Buscar:cover

George Otsuka (or Ohtsuka), sadly passed away in March 2020, was one of Japan’s most renowned jazz drummers. ‘Sea Breeze’, released in 1971on the Union label, is his first record in quintet formation and is reissued here on a single LP housed in a gatefold sleeve.

And we can say that George Otsuka knew how to surround himself: Shunzo Ohno is on trumpet and Flugelhorn, Takao Uematsu on tenor sax and soprano, Takashi Mizuhashi on bass and Hideo Ichikawa on electric piano.

If all the tracks on this album are solid, included the astonishing cover of “Fool on the Hill”, it is especially “Sea Breeze”, the eponymous track opening the album that will make an impression. A super and long jazz-funk track where the five musicians, in perfect osmosis, leave each other enough space to express the full extent of their talent.

Recent copies of the original vinyl,which were only released in Japan have sold for £200-300.

In celebration of the 20th anniversary of the release legendary singer/ guitarist Thalia Zedek's Been Here and Gone, Thrill Jockey is proud to present the album unlike it has ever been heard before: on vinyl, re-mastered by Sarah Register. Thalia Zedek has been one of the most enduring rock musicians of the past four decades. From her auspicious beginnings in bands Uzi, Live Skull, and Dangerous Birds to her wider recognition in Come, Zedek established herself as a singular voice accruing accolades from critics and contemporaries including J. Mascis, Kurt Cobain, and Bob Mould. Been Here and Gone, her debut solo release originally released on Matador in 2001 on CD, marked a turning point in Zedek's music. As Come was coming to a close, Zedek began exploring writing and performing as a solo artist, eventually backed by violist David Curry, pianist Mel Lederman (both of which went on to perform with Zedek for two decades), as well as former Come bandmates Chris Brokaw and Daniel Coughlin. The idiosyncrasies of her voice were laid bare for the first time, revealing an even greater depth to her unique songwriting. The more spacious and rich arrangements sprawl and whisper with powerful vulnerability. "There was definitely something magical about the making of Been Here and Gone," says Zedek. "I'm not sure if it was because it was made at a studio called Higher Power in a recently desanctified church in Stuyvesant, NY, or if it was because it was the end of a century, not to mention a millennium, the end of a decade of being in Come, the longest running band I'd had up to that point, and the end of 5 years of unhappy breakups and tumultuous relationships in my personal life." The eleven tracks that comprise Been Here and Gone embody that tension of uncertainty with a hopeful edge of renewal. Zedek's indelible resilience lifts even the somberest laments into triumphs. Even on the album's three cover tunes, including a haunting rendition of Leonard Cohen's "Dance Me to the End of Love," Zedek's voice and guitar color every note with raw emotion, making each passing gesture personal. Been Here and Gone channels the thunder and roar of Zedek's past into a fragile magnificence.

"Since its beginnings in Jamaica in 1959, the story of the pioneering Island Records label has been inextricably linked to the story of its founder, Chris Blackwell. Now, Blackwell has curated a series of compilation LPs featuring his hand-picked tracks that correspond with his and Island’s legendary history.
On July 23, Island Records / UMC will release Volume Two of The Vinyl Series, a nine-track album covering the years 1969 to 1973. Volume One, which included pivotal songs from 1962 to 1969, will also be available, and Volume Three will follow later this year. Taken together, the set explores the wide-ranging highlights from Island’s remarkable and extensive catalog. "

In 1979 as a 15-year-old Eddie Piller was perfectly placed to be at the epicentre of the Mod revival. An inquisitive passion
for music, a family connection to Mod royalty The Small Faces, and an attitude that saw him travelling his home city, then
the country and then the world to take in the sounds that were emerging. In the years since, Piller has been a legendary
figure within the music industry setting up and continuing to own the ground-breaking Acid Jazz label, signing multiplatinum artists such as Jamiroquai and The Brand New Heavies collaborating on compilations with Martin Freeman and as
an award winning broadcaster even setting up his own Totally Wired Radio station. In The Mod Revival he looks back at the
movement that set him on his way.
• Mod is a sixties youth movement original built on sharp clothes, American soul music and nights on the town, that has never
really died. The originals added young British groups to their likes and then moved on, but their influence echoed on
through the 1970s in Northern Soul clubs, and in the sixties influenced bands of the pub rock era. When punk arrived, it was
supposed to sweep away the past, but instead the Sex Pistols were covering the Small Faces. The Clash brought in Mod DJ
Guy Stevens to produce London’s Calling, The Buzzcocks sounded closer to the Hollies than The Ramones and in The Jam’s
Paul Weller there was a musical and sartorial nod to the past of The Who, The Beatles and pop art arrows.
• Weller had spent the 1970s becoming obsessed by mod and saw punk as having a similar youthful energy to the era he had
missed by being born a decade too late. For others Weller’s style proved an inspiration, and as the Jam broke through in late
1978, they saw a wave of bands follow in their wake, and they themselves influenced others to form their own groups. But
there were other things. In bleak late 70s Britain the glorious optimism of the 1960s looked bright and shiny, and as it was
only a decade or so in the past, it was easy to pick up original records, clothes and books for pennies, and as you bought
these you met other like-minded souls who did the same. For those a little too young for punk, it was a community of gigs,
scooters, clothes, bands and records, and for many it developed on through.
• Eddie never stopped being a mod and has a unique perspective having now lived through four decades of being intimately
involved in the music that has emerged from the mod scene. In this part two double vinyl edition (Part 1 and its CD
equivalent reached #14 in the UK compilations charts) Ed guides us through some of his favourite music from the scene. He
guides us through a plethora of bands whose influences include The Who, The Kinks and the Jam, to sixties soul and R&B,
those with an eye on psychedelia. The records have a vitality and a certain stylish swagger to them, that marks