically rich regions in the world — why then is the airport using AI music? 'Music For The Airport' is our response.
Located in the middle of the Pacific at the outskirts of one the most remote cities on the planet, Honolulu’s Daniel K. Inouye International Airport (HNL) is for most people the first place they encounter when they arrive in Hawaii. Warm sun, tropical tradewinds, playful palm trees and majestic mountains welcome every traveler, as do the sounds of birds, familiar music from Hawaiian artists like Aunty Genoa Keawe and Israel Kamakawiwo’ole, and—at least for now—seventeen “island-themed” AI-generated songs.
In late 1977, while sitting in Germany’s Cologne Bonn Airport on a Sunday morning, Brian Eno noticed how terribly uncomfortable he felt hearing the airport’s “muzak” overhead. For a harried, hurried place like the airport where travelers scramble to their gates, stand in long border control lines, and wait impatiently for their luggage at the carousels, music can create more anxiety than calm. Asking himself, "What should we be hearing here?", Eno soon created ‘Ambient 1: Music For Airports’, a sonic remedy aimed at reducing nervousness in public spaces.
When we heard the news that HNL airport is playing AI-generated “muzak”, we were immediately reminded of Eno’s genre-defying 1978 album. And we were similarly inspired to react. But how? Recreating an ambient masterpiece wasn’t in our wheelhouse. We started digging through our catalog of licensed music which we haven’t yet re-released. We quickly realized this was our chance to highlight some of favorite songs from the so-called CD era: the 1990s and 2000s (with a few exceptions). In less than 20 minutes, we pulled 17 original songs recorded by local artists between 1984 and 2017.
The speed at which this project came together surprised us; reactionary gut instinct often produces swift and lasting results. Ironically, our new compilation likely took less time than it did for the state Department of Transportation to commission its AI songs in question. But even though ‘Music for the Airport’ came together in less than one week, the truth is that this collection of 17 songs is the result of years of hard work, trust, sacrifice, patience, and understanding. Building relationships with and licensing music from artists doesn’t happen overnight, but more importantly: these songs are the result of people pouring their hearts and souls into something they believe in. This music wouldn’t exist today without the artists and their loved ones who supported them along the way.
As of this writing, the DOT states its intention in creating AI-generated songs is to “highlight different aspects of the islands, aviation and the airport” and that “no state funds were used to produce them”. Okay, but at what cost? Technology disrupting the music industry isn’t news to anyone. AI music in public spaces are cost-saving measures, since its users (airports, for example) don’t have to pay the licensing fees typically required, which can be a worthwhile source of revenue for artists. But what happens when a place like HNL airport, which hosts more than 21 million passengers annually, uses music created by machines instead of people to represent Hawaii? The identity of a place beings to erode, diluted by a language learning model’s conceptual summary of what a people and its culture sounds like. To echo Brian Eno: what should we be hearing here? In other words: what should the music of Hawaii sound like?
We believe in the power of music, especially when it comes from the soul. We believe in supporting artists, especially as AI disrupts our lives. We believe that Hawaii must be represented authentically, especially when it comes to song. And of course we believe in vinyl, especially since it was a record from 1978 (Mackey Feary Band’s debut LP) that inspired Aloha Got Soul’s origins in 2010.
We hope you find as much joy in this compilation as we have. Perhaps it’ll soundtrack your next journey to Hawaii. At the very least, we hope some people take a moment to hear these sounds: in your headphones for now‚ maybe someday overhead at the airport in Honolulu.
2024 feiern die Broilers ihren runden Geburtstag: 1994 - 2024, 30 Jahre Broilers. 30 gemeinsame Jahre bedeuten Wachsen und Zusammenwachsen. Auch miteinander streiten und zusammen streiten – für die gute Sache. Zusammen feiern und zusammenstehen, in den Besten aller Zeiten und den Schlechtesten aller Zeiten. Und weil es für jede gute Geburtstagsparty auch die passende Musik geben muss, hat die Band zum ersten Mal alle ihre Hits und Lieblingslieder auf einem Album versammelt. Und nicht nur das, die Broilers machen sich selbst ein Geschenk: Zehn der 22 enthaltenen Songs, nämlich alle, die vor 2011 eingespielt wurden, haben sie noch einmal komplett neu aufgenommen. So erstrahlen legendäre Broilers-Klassiker in zeitgemäßem Glanz, ohne ihre Wurzeln zu verleugnen. Die Broilers sind ein Phänomen: Seit über einem Jahrzehnt gehören sie konstant zu den erfolgreichsten Rockbands im deutschsprachigen Raum. Millionen verkaufter Konzertkarten, Nummer- 1-Charts-Platzierungen, Edelmetallauszeichnungen in Folge, kaum ein Superlativ, den die Gruppe sich noch nicht zu eigen gemacht hätte. Ein paar Schulfreunde aus den Vierteln am Stadtrand von Düsseldorf gründeten 1994 eine Band, die sich am ruppigen Sound einer Streetpunk-Variante orientierte, der schon Anfang der 80er-Jahre unter der Bezeichnung „Oi!“ auf der britischen Insel das Licht der Welt erblickte. Die bedingungslose Liebe, die ihnen bis heute von vielen ihrer Anhängerschaft entgegengebracht wird, hat ihren Ursprung in dieser Zeit. Neben den Liedern, mit denen sie über die Jahre ihren Hörern stets aufs Neue aus dem Herzen sprachen, führte aber auch die Kombination der individuellen Charaktere der einzelnen Musiker an die Spitze: Wie fünf Superhelden aus einer Comicserie bündeln sie als Team ihre Kräfte, begeistern so die Fans und können aus dieser Unterschiedlichkeit Kraft schöpfen und spenden. Die Broilers haben keine Angst vor Pathos, Emotionen und Kontrasten: In ihrer Musik sind wuchtige Bläsersätze, Offbeats, da ist Soul und Rocksteady, da sind Flirts mit Power-Pop und Kitsch und das alles, als wäre es das Logischste und Normalste auf der Welt. Diese eklektische Mischung trauen sich nicht viele. Die Broilers wollen es sich anders gar nicht mehr vorstellen. »Jolly Good Fellas – Best of Broilers 1994 - 2024« legt davon eindrucksvoll Zeugnis ab!
Hopsydian are an Italian pop-metalcore outfit from Milan, formed in 2024, combining alluring and sacral atmospheres with modern metalcore power, alt-metal edge, and post-hardcore urgency.
Built on cinematic tension and explosive dynamics, their sound fuses dark, ritualistic undertones with sleek contemporary production and massive, chant-ready choruses
where beauty and brutality collide in equal measure.
The band was formed by vocalist Myles Idolo alongside guitarists Loris Ronchi and Nikolay Deliyski, later completed by bassist Roberto Vezi. The drummer remains anonymous. Their name--Hopsydian--comes from Hope and Obsidian, a ""magic rock"" symbolizing resilience, shadow, and rebirth, perfectly reflecting the duality at the heart of their music.
Hopsydian revolve around worship, love, obsession, sin, and the temptation of becoming God--balancing the holiness of gold with the black of transgression. Hopsydian balance modern heaviness with cinematic elegance--where intimate melodies and shimmering textures collide with crushing riffs and commanding rhythm sections. Their songs move like a ceremony: building atmosphere, sharpening emotion, and detonating into choruses designed to be shouted back from the crowd. Hopsydian explore the most dangerous forms of faith:
worship, love, obsession, sin, and the seduction of becoming God. Their narratives live in extremes:
desire framed as devotion, temptation disguised as salvation, and beauty that burns at the edges. It's an aesthetic of contrast: the holiness of gold set against the darkness that it can't fully conquer.
Benjamin Wilson from band Caskets helped the band develop their album artistic direction
Despite having released only six songs, Hopsydian have already proven their live impact. In 2025, they debuted on the Slam Dunk Italy main stage, sharing the bill with names such as LANDMVRKS, A Day To Remember, and Caskets, before going on to support Caskets in Milan shortly after. Momentum is building fast--and with a fanbase already demanding the next step, Hopsydian are poised to turn their growing catalogue into what it's meant to become: a fully-fledged era, and the tour that brings it to life.
After more than 20 releases as Not a Headliner, José consolidates his real-name identity with his second release
Four tracks, 28 minutes. José's first record under his own name.
Femenino Singular is José's first record under his own name, following more than 20 releases as not a headliner and an earlier take on the project with not a headliner presents José.
That same gesture moves with the record itself: side A happens at night, side B in the morning, and what the titles hint at shifts with that transition. Built with real instruments - bass, guitar, percussion, synths - reaching for a swing that breaks away from a machine's quantized grid, somewhere between house and techno.
The track titles on Post Dub Cities – the new album by Adriano Zanni, photographer, sound artist, and field recordist – evoke the aftermath, that moment when a place continues to exist and live on, but no longer serves anyone. The human element has vanished, whether it happened overnight or through a slow abandonment that lasted for years. The perspective shifts: buildings, homes and palaces reveal a dimension of reality all their own, in which even the ruins give shape to this landscape that endures, transforming into pure presence.
This, after all, is our fate. The fate of us human beings, of our civilisation, of every civilisation: to pass away, to be forgotten, to erect monuments whose significance no one will remember once we are gone.
The opening track Crisopoli transforms the sonic dimension of a city into an echo chamber: a dark, urban dub built from delays and resonances, holding the imprint of what is no longer there — like a bassline that keeps vibrating even after its source has gone silent. What we see is not the presence, but its reverb.
Available from September 11, second excerpt Warosha gives us a minimalist, enveloping, solemn beat, like the symbols on a map that no one can read anymore. Warosha was the district of luxury hotels overlooking the sea in the city of Famagusta. After the island of Cyprus was invaded by the Turkish army, the entire area, emptied of its inhabitants, who had fled south, was fenced off and surrounded by barbed wire. No one has been allowed to enter it since 1974. Now, on these unspoilt beaches, sea turtles have found the perfect place to breed.
Fordlândia, on the other hand, is the symbol of Henry Ford’s failed dream of conquest. An industrial settlement built deep within the Amazon rainforest, several hours’ boat journey from the nearest towns, to gain access to natural rubber for the tyres of his mass-produced cars in Michigan. An extremely costly project, it quickly became a ruinous pipe dream: a town that has been uninhabited for almost a century and has since been reclaimed by nature.
For a long time now, Adriano Zanni has been exploring, through music and photography, the landscape that unfolds before our eyes, as attentive yet silent observers. As if we were absent, a civilisation that has long since vanished: human presence has dissolved, preparing to fade into oblivion. The precise depiction of places through field recordings, and the black-and-white imagery, give rise to apparitions, hallucinations, and memories. The less present we are, the more we seek meaning. We resist abandonment and the indifference of time.
In the ten tracks (plus three bonus tracks) of Post Dub Cities the echoes and reverberations of dub grant us access to an unknown future, as yet untold – in which we are nothing more than a vague memory. The deep sound guides us through a landscape that is familiar yet unknown, unrecognisable. The cold, distant, industrial rhythm resonates within us as if we were the last, all too aware, inhabitant of a now-deserted village.
Every place – be it an abandoned mining settlement on an island in Svalbard, or a ghost town in Pennsylvania evacuated following an underground fire that has been burning for sixty years at a depth of one hundred metres – leaves questions unanswered, shrouds itself in mystery, and makes us wonder, ceaselessly: what happened here?
In the end, we realise that we don’t really care that much about knowing the details of the disappearance. We can guess them, we’ve seen it happen a thousand times before. Just like in the photos accompanying the album, portraits of ghostly, deserted cities: Belgrade, like Venice, Dublin, Sarajevo, Lisbon, Kraków, Sofia, Naples, Hanoi, Lampedusa, Tehran. Unexpectedly, pleasantly emptied of people, and of their obsessions, struggles, illusions.
Then, suddenly, the crowd returns. Busy, feverish, hardworking. The record ends, the spell is broken. We feel a sense of longing for a future that has not yet come to pass, for a place we were only able to observe because we were not there.
Special poster on 250gram paper. Postcard with photo taken by Sandrien. Hand-numbered sticker. Shrinwrap
After more than a decade without releasing new music, Amsterdam DJ and producer Sandrien returns with her debut album Compass, released on her own new label, inspi. Created during a stay in Spain, where she finally found the space to create freely again, the album marks a new chapter: no genres, no expectations, just music made purely on feeling. Compass is an album about finding your own path, personally and musically, a cycle of searching and finding, letting go and beginning again. Lead single 'Life' laid the foundation for it all. The visual world of the album is just as personal: photographs Sandrien took around her house formed the basis for its artwork and imagery. With 27 years of experience behind her, Compass proves that mastery doesn't lead to routine, but to exploration. This double LP includes a beautiful double-sided poster featuring two original artworks of ‘Compass’ by Dutch artist Pieter Jan Boterkoek. Releases October 9, 2026 Written and produced by Sandrien Mixed by Julien Chaptal Mastered by Giuseppe Tillieci at Enisslab Artwork by Studio Pieter Jan Boterhoek This album is made with love in Spain, Volkshotel Amsterdam and Groenekan.
ADULT. kooperiert nicht. Seit über 25 Jahren verkörpert die dystopische Detroit-Synth-Punk-Institution, gegründet von Nicola Kuperus und Adam Lee Miller, unbeirrbare Frustration, Misstrauen und Beklemmung. Man könnte erwarten, dass sich die Kanten mit der Zeit abschleifen, doch ADULT. hat kein Interesse am Komfort eines Vermächtnisses. Noch nie klang die Musik des Duos so unmittelbar, so dringlich und so unverhohlen wütend wie auf dem abschließenden, kompromisslosen Kissing Luck Goodbye.Mit aufgerüstetem Equipment und einer neuen Klangbibliothek gebaut, ist das Material erdrückend dynamisch, lauter - und zugleich klarer. Kuperus' dominante Darbietung rückt im Mix stärker in den Vordergrund und skizziert ein Arsenal aus lebhaften, ätzenden Rufen, Sprechchören und Gedankensplittern. Lachen - ob in den Texten oder als besessene Präsenz - fungiert als Leitmotiv und verweist auf die bedrohliche Absurdität der modernen Zeit.,THE CHAOS IS WHAT THEY WANT", singt sie in ,R U 4 $ALE" - zugleich eine Absichtserklärung: einer brennenden Welt aus Gier und Unordnung mit trotzigem, meisterhaft zusammengebautem Chaos zu begegnen. ,Du hast in dieser Höllenlandschaft, in der wir gerade leben, zwei Möglichkeiten: kämpfen oder depressiv sein", sagt Miller. ,Beides ist okay. Aber, na ja, die Entscheidung war einfach."ADULT. ist bekannt für hochriskante Katharsis auf der Bühne und griff kürzlich auf seinen Backkatalog an Bassgitarren-Songs aus den 2000ern zurück, wobei sie die vorausschauende Anxiety Always-Ära erneut nachzeichneten - teils aus Notwendigkeit angesichts der heutigen politischen und technologischen Angsttemperatur. Die Reaktion war sofort spürbar: ,Wir waren in Paris, und die Kids sind von der Bühne gesprungen. Und ich dachte nur: Das ist großartig. Das ist irgendwie die Energie, in die ich wieder zurückwill", sagt Kuperus.Diese Erkenntnis fiel mit einer Reihe von Rückschlägen zusammen - Kuperus' Anfällen von chronischem Schwindel, dem Verlust ihres engen Freundes und Kollaborateurs Douglas McCarthy von Nitzer Ebb, dem das Album gewidmet ist - alles unter dem drohenden Regime noch einmal erheblich verschärft. ,Wir dachten nur: Alles zerbricht. Wir zerbrechen. Wir sind kaputt." Dieses Gefühl hielt jedoch nicht an, denn letztlich waren sie viel zu sehr von Wut aufgeladen, um stillzuhalten. Die Stimmung vor Kissing Luck Goodbye waren vier Mittelfinger, die kerzengerade nach oben zeigten.Anstatt sich zurückzuziehen, konzentrierten sie sich auf den Prozess und überarbeiteten ihr Setup - inklusive der ersten neuen Mikrofone seit 20 Jahren. Hält man das Album an irgendeiner Stelle an, zählt man wahrscheinlich ein Dutzend Dinge, die gleichzeitig passieren, in seltsamer, schwindelerregender und dissonanter Harmonie. ,No One Is Coming" attackiert Untätigkeit angesichts des Faschismus - ,NO ONE IS COMING TO YOUR RESCUE". ,None of It's Fun" feuert mit atemloser Dringlichkeit, rasenden Glissandi und pointierten Zeilen wie: ,OH I AM TEARING MY GUTS OUT / LOOK AT ME_ DO YOU THINK THAT THIS IS AMUSING?"Eine geradlinige Basslinie und Kickdrum prallen im Abschlusstrack ,Destroyers" auf pulsierende Mantras, werden dann vollständig gesättigt und kakophonisch. Ihre jüngeren Ichs hätten den Song vielleicht sich selbst zerstören lassen, doch hier gelang es ihnen, die Lautstärke durch alle Extreme hindurch zu stabilisieren und Raum für ein eindringliches, abschließendes A-cappella zu schaffen: WE PAY THE PRICE FOR THOSE IN POWER EXPLOITING YOU EXPLOITING ME CONSUMING YOU CONSUMING ME SICK SICK SICK SICKENING IT IS US THAT ARE DEVOURED BY EVERYTHING I WILL EAT YOUR HATE
Die Musik auf Horse Lords' "Demand to Be Taken to Heaven Alive!" wirkt zugleich unglaublich detailliert und zutiefst menschlich. Die zwölf versammelten Stücke sind vielschichtig, verflochten, tonal und rhythmisch komplex - moiré-artige Muster aus Interaktion und Verzahnung, die sich sowohl körperlich als auch geistig entfalten, voller klanglicher Gänge mit einem unausweichlichen Groove. Künstler sind nicht notwendigerweise Wissenschaftler, Logiker oder spirituelle Führer, doch durch ihr persönliches Verständnis von Ordnung und Erfahrung eröffnen sie einen unmittelbaren Zugang zu gesteigerten Zuständen von Materialität und Immaterialität. Horse Lords wurden 2010 in Baltimore gegründet; sie gingen aus einer anderen Gruppe namens Teeth Mountain hervor und starteten als Trio mit Gitarrist Owen Gardner, Bassist Max Eilbacher und Schlagzeuger Sam Haberman, bevor der Altsaxofonist Andrew Bernstein zum Kernensemble hinzustieß. Obwohl das Quartett aus einer fruchtbaren Noise- und Experimental-Rock-Szene hervorgegangen ist - einem legendären Umfeld für Künstler und Außenseiter, das viele einflussreiche Bands hervorgebracht hat (Lungfish, Matmos) - war ihr Ansatz über sechs Alben, zahlreiche Kollaborationen und als gefeierte Liveband weit vielseitiger, als es die punktierten Rhythmen instrumentaler elektrischer Rockmusik vermuten lassen. Für dieses Projekt wird die Band durch Bassklarinettistin Madison Greenstone, Posaunist Weston Olencki und - erstmals bei Horse Lords - durch Gesang von Nina Guo und Evelyn Saylor ergänzt. Das Eröffnungsstück ,Eureka 378-B" ist ein Arrangement von sakraler Harfenmusik aus dem 19. Jahrhundert, getragen vom Gesang von Guo und Saylor; seine Melodie entfaltet sich weit und setzt einen tonalen Startpunkt für vieles, was folgt. Dazu kommen die kurzen "Rotations", die Fragmente aus anderen Stücken isolieren. "D2BT2HA!" enthält unzählige klangliche und konzeptuelle Schichten, doch angesichts der unverkennbaren Kraft und Menschlichkeit der Musik ist der Prozess, sie zu entschlüsseln, begeisternd und zutiefst lohnend. Selten ist eine Platte, die einen so unmittelbar packt und zugleich bei jedem Hören vollkommen neu erscheint.
The Lemonheads release a strictly limited edition 12” single on 21st September featuring three classic tracks on white vinyl. Lead cut is ‘Roky’, Evan Dando’s homage to the late, great outsider genius Roky Erickson (of garage psyche legends 13th Floor Elevator and much solo strangeness).
"If Roky Erickson had vanished from the face of the earth after The 13th Floor Elevators released their epochal debut single, ‘You're Gonna Miss Me’, in early 1966, in all likelihood he'd still be regarded as a legend among garage rock fanatics for his primal vocal wailing and feral harmonica work." AllMusic
‘Roky’ is Evan's incisive take on the songwriter’s struggles and features a searing guitar break from the song's co-writer Nick Saloman (The Bevis Frond)
The Bevis Frond toured with The Lemonheads in support of the latter’s much-praised ‘Love Chant’ album of 2025 from where ‘Roky’ originally comes. And, to complete this unique package, the Frond cover two Lemonheads’ songs, ‘The Great Big No’ and ‘My Drug Buddy’; both sounding like the kind of UK-based left field power pop that inspired Kurt Cobain in the formative days of grunge – indeed, they could have snook out on the original Rough Trade or 53rd & 3rd labels at any time.
Fact fans looking for Roky-styled curveball ley line between events, might note that The Lemonheads covered The Bevis Frond’s ‘Old Man Blank’ on 2019’s ‘Varshons II’, the same year that Roky sadly passed.
Stars & Quotes:
“One of the most distinctive voices of the ‘90s” The New York Times
“The Lemonheads are one of my favorite bands” Jimmy Fallon
“Gloriously euphoric melancholy” MOJO (on Roky)
Bloodhound Gang’s irreverent brand of comedy-rock and rap-rock is collected here on this essential 1LP hits package, pressed on exclusive Milky Clear vinyl and including a collectible poster. Featuring the band’s biggest and most enduring tracks, the set is led by the international smash “The Bad Touch”, a multi-million-selling single that reached No.1 in Germany, Sweden and several other European territories, while also hitting the UK Top 5. Also included are fan favourites “Fire Water Burn”, “The Ballad Of Chasey Lain”, “Along Comes Mary”, “Foxtrot Uniform Charlie Kilo”, “Uhn Tiss Uhn Tiss Uhn Tiss” and “I Hope You Die”, spanning the band’s most successful era from the platinum-selling Hooray For Boobies through to Hefty Fine. Bloodhound Gang have sold millions of albums worldwide, with Hooray For Boobies reaching No.1 in both Germany and Austria and achieving Platinum certification in the US. Combining the group’s biggest chart hits, cult classics and live favourites, this specially curated single-LP edition delivers the definitive Bloodhound Gang experience in a concise, collector-friendly format.
Gold Colored Vinyl LP Edition zum 25jährigen Jubiläum des Jan Delay Solo Debüt Albums! Zusammen mit der Sam Ragga Band produzierte der Beginner-Frontmann Jan Delay ein Album, das die deutsche Pop-Landschaft nachhaltig veränderte. Noch nie war Reggae mit deutschen Texten so authentisch, so fett und so erfolgreich. Mit der Interpretation des Nena-Hits "Irgendwie, Irgendwo, Irgendwann" schaffte Jan Delay den Durchbruch auch außerhalb der HipHop-Community und legte 2001 mit "Searching For Jan Soul Rebels" weiter nach. Jan Delay zeigt sich als scharfzüngiger Kritiker und Zyniker, Songs wie "Ich Möchte Nicht, dass Ihr Meine Lieder Singt" und "Vergiftet" polarisieren, wurden aber trotz aller textlichen Radikalität zu veritablen Hits.
MEMORIALS jump off the waterslides and head above the clouds with their stunning second album, ‘All Clouds Bring Not Rain’. The duo of Verity Susman and Matthew Simms (formerly of Electrelane and WIRE) locked themselves away in a studio in a barn secluded deep in the woods in southwestern France and re-emerged with a beautiful, unusual record that is both melodic and unconventional. For such an ambitious album it’s striking that it was written, performed, recorded and mixed solely by the two of them. Sounding like an unearthed classic, MEMORIALS twist their influences into their own unmistakable sound. Imagine Nico singing with Can produced by David Axelrod and you’re somewhere in the right ballpark.
The record draws inspiration from a wide range of music including folk, dub, post punk, experimental tape music, 60s soul, garage rock, 70s spiritual jazz and Canterbury prog. This attention to detail in their sound meant finding several other studios to get what they needed to record with, including a harpsichord at 4AD’s studio in London and a vibraphone and vintage Leslie speaker in Stereolab drummer Andy Ramsay’s studio Press Play. Verity’s distinctive, unadorned singing is a focal point of the record, moving from tender to wild. Her vocal melodies quickly become earworms, providing the tuneful heart around which the songs’ more unorthodox elements are arranged, which is where Matthew’s unconventional approach to recording and production comes to the fore. With their adventurous arrangements, classic songwriting skills and innovative production techniques, MEMORIALS have created another mesmerising listen that’s accomplished and compelling in its unique approach yet remains dizzyingly immersive - just like their acclaimed live shows.
A glorious night of no particular significance, Totally, the new album by Baba Stiltz. Recorded in Helsinki in studio with a drummer and overdubs committed in 5 days. Ballroom- sink songs of loss, grief, long drives on the I-5, centralized acquisitions, and corrective conditioning towards the prolonged effects of computerized lifestyles.
Every song looks you straight in the eyes, crooked and veering towards a light fixture off the side of the mirror. Ambivalence and assertions track us, down some gauzy networked afternoon. Relatively, perfectly, three dimensional. Proportions as they appear to us from outer intuition. Sometimes meaning is evoked through pure nothingness. Concealed and nothing known. We have no need for any paradise informed by anything beyond what is directly in front of us.
Stone repetition thwarts the possibility of control and surrenders itself to understanding. Who are we, and what are we trying to understand? To understand being universally greater than being understood. There are soap operas everywhere for those with eyes to see. You don’t have to look as hard as we currently look. The dramatic is everywhere, we breathe it unintentionally, then we come to hate it. Haptic, embodied facts of a tedious life lodged in the jowls of history. Everything under the
sky being the best bedlam has to offer. Your family, your relationships, your memory. As you eat a burger you are reminded of every sharp protrusion and corner under the florescent lights, the same lights you see when you’re born, and although unconfirmed, when you die.
Some of these songs were written years ago, some recently. The bookshelf and television set come into full view. Women/men come and go. Stars and poseurs collapse under their alienated contradictions, the search for truth yields to continued gradients of probability (collapse). Spatial order maintains itself through perceptional feeling. Silence, singing along to Roger Miller, people entering and leaving, figures hovering over you in your dreams and waking hours. Cool and fun, Totally
The fifteenth release of Barro comes with an exclusive: behind the Transylvanian mask of Orlok 101 lies Nöle himself, the boss of the label.
Remember that he used this vampiric AKA to kick off Barro—his The End Of The Beginning being the first release, published in late 2018. That same year, his techno-industrial sound—packed with references from the famous work of Bram Stoker and nightmare atmospheres—helped launch another label: Soil, the Valencia-based imprint, with a project that included a suitably fitting remix of The Horrorist. The following year, he released an EP with five original tracks, titled Runaway, while also “spreading blood” on Antikhrist Visions Vol I alongside his Industrias Mekanikas comrades.
His dark influence has been felt across Barro’s catalogue, whether through his own tracks or remixes—sinking his teeth into artists like The Hacker (under his real name, Amato) or Nebula Circuit. In 2025, Orlok made his debut on Aspecto Humano with a powerful EP, equally gritty and dark. In Barro, we’ve recently had Nöle—the most techno side of Imanol Pagola—with the EPs Electro Bloody Music and Demencial Chico Aceleradom, two great showcases of his ability to keep us dancing nonstop, following the popular Mendekua, released by Xtraperlo.
For Barro 15, the two sides of the producer and DJ come together on this EP, titled Sex With a Cop—four tracks released on vinyl and digitally, plus an alternate version of the final composition as a bonus track.
Nöle's knowledge of the dancefloor and Orlok 101's ability to create atmospheres that will give you goosebumps come together on this EP to create an explosive mix.
Sex With a Cop starts with Hilerri, a techno EBM track where Orlok provides repetitive, screeching sounds and a ghostly melody, while Nöle adds incisive synths and a catchy, addictive vocal sample that warns you of the danger of the material you’re listening to. Orlok then takes over with his industrial and metallic sonorities on the next track, Amets Fabrika, although Nöle’s influence still comes through with his powerful bass and addictive synth lines. A stifled scream and a production packed with a thousand details create an unsettling atmosphere that will surprise you on the dancefloor.
The flip side begins with No Voy A Quedar Con Nadie, a track closer to Nöle’s technooid world. Even with its unsettling opening, it doesn’t take long to turn into a danceable bomb, with that dark touch typical of the Navarro producer.
Surprisingly, he saves the best for last: Harina de Huesos Humanos is one of the most interesting tracks created by Imanol Pagoda, and we can hear it in two versions, one as a bonus track. Thanks to complex production full of details and sounds that come and go, a punchy, hard as granite kick drum, and a carefully crafted industrial atmosphere, it all ends up being the perfect union between the two sonic worlds. A spectacular finale for the label’s fifteenth release.
Inspired by the ska and reggae sounds crossing the border from Belize, the Mexican band Ely Combo was among the first in the country to incorporate Jamaican rhythms into its repertoire in the early 1970s. This single brings together two funk classics—Isaac Hayes’ ‘Shaft’ and the dancefloor favorite ‘Express Yourself,’ originally recorded by Charles Wright & The Watts 103rd St. Rhythm Band—reimagined here as two explosive reggae tracks.
A remarkable anomaly within the Latin American music scene of the 1970s.
‘I have always been drawn to those ambiguous territories between beauty and terror, and the Trinity test is their epitome: magnificent, sublime, terrifying, annihilating. A destructive power that, somehow, only love can compare with.’
The prescriptive art and performance of Berlin based, French producer, Julienne Dessagne, has concluded with a starkly beautiful reimagining of Chris Isaak’s Wicked Game.
As Fantastic Twins, her continuing creative manifestation for music and performance, has released an array of electronic art for the body and mind. A sonic exploration of dual characters shaped through experimental pop, cinematic electronics and the outer edges of techno.
First appearing on the cult Hippie Dance label, before establishing a long and warm collaboration with Keith McIvor aka JD Twitch and his inspiring Optimo Music label, as well as her own House Of Slessor label, this release comes full of mythology and symbolism.
Immersive sound design, narrative tension, and emotionally charged atmospheres, the origin of the project – Wicked Game (Trinity Version) – was composed for a live performance at the Beta Biennale Of Architecture Of Timișoara in September 2024 and given a limited digital release soon after.
The impact on the artist and the music was multi-layered:
‘While recording this cover, images of the Trinity nuclear test, as reimagined by David Lynch in Twin Peaks (Season 3 / Episode 8) kept resurfacing, almost on a subliminal level, suggesting another wicked game: humanity’s love affair with science and technology, driven by the same mix of desire fascination and inevitability that animates Chris Isaak’s original song.’
Approached by Emotional Response, this updated “vinyl” edition is re-recorded / remastered and comes with new interpretations by Julienne herself, as well as remixes by Aho Ssan and Optimo (Espacio).
Dessagne offers a spectrum of mixes and moods; the centrifugal ‘Trinity Version’ a sweeping cinematic masterpiece, between beauty and terror, the artist transmits the aesthetics of sublime; while ‘Thousand Suns Version’ fuses industrial and techno soundscapes for a beatdown reimagining; the melancholia ‘Atomic Love Version’, where the beautiful vocals are matched with a glitchy, clipping ambience; and the finale, the ‘Core Version’ shines a personal, drifting odyssey.
The accompanying remixes see Aho Ssan (Niamké Désiré), composer and sound artist, his remake merging a love of darkcore drone with moments of uplifting energy, the ‘Core Version Aho Ssan Remix’, a fusion of craft and Dessagne’s vocals.
To close, taking up the Optimo remix mantle, Jonnie Wilkes embraces the propulsion, his ‘Thousand Suns Version Optimo (Espacio) Remix’, offering brooding, electro-driven percussion that overflows with emotion and completes this stunning, evolving, organic and singular remake.
David Norland is an Emmy-nominated English composer, known for his scores for drama and documentary, alongside his experimental choral and electronic music. Bringing stories to life through sound, he received critical acclaim for his debut solo album ‘Glam Tear Stain’ (2019) and is set to release follow-up album ‘La Source’ in June 2026 via Denovali Records.
Relocated back to his London home after many years in Los Angeles, and free from years of drug and alcohol problems, recent commissions for two choral works allowed Norland to return to the innocent origin of his musical world, and his experience as a parent prompted a lot of outward reflection. What kind of world are we leaving to our children?
Inspired by his score to the forthcoming silent black and white film ‘Carousel’ (2026), Norland found other music emerging that refused to be ignored. The film’s director opened the door to an entirely free scoring process – no temp music, no expectation, no guidelines, just pure intuitive expression. ‘La Source’ draws on this experience, alongside his childhood as a touring chorister, the honkytonk upright piano in the north-east London bedroom of his early 20s, his early recording experiments with a TASCAM 4-track cassette recorder, and his intense preoccupation with bells, flutes, stone architecture, and mysticism.
From the haunting, choral beauty of ‘E-Car Soul’ to the breezy album title track, Norland blends minimalist classical structures with electronics. A unified tapestry of blended voices, harmonies and textures, ‘La Source’ is a deeply emotional and melancholic journey for Norland. “In the end, I’m looking to find meaning through the music, like when I was a kid singing in choirs. But I get the most sense of meaning through transcendent experiences, rather than anything intellectual or dogmatic. I have to feel it, not think it. I’m trying to make work that’s luminous, wondrous, shimmering and strange, so I can keep having those experiences,” says Norland.
On his inspiration for the album, Norland adds, “I love making patterns in things and finding patterns. That’s why minimalism was so enticing to me, the patterns are so explicit. I love word play and anagrams. The big sadness coming through as I was making the record is this clarity over the future of my kids. Everything else is a complete distraction. This incredible nurturing planet and its ecosystem are being rapidly destroyed, and the forces destroying it are relentless and punitive. And they seem to be fine with consigning our children to live in an ever-more-hostile wasteland. You can’t pretend that’s not coming, if you do I think you’re lying to yourself. And perhaps eventually it will be the fact that people love their kids that will stir wider fear and action. It’s hard to think of anything more connected to the idea of spirit.” The result is the reflective, ecstatic, mystical and sad world of ‘La Source.’
Norland’s screen work includes the award-winning documentary Anvil! The Story Of Anvil (2008), directed by Sacha Gervasi, and since 2010, he has composed much of the music for US broadcasting giant ABC’s primetime news documentaries. His work for ABC is broadcast in the US and around the world on a daily basis.
In 2012, he was the music supervisor for Hitchcock (2012) featuring Anthony Hopkins, Helen Mirren & Scarlett Johansson and in 2017, he teamed up once again with Gervasi for the score to November Criminals starring Chloe Moretz and Ansel Elgort. The following year, he composed the score for the Emmy-nominated HBO film My Dinner With Herve, starring Peter Dinklage and Jamie Dornan.
Norland will be performing the score of Carousel later this year, and the score itself will be a forthcoming release on Denovali. 2026 will also see the release of documentary All Permits Secured, a valentine to the history of EDM, featuring Norland’s score.
SIGNUM REGIS was founded in 2007 and stands for finest melodic Power Metal with both progressive and symphonic elements. Their upcoming new and eighth studio album „Beyond Spacetime“ will be released on October 9th through Fireflash Records and will feature different vocalists. Among them their current singer Mayo Petranen, who just returned to the band, his successor Jota Fortinho as well as top class names, such as Ripper Owens (ex-JUDAS PRIEST), Matt Smith (THEOCRACY), Ralf Scheepers (PRIMAL FEAR), Johnny Gioeli (HARDLINE, AXEL RUDI PELL), Tasos Lazaris (STEEL ARCTUS, WHITE WIZZARD), David Åkesson (SYMPHONITY; QUANTICE), but also Victor Smolski (ALMANAC, ex-RAGE), with a guitar solo on the first single-release „Throne Of Gold“.
„We are so satisfied and proud of it! Even though the last 3 years were not easy for the band, this is definitely not just a ""next"" Signum Regis"" album, we are a band, we are always aiming to create something special - for us and for fans“, comments guitarist Filip Koluš, who also mixed and produced the album.
„Beyond Spacetime“ is rounded up by an excellent artwork from Uwe Jarling, known for his work for acts like HEAVEN’S GATE, GRAVE DIGGER or recently FRONT ROW WARRIORS. „The result is awesome! We are definitely a band that considers the artwork a very important part of our artistic vision. Over the years this approach has only grown stronger, so having a real cover artist has become an absolute must for us“, comments Tommy.
SIGNUM REGIS will celebrate their 20th anniversary next year. „Beyond Spacetime“ already feels like kind of a best-of journey through their past, present and future. „We grew up on the values of traditional melodic metal - this focus will most probably never change“, says Filip Koluš and explains: „At the same time, we are also a group of great friends, who have a common goal - to make the best quality metal music together.“
Teen of Denial: Joe’s Story is a freshly reimagined take on Car Seat Headrest’s beloved breakout, Teens of Denial, now celebrating its 10th anniversary.
On the original album, Toledo often used the name “Joe” as a pseudonym – a sly homage to Daniel Johnston. Revisiting Teens in the run-up to its 10th birthday, he felt called to give Joe a unique backstory and began tweaking the album to tell that tale. The group returned to the studio with Teens producer Steve Fisk to update accordingly – tweaking lyrics, revising arrangements, and recording new songs in the “Denial-style,” including ‘Optimistic Son” and the anthemic ‘Joe Drives Again’. The result retains Teens’ dark edge and youthful cynicism, but allows a bit of hard-won compassion into the mix.
From Will Toledo:
Sometime last year, it was suggested to me that we do something for the ten-year anniversary of ‘Teens of Denial,’ so I started looking back on the album to see what we might do. In spite of some of its songs being a regular part of my life for the past decade, it wasn’t a record I’d thought much about as a whole since it came out. Most of the songs I’d come up with over a two-year period at the end of my college days, when I was struggling a lot with cynicism and misplaced aggression. But by the time the songs were done, I was living in Washington, Car Seat Headrest was a full band with a record label, and in spite of the turmoil of the writing process, the final album was pretty enjoyable for everyone to work on.
This time, looking back at the songs, I started to feel like there was a story being told through the album, though I’d never imagined it as being a narrative work. On ‘Hi, How Are You?’ Daniel Johnston had used the name “Joe” in the titles of a few tracks –“No More Pushing Joe Around,” “Keep Punching Joe” – as a sort of joke, a stand-in for himself. I borrowed the idea, and the name, for titling songs on ‘Denial.’ This time, I started thinking - who is Joe? And how do the songs, in the way they’re sequenced on the album, reflect what he’s going through? As I started asking this question, a story emerged with startling wholeness and clarity, like finding the foundations of an ancient city while digging in my backyard. As I kept digging, certain songs from the original album fell by the wayside, as they seemed misplaced in this new context; others asked for new lyrics, to fully give birth to the story contained in the music.
The resulting work feels more like the album ‘Teens of Denial’ was meant to be. When you’re writing from a dark space, it’s hard to have perspective on where you’re at. This time, I could pull from memories of that darkness, and use the distance and additional perspective of ten years of life to shed a fuller light on the experience. Joe is a character going through some of what I experienced, and some of his own problems. Telling his story, and not just my own impressions of life at the end of the teen years, brought a new level of compassion and wholeness to the album. It gave us the opportunity to write new material in “Denial style”, embracing a snappy and simple(ish) rock aesthetic, and in an additional blessing, we were able to team up once with Steve Fisk, a joy and inspiration to get back into the studio with after ten years. We mixed the material at his house in Tacoma, and were constantly amazed at the lack of divide between past and present, as we’d punch in vocal overdubs ten years later into the same gear, hearing my voice now running alongside a 2015 Will. For someone coming across this album or this band for the first time, this is how they’d hear the record, not as a relic of the past but as a new piece. It was immensely rewarding to experience that on our side.
For anyone familiar with ‘Teens,’ comparisons with the original will be inevitable, but I do hope that as much as possible, people can come to this album on its own terms, approaching it as a teen, hearing the music and story for the first time. I believe music is an ongoing story, and albums don’t always do justice to its dynamic, ongoing nature. What gives it life is the new ears that hear it, and the new hearts that engage with it. I’m so grateful that this is a work that people have kept coming to, and I hope that this presentation does them honor with a fresh offering to the conversation. We’ve known that “it doesn’t have to be like this”; now we can wonder - “what it if were like this?”
In the spring of 1971, somewhere between Brussels, Paris and a collective pop fever dream, Le Monde Fabuleux Des Yamasuki landed on vinyl. It sounded like nothing else then and it still does not today. More than half a century later, Sdban Records proudly presents a reissue of this singular cult album, available from April 3, 2026 on vinyl.
The album was produced by Jean Kluger and written both by Jean and Daniel Vangarde (aka Bangalter, later the father of Thomas Bangalter of Daft Punk), who were alreadywell ahead of their time, long before electronic music rewrote the rules of pop culture.
Released under the name Yamasuki, also referred to as The Yamasuki Singers, or The Yamasuki's, the project was never intended as a conventional band. It was a studio-born fantasy, a concept album disguised as a pop record. What began as a standalone single quickly expanded into a full-blown pan-cultural pop opera that ignored genres and common sense with joyful abandon.
Musically, the album sits at a delirious crossroads. Psychedelic pop collides with funk rhythms, samba and bubblegum melodies, full of chants and choruses in a phonetic pseudo-Japanese, written with the help of a dictionary. Kluger and Vangarde famously recruited a children's choir to perform the vocals, and for added spectacle, they brought in a Japanese judo grandmaster, whose ritualistic shouts and battle cries erupt throughout the record.
Several singles were released. One of them, Yamasuki, with accompanying dance move, appeared in the United Kingdom and France on John Peel's Dandelion label, a fitting home for a record that thrived on the margins of pop culture. Its B-side, Aieaoa, proved even more potent. In 1975, the song was reborn as A.I.E. (A Mwana) by Black Blood, an African group recording in Belgium, this time sung in Swahili. That melody would travel even further. Aie a Mwana became the debut single of English pop group Bananarama, and in 2010 it resurfaced once more as Helele, an official song of the FIFA World Cup, recorded by South African singer Velile Mchunu with Danish percussion duo Safri Duo. That version became the most widely known incarnation of the song. With Jean Kluger directly involved, it was less a cover than a continuation of the original idea.
The album's afterlife did not stop there. Over the years, Yamasuki has been quietly sampled, covered, and featured across media far beyond the realm of novelty pop. Kono Samourai was sampled in The Healer by Erykah Badu (2007), produced by Madlib, while Yama Yama has found its way into recent pop culture as well: appearing in the television series Fargo, on Angus Stone's project Dope Lemon, and on the 2008 Late Night Tales compilation curated by Arctic Monkeys drummer Matt Helders. Proof, if any were needed, that this strange little record carries a deeper musical DNA than its playful exterior might suggest.
This new reissue of Le Monde Fabuleux Des Yamasuki proves the renewed interest and respect for this cult album, faithful to the original spirit while finally giving it back the physical presence it deserves. In an era obsessed with genres and algorithmic neatness, Yamasuki still laughs, dances and karate-kicks its way past definitions. It reminds us that pop music can be playful without being disposable, strange without being cynical and joyfulwithout explanation. The world of Yamasuki was always fabulous, we are just lucky it found its way back to us!
Courtney Storer is Aerofunk, a UK producer who broke out back in 2023 and has been dropping heat ever since., This new EP for Funk Dubs is no different: 'At The Tone' opens with a blend of woozy synth tones and answering machine messages that are offset by gritty and cold drum textures that remind of early tech house greats. 'Relax' is another cut that blends body-popping and elastic bass with snappy drums and odd samples that work perfectly. 'Wet One' is a hot stepping acid-laced tech house slammer with plenty of machine soul and 'White Heat' then closes with more hefty drums that spark plenty of physical reactions and come laced with tactile synth designs.
Argentinian artist Juan Hansen presents his debut album 'Ultrasonido'; twelve tracks spanning indie dance, tech house, and soft melodic house, released on his own newly founded label Ultrasonido, with the second single 'Inside My Mind' coming out via belonging by Innellea.
After his breakthrough Boiler Room appearance in 2019, Juan has been on a relentless quest to push the boundaries, playing major stages around the globe, becoming one of the figureheads of the Argentinian electronic music world. As an exceptional live artist, multi-instrumentalist and vocalist, Juan brings a real sense of groove to the stage, merging two worlds effortlessly: deeply emotional songwriting and direct, dancefloor-focused club tracks. 'Ultrasonido' brings both sides together. The album is a clear evolution of Juan Hansen, presenting a wider range of his sound, which he also presents in his live performances. A journey through the musical world of Juan Hansen.
Across twelve tracks, with contributions from Clér Letiv, Santi Portillo, Franco BA, Rocio Giorgi, Miko Franconi, Brigado Crew and Marley Waters, Juan shifts between club-focused tracks and more intimate, song-driven moments, moving naturally between Spanish and English. It’s a debut album that captures both his roots and the direction he’s evolving toward.
Juan Hansen's story doesn't start on the dancefloor, it starts with acoustic instruments. He built his foundation in the indie and rock scenes of Argentina before crossing into electronic music, a journey that's still audible in every track he makes. After years of building his profile with live performances, mesmerizing audiences from Cosquín Rock and Ultra in Argentina to Watergate in Berlin, Burning Man in the Nevada desert, and Grand Factory in Beirut.
His search is real and visceral; a search for the different, mixing genres without prejudice, with a seriously playful attitude. Positioned within a new generation of artists dedicated to improvising on stage, Juan fuses electronic sounds with analog instruments and organic soundscapes. There's no genre cage. 'Ultrasonido' is his debut album and the launch of his own label, also named Ultrasonido. A long-form statement after years of singles, EPs, and shows around the globe.
Sublime frequencies from the golden era of ambient electronica.
Plumbing hidden depths beneath a deceptively tranquil surface, MLO's mid-90s masterpiece Io is an overlooked gem from a golden era for ambient electronic music. Originally released in 1994, Jon Tye and Pete Smith's collaborative album responded to the growing chill-out movement by leaning into classical and avant-garde influences from Satie, Debussy and Cage through to Soft Machine, Incredible String Band and Eno. Recorded across various studios stacked with classic and rare synths, Io was patiently composed into slowly unfolding suites punctuated with ripples of arrhythmic interference to arrive at a purist vision of true ambient.
The next instalment in Forever Records' ongoing reissue series shines a light back on this landmark piece of UK electronica with the first official reissue since its original edition on Rising High. As well as the original double LP pressing and a new CD digipak version, there will also be a uniquely numbered, limited edition housed in a gatefold sleeve that comes with a bonus 10" featuring two previously unreleased versions of the album's opening cut, 'Wimborne'.
Press response to Io:
"Not so much ambient, more environmental music, Io lets you bring as much (or as little) of your surroundings in as suits your mood. Every listen can be different. Interactive ambient at last.”
IO is pure ambience. Relying on motif as opposed to melody, MLO have produced a truly evocative album.
Peter McIntyre, Mixmag, UK 1994.
"MLO's influences range from the likes of Eric Satie and the intellectual salon music of his era to the more predictable reference point of dubby, modern techno, though they feel, perhaps rather contentiously, that "ambient music can exist in isolation from the rest of the dance music arena". Can it? Take a trip to Io, and find out."
Generator Magazine, UK 1994.
"If you like your ambient deep and moody with long chords that creep along at approximately the speed of drying paint then check out MLO’s Io."
Mixology, UK 1994.
"MLO set the controls for the heart of headspace for their first full album release. Io is top grade ambient brain… Ace album…"
Select, UK 1994.
Sublime frequencies from the golden era of ambient electronica.
Plumbing hidden depths beneath a deceptively tranquil surface, MLO's mid-90s masterpiece Io is an overlooked gem from a golden era for ambient electronic music. Originally released in 1994, Jon Tye and Pete Smith's collaborative album responded to the growing chill-out movement by leaning into classical and avant-garde influences from Satie, Debussy and Cage through to Soft Machine, Incredible String Band and Eno. Recorded across various studios stacked with classic and rare synths, Io was patiently composed into slowly unfolding suites punctuated with ripples of arrhythmic interference to arrive at a purist vision of true ambient.
The next instalment in Forever Records' ongoing reissue series shines a light back on this landmark piece of UK electronica with the first official reissue since its original edition on Rising High. As well as the original double LP pressing and a new CD digipak version, there will also be a uniquely numbered, limited edition housed in a gatefold sleeve that comes with a bonus 10" featuring two previously unreleased versions of the album's opening cut, 'Wimborne'.
Press response to Io:
"Not so much ambient, more environmental music, Io lets you bring as much (or as little) of your surroundings in as suits your mood. Every listen can be different. Interactive ambient at last.”
IO is pure ambience. Relying on motif as opposed to melody, MLO have produced a truly evocative album.
Peter McIntyre, Mixmag, UK 1994.
"MLO's influences range from the likes of Eric Satie and the intellectual salon music of his era to the more predictable reference point of dubby, modern techno, though they feel, perhaps rather contentiously, that "ambient music can exist in isolation from the rest of the dance music arena". Can it? Take a trip to Io, and find out."
Generator Magazine, UK 1994.
"If you like your ambient deep and moody with long chords that creep along at approximately the speed of drying paint then check out MLO’s Io."
Mixology, UK 1994.
"MLO set the controls for the heart of headspace for their first full album release. Io is top grade ambient brain… Ace album…"
Select, UK 1994.
As the dust begins to settle on one of his most significant and pivotal bodies of work to date - the critically acclaimed techno-focused 'Grow' released by Craig Richards on The Nothing Special - Calibre returns to his own label Signature for another fathomless LP exploration. Laced and spaced with the precision balance of sounds, speeds and styles he's known for, and predominantly characterised by his own lyrics and vocal textures, 'Deep' once again reminds us of Calibre's singular status as an artist whose creations transcend time, tempo and territory. Ranging from one of his most in-demand dubs 'No One Gets You' to poignant yearning introspection of tracks such as 'Better Than Me' and the rolling, jazzy broken beat summer serenade 'Lit', 'Deep' is yet another accomplished, alluring and truly unique pieces of work from one of electronic music's most consistent and prolific artists.
Sadurn’s sophomore album The Underworld is a collection of heart-rendingly personal and instantly relatable songs, due out this fall on Run For Cover Records. Following years of lingering vocal issues for guitarist G DeGroot, the album is the culmination of an emotion- al and spiritual journey and a a deeply personal meditation on loss, healing, and transformation.
Sadurn began in 2017 as a solo project for G DeGroot, and from the start their approach to songwriting was informed more by emotional intuition than any kind of real ambitions to be heard. “I discovered songwriting as an outlet for processing my reality,” they explain. “A lot of times when something is hard to say, it flows more easily in songwriting. It’s a place where you can circle back to your own truth.” After moving to Philadelphia, DeGroot was joined by gui- tarist Jon Cox, drummer Amelia Swain, and bassist Tabitha Ahnert. The group recorded Radiator, a debut that immediately connected with listeners and was met with critical acclaim.
Throughout The Underworld, the rawness of DeGroot’s lyrics are matched by Cox, Ahnert, and Swain’s evocative playing. Stunning opener “the weight” describes the early stages of a relationship deteriorating, with brilliant soloing from Cox and DeGroot’s warm voice intertwining through its widescreen outro. Highlights like “mess,” “never tell me,” or “whole thing” strike a perfect balance be- tween lush arrangements and intimate performances, while tracks like “why does my heart” or “can’t stop” add unvarnished, single take moments of spontaneity, or GarageBand demo looseness that perfectly compliment the unabashed longing in the songwriting.
Sadurn’s sophomore album The Underworld is a collection of heart-rendingly personal and instantly relatable songs, due out this fall on Run For Cover Records. Following years of lingering vocal issues for guitarist G DeGroot, the album is the culmination of an emotion- al and spiritual journey and a a deeply personal meditation on loss, healing, and transformation.
Sadurn began in 2017 as a solo project for G DeGroot, and from the start their approach to songwriting was informed more by emotional intuition than any kind of real ambitions to be heard. “I discovered songwriting as an outlet for processing my reality,” they explain. “A lot of times when something is hard to say, it flows more easily in songwriting. It’s a place where you can circle back to your own truth.” After moving to Philadelphia, DeGroot was joined by gui- tarist Jon Cox, drummer Amelia Swain, and bassist Tabitha Ahnert. The group recorded Radiator, a debut that immediately connected with listeners and was met with critical acclaim.
Throughout The Underworld, the rawness of DeGroot’s lyrics are matched by Cox, Ahnert, and Swain’s evocative playing. Stunning opener “the weight” describes the early stages of a relationship deteriorating, with brilliant soloing from Cox and DeGroot’s warm voice intertwining through its widescreen outro. Highlights like “mess,” “never tell me,” or “whole thing” strike a perfect balance be- tween lush arrangements and intimate performances, while tracks like “why does my heart” or “can’t stop” add unvarnished, single take moments of spontaneity, or GarageBand demo looseness that perfectly compliment the unabashed longing in the songwriting.
Sadurn’s sophomore album The Underworld is a collection of heart-rendingly personal and instantly relatable songs, due out this fall on Run For Cover Records. Following years of lingering vocal issues for guitarist G DeGroot, the album is the culmination of an emotion- al and spiritual journey and a a deeply personal meditation on loss, healing, and transformation.
Sadurn began in 2017 as a solo project for G DeGroot, and from the start their approach to songwriting was informed more by emotional intuition than any kind of real ambitions to be heard. “I discovered songwriting as an outlet for processing my reality,” they explain. “A lot of times when something is hard to say, it flows more easily in songwriting. It’s a place where you can circle back to your own truth.” After moving to Philadelphia, DeGroot was joined by gui- tarist Jon Cox, drummer Amelia Swain, and bassist Tabitha Ahnert. The group recorded Radiator, a debut that immediately connected with listeners and was met with critical acclaim.
Throughout The Underworld, the rawness of DeGroot’s lyrics are matched by Cox, Ahnert, and Swain’s evocative playing. Stunning opener “the weight” describes the early stages of a relationship deteriorating, with brilliant soloing from Cox and DeGroot’s warm voice intertwining through its widescreen outro. Highlights like “mess,” “never tell me,” or “whole thing” strike a perfect balance be- tween lush arrangements and intimate performances, while tracks like “why does my heart” or “can’t stop” add unvarnished, single take moments of spontaneity, or GarageBand demo looseness that perfectly compliment the unabashed longing in the songwriting.
Up In Her Room are delighted to announce their first release of 2025, and a return to the label from Oli Heffernan, aka Ivan the Tolerable!
10 new chunks of lo-fi instrumental library-hop - recorded in 2 days in Summer 2024, ‘Nocturnes’ is the first ITT album of 2025, and the first one made solo by Heffernan since ‘Wild Nature’ in 2019.
Known for his genre-defying and boundary-pushing approach to music, Heffernan – who has spent years experimenting with various styles, instruments and production techniques has crafted a collection of tracks that defy categorization. The new album is a sonic tapestry of atmospheric library music, dusty hip-hop beats, and the organic, unfiltered essence of field recordings, all neatly packaged up into a format that allows each element space to breathe.
‘Nocturnes’ weaves intricate layers of samples, loops, and live instrumentation, combining elements of hip-hop, dub, jazz, and electronic music, all while maintaining a sense of urban cinematic flair.
The album is released by Up In Her Room on limited edition black heavyweight vinyl
Across the past decade, KAS has established herself as a unique voice in experimental electronic music, a composer and synthesist whose work dissolves the boundaries between ambient electronica, contemporary classical, composition, and immersive sound design. Her new album “Ruin: It’s Not Just Music” arrives with a distinctive gravitational pull. The record moves with greater physical force, placing rhythm and impact at the centre of its architecture, revealing a more confrontational and embodied dimension of KAS’s musical language.
The first single “Ruin” arrives May 22nd, with the full album released October 2nd via SOMEONE SPECIAL the new label co-founded by KAS.
Where much of KAS’s earlier work explored harmonic environments, the forthcoming album is built around tension and release. Inspired by the sound of drum and bass, breakbeats fracture through dense fields of synthesis, percussive patterns and her signature melodic fragments – motions that feel closer to the kinetic language of club music than the meditative spaces often associated with her past catalogue. The result is a body of work that feels both recognisably hers and newly charged, music that moves through the body as insistently as it engages the mind.
For listeners who first encountered KAS through the glowing synthesis of “Ears” (2016) or the intricate experimental pop of “The Kid” (2017), this direction may feel initially surprising, yet the shift has been quietly unfolding across the past several years. KAS’s practice has steadily expanded beyond the expectations placed upon experimental electronic artists, moving between orchestral composition, audiovisual installations, film scoring, and large-scale commissions while retaining the unmistakable sonic signature that defines her work.
The 2022 albums “I Could Be Your Dog / I Could Be Your Moon” (2022) and “Let’s Turn It Into Sound” (2022) explored a deeply immersive approach to composition, expanded her reputation and instinct for constructing detailed sonic ecosystems while continuing to blur the lines between experimental electronics and contemporary pop structures. KAS’s most recent output has continued to widen that field including the rhythm oriented electronic album “Gush” (2025) and her return to more orchestral roots with “Thoughts on the Future” (2025). Together these releases underscored the breadth of her practice.
Her prolific collaborators and creative partners have ranged from Patti Smith and Suzanne Ciani to Danny Elfman, Tycho, Glass Beams, RY X, Caribou, Four Tet, Reggie Watts, and Max Richter, while her compositions have appeared in projects with Apple, Chanel, Meow Wolf, the BBC Orchestra, and major film and television productions.
On “Ruin: It’s Not Just Music”, that vocabulary becomes more kinetic than ever before. The record draws energy from jungle, drum and bass, and dance-floor focused electronic music while retaining the intricate synthesis and tonal curiosity that have defined KAS’s work from the beginning. The result is a record that feels equally at home within club culture, contemporary composition, and the experimental spaces that have long championed her artistry.
On May 27th KAS will present a major performance at London’s Barbican Centre alongside the London Contemporary Orchestra, marking the ten-year anniversary of her landmark album Ears. The evening will trace the arc of her creative evolution while also introducing material from the new album.
"Steve Watson's roots lie in Paramaribo, at that time the capital of the Dutch colony, where he won the 1975 Suriname Song Festival. This artist had a very strong connection with the music of his country, although unlike other artists - such as Max Nikman, for whom he acted as vocalist too - he performed his songs in English. Siegfried Boerleider, his real name, moved shortly thereafter to the Netherlands, where he also played in the groups The Backlot (with Laura Fygi and Rowan Moore) and Soul Conference. He released several singles on various labels, shaking off the "kaseko" music genre, which fused many different styles from Africa, Europe and the Americas, but considered rhythmically complex. He took time to move toward a simpler, yet well-structured, melodic genre in the recording studio, producing songs that were enjoyable to listen to on the radio and sensually danced to in the disco. With 1981's "Born To Boogie," we risk a seductive journey into the soul music of Suriname, which also possesses the fragrance of Dutch tulips. Then thanks to its charm, exploded in the Netherlands and subsequently in the world. Steve Watson - in addition to his personal style, rich in that simple and genuine expressiveness - also deserves recognition for his excellent songwriting, which led him to write for other Dutch artists, even though his two best songs are on this vinyl: "May Little One" and "Born to Boogie", ....the latter title has never been more fitting !!! Listen to it and go crazy !!!"
SECOND REISSUE ON THIS HEAT’s OWN NEW IMPRINT FOLLOWING ‘THIS HEAT’ (TH01LP) WHICH WAS UNCUT ‘REISSUE OF THE MONTH’ RECENTLY WITH 9/10 REVIEW + 4-PAGE FEATURE WITH Q+A.
*24 bit/96 kHz re-master from original analog tapes.
*Heavyweight 180gm vinyl and heavyweight sleeve with pantone printing to match original 1979 release.
Simon Reynolds on Health and Efficiency:
“For some fans, Health and Efficiency is This Heat’s peak achievement – their most concentrated blast of visceral intensity and wayward experimentalism….Lead track “Health & Efficiency” combines fierce angular rock that fully lives up to Cunningham’s belief that This Heat could become a postpunk King Crimson, with a multi-part babble of vocals, clattering percussive timbres, and found sounds.’’
Flipside “Graphic/Varispeed” is more subdued and hypnotic: a wavering tonescape whose duration depends on whether you play it at 45 rpm or 33 rpm. This reissue reproduces the original release’s striking cover image of a human figure painted in blue by Pete Cobb, along with the cryptic flipside of text in many different languages.
Although widely considered to be Post-Punk’s finest, This Heat actually began performing and recording their music in 1976, the early days of London’s punk era. Within their two albums and an EP they perfected a strange and volatile new strain of avant-garde rock that time has proved to be massively influential, a blueprint for much that would follow: post-rock, math rock, homemade musique concrète, experimental electronica. Numerous critics have recognised the band's influence on the music of Sonic Youth, Glenn Branca, Steven Wilson, Public Image Ltd., Radiohead, Swans, Shellac, Young Knives, Black Dice, Lightning Bolt and numerous other experimental and post-rock bands.
Disbanding in 1982 they have left an undeniable legacy that has only continued to grow in stature and relevance.Having recently passed the 50 year anniversary of their first gig, and the recording of material that appears on their debut album, the group’s surviving members Charles Bullen and Charles Hayward, true to their DIY roots, have set up an imprint to release their recordings for their growing fan base that is increasingly recognising their influential place in music history.
‘They went beyond punk before punk had properly started…the entire album is a controlled explosion of ideas. Nearly fifty years on, This Heat’s debut is something the world has still not completely caught up with.’ - Simon Reynolds
‘Over the years, there have been bands to play as aggressively, or even as strangely, but very few have been able to rise from their collective influences and histories to create music so singularly distinctive and inspiring.’ – Pitchfork 9/10
‘This Heat sounded like the future then ... and still do now.’ - Dan Snaith (Caribou)
‘This Heat had a certain kind of force the post-punk bands were unable to adequately control without falling foul of rawk excess, and which the punk bands—albeit blitzing and rowdy—were too basic in form to build.’ – John Calvert , The Quietus
Born in São Paulo, Caetano Malta embodies the vibrant creative energy of one of Latin America's most dynamic cities. A singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist, he has spent more than twenty years crafting a distinctive musical universe shaped by Brazil's rich and diverse traditions. Tropicalia, MPB, Afro-Brazilian rhythms, psychedelic folk, and contemporary pop blend seamlessly in his work with effortless elegance.
Over the years, he has become a highly sought-after collaborator. Since 2004, he has performed with numerous leading Brazilian artists, including Lucas Santtana, Bixiga 70, Karina Buhr, and many others. After two decades of international touring, he eventually settled in Paris, where he became the guitarist for Flavia Coelho, Luiza, Guts, among others. As a songwriter, he has also co-written with artists such as Lucas Santtana, Wado, MOMO, Rubinho Jacobina, and Arto Lindsay.
With Eterna Juventude, his long-awaited debut solo album, due for release in autumn 2026, Caetano Malta reaches a new artistic milestone. The record reveals a radiant songwriting style where harmonic sophistication, organic rhythms, and instantly memorable melodies come together naturally. Filled with joyful energy and deep tenderness, Eterna Juventude celebrates imagination, movement, and childhood's unique ability to reinvent the world. It is a remarkably accomplished debut, showcasing an artist whose singular voice and musical identity are already fully formed.
What an unbelievable record. From the wild cover to the iconic breakbeats, Roots from Ian Carr’s Nucleus is one of the dopest albums we know. This is seriously thick, funky-prog jazz-rock heaven. Originally released on Vertigo in 1973, other than a couple of versions at the time for other territories, Roots was never re-pressed since so it’s gone on to become another one of those impossible to find records.
Maybe it was a little too out there for the time, but it’s aged very, very well indeed and this Be With re-issue, re-mastered from the original analogue tapes, shows off just why this deserves to be back in press.
Genius trumpeter and visionary composer Ian Carr was one of the most respected British musicians of his era. He was a true pioneer and saw the potential in fusing the worlds of jazz with rock, just as Miles Davis and The Tony Williams Lifetime did in the US. In late 1969, following the demise of the Rendell-Carr quintet, and tiring of British jazz, Carr assembled the legendary Nucleus. Regarding music as a continuous process, Nucleus refused to “recognise rigid boundaries” and worked on delivering what they saw as a “total musical experience”. We can get behind that.
Under bandleader Carr, Nucleus existed as a fluid line-up of inventive, skilled musicians. This constant evolution and revolution was all part of the continuous musical exploration and discovery that took jazz to new levels.
Working together with producer Fritz Fryer and engineer Roger Wake, the seven compositions by Carr, Brian Smith and Dave MacRae that make up Roots flirt with perfection, and Nucleus at that time made up of the cream of 1970s UK jazz with Brian Smith on tenor saxophones and flutes, Dave MacRae on piano and electric piano, Jocelyn Pitchen on guitar, Roger Sutton on bass, both Clive Thacker and Aureo De Souza on drums and percussion, Joy Yates delivering the vocals and of course Carr on trumpet.
The spellbinding title track immediately renders the album indispensable. Riding the illest of loping breakbeats, “Roots” is low-slung, doped-out heist-funk. An absolute monster. If it sounds familiar then that’s likely down to it being sampled by Madlib for Lootpack and Quasimoto’s “Loop Digga”, as well as by a whole host of beat manipulators. “Roots” conjures prime instrumental hip-hop / beat music, only 20 years ahead of its time. Truly, these are the roots. Through sinuous bass, twinkling keys and a hypnotic guitar riff, a smoky brass motif weaves its way into a gloriously deep haze around Carr’s solos. “Roots” is over 9 minutes long, but there’s not a single wasted second, not surprising given that this is a condensed version of an originally 40 minute long commissioned composition.
The soothing vocal fusion delight of “Images” follows. Meticulously constructed, with gorgeous flute work from Brian Smith, with Joy Yates’ silky vocals and Dave MacRae’s Rhodes never sounding better. The cool, driving “Caliban” closes out the first side. Originally the third movement in a four part commission to celebrate Shakespeare’s birthday it stands up on its own, all robust rhythms and blended brass. Keyboard colour and Carr’s trumpet are splashed across the funk drums and basslines (and there’s even some bamboo flute). This really is fusion: the elements of jazz and rock coming together in beautifully synthesis.
Side two opens in riotous fashion with the short, thrilling samba of “Wapatiti”. Next up, “Capricorn” forms a smoothed-out, jazzy constellation. Mellow and dreamy, its twinkling percussion and languid horns slowly build the vibe before head-nod drums and a killer bassline enter the fray. With a distinct heaviness that Black Sabbath would’ve envied, “Odokamona” is a venomous slice of riff-soaked jazz metal (yes, you read that right), elevated by Carr’s wah-wah horns.
The album closes with MacRae’s exceptionally cosmic “Southern Roots and Celebration”. Very much in conversation with Weather Report, it opens as a languorous, spiritual jazz of chiming keys and serene guitar that turns slowly, gorgeously into a mid-paced, brass-laced banger. It’s another sure-fire party starter and the sound of the band having a righteous blast, building an ecstatic chaos that ends with Yates screaming.
And of course we need to talk about Keith Davis’ cover for Roots. Perhaps the coolest record cover of all time? Certainly one of the most bonkers. Just your run-of-the-mill high-gloss, acid-tinged airbrush dystopian/utopian living-room party scene. Consider this your chemical flashback trigger warning.
Front-and-centre the hip-to-death green robot holds court with their giant ball of yellow barbwire wool, hooked up to… something(?) being teased out from under the stairs (probably best not to ask). A thoroughly zoned-out, long-legged Pop Art party-goer lounges half-plugged in to the painting behind her as a pair of legs flail into shot from the the top of the stairs opposite. We won’t even begin to guess what the chap’s up to in the middle, but the view out of the windows is rather nice, and someone’s already got the hoover out ready to tidy up. All of the Nucleus sleeves are something special, but this particular one? Crikey.
This Be With edition of Roots has been re-mastered from the original Vertigo master tapes, Simon Francis’ mastering working together with Pete Norman’s cut to weave their usual magic with these wonderful recordings. The crazy cover has been restored at Be With HQ as the finishing touch to this long overdue re-issue.
There is a hush most of us only knew as children, the warm drift between familiar household sounds and being carried to bed, a place that belongs to you and to some self you have not met yet. June McDoom’s debut full-length, Follow the Light, lives in that dream space and then keeps walking, slipping out of time and waking somewhere new, barely familiar enough to feel like home yet wholly your own. She came up in a Jamaican household on the edge of the Florida Everglades, an existence built of extended family, communal care, bass and harmonics. Her father, a carpenter and a student of sound, built his own speakers and kept three sound systems going across as many rooms. His low end would rise through her bedroom floor like some wayward cat while she lay above it with folk records, finding harmonies that were new and hers alone. Two musics in one room. Lushness as past and premonition. She found folk on her own, somewhere between the cast recording of The Sound of Music and Simon and Garfunkel, while everyone around her called it sleepy music. She did not mind being the only one. The solitude let her fall for harmony first, before words, before anything else, and harmony is still the thing she reaches for. Generationally speaking, the music was already in the air. Her grandfather, Colin Smith, is a distinguished mento man who played banjo and guitar and built his own rumba boxes, worked to keep Jamaica’s oldest acoustic folk form alive. Mento is the root of all of it: ska, rock steady, reggae, dub and everything after. He is the one who put a guitar in her hands. An inheritance, a gift and a map. Even her name is part of it, though she will tell you she landed on it more by feel than reason. She records as June McDoom, born Alyssa, June being a nickname one of her grandmothers, Joan, went by, a name she thought was cool to carry and simply liked the sound of. An etheric channel that reverberates all the same. A dub all its own.
Made slowly and by hand with her longtime partner Evan Wright, Follow the Light lays the harmony of folk over the rhythm of dub, with Dionne Warwick, Minnie Riperton, Pentangle and the washed guitars of Cocteau Twins haunting its outer edges. Voice and guitar seeking each other out first, then everything else stacked across long days in the studio they keep at home, restraint kept on purpose. The lead single “Without You” is the whole method surfacing, split open and sparkling like a geode in a creek bed. Angelic heroics, and nothing less.
At the heart is family. Her grandmother Aggie, the light behind “Memory,” guiding still. And underneath, the quieter truth the record keeps: none of us are only one person, but a continuum of selves, the ones who shaped us and the ones we have yet to meet. Future you is an ancestor your current self gets to greet. Press play and the same invitation is yours: A few minutes out of time, a place that turns familiar the longer you stay until you surface somewhere new and find it was yours all along
Few records sit between genres as confidently as Schöneberg. Not quite techno, not quite trance, not quite house, and precisely because of that, instantly recognisable as something of its own. Originally released in 1993 as part of Marmion's Berlin E.P. on Superstition Records, the track became one of the defining anthems of early European club culture, championed by Tony De Vit at London's legendary Turnmills Trade events and played in the best clubs across the UK, Benelux and beyond.
Schöneberg grew directly out of the duo's DJ sets at the Bunker in Berlin-Mitte. Between techno and trance, Mijk van Dijk and Marcos López were looking for a common ground. The track was recorded in a single night, the result of that search. Its defining details were deliberate: the hi-hat arriving unusually late, the short disorienting break that became a trademark. As López puts it: "For me the piece is still a condensed version of an entire DJ set."
In 2023, Superstition marked the 30th anniversary with a 21-track remix collection spanning three decades of reinterpretations. Now the track returns to vinyl, focused and stripped back to three versions: the original 1993 mix, the in itself legendary Marmion Remix, and the interpretation by DJ T., appearing on vinyl for the first time.
Pressed on orange coloured vinyl, this 2026 reissue sees all three versions carefully remastered from the original sources and newly recut for vinyl, bringing renewed depth and clarity while preserving the character that made Schöneberg a classic.
There is a hush most of us only knew as children, the warm drift between familiar household sounds and being carried to bed, a place that belongs to you and to some self you have not met yet. June McDoom’s debut full-length, Follow the Light, lives in that dream space and then keeps walking, slipping out of time and waking somewhere new, barely familiar enough to feel like home yet wholly your own. She came up in a Jamaican household on the edge of the Florida Everglades, an existence built of extended family, communal care, bass and harmonics. Her father, a carpenter and a student of sound, built his own speakers and kept three sound systems going across as many rooms. His low end would rise through her bedroom floor like some wayward cat while she lay above it with folk records, finding harmonies that were new and hers alone. Two musics in one room. Lushness as past and premonition. She found folk on her own, somewhere between the cast recording of The Sound of Music and Simon and Garfunkel, while everyone around her called it sleepy music. She did not mind being the only one. The solitude let her fall for harmony first, before words, before anything else, and harmony is still the thing she reaches for. Generationally speaking, the music was already in the air. Her grandfather, Colin Smith, is a distinguished mento man who played banjo and guitar and built his own rumba boxes, worked to keep Jamaica’s oldest acoustic folk form alive. Mento is the root of all of it: ska, rock steady, reggae, dub and everything after. He is the one who put a guitar in her hands. An inheritance, a gift and a map. Even her name is part of it, though she will tell you she landed on it more by feel than reason. She records as June McDoom, born Alyssa, June being a nickname one of her grandmothers, Joan, went by, a name she thought was cool to carry and simply liked the sound of. An etheric channel that reverberates all the same. A dub all its own.
Made slowly and by hand with her longtime partner Evan Wright, Follow the Light lays the harmony of folk over the rhythm of dub, with Dionne Warwick, Minnie Riperton, Pentangle and the washed guitars of Cocteau Twins haunting its outer edges. Voice and guitar seeking each other out first, then everything else stacked across long days in the studio they keep at home, restraint kept on purpose. The lead single “Without You” is the whole method surfacing, split open and sparkling like a geode in a creek bed. Angelic heroics, and nothing less.
At the heart is family. Her grandmother Aggie, the light behind “Memory,” guiding still. And underneath, the quieter truth the record keeps: none of us are only one person, but a continuum of selves, the ones who shaped us and the ones we have yet to meet. Future you is an ancestor your current self gets to greet. Press play and the same invitation is yours: A few minutes out of time, a place that turns familiar the longer you stay until you surface somewhere new and find it was yours all along
After the acclaimed Bar Mediterraneo, Massimo Di Lena and Lucio Aquilina return with People Of The Moon, expanding their sound into a space of creative freedom. The “People of the Moon” are not fictional, but a dimension within us all: a deeply personal yet universal force, an alternative mindset that emerges when freed from social constraints.
Under moonlight, the album explores anxieties and aspirations through groove and rhythm, expressed in Neapolitan, Arabic, English, Spanish, and Portuguese. It moves fluidly from Afro-Cuban influences in “Celavì” to Anatolian textures in “Ma Tu Che Bbuò”, blending highlife guitars with Nu Genea’s signature mandolins-new rhythms filtered through an Italian lens.
The first single “Sciallà” (2025) introduced this direction: dance as catharsis, not escape. The title track reflects a quiet resilience-persistent rather than triumphant. “Onenon”, featuring Tom Misch, channels Mediterranean brit-funk, while “Acelera”, with María José Llergo, evokes a flamenco-tinged pursuit of the unattainable.
“Puleza” recalls Nuova Napoli with driving energy and vintage synths, while “Shway Shway”, sung by Celinatique, captures the album’s orbital flow-measured, rich, and rhythmically complex, echoing afrobeat explorations with Tony Allen.
Melody remains central, as in “Carè”. Across ten tracks, falling, flying, and dancing merge in a suspended groove. Gabriel Prado’s “Ondas Do Mar” embodies this pull: a cyclical motion, like the tides—irresistible, transformative, and alive within us.
Once upoun a time Fat Mike came up with the idea of calling up 101 of the best old and new punk rock band around, have them each record a 30-second long song, then put all the tracks out on one record to make the best punk compilation ever. And guess what, the dream came true. The 101 most famous punk rock bands around doing each a 30 seconds long song Back in print for the first time in ten years! Pressed to Lime Vinyl Features super rare songs (recorded exclusively for this compilation) by Green Day, The Offspring, Blink- 182, Pennywise, Rancid, Less Than Jake, The Vandals, Bad Religion, and more
Palace Limited presents it’s inaugural release from the early UK tech-house duo, Lo-Kee aka Julian Phethean (aka Mr Cenz) & Rafael de Swarte. The record features long awaited represses of three highly sought-after Lo-Kee records from 1998 - 2003 compiled onto a single 12”.
The record features A1 from Organised Sound 005 titled ‘Second Sight’, A1 ‘Human Affects’ and B1 ‘Earth Humm’ from Organised Sound 003 and the B2 from Affected Music 002. Seminal early UK fusion of house and techno with a minimalist approach which laid the foundations for much that followed.
Written and produced by Julian Phethean & Rafael de Swarte.
Superfan is the songwriting veil of Kali Priya Flanagan, the Brooklyn-based multi-instrumentalist and producer. While initially imagined as a solo act, ambitious string arrangements crafted in collaboration with cellist Omeed Almassi have come to define Superfan’s noisy and magnetic pop soundscape.
Today, Superfan announces their forthcoming album ‘My Piledriver Heart’ (MPDH), out October 16 via new label home AD 93 (Joanne Robertson, Dagmar Zuniga, YHWH Nailgun). Along with the announcement, Superfan presents his new single “In the Gold Room” paired with the live version filmed by Garrett Winston inside Agger Fish Building in the Brooklyn Navy Yard.
MPDH marks the first release outside of the record deal Flanagan signed at age 14. The album finds Flanagan embracing a more expansive, experimental vision of indie rock - melding deeply tuned acoustic guitar, cello, and Eastern musical influences into what he calls his “Acousticello” sound. Recorded largely live with cellist Omeed Almassi and producer Hudson Pollock, the record explores heartbreak, independence, and hopeful melancholia. Kali says “This time around it was about being (myself) versus becoming myself. This album was made to acknowledge the ebbs and flows in chugging along with life and love, from a place of comfort within the self that opens you up to the beauty in everyday life.” He does so through intimate performances that blur the line between folk, chamber music, pop-rock ballads, and alternative rock. Last year, he released the singles “Apeiron (Fantasy Football)” and “Miss W Jones” and earlier this year he released “Picture of Return.”
Following his acclaimed debut Tow Truck Jesus, Flanagan opened for The Strokes at Red Rocks, and has quietly become a fixture of New York’s DIY scene, performing alongside artists like Horsegirl, Knifeplay, and Quiet Light, while also playing support shows with King Woman and Victoryland this summer. He is also in the rising emo band Holidays in United States.
Before Superfan, Flanagan found success during the pandemic under his first moniker, “KALI.” His initial releases garnered millions of streams and led to collaborations with seasoned high-profile producers and industry teams. Despite his budding career as an indie-pop star, Flanagan was dissatisfied with the conditions of his artistic output and community as he reached adulthood. His coming-of-age years in Los Angeles were marked by an ever-present new-wave pop music oblivion: “hits” made in 5-hour sessions with strangers, a social life suffocated by others’ aspirations for fame, and an absent audience for live music that pushed past the prescriptions of recorded music. On MPDH, Kali says “I can’t help my urge to write these pop-rock ballads, but we really wanted to push the boundary of genre and expressing the sentiments of the songs through experimentation.”
The Rio-based project Pra Gira Girar presents a new interpretation of the song Atabaque Chora, originally made famous by the trio Os Tincoãs. Written by Dadinho and Mateus Aleluia, the piece opens the group’s iconic 1977 album Os Tincoãs —and has now been chosen to mark the beginning of Pra Gira Girar’s own recording journey.
Formed by Alvaro Lancellotti, Michele Leal, and Alan de Deus on vocals, Pedro Costa on guitar, Kassin on bass, Zé Manoel on piano and vocals, Zero Telles (in memoriam) and Anna Magalhães on percussion, and Diogo Gomes on trumpet, the project was born from Alvaro Lancellotti’s long-standing admiration for the work of Os Tincoãs and his wish to create a live show celebrating the legendary trio.
For a year, Alvaro, Michele, Alan, and Pedro made up the core of the group, meeting weekly for rehearsals that became a deep dive into Os Tincoãs’ intricate vocal arrangements. These sessions were essential to recreating the grandeur and complexity of the Bahian trio’s music. Pedro Costa transcribed the vocal lines and, together with Michele Leal — a singer-songwriter with a background in choral singing — adapted the arrangements for a formation that, unlike Os Tincoãs, features a female voice.
Picking the best songs out of Focus’s legacy is no easy task: they have released so many top quality progressive songs it’s deemed almost impossible. However, Hocus Pocus (Best of Focus) manages to compile two records filled to the brim with the best that Focus has to offer.
The obvious tracks such as “Sylvia” and “Hocus Pocus” are included in the track list alongside “House Of The King”, “Harem Scarem” and “Anonymus”. A must for anyone wishing to recap on lost memories or as an introduction to the merits of Focus!
Hocus Pocus (Best of Focus) is available as a numbered limited edition of 1000 copies on red and white swirled vinyl
Community Function’s debut release presents four raw, floor-focused cuts from Detroit’s Hood: three originals spanning high-energy breakbeats and atmospheric techno-house and a low-slung, chest-rattling remix from France’s Cruise Control.
Rooted in traditional Middle Eastern music with a percussive background, Hood channels a rhythm-centric mindset through machines to deliver fat grooves, funky basslines and drums that don’t quit.
ANEMOIA opens as a lean, late-night warehouse tool locking a sultry breakbeat over a driving 4/4 pulse, bridging raw machine funk and classic electro with a cheeky vocal sample, a dominant low-slung bassline, and constantly shifting top-end percussion for unvarnished, high-energy club material. XATION shifts into heavy, driving yet atmospheric territory that blurs the line between Detroit Techno and '90s Tech House, held together inside a deeply textured sonic environment that moves between rhythm-centric and melodic structures before a massive breakdown of lush pads and warm strings lifts the floor and grounds it back in groove. PLAYTEST tracks out live with the foundational 707 and SH-101 combo, relying on a single chord, a dystopian vocal sample, and raw, on-the-fly programming to deliver a relentless, hypnotic chugger for the purists. XATION (Cruise Control Remix) closes out with a low, heavy bassline that hits the chest first, dragging bodies into its sway and taking its time to build tension before releasing it.
Major figure in electronic music and pioneer of cosmic disco, Space was founded in 1977 by Didier Marouani.
"Magic Fly", its first single, embodies its futuristic DNA (a melodious, cosmic and disco-inspired composition). Following its worldwide success, 3 albums were released in 2 years :
- "Magic Fly" (1977), blending melodic richness with synthetic innovation, delivered both dancefloor hits and midtempo tracks.
- "Deliverance" (1977) is a typical 70s concept album, ranging from disco to cosmic electronic music.
- "Just Blue" (1978) is a more melancholic album featuring broader orchestrations and complex harmonies.
These 3 records sold over 10 million copies worldwide.
"The Art Of Space Disco (1977-1978)" presents Space's most iconic tracks and sums up two fruitful intense years of musical innovation.
- The Vinyl comes in as 1LP Crystal Clear. It includes 4 edits : Carry On Turn Me On, My Love Is Music, Deliverance & Running In The City.
- The Double CD features original versions . It includes 2 additional tracks (Symphony, Velvet Rape) and 8 remixes (never released physically before) produced in 2026 by artists whose musical careers were shaped by Space.
- CD & Vinyl Exclusive liner notes by Jean-Yves Leloup.
- All tracks have been remastered by Alex Gopher
It's hard to explain an album when one listen is enough. All the more so with MaMaMa: there's no room to stay passive. Listening to his new album, EST, means immersing yourself in an atmosphere that's softly psychedelic, comforting and organic all at once. A dreamy, electronic pop that proves this Strasbourg-at-heart, Paris-by-adoption musician, arranger, singer, songwriter and producer never stops reinventing himself. After changing his name — formerly Petit Prince — and delivering two critically acclaimed albums ("MaMaMa-gnificent." / "Hooks you carry in your head for a long time" / "sumptuous arrangements"), Elliott Diener now offers an even more sincere record. Real songs in French, after two albums where production sometimes took up all the space: "when you make heavily produced music, once you strip away the layers of sound, there's no fruit left underneath. On EST, I don't need makeup for the songs to work," he admits.
That's what this new album is about: the song and the French language first, then the pleasure of sound. An album less concerned with talking about its own making, more inhabited, more embodied, within a contemporary folklore. With this new album, don't expect to be bored: EST is his best record yet.
No pretense
Entirely conceived in his studio in Pantin — a room of his own, at last — imagined as a space free of any daydream, open to every sonic landscape, MaMaMa offers a record that's both hazy and downy soft. Often composed very early in the morning, it has become nostalgic without being dark, melancholic without being sad, with a few lineages showing through: Flavien Berger, Moodoïd, Feu! Chatterton for the taste for words and unease, Mount Kimbie for the approach to sound and rhythm. Unsurprising, given that EST was finalized with the British duo's producer. Live, MaMaMa is preparing a show in the style of Nicolas Jaar or UTO. Hypnotic and immersive.
The most liberating thing is that EST is an album without pretense. With it, we move through perseverance (in Aussi loin qu'il tiendra debout), the small arrangements we make to avoid facing reality (Tout sauf la vérité), and the fragility of bonds we thought were solid (Si bien ensemble). We also touch on lasting conflicts with the people we love (Anywhere You Are, There You Are), misunderstanding (Elle me parle une langue), and the erosion of friendships (S'envoler). EST draws an intimate and redemptive map of human relationships, in a body of work that's both lucid and sensitive — like when he also addresses social masks such as filial love (in Beau garçon, dedicated to his son) or relationships that have become impossible.
"It's really the album that sounds most like me, in terms of sonic landscape," Elliott points out. A record that rises above the noise of an imperfect, shifting world — like us — joyful in its words, liberating in its production. A true gem.
Across four tracks of lean and potent workouts with his unmistakable sonic signature, Peverelist returns to Livity Sound with his first release of 2026. After three years shaping out the Pulse series, Pace The Wrecks EP finds Pev shifting focus in subtle ways while upholding his focus on impactful, sprightly club modernism.
It's clear there are fresh inputs into the Peverelist sound from the very first note of 'Wreck I', which opens on an ominous lower-register piano note leading into a brooding house-tempo cut laced with sci-fi synth licks. On 'Wreck II' the dial shifts towards a more rapid-fire, electro-informed rush before swerving towards the bass-heavy, bleep-loaded jack of 'Wreck III'. 'Wreck IV' closes the EP out on a more sparsely arranged broken beat tip primed for lighter moments in the mix.
True to Pev's singular sound while maintaining the consistently fresh, uplifting energy of his recent output, Pace The Wrecks opens up the next phase in his studio work with assured poise and a sustained commitment to keep pushing forwards.
Dja Dja is Marina Herlop"s most ambitious work yet, blending emotional intensity, self-affirmation, and cathartic release into a deeply personal musical journey. Conceived as a single interconnected piece, the album follows an intricate structure inspired by the Hero"s Journey while remaining open to individual interpretation. Combining avant-garde experimentation, classical composition, orchestral brass, and Balinese gamelan, it expands Herlop"s sonic palette in bold new directions. Entirely self-released and largely handcrafted, Dja Dja reflects Herlop"s commitment to artistic autonomy and music as a self-sufficient form of storytelling.
Metal is the debut EP from elisanyhm, an electronic and experimental musician who is based in Berlin.
The tracks that constitute Metal draw on a variety of materials and methods, yet they are commonly marked by an attempt to compose music in connection with a logic of refusal. This results in pieces that are both singular and capable of being set together.
A central tendency of the pieces on Metal is to stretch out time. This tendency could also be understood as: sounding time itself, without the rush of determination.
What might initially seem static can also, eventually, and ultimately be encountered as moving through dense layers. The deconstruction of direction leaves one affected by an indeterminate multiplicity of rhythms, voices, field recordings, and electronic sounds that are more than what one is supposed to construct.
Renowned London producer, DJ, and Apron Records founder Steven Julien taps into his alter-ego with his new album, 808 PRINCE out 16th October.
Written and produced around iconic drum machines, 808 Prince embraces raw drum programming,
analogue textures, and bass-heavy compositions.The record moves fluidly between peak-time club energy and experimental rhythm studies, exploring the shared languages of techno, house, acid house, grime, and electro. Rather than looking back, the album reimagines the influence of the 808 through Julien’s distinct production style, creating a body of work that is both timeless and forward-looking.
The album features a strong lineup of collaborators, including James Massiah, J. Caesar, Jarren, Touch Sensitive, and KIAH, expanding Julien’s sonic universe while remaining anchored in pure groove and movement. More than an album, 808 PRINCE marks a new chapter in Steven Julien’s artistic practice, bringing together decades of club music influence, hands-on studio craftsmanship, and a lifelong fascination with rhythm into a singular statement designed for dance floors worldwide.
Seven years after 2019’s ‘The Dusk Loom’, Petrels returns with a pair of new albums, Infangthief and Outfangthief. The first of these releases, Infangthief, was originally written and recorded in 2022, before being reworked in light of a subsequent album, Outfangthief, due to be released later this year.
The two albums act as companion pieces, mirrors revealing facets of the other, overlapping in sound and subject matter. Though Outfangthief may have been written after Infangthief, it is no mere follow-up, with it's own creation causing a re-visiting and re-working of the earlier album, which in turn informed the writing of its twin.
Taking their titles from Old English legal terms ("thief seized without" and "thief seized within”), the central thread running through both albums is the illusion of assumed human authority - that which is given and that which is taken by force. With Western society seemingly hellbent on willingly embracing a brutally destructive economic model (even in its death throes), these albums attempt - in their own small way - to undertake the essential task of imagining alternative ways of being.
Petrels is the solo project of musician and artist, Oliver Barrett. Since releasing his debut, Haeligewielle, in 2011 (#9 in A Closer Listen's Best Albums of the Decade), Petrels has toured across Europe and shared a stage with the likes of Jóhann Jóhannsson, Tim Hecker, FIRE!, Nate Young (Wolf Eyes), Trouble Books, Demdike Stare, Nadja, and Hans-Joachim Roedelius (Cluster). Working from his home in Somerset, UK, Barrett has released numerous albums through his Floating Limb imprint, as well as mixing and/or mastering hundreds of releases for the likes of Keiji Haino, Loren Connors & Alan Licht, Judith Hamann, Incapacitants, Mette Rasmussen & Sofia Jernberg, Yasunao Tone and more
“Petrels sidesteps the chilliness found in much of the music of his peers, replacing it instead with an almost spiritual ecstasy, his ravishing synths and almost choral vocal treatments calling out in cosmic, wide eyed wonder at the universe.” – Paul Margree, Louder Than War
Trumpeter, rapper and sonic wanderer Pan Amsterdam has carved out one of the most distinctive voices operating at the intersection of jazz and hip-hop today.
Pan Amsterdam is a musical enigma wrapped in an enduring riddle. His creator is a jazz musician from Houston who’s found fame working with Detroit punk rock God, Iggy Pop, and British indie royalty, Metronomy, and now makes shapeshifting, adventurous hip hop out of the music’s spiritual home, New York.
He’s an irreverent character born out of frustration and named after a misunderstanding, yet one who’s on the verge of releasing his fifth album of truth-slaying, genre-crossing rhymes and beats. The result is a catalogue that feels both deeply rooted in Black American musical tradition and completely untethered by convention.
Pan Amsterdam returns with ‘Panarama’, his fourth full length album and a bold reassertion of his hip hop identity, released via Def Pressé. Created by Houston-born, New York-based musician and composer Leron Thomas, the record finds Pan Amsterdam embracing the harder edges of his sound while continuing to blur the lines between jazz improvisation, abstract rap, punk attitude, and experimental production
Written as a response to contemporary life and the endless cycle of information, conflict and distraction that defines modern culture, ‘Panarama’ unfolds as a stream of consciousness journey through hyper-normalised realities. Across sixteen tracks, Thomas navigates social commentary, personal reflection, absurdist humour, and cultural critique, delivering his observations with the same spontaneity and freedom that have become central to the Pan Amsterdam project
Lead single ‘Szechuan Beef’, produced by acclaimed collaborator 1FS, serves as one of the album’s defining statements. Built around Thomas’ signature free-flowing delivery, the track explores the overwhelming nature of contemporary life, where domestic conflict, social division, entertainment scandals and political discourse become flattened into a constant stream of content.
In Thomas’ own words: “My stream of consciousness style comes quite naturally to me due to the conditioning of scroll down culture where everything, no matter how minor or extreme, is hyper normalised.”
Elsewhere, the track ‘Vanilla Ice’ was written in response to widely publicised ICE killings and the speed at which tragedy is absorbed and forgotten within online culture. Thomas channels the anxiety and emotional disorientation of endlessly consuming information, allowing his thoughts to unfold in real time as social commentary collides with everyday digital noise. The result is both deeply personal and sharply observational, reflecting the fragmented reality of modern life. Other album highlights include the cinematic, Interpol-esque opener - ‘Old Friend’ complete with shimmering guitar lines and an far-reaching introspective, no-filter vocal as Thomas teams up with Nick Zinner (Yeah Yeah Yeahs) and Brad Truax (Interpol) across multiple tracks, often the production traverses left-field indie territory, but always maintaining Pan Amsterdam’s unique musical identity throughout. For the hip hop purists and beats lovers there are plenty of riches to discover from the clever nostalgic sample flips of ‘Cutlery’, the sleepy lofi of ‘Shuriken’ and the wonky LA beat scene / early Flying Lotus era beats of ‘Drunken Noodles’ - all boasting quick witted lyricism. ‘Deep Fried Shiney Things’ explores early electro and industrial sonics while album finisher is an upbeat new wave / indie band cut which sees Thomas take a break from rapping, but of course never letting up on the sharp observations nonetheless
While his previous record explored more alternative territory, ‘Panarama’ marks a deliberate return to rap, as Pan Amsterdam explains:
“I just wanted to do a rap album again.I enjoyed making my last album, but I felt like rapping again. I like to have the freedom to move in between musical worlds that suit the current state I’m in. Frequency accommodating frequency.”
This philosophy runs throughout the album. Tracks move effortlessly between jazz-inflected arrangements, experimental beats, punk energy and underground hip hop aesthetics, allowing ideas to evolve organically rather than conforming to traditional structures. Thomas describes himself as an improviser first and foremost: “I think like an improvisor. That’s how my albums pretty much move. It’s improvisation.”
Featuring additional contributions from Spice Programmers, AnOtter and Mr. Shn, ‘Panarama’ presents a wide-ranging cast of collaborators while remaining firmly rooted in Thomas’ singular creative vision. The record embraces contradiction, humour and unpredictability, capturing fleeting thoughts and observations with the same freedom and spontaneity that define jazz improvisation itself.
A musical enigma wrapped in an enduring riddle, Pan Amsterdam has built a reputation as one of contemporary music’s true outsiders. The project emerged from frustration, experimentation and artistic freedom, with Thomas drawing equally from his background as a jazz musician and his collaborations with artists including Iggy Pop and Metronomy. Operating from New York while carrying the spirit of Houston’s musical heritage, Pan Amsterdam has developed a distinctive voice that sits comfortably between avant-garde jazz, underground hip hop and experimental music.
Reuniting with Def Pressé for ‘Panarama’, Thomas explores what he describes as the more hardcore side of his artistic identity:
“They let me do anything and everything I wanna do so long as it’s on audio, and I need that freedom. What may verbally be perceived as vulgar to one group of people may be very thoughtful and a poignant description of the times that we’re presently in, so I’m glad that I’m part of a label home that understands that.”
"Things are looking better than ever for GENERATION STEEL! The quintet from Wetzlar/Germany, has reinvented itself on all fronts and is set to take the music world by storm with its upcoming third studio album, Steelmachine.
With the addition of guitar wizard and songwriter Thilo Herrmann - who made his debut in 1985 on the FAITHFUL BREATH classic “Skol” and has written heavy metal history throughout his career with RISK (including “Ratman”), RUNNING WILD (including “Black Hand Inn”, “Masquerade”), and GRAVE DIGGER (including “Ballads of a Hangman”) - bandleader and guitarist Jack the Riffer now has a living legend by his side.
There has also been a change behind the mic: from now on, Swedish vocalist Mike Stark - who currently sings for the Argentinian band FEANOR and the Swedish group STORMBURNER - is setting the tone. His powerful, high-pitched yet dynamic voice gives the new tracks an absolute seal of quality.
GENERATION STEEL stands for authentic, traditional, '80s-influenced heavy metal, combining the styles of ACCEPT and JUDAS PRIEST.
The ten neck-breaking tracks on the band's third full-length album were produced by Piet Sielck (IRON SAVIOR), who has previously refined classics by GAMMA RAY, GRAVE DIGGER, HEADHUNTER, STORMWARRIOR and BLIND GUARDIAN.
The cover artwork, designed by Gyula Havancsak (who has also created artworks for POWERWOLF, ACCEPT and BLIND GUARDIAN, among others), is equally eye-catching.
Anyone who loves honest, traditional German metal will quickly embrace “Steelmachine”, because the quintet not only takes us back to the '80s, but also shows just how timeless true metal is. Ten home runs, including the four singles “Steelmachine”, “Witches Cross”, “Wings of Fire” and “Fields of Pain”.
Stay Metal – Stay Steel!"
Produced by François Tétaz and Luke Howard and recorded primarily at Melbourne's Synth Temple, Tina Arena's Way Of The World reimagines “True Faith” (New Order), “Way of the World” (Max Q / Michael Hutchence), “Enjoy the Silence” (Depeche Mode), “Ordinary World” (Duran Duran), “Torno Bambina” (Ada Mori) and “Cayendo” (Frank Ocean) through stunning orchestral arrangements, prepared piano, analogue synthesis and electronic textures.
Rather than traditional cover versions, these are complete artistic reimaginings that reaffirm Tina Arena as one of Australia's most expressive and enduring vocalists. Of first single “True Faith”, Tina says: “Making the deliberate choice to focus on the lyric of true faith was musically revelatory for me. It presented a blank musical canvas with endless vulnerability and space for me to explore.”
François Tétaz, a Grammy and ARIA-winning producer known for his work with Gotye, Kimbra and Architecture in Helsinki, contributes synthesisers, Rhodes, prepared piano and drum machines throughout, while pianist and composer Luke Howard shapes the EP's restrained, cinematic language. The pair are joined by an ensemble including the Budapest Art Orchestra, Peter Knight, James Rushford, Mindy Meng Wang and orchestrator Felix Watson, giving the collection its rich, orchestral backbone.
The EP announcement lands amid a landmark 50-year career anniversary for Tina — one of Australia's highest-selling artists of all time, having sold more than 10 million albums worldwide.
The threeway combo you never knew you needed. Sam Binga, Machinedrum and Cesco built the raw bones of these tunes across a single morning in LA, overlooking MacArthur Park, in an intense session that saw them throwing live Bingerian vocals, raw Brazilian shrimp-sellers and tweaked-out Acid lines into the melting pot.
Further sessions between Highland Park and Stokes Croft saw these bare bones jams get fleshed out into the four genre-bending tracks that make up the Niche Flex EP, all of which have been tested out in clubs and festivals across the world, and which land this September via Binga's Pineapple Records imprint, on both vinyl and digital formats.
While obviously handy in the studio, Team MACESGA (as nobody calls them) also can operate a DJ booth to a reasonably high standard, as witnessed at the raucous Pineapple Takeover at the Beatport HQ in LA, and are available to showcase their Transatlantic Threesome at a Quality Music Venue or Devious Fetish Spot near you.
Citric Dub EP is a collaborative release from Law and RUNDR, released via R-WHITES, Repertoire's jungle-focused sister label for releases from the core Repertoire crew.
Following the first five R-WHITES compilation volumes, Citric Dub EP marks the imprint's first dedicated artist EP, exploring the intersection of jungle, dub techno and ambient music.
Deep sub bass, tape-inspired textures and hypnotic, progressive arrangements combine with classic breakbeats to create a sound that is both immersive and firmly rooted in the foundations of jungle.
Music on heavy rotation while making the record included... Basic Channel, Deepchord, Terekke, Biosphere, Wax Doctor, Aphex Twin, Burial, Nala Sinephro, Scientist and Jah Shaka.
Injury Reserve was originally a trio, consisting of rappers Ritchie With a T and Stepa J. Groggs and producer Parker Corey. Their mixtapes Live From The Dentist (released in 2015) and Floss (2016) earned them underground buzz, and they capitalized on the attention with their debut album in 2019, the eponymous Injury Reserve.
The group's momentum was put on hold when in June of 2020 Groggs tragically passed away. By the Time I Get to Phoenix was largely completed ahead of Groggs' passing with his contributions, and will be the first Injury Reserve music to be released since their eponymous debut album. Ritchie and Corey took the past year to complete the record, and the title has meaning past simply referencing Injury Reserve's hometown. It's an homage to a song that has been covered countless times, which is in line with Injury Reserve's ethos and approach when it comes to creating music. The group pulls from several styles and eras of hip hop, but runs each one through the Injury Reserve lens, putting their own distinct and cohesive sound across their references. Nowhere is that dynamic more present than on By the Time I Get to Phoenix.
Featuring Defected's very first UK No.1 chart single; the Ibiza classic 'Another Chance' from Roger Sanchez, Dennis Ferrer's anthemic mix of Fish Go Deep's 'The Cure & The Cause', Blaze & Barbara Tucker's huge 'Most Precious Love' and Kings of Tomorrow's 'Fall For You'. Those vocal hits sit perfectly alongside underground cuts from Maya Jane Coles who takes on MK's '4 You', Osunlade's 'Envision', Mr V's NYC classic 'Jus Dance' and the Karizma & DJ Spen's '4 The Love'. For the first time in its 27- year history , Defected compiles its greatest hits, underground anthems and bonafide house music classics into a 5 volume triple vinyl collectors series.
After two highly praised singles on consecutive Razor-N-Tape Family Affair compilations, Dennis Liber brings his signature tropical disco sound to the Astro Danza EP, his first solo outing on the label. Inspired by years living in and creating community in the Caribbean, the EP brings together an international crew of musical cohorts to take listeners on a journey through different shades of paradise. From the hypnotic night time energy of the title track, to the tropical joy of Être Heureux (with a standout remix from French producer Anoraak), and the dreamy celebration of feminine freedom in Femme Papillon, the Astro Danza EP is the cosmic and sensual sound of endless summer!
Orbe Records presents its most ambitious release to date: a special edition vinyl signed by its founder and main catalyst, Orbe. Comprising 4 meticulously crafted tracks, this record stands as the Andalusian artist's most mature work since his beginnings in the electronic music scene.
Far from looking back, this EP is a definitive statement of intent—a sonic manifesto that clearly outlines the artistic direction and evolution towards which Orbe is driving his sound. The record is a total immersion into hypnotic, deep techno, engineered for both physical trance on the dancefloor and mental introspection.
Through cyclical sequences, organic textures, and flawless rhythmic architecture, every cut on this vinyl shuns passing trends to reclaim a techno with a truly timeless vocation. An essential collector's item capturing an artist at the absolute peak of his creative maturity.
Richly progressive folk-informed heavy post-rock and a sick burn to boot. - The Obelisk Rebecca Vernon (SubRosa), the driving creative force behind THE KEENING returns with her second album, Devotion. The new album sees Vernon and company releasing one of the year's most evocative albums; a truly compelling mix of slow burning, ethereal post-rock, folk, goth, and soaring doom. For Vernon, the writing process for Devotion took place in two starkly different environments. It ranged from the contemplative solitude of a friend’s cabin in a deserted Idaho ski resort, to the hectic reality of a 55+ senior living community in Spokane, Washington, where she was staying with her father. This shift resulted in an explosive album with a subtle duality that resonates throughout its most poignant moments. Take the lead single, "A Little Bit of Blood," for example. Quiet, acoustic guitar strums give way for Vernon's haunting vocals, before the backing instrumentation explodes into a soaring chorus reminding the listener that sometimes the best paths taken are the most difficult. "You drew a little bit of blood to show me Just a little bit of blood to make me see It took a little bit of blood to wake me Just a little wound in the night to free me" In a 2024 interview with Decibel Magazine, Vernon discussed the drastic shift in heavy music's themes in recent years, highlighting a willingness to convey raw emotion: "Metal is beginning to share more vulnerable things, more confessional things. Metal has almost become a safe place to talk about those things. People are being open with their struggles. Twenty years ago, they wouldn't have." Devotion lays these emotional confessions bare and showcases a truly bright burn. Devotion was recorded in April 2022, again at Hallowed Halls in Portland, with Billy Anderson and Nathan Carson featured in their same roles as heard on Little Bird. Once again, Vernon showcases her writing prowess, having a heavy hand on all the instrumentation for Devotion; Vernon played drums, guitar, piano, organ, and hammered dulcimer, and provided most of the vocals on both albums, with a few guest vocalists added to the mix.
John Diva & The Rockets of Love make a triumphant return with their explosive new album “Your Favorite Drug”, set for release via Frontiers Records. Bursting with attitude, swagger, and unapologetic energy, the band delivers a full-throttle hard rock experience that feels both timeless and electrifyingly fresh. Packed with massive hooks, soaring choruses, and razor-sharp riffs, “Your Favorite Drug” showcases the band at the peak of their songwriting power. Standout tracks like “Bigger Than America” and “The Devil’s Got My Back” emerge as true anthems, destined to ignite stages and thrill every hard rock fan with their infectious energy and sing-along choruses. Produced by Hannes Braun, the album captures a polished yet gritty sound that perfectly amplifies the band’s larger-than-life personality. This is more than a comeback — it’s a statement. John Diva & The Rockets of Love are back, louder, bolder, and more addictive than ever. One of the best hard rock releases of the year!
Since starting Bytes in 2019 we’ve fielded a lot of messages along the lines of, “Is this ever going to be released on vinyl?” The bulk of these requests have concerned remixes of artists on Bytes done by Andy Bell (RIDE/Oasis) under his electronic alter-ego GLOK. And on realising that he has done four for us now (Franz Kirmann, Steve Queralt & Michael Smith, Herrmann Kristoffersen and Seagoth), it seemed silly not to compile them all together on a four-track 12” EP. The super limited edition 12” is on black wax and comes in the original Bytes house bag with a vinyl sticker containing all the release info signed by Andy. Edition of 250. No repress.
A1. SOLITARY (GLOK REMIX) - FRANZ KIRMANN
The first remix Andy ever did for Bytes was a radical reworking of ‘Solitary’, the towering ambient closer to Franz Kirmann’s ‘Madrapour’ album, which was released on Bytes in 2019. Andy’s remix is a heartbreaking, melancholic 3am banger. This is one for fans of Four Tet and Jon Hopkins, a slowburner with billowing plumes of distortion that builds towards an ecstatic rush of a finale.
A2. CHALDEAN ORACLE (GLOK REMIX) - STEVE QUERALT & MICHAEL SMITH
In 2023 Andy took ‘Chaldean Oracle’, a track from the collaboration between his RIDE bandmate Steve Queralt and the writer Michael Smith, down the K-Hole, eschewing Michael’s vocal almost entirely and turning in a Detroit dub-techno monster with echoes of Bandulu and Carl Craig in its shimmering melodies, eerie distortion and pounding drums.
‘Gone Gold’ was the title track of the excellent second album by ambient-techno group Herrmann Kristoffersen (2021). Andy taps deep into the dub at the heart of the original, with echoes of John Carpenter's soundtracks and his own extended electronic excursions under the GLOK moniker.
B2. ETERNITY (GLOK REMIX) - SEAGOTH
It was Andy who brought Seagoth to the attention of Bytes when he played ‘Eternity’ on his Soho Radio show in 2020. It all came full circle when Bytes released ‘Eternity’ as a single in 2021, with a stunning remix by Andy in his GLOK guise on the flip. Andy strips the track back to showcase the resonant vocal in all its glory before the blissed-out outro that makes full use of the track’s dancefloor-friendly drum break.
Colombian accordionist and composer Aníbal Velásquez began his recording career in the early 1960s. It was precisely during this early stage of his discography that he recorded the irresistible "Mambo loco," a much rawer, more hypnotic, and more percussive version than the one he would release years later on Discos Fuentes. Vampisoul completes this single with the version that Peruvian group Los Continentales, fronted by superb guitarist Pancho Acosta, recorded of "Tiro al blanco," one of the most iconic songs by Colombian group Afrosound.
Two dancefloor bombs, recorded in Peru in the mid-'70s by bandleader, producer, and keyboardist Otto de Rojas. It's no coincidence that "Choca las caderas" was originally released as a single backed with "Al ritmo del Bump-Bump," a clear tribute to the classic "Soulful Strut," making the artist's affinity for the soul and funk sounds coming out of the States unmistakable. "Choca las caderas" is made for dancing and partying hard, with irresistible horn arrangements and an incredibly groovy rhythm section. "El tema de Coco" is another superb instrumental recorded by Otto de Rojas, who plays the electric pianos and Moog on this track.
These two tracks are now reissued together on a 45 for the first time.
Folksongs and Ballads by Tia Blake & Her Folk-Group, is more than just a “lost classic”. As clear and honest as can be, Folksongs and Ballads is a magnetic record, a refuge like only Nick Drake, Nico, and a few others have been able to create. A graceful, delicately minimalist approach to classic Appalachian and British folk songs.The perfect balance between melancholy and daydream. Originally released only in France in 1971, Ici Bientôt is very pleased to present the first-ever reissue on vinyl.
When she recorded her only album, Tia Blake was nineteen years old and had just arrived in Paris a year and a half beforehand. She spent most of her time at Disco’Thé, a record shop in the Latin Quarter, a free space, peaceful and inspiring, a hub for students as well as the local artistic community.
There, Tia would occasionally sing—when she managed to overcome her shyness. Two young guitarists who were passionate fans of folk music and regulars at the shop began to accompany her, forming “Her Folk Group.” One year later, they cut 11 tracks at Pierre Barouh’s Studios Saravah.
Folksongs and Ballads is composed of traditional tunes that have been covered many times, but they’re not the best-known folk standards. A collection of stories ranging from the Middle Ages to the 1960s, bringing together sublimely doleful ballads, lamentations for a lost lover, and an unexpected, brilliant version of the road anthem “Plastic Jesus.”
Tia Blake's haunting, unaffected voice captivates and comforts us, wrapping us in its cool embrace. Meanwhile, the tasteful, stripped-down, mellow acoustic arrangements provided by the guitarists, reminiscent of Bert Jansch and John Renbourn, occasionally supported by a kena flute, have created the space Tia Blake needed to reinvent these traditional songs.
Folksongs and Ballads is a timeless record, deep and unique, a longtime companion for repeated listening, in the vein of works by Sibylle Baier, Bridget St. John and Vashti Bunyan.
After decades contributing to records where a single riff could transform a dancefloor, Charlie May turns that instinct inward on Trusted Farms.
For over thirty years, Charlie has occupied a position that seems increasingly rare in electronic music: the musician’s musician, the person behind the machines, the extra pair of hands in the studio, and quite often, the person responsible for the melody you end up carrying around in your head for weeks on end.
Alongside Duncan Forbes as Spooky, Charlie helped shape some of the most important electronic music to emerge from the UK in the early ’90s. That partnership would also sow the seeds for one of Sasha’s defining records: the central riff behind Xpander began life in Spooky’s live material, before Charlie brought the idea into the studio with Sasha and helped transform it into one of electronic music’s most enduring anthems.
Listen closely to Charlie’s work and there’s a particular instinct that keeps returning: knowing when a simple synth line is enough. Knowing which note needs to change. Knowing when repetition stops being repetition and starts becoming the entire reason a track works. More recently, as one-third of Quiet Places on ASIP, he’s taken those same instincts somewhere looser — beatless, gridless and led by improvisation.
Trusted Farms puts those instincts front and centre.
Tiny melodic phrases appear and refuse to leave. Synth lines repeat just long enough to become lodged in your head. Parts rub against each other without being tidied into submission. There’s a sharpness and directness to it all amongst the purposeful analogue warmth.
Some of these tracks feel almost ridiculously simple at first. But simplicity is difficult when you’ve spent decades learning every possible way to complicate something. Many of the parts on Trusted Farms were performed live with minimal editing. A synth line might be doubled, distorted, re-recorded and pushed back through another piece of equipment, but it remains the same idea. Instead of filling the gaps, Charlie works on the weight and character of what is already there. The melodies become physical; slightly worn around the edges.
For someone whose fingerprints can be found across some genuinely monumental moments in electronic music, Charlie has spent decades knowing what to add.
Trusted Farms is about knowing exactly what to leave alone.
Available on black 12”, mastered by Andreas Lupo LOOP-O Lubich and featuring artwork by Peter Skwiot Smith,
THEODOR are a musical export from Darmstadt who are now well known far beyond the insider scene, enchanting audiences worldwide with their atmospheric, slightly psychedelic-sounding sweet soul. GERD JANSON, meanwhile, whoseNew Release Information musical roots also lie in Darmstadt, has been sending house, techno and disco
ravers into ecstasy worldwide as a DJ for decades. The @robertjohnsonclub resident also runs the @runningbackrecords label, which has been in existence since 2002, and regularly tinkers with electronic productions and remixes alongside his sound engineer @lopazz_mixmastering.
Sundae Soul, a Darmstadt-based label, has now, in a mathematical masterstroke, put two and two together and brought THEODOR and GERD JANSON together musically. It just had to be done. The result is a 7” single featuring the boogie-style track “Your Love” (to be found on THEODOR’s second album “Holocene”) on one side and the “Your Love – Gerd Janson 7” Mix” on the other. The term “mix” is almost misleading in this context. For his remix, Gerd has taken “Your Love” apart on the musical dissection table, filleted it and put it back together completely from scratch. The remix builds on the original with great skill and squeezes a technohouse club hit out of the producer-DJ’s repertoire.
We all agree – this one’s got to go straight into the club. So let’s get down to business and grab that vinyl.
Komatssu se ha encargado de cocinar el primer lanzamiento de su sello Dramalax: cinco cortes con sonidos que recorren desde el electro afilado y potente hasta los breaks ácidos, pasando por sonidos que recuerdan al electroclash más pistero.
Paradoxia abre la referencia con un primer corte implacable, construido sobre kicks profundos y una cadencia mecánica que recuerda al pulso constante de una fábrica en funcionamiento. Un mundo robótico donde todo encaja como parte de una inmensa cadena de montaje.
Nanobot trae un ritmo electro bien marcado, una sensación de avance constante a través de un túnel donde atmósferas cálidas nos acompañan liberando la tensión, un tema perfecto para cambiar el color del set.
Recovering Faith, una herramienta perfecta para el club. Arpegios envolventes, sintetizadores de sabor noventero y una energía marcadamente eléctrica construyen una atmósfera perfecta para sumergirse en la pista de baile.
Alligator viene después, con un pulso firme marcado por una percusión potente, donde lásers y hits vocales se entrelazan con un bajo eléctrico y punzante, creando un ritmo macarra y pistero. Un track con mucho carácter.
Etainen le pone el lazo a este primer lanzamiento. Aquí, el sonido sintético y robótico del electro que hemos visto en ‘Nanobot’ y ‘Alligator’ se da la mano con un break de batería clásico, generando atmósferas tensas y ácidas. Un track divertido y pistero, perfecto para crear momentos de tensión en tus sets.
En conclusión, Komatssu presenta con esta referencia una declaración sonora de lo que Dramalax quiere traer a vuestras maletas: sonidos potentes y versátiles para los aficionados al electro y los breaks con sabor clásico, sin perder de vista el sonido de hoy.
Silsila Dubs is a brand new label emanating from the backrooms and dancehalls of West London. Deeply inspired and rooted in the long standing traditions and dialogues of sound system culture, the label's output will echo the myriad musical foundations laid at various local historic venues including Southall Community Center and the Tudor Rose respectively.
Energized by the sounds of Jah Shaka, Aba-Shanti-I (Falasha Recordings), The Disciples, Manasseh, Conscious Sounds and more, the Silsila Dubs sonic aesthetic is that of classic 1990s sounds and recording techniques, lovingly channelled and dubbed via the cult Soundcraft Ghost Mixing Desk at Silsila HQ.
This debut release from the label has been written, produced and mixed by Govind Singh of the burgeoning Mya Hi-Fi crew who are closely related to Silsila and it's output. Across 2 mixes 'Perseverance' offers us a meditative and uplifting space in which to enrich our ears and our minds to carry on, no matter what life throws at us. Positive sounds for all to absorb.
London’s Silsila Dubs crew triumphantly return with further explorations into the deeper recesses of sound system culture as a tool for spiritual enlightenment. The Hayes based collective – with close links to the Mya Hi-Fi family - are committed to the preservation of the long-standing ethics and methods of this culture, and the myriad cultural influences and flavours that a city such as London can present. This much anticipated second release mirrors these notions with style and grace.
The second release on the label ‘Walk in the Light’ has existed on dubplate since 2023, with the mighty Aba Shanti-I making it one of his selections at the Notting Hill carnival of that year. An uplifting and motivating digital dub track that boasts live instrumentation, echoing the mammoth influences and spirits of the late Jah Shaka, The Disciples, Conscious Sound, Aba Shanti-I and Nick Mannaseh respectively.
Featuring a beautiful master and cut from Music House alumni Chris Hanson, an inspiring trumpet performance from Silsila family Luther Vine, and a crucial Melodica, mix and version from label head and producer Govind Singh, ‘Walk in the Light’ is a sonic mantra, a vehicle of positive vibration and a means to step out of the shadows.
Orphx makes a striking comeback with a six-track EP on KR3, celebrating Rich & Christie's three-decade career in the industrial music scene.
Theikos EP - spans multiple eras and moods, merging raw, ancient production methods with modern interpretations. The result is a sonic landscape that bridges pulsing club rhythms with the intense energy of extreme electronics and death industrial. The title track, "Theikos," began in 1998 and was only finalized in 2024, years of evolution shaping it into a truly formidable piece.
This 12" release stands out as a deep and fully realized body of work, filled with personal insight and resonant echoes of a primordial world.
The standard edition comes in a sleek single-pocket gatefold sleeve, featuring a 1997 photograph taken in Toronto by Michael Nine, capturing the duo in their early years and visually anchoring the album to the roots of their sound. Limited and special editions include an exclusive booklet with archival photos of Orphx and a poster, along with a promotional videos featuring remastered and reimagined archival footage created especially for this release.
Acclaimed, Swedish composer, producer and live artist Sebastian Mullaert, and Georgian electronic artist Tamarma (Tamara Davitashvili), are set to release the deeply personal and genre-fluid album ‘Holds the Sky’ on the 25th September via Awesome Soundwave, the label curated by Christopher Coe and Carl Cox.
Spanning ambient, experimental and alternative electronic forms, alongside a set of dancefloor-oriented reworks that expand the project’s sonic spectrum, at its core, the album is the result of an unusual artistic convergence that traces back to 2020. Tamarma entered Mullaert’s successful In Bloom mentorship programme on a scholarship, and over a year-long deep exploration of album creation, her work revealed a rare clarity and emotional depth.
One piece in particular became the catalyst. Developed further through Mullaert’s 4 step studio process, it unfolded into a full length album collaboration. What began as a single composition has since grown into an album that documents an organic and intuitive exchange between two distinct artistic voices.
The result is less a collection of tracks than a continuous unfolding; a dialogue shaped by trust, listening and shared curiosity. Rather than aiming for a fixed genre position, the album operates as a living process: a meeting point between tradition and experimentation, between voice and synthesis, between two artists allowing something larger to emerge through their collaboration.
With compositions such as the chiming ‘Being Colours’ and hypnotic ‘Holds The Sky,’ Mullaert and Tamarma have created a body of work that resists easy categorization. The album moves through intimate, meditative passages and more rhythmically driven moments, always anchored in a sense of presence and emotional immediacy. The flickering beats of ‘Winnow’ and ambient manifestations of ‘Lost In Dimension’ and ‘Field of Us’ add a sense of tranquillity, stillness and convergence.
Tamarma’s voice carries both a personal and cultural depth throughout the album, while remaining fluid and responsive to the moment. The result is a sound that feels both intimate and spatial, where voice, texture and atmosphere are closely connected. Her Georgian musical heritage combined with Mullaert’s open-ended electronic exploration, allows something beautiful to emerge, shaped by listening, space and a sense of something larger than either artist alone.
Widely celebrated in the electronic music community, Mullaert has spent the last three decades moving beyond the boundaries of electronic music, from shaping the sound of cult duo Minilogue to creating the fully improvised global platform, Circle of Live, which has seen him perform and collaborate with artists such as Mathew Jonson, Âme, Amp Fiddler, Aurora Halal, Speedy J, Sam Barker, Dorisburg, Move D, Sleep D, Kuniyuki, Pantha du Prince, Leafar Legov, Wayne Snow, Laurence Guy, VRIL, Neel and Erika.
Initially making a name for himself in the world of techno, his performances have moved fluidly between environments, from underground spaces including Berghain’s Panorama Bar to festivals around the world, and venues including the Barbican, London, where he has appeared alongside artists including Joep Beving, Laura Misch and JakoJako. Platforms such as ARTE have featured his performances, placing his work within a broader European cultural context, while support from Resident Advisor and Boiler Room reflect his continued presence within the core of electronic music culture. He has received a Swedish Grammy and the P3 Guld award from Swedish National Radio.
His 2020 album ‘Natthall,’ developed in collaboration with Tonhalle Orchestra Zürich and performed with Subchamber Ensemble, saw Mullaert enter the world of contemporary composition, and merged electronics with chamber music and improvisation. The album was later named among the top post classical releases of the year by BBC Music Magazine.
A new documentary film by Ableton, set for release this summer, captures Mullaert’s Circle of Live project through a performance at Brighton Dome in the UK, featuring Mullaert and electronic artists Clark and Rival Consoles. The film offers a rare insight into the inner workings of collective improvisation at a high artistic level, further cementing Mullaert’s role as a leading voice in contemporary live electronic practice.
Tamara's background is rooted in the landscapes and traditions of Georgia. Raised near the Caucasus Mountains, classically trained in piano and shaped by years as a jazz vocalist, her work carries traces of Georgian polyphonic singing and a strong connection to nature and place. Her transition into electronic music is not stylistic but transformational; a recontextualisation of heritage into new sonic forms.
‘Holds The Sky’ will be available on vinyl and digitally on the 25th September via Awesome Soundwave. The digital release includes three exclusive album track reworks from Mullaert.
You've never played a game like Blippo+ before, and you've never heard a video game soundtrack quite like Greatest Hits from Planet Blip.
Composed by Rob Kieswetter and Jona Bechtolt from the LA-based trio YACHT, the soundtrack collects 71 tracks from the cult classic video game Blippo+, reworked and sequenced into a continuous listen for this special release —a TV static-speckled gatefold double LP, out Oct. 16 via Hologram Opera, marking the soundtrack’s physical debut.
Taking the form of a cable TV simulator, Blippo+ captures the magical feeling of seizing a mysterious signal from outer space and discovering the television programming of an alien culture. Soundtracking the game’s pastiche of programs is Rob and Jona’s genre-spanning score—synth-heavy, eccentrically electronic, with a skewed sensibility that pays homage to cable access, library music, video art, and the late-night margins of the 80s and 90s underground.
TV obsessives will find plenty to love in Greatest Hits from Planet Blip: with surreal theme songs, jangly jingles, zippystings, catchy kitsch, period-accurate menu music and even pop hits from the alien airwaves, this propulsively playful soundtrack will have channel-flippers tingling with nostalgia.
“Planet Blip is an alien planet where art and music are the only currency and ‘consciousness particles’ form the basis of all media. To capture the spirit of this world, we drew inspiration
from all the music we felt best embodied this ethos and ran it through our own utopian blender,” say Bechtolt and Kieswetter.
Blippo+ is an award-winning, experimental, live-action video game created by YACHT and Telefantasy Studios, along with developers Noble Robot and Dustin Mierau, and published by Panic Games. It was released for Steam, Playdate and Nintendo Switch in 2025 to widespread
critical acclaim and has earned a devoted fandom. A Mac version followed earlier this year, and was nominated for an Apple Design Award.
"Simultaneously nostalgic and futuristic, otherworldly yet
welcoming, Blippo+ is an absolute artistic triumph.
" —Deven McClure, Screen Rant
"Blippo+’s presentation might ape old traditions, but the collective impact of its content is richer, deeper, and more entertaining than any mere remembrance.
" —Garrett Martin, Paste/Endless Mode
"In the increasingly reactionary and prescriptive landscape of video games, it is remarkable to encounter something so distinctive, so hopeful, so celebratory, so devoted to expanding the possibility space of art beyond a single medium." —Sam Bodrojan
Jasmín returns to fabric Originals with the second instalment in her four-part series, Concrete Summer / Skeletal.
Following her debut release It’s Girls Night / Long Hair, the Dutch-Argentinian producer delivers two stripped-back, percussive techno cuts shaped by the architecture, tension and atmosphere of cities after dark.
Concrete Summer opens with a primordial pulse: saturated drums and feverish shaker rhythms lock into a raw, hypnotic groove. On the flip, Skeletal pushes deeper into the night, pairing a driving kick and syncopated percussion with distorted drones and mounting pressure.
Sparse, physical and deeply immersive, both tracks leave space for the dancer to complete the picture, continuing Jasmín’s singular exploration of stripped-back techno and the nocturnal worlds at the heart of her ongoing collaboration with fabric.
For Louis Johnstone, making music has never been about waiting for the right equipment, the right environment or the right moment. Across more than a decade of work as both Wanda Group and A Large Sheet Of Muscle, the Huddersfield-based musician has built one of British experimental music's most singular bodies of work by embracing whatever happens to be within reach, allowing instinct, improvisation and circumstance to shape the outcome as much as conscious composition.
"'Chinese Benefits' was made over a year ago on an iPhone that had a broken microphone and was on its way out," he explains. "I have made many records after this with clearer sounds. Sharper ideas. That is never the point, though. You work with what you hold in your hands."
Recorded entirely on a failing iPhone 6 that stopped working shortly afterwards, 'Chinese Benefits' isn't a record about damaged technology. It is a record shaped by it. Rather than resisting the limitations of the device, Johnstone allows them to become part of the music itself, where distortion, interference and deteriorating fidelity are inseparable from the recording process.
Across twenty brief but disquieting pieces, corroded spoken word, environmental recordings, abrasive noise and fractured electronics continually emerge and dissolve. Voices drift in and out of range, reverberation stretches everyday sounds beyond recognition, and bursts of white noise interrupt moments of uneasy calm. There are echoes of radio transmissions, field recordings and musique concrète throughout, yet 'Chinese Benefits' never settles comfortably into any one tradition. Instead, it inhabits a space where accident and intention become almost impossible to separate.
That philosophy has long defined Johnstone's work. Through a vast catalogue of self-released recordings on his Umbro G imprint, alongside releases for labels including The Trilogy Tapes, he has consistently favoured immediacy over refinement, embracing imperfection not as an aesthetic but as a practical reality. His recordings are less concerned with perfection than with capturing the conditions in which they were made.
Looking back on 'Chinese Benefits', however, Johnstone's own assessment is characteristically understated.
"Listening back fully, it's quite a nice record actually. Fair enough, I make them and never really listen again TBH. Even better, it was the last Large Sheet Of Muscle record made on that phone with grit and damaged guts."
Like much of his work, 'Chinese Benefits' offers few fixed meanings. Its titles remain cryptic, its voices partially obscured and its structures deliberately unstable. What emerges instead is a deeply personal document of process over perfection, where the limitations of the tools become inseparable from the music they produce, and where the act of making something matters far more than the conditions in which it was made.
Love or its absence dominates the intimate songs on the new album from ARBORIST – the musical outlet of Mark McCambridge. Looking For Love, Arborist’s fourth album of exquisitely inventive Americana, places us firmly in his hometown of Belfast, allowing it to act as a microcosm of the wider-world, with all its foibles and charms. We find fictional protagonists scouring the dark corners of the city, wiling-away afternoons in strip clubs, wandering the streets in all weather and reflecting on the harsh reality of modern society, all in search of an elusive love – emphasising our need for it now more than ever.
Looking for Love is ARBORIST’s first album to be self-produced by McCambridge, largely from his home studio in Belfast – and at times it feels like we are in the room with him. It’s a different kind of record for him as previously he has always sought collaboration; whether it be with Kim Deal who chose to sing intertwined harmony on his debut single “Twisted Arrow”, or recording in The Curfew Tower owned by The KLF’s Bill Drummond who described Mark’s songwriting as being “riven with more loss than any record since Leonard Cohen quit this world”, and who Matthew E White and his Spacebomb band collaborated with to such astonishing effect on the previous Arborist LP, 2023’s An Endless Sequence of Dead Zeros, winner of the prestigious Northern Ireland Music Prize. This time, with no outside producer steering the way, McCambridge found that the quiet hours were where he felt most at ease, despite periods of trial and error, and, by his own admission, moments of feeling genuinely lost in it all.
Despite playing many of the parts himself, McCambridge still called upon old friends from the community around him; Spacebomb’s resident bassist Cameron Ralston (Bonnie Light Horseman, Hiss Golden Messenger) again features throughout the record, alongside Eamon Ferris (The Waterboys) on drums, with the great and the good from Belfast’s vibrant music scene. Grainne Meyer plays concert harp and Aga Olek plays violin for the quasi-title track “Looking 4 Love” – an off-kilter love-letter to Belfast. Meilana Gillard provides a sleazy saxophone on “Bye Bye Johnny Cash” – a seedy tale of a man obsessively visiting a dancer in a club, and The Larne Community Youth Choir provide backing vocals for “Go Kill The Fatted Calf” – a song Mark wrote about his son growing up, a take on the parable of the prodigal son, with Jonny Ashe’s blistering guitar solo adding an album highlight. The Errigal Ensemble String Quartet and Aisling Agnew’s breathtaking flute solo feature on “What Is It You’re Asking” – a song about love, or its absence, both personally and universally in these times.
McCambridge was recently honoured with a “Fellowship” by the Seamus Heaney Centre at Queen's University Belfast where he collaborated with such illustrious names from the literary world as Nick Laird, Caoilinn Hughes and Conor McPherson. Through the University he was given access to the music department's Steinways and pipe organs, and decided to try one out for the album’s centrepiece “I’ve Been A Flaneur”. As Mark explains, "The drone on the pipe organ — and the sound of it starting and stopping — was so visceral that I decided to try a half-written song against it right there and then, and this came out in one take… The song was a breakthrough artistically - I don't think I'll ever record in the same way again after this."
The album was engineered by longtime collaborator Ben McAuley (Van Morrison) and mixed by Jimmy Robertson (Anna Calvi, Beth Gibbons, Fat Dog). The results are staggering, devastating and uplifting in equal measure, calling to mind albums such as Songs Ohia’s Magnolia Electric Co., The Divine Comedy’s Regeneration, The Blue Nile’s Hats and Wilco’s Ode to Joy, as well as early-70s records from John Cale, John Lennon and Bill Fay.
Belfast native Mark McCambridge played his first show as Arborist supporting James Yorkston. A solo tour followed, and impressive performances led to notable support slots alongside Low, Cat Power, Echo & The Bunnymen and Guy Garvey. Arborist's debut single, the Americana-tinged "Twisted Arrow," caught the attention of the critics with an astonishing duet with Kim Deal of The Breeders. The debut album Home Burial (2016) and its follow-up, A Northern View, both received glowing praise, from The Guardian ("instant classic" ----) to MOJO ("devastatingly bleak… upliftingly beautiful" ----) to Uncut (8/10), with BBC 6 Music play from Cerys Matthews, Cillian Murphy, Lauren Laverne, Radcliffe and Maconie and Gideon Coe — and Steve Lamacq calling single "Taxi" "one of those records that makes you immediately stop what you're doing." He went on to even greater success with the 2023 Northern Irish Music Prize winning third LP, An Endless Sequence of Dead Zeroes, which was recorded at SpaceBomb Studios in Virginia with musician and producer Matthew E White. For his fourth LP, Looking For Love, he has signed with Fika Recordings and with a tour approaching in November, 2026 looks set to be a seminal year for the Irish artist.
Murmuration’ is the low hum made by vast, beautifully choreographed flocks of starlings as they simultaneously flap their wings and take to the sky. Some people say that the frequency of this unique, rumbling, oscillating sound can cure diseases...
One of the most exciting live bands in the UK, British Birds combine the garage-punk energy of Billy Childish, the wry English sophistication of XTC and the witty pop inventiveness of The Lovely Eggs. Like a murmurating flock of starlings, they create a unique sound, and might even be able to cure diseases.
Based in Chorley, Lancashire, British Birds are a resolutely DIY band. Bobby records and mixes all the music; Emma creates all the artwork. Their first two albums were self-released, selling hundreds of copies at gigs and at a few chosen record stores. British Birds didn’t wait for permission to take flight. They just got on with it. Their songs are sophisticated, hard-hitting, and very skilful. It may be DIY, but it’s big and it’s ambitious.
Sessions for Marc Riley and Gideon Coe have followed, along with tours supporting The Bug Club, BC Camplight and Lovely Eggs.
‘Murmurate, Oscillate’ kicks off with Lie Down With Dogs, Stand Up With Fleas, a rousing expression of exasperation at our passivity in the face of lame authority. British Birds are acute observers of the English political scene, shrouding their observations in humour and surrealism. Polka Dot Eyes is another piece of sharp social observation: it portrays Lancashire lads – friends from school – who join the Army and return home physically and mentally damaged. The song is simultaneously disturbing, funny and catchy as hell. From the fog of disinformation and doubt that surrounds us all in 2020s Britian, British Birds embrace the darkness, but with wit and verve – no slogans, no easy answers – and with an energy that helps us escape the mundanity of a declining island. This might all sound a bit bleak, but it’s not: every single one of the songs on this album has a chorus as big as a house.
There are personal songs too: Scary Movies is a poignant description of Bobby and Emma’s grandfather, who delighted in showing them horror films when they were kids – giving them sneak previews of the darkness they’d come to embrace as adults; Just Like Them is a celebration of introversion: it might not be fun, but it’s better than being an idiot. (Paradoxically, any other introverts who hear this song will feel impelled to join in in the chorus.) Blame Game and Thunder Claps examine the darkness inherent in relationships: there is always an impending storm, if you recognise the low hum of the imminent thunder. Once again: the choruses of these songs confound the melancholy sentiment.
You’ll get the same impression if you see British Birds live: Bobby’s ferocious guitar and dark lyrics are counterpointed with Emma’s sometimes haunting, sometimes playful vocal responses and insistent rhythms. You’ll be swept away by the energy of a band who don’t know the meaning of limits. And as the songs get darker and darker the smile on your face gets wider and wider.
The core members of British Birds are siblings Bobby and Emma Townson, working from their HQ-cum-nest in Chorley. Drums are by Dominic Lawson (apart from Michael Aindley on ‘Just Like Them’). Bass is by James Robinson.
British Birds will be embarking on a headline tour of the UK in early 2027.
On Dummy’s new album, do you love the color of the sky?, the Los Angeles-based 5-piece deliver a breathtaking piece of work that introduces new textures and rhythms to their already varied and refined catalog. For the band’s third album, and first for new label home Polyvinyl, the group split time between self-recording at their home studio as well as Studio 22, linking up with frequent collaborator and engineer Joo-Joo Ashworth (Corridor, Automatic, Spiral XP). The band focused on intentionality and experimentation, exploring downtempo dance beats and electronic music while pushing the guitar as far as they could, using new self-sampling and processing techniques. Percussionist Alex Ewell’s overall sound design and production skills can be heard across the album, with layered drum sounds and rhythmic tremolo techniques shining throughout. Tracks like “Full Spectrum Dominance” and “Alluvial Fan” showcase the band’s tasteful pop sensibilities, while closing track “Heaven’s What You Make Of
It” features perhaps the strongest vocal delivery yet from vocalist/keyboardist
Emma Maatman. Additionally, the dynamic exchange between guitarists Joe Trainor and Nathan O’Dell is absolutely gorgeous, adding a new layer of immersion and directness that is unlike anything the band has done before. The result is Dummy’s most ethereal and sincere record to date, with more feminine and delicate undertones that sit beautifully alongside the gritty and noisy textures the band has become known for. Dummy has been praised in numerous outlets such as Paste, Stereogum, Aquarium Drunkard and Pitchfork, who described their second album, Free Energy, as “the
sound of a band turning all its potential energy into music that’s dazzlingly kinetic and powerful." The band has toured the US, UK, and EU extensively, with festival appearances at Austin Psych Fest, Treefort Music Festival, and others. In addition to larger outlets and festivals, the band’s strong ties to community and DIY ethos are ever-present, oftentimes preferring to play and connect with different local artists on tour, uplifting those around them while shining a light on the history of independent music.
On Dummy’s new album, do you love the color of the sky?, the Los Angeles-based 5-piece deliver a breathtaking piece of work that introduces new textures and rhythms to their already varied and refined catalog. For the band’s third album, and first for new label home Polyvinyl, the group split time between self-recording at their home studio as well as Studio 22, linking up with frequent collaborator and engineer Joo-Joo Ashworth (Corridor, Automatic, Spiral XP). The band focused on intentionality and experimentation, exploring downtempo dance beats and electronic music while pushing the guitar as far as they could, using new self-sampling and processing techniques. Percussionist Alex Ewell’s overall sound design and production skills can be heard across the album, with layered drum sounds and rhythmic tremolo techniques shining throughout. Tracks like “Full Spectrum Dominance” and “Alluvial Fan” showcase the band’s tasteful pop sensibilities, while closing track “Heaven’s What You Make Of
It” features perhaps the strongest vocal delivery yet from vocalist/keyboardist
Emma Maatman. Additionally, the dynamic exchange between guitarists Joe Trainor and Nathan O’Dell is absolutely gorgeous, adding a new layer of immersion and directness that is unlike anything the band has done before. The result is Dummy’s most ethereal and sincere record to date, with more feminine and delicate undertones that sit beautifully alongside the gritty and noisy textures the band has become known for. Dummy has been praised in numerous outlets such as Paste, Stereogum, Aquarium Drunkard and Pitchfork, who described their second album, Free Energy, as “the
sound of a band turning all its potential energy into music that’s dazzlingly kinetic and powerful." The band has toured the US, UK, and EU extensively, with festival appearances at Austin Psych Fest, Treefort Music Festival, and others. In addition to larger outlets and festivals, the band’s strong ties to community and DIY ethos are ever-present, oftentimes preferring to play and connect with different local artists on tour, uplifting those around them while shining a light on the history of independent music.
The Dutch composer and conductor, born in 1993, has assembled a powerful collective with his "hugely inventive and fast- thinking" (UK Jazz News) Brainteaser Orchestra, uniting the vanguard of the current Amsterdam scene - including guitarist Teis Semey , saxophonist Kika Sprangers , drummer Jamie Peet , violinists George Dimitriu and Yanna Pelser , trombonist Nabou Claerhout , clarinetist Federico Calcagno, and bassist Alessandro Fongaro. This lineup has been making international waves, highlighted by invitations to major European festivals and a recent performance alongside Pat Metheny at the North Sea Jazz Festival. Now comes Tonepool Paradox, the orchestra's second album, commissioned to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Amsterdam's legendary BIMHUIS. Wybenga's compositional approach radically breaks with big band conventions. His process mirrors that of a hip- hop producer: he records solo improvisations by his musicians, chops the material into pieces, and uses these fragments as samples to build entirely new tracks. Wybenga layers jazz, electronics, and contemporary classical music without ever sounding academic or overintellectualized. For Tonepool Paradox , he expanded this concept internationally, bringing in guests such as Berlin-based saxophonist Otis Sandjo, Parisian violinist Theo Ceccaldi, singer Lizz Wright , and hip- hop vocalist Pink Oculus . Mixed by Grammy winner Nic Hard (Snarky Puppy), the sound brings together the diverse musical styles of everyone involved, juxtaposing the angular lines of the horns with sweeping, melodic string passages.
In their own words, it's "more focussed, paced and thought-out." Over 13 tracks that explore the horrors of the outside world and the internal minefield of the brain, Mould's debut also hits with the thrills of a brilliant live band who've distilled that energy to tape. The title comes from a line taken from the time signature-warping 'Emotive Language' that distills what it means to be a band in 2026 down to one concise sentiment. "This has always been the dream, playing with your mates and making good songs and getting to tour and make records," says Kane. "But the realities of trying to start a band now, when you're 30 and also have other goals at the same time are hard. We'd be doing it regardless, but you have to learn a lot. " This duality runs throughout the record, where tracks like lead single 'Float' speak of "strolling through hellscapes" of social media yet surround their frustrations with the sort of barbed, visceral musicality that sounds like if Interpol had grown up in gloomy, rain- soaked Britain. "You're endlessly doom scrolling, past a funny video of a sausage, and then there's Farage and then there's an ad for something," Joe says of the track. "That mindnumbing flashy distraction turns you into idiots."
In their own words, it's "more focussed, paced and thought-out." Over 13 tracks that explore the horrors of the outside world and the internal minefield of the brain, Mould's debut also hits with the thrills of a brilliant live band who've distilled that energy to tape. The title comes from a line taken from the time signature-warping 'Emotive Language' that distills what it means to be a band in 2026 down to one concise sentiment. "This has always been the dream, playing with your mates and making good songs and getting to tour and make records," says Kane. "But the realities of trying to start a band now, when you're 30 and also have other goals at the same time are hard. We'd be doing it regardless, but you have to learn a lot. " This duality runs throughout the record, where tracks like lead single 'Float' speak of "strolling through hellscapes" of social media yet surround their frustrations with the sort of barbed, visceral musicality that sounds like if Interpol had grown up in gloomy, rain- soaked Britain. "You're endlessly doom scrolling, past a funny video of a sausage, and then there's Farage and then there's an ad for something," Joe says of the track. "That mindnumbing flashy distraction turns you into idiots."
An evolution of her radio show, event series and Bandcamp community under the same name, this compilation plots a globe-spanning day-into-night voyage across 16 tracks, from artists, countries and scenes that have shaped Jamz' musical worldview. Each track, many of which are exclusive to this comp, tells a story of heritage and roots, whilst pushing boundaries and pioneering new sounds in their respective regions. From the Reunion Island to Latin America, East Africa to the Caribbean and Pacific, it's a 24-hour cycle moving from downtempo to dancefloor. The concept of Dance Around The World began in the summer of 2025 but has ultimately been a part of Jamz' journey in music since the beginning. At the centre of it is her 15-year career as radio presenter - her tastes evolving from the early days on Reprezent Radio, to a 1Xtra residency and now a Saturday daytime show on BBC 6Music. There has always been a desire to highlight music from underrepresented scenes to new audiences.
Three decades since Global Underground began defining what a superstar-DJ mix album could sound like, this anniversary release breaks from the format entirely. Instead of just one artist focus, the focus is on the decadal number: here there are 30 artists, 30 new exclusive tracks - and no mixing. Guy J, Rodriguez Jr., Quivver & Dave Seaman and an unexpected Nadia Ali/Frankey & Sandrino pairing headline the tracklist, compiled to represent the current state of the progressive-house lineage. Collector's edition aside, the standard triple-vinyl set on purple, orange and aqua vinyl is the one you wanna own.
Global Underground ist stolz darauf, diese wegweisende Veröffentlichung anlässlich unseres 30-jährigen Jubiläums präsentieren zu dürfen. Dreißig Künstler, dreißig brandneue, exklusive Tracks – zur Feier von dreißig Jahren, in denen wir euch die allerbeste elektronische Musik präsentieren. Auf „THIRTY“ sind einige der dynamischsten Künstler der Dance-Musik vertreten: Guy J, Rodriguez Jr., Quivver & Dave Seaman, Nicky Elisabeth, Yulia Niko, HotLap, Spencer Brown, eine ganz besondere Zusammenarbeit zwischen der legendären Nadia Ali und Frankey & Sandrino sowie viele weitere.
Teal return on October 2 with Love Comes Thru, the trio's nine-track debut album. Expanding their emotionally resonant blend of downtempo trip-pop, the record reaches into street soul, dub, and experimental grooves, marking a confident new chapter for the group.
At its core, Love Comes Thru is a reflection on the quiet strength of love—not through grand gestures, but through the steady presence that carries us through uncertainty, change, and connection. Written over the course of a year of bi-coastal collaboration, the album became a testament to the bond Teal share as artists, friends, and family.
From the lush synth landscapes of "Aries Moon" to the footwork-inspired pulse of "Time Is Blind," the album explores themes of patience, vulnerability, longing, and intimacy. Standout singles "Kissing in a Dream" and the title track lean into left-field street soul, while stripped-back, 808-driven tracks like "Change Your Mind" and "Anomaly" demonstrate the power of restraint without sacrificing momentum. Building on the group's love of ambient improvisation, Love Comes Thru also features instrumental pieces with percussion by Brandon Valdivia (Mas Aya/Lido Pimienta).
The album closes with the sensual "Bubbling," bringing the journey full circle with a reminder that love ultimately comes through in its most embodied, physical form. Love Comes Thru is presented in a deluxe, limited-edition matte-finish, double-embossed jacket with a printed inner sleeve. Available on LP and digitally through Rubadub, In Sheep's Clothing, and Forced Exposure beginning October 2.
Wewantsounds is delighted to continue its Ziad Rahbani reissue program with Ana Moush Kafer, a classic album by the Lebanese legend Ziad Rahbani, recorded at his By-Pass Studio in Beirut during the height of the Lebanese Civil War in 1985. Showcasing Rahbani’s signature blend of Arabic music infused with touches of jazz-funk and bossa nova, the album has attained cult status over the years. Originally released on cassette, it has never before been available on vinyl. Newly remastered, this edition features the original Relax-In cassette artwork from 1985 and includes new liner notes by Mario Choueiry of the Institut du Monde Arabe in Paris.
Ziad Rahbani, who passed away in 2025, remains one of the most influential figures in modern Arabic music and a cultural icon in Lebanon. A musician, composer, pianist, producer and playwright, he helped modernize Arabic music over five decades. The son of composer Assi Rahbani and singer Fairuz, he shaped her late 70s–80s recordings producing Wahdon and Maarifti Feek, while building a major solo career with classics such as Abu Ali and Houdou Nisbi, which have become cult favourites for a new generation of DJs and music lovers.
Released in 1985 in Lebanon, Ana Moush Kafer stands as one of Rahbani’s key achievements. Recorded at his By-Pass Studio during the Lebanese Civil War, it blends Arabic melodic traditions with jazz-funk, bossa nova and Western arrangements. Originally cassette-only, it became one of his most revered releases. Throughout the album, Rahbani’s writing reflects the turbulence of wartime Beirut with a blend of sharp social observation, political satire and melancholy. It captures a moment in Lebanese cultural history where experimentation, satire and popular song intersected, giving the album its enduring influence among music lovers.
Sung by Rahbani and Sami Hawat, alongside Beirut-based musicians, the album features both Western and traditional Arabic instruments. It balances refined arrangements with lyrical irony, social commentary and political reflection, which remain deeply resonant in today’s context in Lebanon.
One of the highlights of the album is the song “Shou A’ada Ma Bada,” with lyrics by Joseph Harb, which reveals a clear bossa nova influence, while the closing track, “Al Mokawama Al Watania Al Lobnani,” offers a deeply human view of war, avoiding patriotic cliché in favour of a nuanced perspective rooted in lived experience.
As Mario Choueiry observes in his liner notes, “Ana Moush Kafer stands as one of the high points of modern Arab political songwriting, yet transcends its historical and geographical context through the universal relevance of its themes and the timeless quality of its music.”
Forty years on, Ana Moush Kafer remains a landmark of Arab music. Wewantsounds presents it on vinyl for the first time, newly remastered and featuring original artwork. This long-awaited reissue restores one of Ziad Rahbani’s most important works to circulation, reaffirming its place as a defining statement in modern Arabic music.
a 1. Ana Moush Kafer 5:03
b 2. Shou Hal Ayyam 5:46
c 3. A'anitham 4:37
d 4. Shou A'ada Ma Bada [3:45]
[e] 5. Yessa'ed we Yea'en [5:05]
[f] 6. Bi Halyawmayn [3:46]
[g] 7. Bharf Esheen [1:12]
[h] 8. Bhaneek [5:34]
[i] 9. Al Mokawama Al Watania Al Lobnani [3:06]
[a] 1. Ana Moush Kafer [5:03]
[b] 2. Shou Hal Ayyam [5:46]
[c] 3. A'anitham [4:37]
[d] 4. Shou A'ada Ma Bada [3:45]
[e] 5. Yessa'ed we Yea'en [5:05]
[f] 6. Bi Halyawmayn [3:46]
[g] 7. Bharf Esheen [1:12]
[h] 8. Bhaneek [5:34]
[i] 9. Al Mokawama Al Watania Al Lobnani [3:06]
[a] 1. Ana Moush Kafer [5:03]
[b] 2. Shou Hal Ayyam [5:46]
[c] 3. A'anitham [4:37]
[d] 4. Shou A'ada Ma Bada [3:45]
[e] 5. Yessa'ed we Yea'en [5:05]
[f] 6. Bi Halyawmayn [3:46]
[g] 7. Bharf Esheen [1:12]
[h] 8. Bhaneek [5:34]
[i] 9. Al Mokawama Al Watania Al Lobnani [3:06]
[a] 1. Ana Moush Kafer [5:03]
[b] 2. Shou Hal Ayyam [5:46]
[c] 3. A'anitham [4:37]
[d] 4. Shou A'ada Ma Bada [3:45]
[e] 5. Yessa'ed we Yea'en [5:05]
[f] 6. Bi Halyawmayn [3:46]
[g] 7. Bharf Esheen [1:12]
[h] 8. Bhaneek [5:34]
[i] 9. Al Mokawama Al Watania Al Lobnani [3:06]
[a] a1. Ana Moush Kafer [5:03]
[b] a2. Shou Hal Ayyam [5:46]
[c] a3. A'anitham [4:37]
[d] a4. Shou A'ada Ma Bada [3:45]
[e] b1. Yessa'ed we Yea'en [5:05]
[f] b2. Bi Halyawmayn [3:46]
[g] b3. Bharf Esheen [1:12]
[h] b4. Bhaneek [5:34]
[i] b5 Al Mokawama Al Watania Al Lobnani [3:06]
[a] a1 | Ana Moush Kafer [5 03]
[b] a2 | Shou Hal Ayyam [5 46]
[c] a3 | A'anitham [4 37]
[d] a4 | Shou A'ada Ma Bada [3 45]
[e] b1 | Yessa'ed we Yea'en [5 05]
[f] b2 | Bi Halyawmayn [3 46]
[g] b3 | Bharf Esheen [1 12]
[h] b4 | Bhaneek [5 34]
[i] b5 | Al Mokawama Al Watania Al Lobnani [3 06]
[a] a1 | Ana Moush Kafer [5 03]
[b] a2 | Shou Hal Ayyam [5 46]
[c] a3 | A'anitham [4 37]
[d] a4 | Shou A'ada Ma Bada [3 45]
[e] b1 | Yessa'ed we Yea'en [5 05]
[f] b2 | Bi Halyawmayn [3 46]
[g] b3 | Bharf Esheen [1 12]
[h] b4 | Bhaneek [5 34]
[i] b5 | Al Mokawama Al Watania Al Lobnani [3 06]
[a] a1 | Ana Moush Kafer [5 03]
[b] a2 | Shou Hal Ayyam [5 46]
[c] a3 | A'anitham [4 37]
[d] a4 | Shou A'ada Ma Bada [3 45]
[e] b1 | Yessa'ed we Yea'en [5 05]
[f] b2 | Bi Halyawmayn [3 46]
[g] b3 | Bharf Esheen [1 12]
[h] b4 | Bhaneek [5 34]
[i] b5 | Al Mokawama Al Watania Al Lobnani [3 06]
Cristina Camargo broke onto the Brazilian boogie scene in 1980 with the single "Moral Tem Hora", penned by the by then already famous brothers Marcos and Paulo Valle. They were soon joined by the arranger/producer/musician powerhouse Robson Jorge and Lincoln Olivetti, who worked with practically all the big MPB stars from Jorge Ben and Gal Costa to Caetano Veloso and Gilberto Gil. Armed with the endless possibilities that the burgeoning Brazilian music scene provided, the group went into the studio and produced the eponymous debut album Cristina Camargo.
The result is a very special record built around that successful single that does what Brazil does best: blending their own musical heritage with sounds in vogue in the rest of the world, in this case the boogie disco that was all the rage in the USA in the first half of the 1980s. Expect endearing choirs, tight grooves, and a killer production value on par with the big-budget studios up north.
Cristina Camargo is available as a limited edition on yellow vinyl and includes an insert with lyrics.
In 2000, after almost two decades of hibernation under the ambient waves and dub currents of the Sargasso Sea, LSD revived the seminal ‘Auntie Aubrey's' series, an Orb Remix Project. Released as a 2 x CD compilation, Part 3 is a veritable smorgasbord of classic, new and unreleased labour-of love remixes that span three decades yet still transcend space and time.
Many influential artists have been involved with The Orb since the beginning, and the project keeps evolving and adapting. Dr. Alex Paterson, the gravitation centre of the Orb is known for his playfully subversive remixes and true to form this album highlights the diversity of his musical mind.
We see the good doctor remix the melancholy and evocative “The Last Lighthouse Keeper” from The Transit Kings, an early British electronic music group that included Jimmy Cauty of The KLF, one of the original members of The Orb. The remix of ‘Davy Jones’ Locker’ from System 7 takes you surfing on a sun-dappled sea of ambient dance nostalgia, while Killing Jokes’ ‘European Super State’ remix (in which LSD label founder Martin ‘Youth’ Glover plays bass guitar) sounds like the soundtrack for an imaginary spy thriller with the powerful lyrics and hypnotizing voice of Jaz Summers.
Legendary producer Youth teams up with Lx yet again on a psychedelic rocker with spellcasting vocals by Lara Smiles, and this is just the beginning! Boasting an all-star lineup, the compilation includes many of our scenes most esteemed electronic music producers such as Coldcut, David Harrow, Sendelica and Gaudi as well as the ambient blissed out vibes from the enigmatic DF Tram, Duende India Collective and The Gyuto Monks of Tibet, this collection offers up such the variety to appease even the most dedicated Orbsessives and music connoisseurs
Anyone who has had the sheer pleasure of seeing and hearing Leroy Burgess perform in concert will know just how amazing the live renditions of his iconic compositions of Disco Boogie hits and classics sound with a full band and a fully fueled audience. Accompanied by the ten piece French band and long time Leroy Burgess collaborative outfit Saving Coco, BBE Music is releasing live versions of two of those classics Let’s Do It and Big Time. Recorded and released by Rick James in 1980 Big Time is an absolute killer of a track that sounds so fresh decades later in this crowd energising performance. Famously released by Convertion Let’s Do It was a huge club hit in the early 1980s and is the perfect track to accompany Big Time on this release. Leroy Burgess is a certifiably genuine legend of Black music; his compositions have moved dancefloors across the world since the early 1970s as a member of Black Ivory, then Convertion, Paradise Garage favourites LOGG, Kleer and electro outfit Aleem. His collaborations with Patrick Adams, Inner Life, Dazzle and solo artists such as Eddie Kendricks, Rick James and Fonda Rae have cemented Leroy Burgess’ place in the annals of Black Music History. As a founder-member of the Universal Robot Band he co-wrote the massive perennial favourite Barely Breaking Even. Leroy Burgess feat. Saving Coco-Big Time/Let’s Do It is released as a 12″ vinyl and digital download and definitely belongs in the ‘make sure you get this’ category. Mixed by Marc Mac and mastered at the Grammy-nominated Carvery Studio by Frank Merritt. Available as 12″ vinyl and digital download. Release date September 25th, 2026
Killer Groove Records presents a new 7" by Electric Circus, pairing "High Fever" and "Ogres": raw, hypnotic funk built on obsessive bass lines, sharp horns, dub delays and wah-wah guitars.
Both tracks are taken from Rites, the band's second studio album, out November 27 on limited-edition LP, CD and digital. The 7" is limited to 500 copies worldwide and is out September 25.
On the A-side, "High Fever" maps Electric Circus's territory: '70s funk, Afrobeat and psychedelia meet in a steady build toward a climax of synths and groove. The track grew from a bass line written over one feverish weekend and runs as a single continuous rise in tension.
The groove takes its cue from The Meters, locking syncopated accents into place while a punchy horn section cuts through from the opening bar. Dub delays and layered textures then open the arrangement out, trading space with wah-wah guitars and a treated clavinet that sounds vintage without dating the mix. After a darker, nocturnal passage, the saxophone rises over percussion and synths for the climax.
On the B-side, "Ogres" was the first track conceived for the album and the last to be completed. It began as a bass-and-percussion ostinato in an Ethiopian pentatonic scale, modelled on a war march, and grew into a dense groove with psychedelic and trip-hop textures. Its rhythm conjures a twilight bestiary of dark, menacing or perhaps merely curious creatures, building to a tense climax before resolving into a smooth, dreamlike finale that suggests awakening, or re-emergence.
Like the rest of Rites, both tracks started in jam sessions and were recorded in stages: live takes of the core arrangements first, then dedicated sessions for synths, horns and overdubs. Marco Sirio Pivetti engineered at Metrò Rec Studio in Riva del Garda, Gio Solo at Sberdia Studio in Turin. Overdubs were reamped through tube amplifiers and analog outboard. The band co-produced with Pivetti, who also mixed; Riccardo Ricci mastered at Velvet Room Mastering Studio in Brighton.
Electric Circus are based in Turin. They released their debut album, Canicola, in 2018 and have toured the U.S. Scoring Contrecourant (2021), a documentary series shot in Senegal and Mali, led them to Sahel Roots, a duo from the north of the country. The two groups recorded On est ensemble (Mieruba, 2023) remotely between Turin and Bamako, each writing two pieces for the other to finish.
For fans of The Heliocentrics, Calibro 35, BADBADNOTGOOD.
In 1996, Busta Rhymes delivered his debut album, The Coming, three years after the Leaders of the New School unofficially disbanded. Though his talents were evident on those Leaders of the New School releases, Busta went on a series of features that only built up the public's desire for a solo Busta album. Right out of the gate, Busta dropped his classic debut single "Woo Hah!! (Got You All in Check)" that made it abundantly clear he was to be mentioned among Hip Hop's greatest solo artists. The energy and originality packed on that one song set a tone for the album that displays Busta's raw talent and ability to bend words with his ever rambunctious flow. The album features production by Easy Mo Bee, DJ Scratch, Q-Tip, and J Dilla. Songs such as "Everything Remains Raw", "Abandon Ship", and "Still Shining" all rise above as The Coming's stand-out tracks, but "Ill Vibe" is the album's crown jewel moment. Busta sounds right at home over this J Dilla beat, trading verses with his Native Tongue cohort Q-Tip. The Coming was a critical and commercial success for Busta Rhymes. It reached #6 on the Billboard 200 chart in 1996 and has since received a platinum certification from RIAA. As mentioned, The Coming boasts the hit single "Woo Hah!! Got You All in Check " which reached #8 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in 1996. It was nominated for a 1997 Grammy Award for Best Rap Solo Performance. It also ended up sporting another hit single, It's a Party featuring Zhané. The Coming shows amazing variety where Busta can break free from the bells and the whistles of the Busta Dungeon Dragon flow to explore other ways of leaving our jaws open by his incredible lyricism. The Coming surely lives up to its title, as Busta delivers a performance that ignited his impeccable solo career.
180g Heavy double vinyl LP with liner notes by Tyran Grillo. Limited Japanese Obi for the first pressing. Original artwork by Russell Mills and photography by Jean-Baptiste Mondino.
The third Time Capsule is a body of dub reinterpretations by celebrated producer Bill Laswell of Ethiopian singer Gigi. Curated by Tokyo record collector, music researcher and seasoned reissue supervisor Ken Hidaka, it is the first time Illuminated Audio is pressed to vinyl after its CD release in 2003.
Ejigayehu Shibabaw was born in 1974 in Chagni, northwestern Ethiopia and by pursuing a career as a singer, went against her father’s strict, traditional gender roles. As Gigi, she embraced the same musical freedom she had strived for in her personal life, incorporating the Ethiopian church, funk, hip-hop, West and South African music into her work. She first settled in Nairobi, then Addis Ababa, where she quickly established herself as one of the city’s leading singers. A move to San Francisco in 1998 led to a long and fruitful creative partnership with bassist and producer Bill Laswell.
Around the same time, Chris Blackwell had stepped away from Island Records to start the art house film company and label Palm Pictures. He took an interest in Gigi and together with Laswell, pulled together an all-star cast of musicians for her self-titled US debut album, including Herbie Hancock, Pharoah Sanders and Wayne Shorter. It won international critical acclaim, not just for its musicianship but for making Gigi a “defining voice for the Ethiopian expatriate community”, as journalist Tyran Grillo praises in his Time Capsule liner notes. From the nation-defining 1896 victory over Italian invaders to the quiet revolutionaries who wear simple shemma garments, Grillo believes the themes in Gigi make it “a shower of sunlight on her homeland for those ignorant of its struggles.”
After its success, Blackwell encouraged them to go back into the studio to rethink the album and Illuminated Audio was born. “Anyone can make a voice sound worldly”, Grillo remarks, “but rare are those who can make one sound inner-worldly.” Gigi was clear with Laswell to give her vocals a minor role “because it’s already been done.” Instead her Amharic verse is fleeting, exhaling through the textures like ghostly fragments; soaring yet muted. Yet the album is still titled under her name, an assertion by Laswell of her central role in the album’s creation. Not only was it a fully endorsed project by Gigi, but she would be present throughout its development, giving feedback on half-finished ideas as Laswell played them back in the studio. “It works perfectly”, she reflected after the album’s release. “We wanted to capture the whole spirit of each track, and Bill’s remixes create a different music language that really puts you in a pleasant place”.
This new vocabulary takes its lead from a technical approach that Laswell had been perfecting during a furtive creative period at the turn of the millennium. Much like his ambient interpretations of Miles Davis (Panthalassa, 1998), Bob Marley (Dreams of Freedom, 1997), and Carlos Santana (Divine Light, 2001), Laswell approached Illuminated Audio by returning to the original multitrack masters. Gigi wasn’t just reworked, but recomposed into an expansive lattice of instruments, submerged in a watery ambience of dub and trance undercurrents.
Sonically, this new language that Gigi refers to, is manifested by the original album’s more understated parts being pushed to the fore. Explaining his contrasting methods, Laswell saw Gigi as being “put together in a way that fits”. Contrastingly, in Illuminated Audio, “a lot of things that I featured in the remix weren’t as audible in the original.” Instrumentation laying near-dormant, deep in the mix, are brought to the fore: the acid rock guitar and Wayne Shorter’s saxophone on ‘Tew Ante Sew’, Graham Haynes’ flugelhorn on ‘Nafekeñ’, Laswell’s bass on ‘Kahn’, the melodica in Mengedegna or the floating synths and talking drums in ‘Gud Fella’.
Brought to his attention by mentor DJ Nori, Hidaka describes Illuminated Audio as a “masterful sonic exploration into ethereal ambience and dub” and made sure this reissue also contained a full remaster to give its “deep musicality” much better dynamics and density in the overall sound. Hidaka admits that Laswell's music “is sometimes so out-there, it is often misunderstood” and, indeed, to dub album non-believers this might seem like a prolific producer imposing himself on another artist’s work; eternally developing rearrangements that never quite get to its destination. But that’s missing its true power and triumph. This is more than the reissue of a remix, but “a wholly unique musical entity”, as Hidaka describes. Illuminated Audio refers to the illuminated manuscripts that comprise the major part of Ethiopian art and its new compositions stand in proud solitude as a rare body of reworks that both informs and enhances their originals.
Often credited as the father of multi-media theatre, Alwin Nikolais (1910-1993) took complete creative control over his productions - including cutting-edge approaches to lighting and costume that transformed human bodies into shifting sculptural shapes, while also composing wildly innovative electro-acoustic and synth-based audio as accompaniment.
After initially experimenting with musique concrète and tape manipulation (as demonstrated on the 1959 LP Choreosonic Music of the New Dance Theatre of Alwin Nikolais) Nikolais became the first owner of Robert Moog's synthesizer at the Audio Engineering Society convention in New York in late 1964. Relying heavily on the Moog and later the Synclavier synth/sampler, these 21 tracks document Nikolais' highly-prescient compositions across the mid 1960s through to the late 1980s - existing not only as extensions of his other-worldly choreographic productions, but standalone pieces of foundational mid-century American electronic and experimental music.
"Born in Southington, Connecticut in 1910, Nikolais’s early years and early career were in acting, music and puppetry. It was not until the late 1930s that he began his work as dancer/choreographer in Hartford, Connecticut, where he was commissioned by the Avery Memorial Theatre, a part of the Wadsworth Atheneum, to create an evening-length work to the music of Ernst Krenek. Previously his work and study as a pianist-organist found him accompanying silent films. This sort of accompaniment required from the musician not only a playing skill but also a versatility in improvisation, matching movement to sound, and evoking mood to situation.
Nik was drawn initially to dance by his involvement with the percussion scores used by the illustrious early twentieth century German dancer Mary Wigman. In trying to learn more about percussion, he was lured into dance class and thus his career began. His development of music and dance occurred simultaneously. His introduction to the twelve-tone technique opened his mind to the expanding areas of atonal music, and his dealing with music as sound per se. In 1948, after being appointed director of the Henry Street Playhouse in New York, Nikolais formed the Playhouse Dance Company, later known as the Nikolais Dance Theater, and began his aesthetic orientation toward dance as a study of motion. By the 1950s, he had ceased creating literal dances and began his explorations and eventual milieu as an abstractionist.
Sound became an important part of his abstract theatre. For his first dances, which involved his new thinking of dance as both a visual and kinetic art, he used live percussion scores in which he directed his dancers to play instruments of all nature. There was a combination of children’s toy instruments as well as harsh and resonant automobile brake drums, and other pitched auto parts which he also used to accompany classes. Once he installed his own tape recording machines, he quickly used the limited range these instruments provided in a new way, slowing and increasing speed and reversing sound. He also made the sounds adhere to the choreographic structure (not the other way around), thereby giving the dance its independence from the musical phrasing. But the real need remained: the search for new sound. Nik made a sound library, recording noises and percussion and vocal sounds, which the French aptly called musique concrète. Needless to say, he became a master at splicing bits and pieces.
From 1956 to 1962 Nikolais composed eleven major scores for his theatre pieces using such techniques. In 1963, James Seawright, who at the time was assisting Nik in his productions and also working at the Columbia-Princeton Center for Electronic Music, recorded a sound bank for the production Imago (1963). With this material, Nikolais created his first synthesizer score. Imago won the Paris Grand Prix in 1968 and launched the Nikolais Dance Theatre towards its national and primarily international acclaim.
During the same period, Seawright came to Nik and told him of a young man who had invented and constructed a simplified synthesizer and insisted that Nik visit the electronic fair currently being held in New York. Nik did so and met Robert Moog. He was completely taken by the new machine and after making some suggestions to Moog, (which Moog made), Nik bought the inventor’s first machine with the aid of a Guggenheim Fellowship. Moog himself was astonished by what his machine could produce for Nik. This machine was later acquired by the Museum of Musical Instruments at the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor as the first Moog synthesizer. The Synclavier was Nik’s next source of sound and since the mid-1970s remained the major instrument in the Nikolais soundroom.
Alwin Nikolais has been honored and awarded throughout the world. He has received the French Legion of Honor, the Kennedy Center Honors, National Medal of the Arts, two Guggenheim Fellowships, as well as Mellon, Ford, and Rockefeller grants. He has been a recipient of NEA grants since 1966, been awarded five honorary doctorates, all for his remarkable achievements in Dance Theater. His genius has influenced several generations of artists."
—Murray Louis
Compiled onto one vinyl album for the first time, Landlocked (Numbers, 2026) presents Hallucinator’s 1999 debut album originally released under Mark Ernestus and Moritz von Oswald’s label Chain Reaction. Writing much surrounding the culture of what would be later considered ‘Dub Techno’ and its’ primary distribution center, Hard Wax, leads one down roads of shifting primary sources and decades old overheard smoke break recollections. Maybe brevity primes the listener to the paralinguistic to approach the sound on its terms; focusing on how things are uttered and not what.
This theory will remain unconfirmed. Hallucinator original press release left us with three or so gestures to consider over the years since:
“A new act on CHAIN REACTION”s distinct productional thesis. HALLUCINATOR are 3 people from he UK/London and this their first release ever- that’s all what the artists want to let us know…. This record is dedidacted to the memory of Stephen Lawrence!”
The first gesture is one of personnel. Since ’99, we’ve gotten to learn a bit more about the artists behind the Hallucinator project. All London-based, all writers, composers, and sound-designers— Anna Piva, Edward George, Trevor Mathison. These three seem to flow between parameters as aesthetic tactic and tacit structure to the work itself. For example, other collaborative shapes have come from this lineup including Flow Motion (Piva, George and Mathison) as well as the now defunct Black Audio Film Collective of which George and Mathison are founding members.
The second gesture is in the second line of the previous press release, “distinct productional thesis.” Much of Landlocked’s affect and sequencing seems to suggest an emotional study of entropy at the level of sediment. Rhythms play with space and capacity through polyvalence. The production chose subtractive vertigo, often switching and bringing back in elements that vanished from the track 6 minutes ago. Dubbing out so much of a track, one begins to associate sound akin to memories held in the experience of running your hand across a concrete block as a child. Felt (re)memberance in lieu of narrative tale. Using textures that flicker between colour and percussion, Hallucinator’s 12-tracker of loudspeaker perception music might be a mediation on the psychic wake of the Cold War. Intermittent strata of ambience and groove convects an active margin rifting event underneath a scorched geology of power in Western Europe. Again, this is all grapevine hearsay.
But it’s silence that voices the third gesture. The album’s sparse application of the written word touches on the ennui paradox of being landlocked on an island. Stuck. Trapped in the psychosis of occidental hypercentricism. A looping silence of Black British tragedy: “to the memory of Stephen Lawrence”. 18 year-old Lawrence was stabbed to death at a bus stop in southeast London by six white men in 1993. The rift of grief and implicit reiteration of modern subordination left by this hate act went legally silent for almost two decades until Lawrence’s killers were ultimately sentenced to virtually life in jail in 2012. Only six years removed at the time of Hallucinator’s initial invocation of rememory, the mind-numbing accretion of what Black Studies Professor Denise Ferreira da Silva might call “unpayable debt”, finds demonic ground across Landlocked, forming an aural sense of what continues to be refused.
The album ventures through spaces of overactive non-happenings: ‘Red Angel’’s factory floor dub flashes between smokestack and jungle visions, or the halfway mark’s stilted breath of ‘Dusk’ lending its mood to the sort of sedated dreams built from daily life under colony rule for instance. That linked rhythm links us back to our linked fates across Black and Brown folk is real, thus the syncopated signals through this work behave on the level of transnational radiotelegraphy, sounding out its windswept tension of a body negotiating a meat-grinder schema of linear production and wage for others to know that unspeakable thing can be broadcast in every drum tongue.
As the silence continues to reverb, we return to the sort of meaning-making that cannot be told but felt. Soothing to some, disturbing to others. Landlocked, a Rorschach test for a crumbled empire.
Two years in the making, “Talk About It” delivers on all the hype and promise of Blimes and Gab's 20-million-view YouTube sensation “Come Correct,” which blew up the Internet. (It’s included here as a vinyl-only bonus song on side D!) Hip-hop heavyweights Method Man, Jay Park, Bahamadia, and Iamsu! each drop by for features. The song “Feelin It” appeared on HBO’s Insecure. Single "Hot Damn" was featured in the soundtrack for the movie Cut Throat City. Uproxx Music named "Talk About It" one of their top albums of the year. Billboard says “Blimes and Gab drip with pure swagger: Seducing the listener with entrancing melodies and hot-and-heavy lyrics,” while Variety describes “Feelin It" as "the perfect summer song.” This deluxe double LP is pressed on yellow and black vinyl and includes liner notes by Miss Casey Carter. Only 500 individually numbered copies have been made.
Muyei Power or Orchestre Muyei (muyei means 'our country') was one of the top dance bands of the1970s in Sierra Leone. Soundway Records' first collection of music from this West African country ('Muyei Power: Sierra Leone in 1970s USA') is an album of rock-infused, 'afro' music from a group that traveled the world throughout the mid 1970s. Fusing elements of electric Congolese and Nigerian music with fast, syncopated, uptempo modernised arrangements of traditional music, Muyei Power produced a series of unique single-only releases that have been unavailable for 35 years. The rare recordings featured here are a glimpse of a dynamic and powerful band at the very height of its powers.
Even though lyrically Orchestre Muyei focused on traditional themes and songs, the arrangements and formulation of the instrumental side of things still very much reflected the mixed nature of urban Sierra Leone music, exemplified by a small collection of bands that also included Afro National, Sabanoh 75 and Super Combo.
For the early part of 1970s the band toured extensively throughout Sierra Leone, Liberia and Côte d'Ivoire before making a handful of 45s in local TV and radio studios. The recordings featured here however come from a period of touring the college circuit in California during late 1975 and early 1976. Later that year, as they played the colleges of the east coast, they gave the tracks to the owner of the African Record Centre in Brooklyn, New York. He initially released two of them on his in-house Makossa Records label as 7-inch 45rpm singles in 1976. The tracks from 1975/6 were then not heard of again until 1979/80 when the African Record Centre released many of them on a series of Makossa Records 12's that sounded far superior than the records that had been released a few years earlier.
Orchestre Muyei Power finally split up in 1979 leaving no proper album releases and only a handful of recordings for us to enjoy all these years later.
New pressing on black vinyl (500 units). Following the recently released and highly praised Trees 50th Anniversary box set on Earth Recordings, Trees reissue their debut album ‘The Garden of Jane Delawney’as a standalone release. It’s now over fifty years since Trees’ formation, a band who helped define ‘Acid Folk’, creating a sub-category in the lexicon of record dealers and music critics alike. “When we are talking about psych folk or acid folk, we are really talking about music like this by Trees” Stuart Maconie, BBC6 Music. Trees first album, ‘The Garden of Jane Delawney’ (1970) snuggles nicely into contemporary nu-folkies’ idea of the genre, and shares some of the pastoral-whimsy that characterised The Incredible String Band or Donovan, offset by some stunning interpretations of traditional material and Bias’ own songs. The record includes readings of ‘Lady Margaret’, ‘Glasgerion’, the old standard ‘She Moved Thro’ The Fair’, and the extended fade of the group’s own ‘Road’, presage the explosive instrumental duelling that would come to characterise the follow up album, ‘On The Shore’. // “The music’s arcane power remains intact” Mojo. // “A fantastic band” Record Collector. // “Spectacular” Uncut. // “Sublime” Shindig. // Timeless” Prog. // “It’s these two original albums that stand as pinnacles of form” The Wire. // Track listing: A1. Nothing Special A2. The Great Silkie A3. The Garden of Jane Delawney A4. Lady Margaret B1. Glasgerion B2. She Moved Thro' The Fair B3. Road B4. Epitaph B5. Snail's Lament
Rekids drops a brand new T this fall, coming in two colour ways and featuring the label’s ’Stay Out All Night’ motif and character, referencing Radio Slave’s club anthem of the same name.
Having collaborated with global brands such as Beams in Japan and Berlin’s Being Hunted, Radio Slave and Rekids have been creating t-shirts since the label's inception back in 2006, with Matt Edwards (aka Radio Slave) even launching a spin-off clothing label ‘Electric Uniform’ in 2014.
T-shirts are hand-screened heavyweight 100% cotton, and built for staying out all night.
PURE GARAGE RETURNS WITH A CAREFULLY CURATED SELECTION OF COLLECTIBLE CLASSICS.
Pure Garage, the best-selling UKG compilation of all time, returns with a fresh stack of high value collectible classics on DJ friendly vinyl.
With a host of gold & platinum selling compilation albums under it’s belt, plus countless sold out events across the UK, Pure Garage is known and trusted by both hard-nosed purists & the casual listener.
This latest foray coincides with an incredible resurgence in interest for the UK Garage sound, bringing together 8 high collectible infectiously funky cuts, spread across a DJ Friendly 2 slices of vinyl.
Pure Garage Collectible Classics Volume 1 opens with Buggin Me by garage pioneer Zed Bias alongside Al Brown, a groovy bassline, funky beats and a great vocal hook combine perfectly to showcase the mighty Zed Bias at his funky best.
Set It Off, by Chris Mack / Flavour, is a truly collectible record. Originally only available on vinyl as a limited white label press, copies of Set It Off have been trading hands on sites such as Discogs for as much as £130… It’s worth buying this compilation purely to get hold of this track on vinyl!
Another track that is going for big money on reseller sites is Romantic 2001 by DJ Deller. With this minimal 2 step riddim having sold for up to £120. This is definitely one for the collectors.
Funkaholics aka Jeremy Sylvester rounds off the first piece of vinyl on this album with the bass heavy Down 2 Da Ground.
Vinyl 2 kicks off with the sing-a-long classic from 1998, Anthill Mobs’s track Don’t Leave Me, followed hotly by the speed garage sounds of Body Grooving by M.F. Project.
Finally, Deep Impact drops My Fantasy followed up with a regular name of the Pure Garage live event line ups, Scott Garcia drops his soulful club classic Music Takes You, rounding out an impressive batch of tracks representing everything exciting about the UK Garage genre.
PURE GARAGE COLLECTIBLE CLASSICS VOL 1 will be released on double vinyl 16th December 2022!
Dire Straits' arresting self-titled debut arrived in the midst of punk's reign but couldn't have been further removed from the era's slash-and-burn style. Recorded in West London in February 1978, the band's tasteful, jazz-inflected set embraces folk, blues, and pub rock while also tracing a direct line back to the beat-oriented sound of early rock n' roll. Country and roots accents further distinguish the British quartet's stripped-down music from any 1970s peers, as does the transparent production, which has remained revered among audiophiles the world over – and which has never been better than on this meticulous pressing.
Mastered from the original master tapes and pressed at RTI, Mobile Fidelity's 180g 45RPM 2LP version of Dire Straits features natural tonalities, superb balances, you-are-there imaging, deep-black backgrounds, and pristine clarity. Even if you've heard this album hundreds of times before, you've never experienced it with such lifelike sonics and premium richness. This numbered-edition collector's set immerses you within the smoky, laidback atmospherics of every song. This is how all vinyl should sound.
Crucial to every arrangement, Mark Knopfler's winding guitar lines emerge with supreme transparency and multi-hued textural detail. His intricate playing comes across as if it's being transmitted via his 60s-era Fender Vibrolux amplifier placed right before you. The cleanliness, dimensions, and live feel are that good. His bandmates, too, benefit from the extra groove space afforded by this 45RPM edition. Rhythms skate and swirl; percussive effects resonate with crispness and attack; the leading edges of notes naturally decay.
Dire Straits' strong, well-edited batch of original material further enhances the overall enjoyment and makes the record one whose pleasures go far beyond the organic sonics. Just as Knopfler's narratives pour forth with poetic and surrealist texts, the musical settings – an intoxicating combination of easygoing shuffles, back-hall boogies, and pop-honed ballads – mirror the old-fashioned soulfulness inherent in the classic recordings of the late 50s and early 60s. The lyrics are equally captivating.
Drawing from his time as a youth in Newcastle, Leeds, and London, Knopfler invests tunes with an autobiographical slant and emotional connectivity that become obvious the moment he opens his mouth to sing. "Down to the Waterline," "Wild West End," and "Lions" all feature colloquial touches that add to their reach. By extension, "In the Gallery" functions as a tribute to Leeds sculptor Harry Phillips (father of future Knoplfer collaborator, Steve Phillips) while the record's breakout smash, "Sultans of Swing," pays homage to struggling bar bands.
Through it all, Dire Straits performs with a subtle cool and clever poise that no band ever matched. Just how good is the chemistry? Bob Dylan heard the quartet and invited Knopfler and drummer Pick Withers to play on Slow Train Coming. But even Dylan himself didn't hear Dire Straits sound this magnetic back in its original heyday. Now, everyone can.
Djrum's first release since 2019, the Meaning’s Edge EP is an introduction to a whole new world. For the artist also known as Felix Manuel, it was created in the final stretches of six rather traumatic years work. Having carefully honed his techniques and aesthetics, and learned some hard-won emotional lessons over this time, finally he began to work in a quicker, lighter fashion – and to cleanse his palate a little by bringing in a fresh ingredient: his own flute playing. For listeners, though, it will serve as an appetiser, a way into the delights and complexities of this new phase of his creativity.
It’s a serious work in its own right, mind. The use of flutes – including Bansuri, Shakuhatchi, Western Classical, and synthesised all blending and blurring into one another – gives it a coherence and a sense of airiness that unites the five tracks over half an hour, however divergent their beats get. And as in all his music, Felix’s whole life is in here. Ethnomusicology studies, untold hours of DJing everywhere from the gnarliest squat raves to the most rarefied deep house clubs, explorations of his own neurological and emotional makeup, and the technical finesse of someone who is never not creating music or art, all roll into an experience that’s dazzling, delightful and keeps on giving.
Just the opening track ‘Codex’ alone touches on OG dubstep, Aphex Twin-like braindance, post-classical exploration, movie themes and more. The gentle tones and melodies that rise up out of it perfectly conjure Felix’s running theme of a protective bubble that provides a sense of safety and tranquillity even as the beats and acid gurgles and spurts all around it conjure up the slings and arrows of life’s difficulties.
The tone set, the EP moves through ultra-rarefied glass-like percussion in an almost ambient setting, hints of grime’s counterintuitive patterns, and even more hectic patterns influenced by Tanzania’s hyperspeed singeli style of dance music – but always with that perfect balance of chaos and control, unpredictability and protection. It rewards playing and replaying endlessly, it’s a profound and often joyous experience… and it’s only just the beginning. This is the return of a master craftsperson more focused than ever on his vision and vocation and ready to blow your mind all over again.
Mastered and cut on 140g black vinyl by legendary mastering engineer Matt Colton at Metropolis Studios, London. Pressed at optimal media, Germany.
Tomu DJ’s debut on CST Imprint shares ten atmospheric wistful ruminations on being, living, and the spiritual undercurrents that alchemize these experiences into song. Hazy memories recalled through glitchy lush lullabies, moving through whispered skittery percussive states into warm melodic vocal confessions. Playful yet exacting productions ebb and flow between pensive indietronica pop interspersed with blissful club tracks that swing from ambient, drum and bass, breaks and house for the dancers. A sanguine daydream, to be free.
Her fourth album since 2021 but first on vinyl, Tomu’s deceptively simple compositions bely complex emotions. Minimal, every element just so, nothing unnecessary. Her ability to create ideal environments for collaboration on full display.
One of the most popular and notorious of all British hardcore acts, the Exploited were formed on a dire Edinburgh council estate in 1978 by singer Terry Buchan and guitarist Stevie Ross, although Buchan’s brother Wattie would soon become leader and the lineup seldom stayed stable. Influenced by the Pistols, they built their large working class and skinhead following through an aggressive, fast-paced, and uncensored hardcore style. Gathering singles from their street punk days and the best tracks from their first three albums, Totally Exploited was the band’s first compilation and it remains the best by far. Essential Exploited!
Since 1992, Robin Storey (founding member of the pioneering post-industrial band Zoviet*France) has been creating innovative and thought-provoking music under the Rapoon moniker. Drawing inspiration from his early days with Z*F, he continues to push the boundaries of ambient, industrial, and world music genres, earning him a dedicated following across the globe.
Originally available in 1994 as a limited-edition DAT tape through Staalplaat Records, Cidar was later included as a bonus CD in the reissue of another Rapoon classic, Fallen Gods. Now, after years of anticipation, fans can experience this mesmerizing work as a stand-alone release – remastered and expanded with three previously unreleased tracks from the original 1994 recording sessions.
Cidar showcases Robin’s signature sound – a seamless blend of Z*F-inspired drones and loops intertwined with vibrant African percussion and hauntingly beautiful Asian string instruments. This combination creates an immersive, trance-like atmosphere that transports listeners into a world of meditative sonic exploration.
With its enchanting rhythms and deeply textured layers, Cidar stands as a testament to Robin’s unparalleled ability to craft music that defies genre boundaries while remaining instantly recognizable. Fans of both Zoviet*France and Rapoon will find themselves drawn into the hypnotic sounds of this timeless masterpiece.
The standalone release of Cidar marks an important milestone in the history of experimental music, offering audiences worldwide the opportunity to rediscover or experience for the first time one of Robin Storey’s most influential works.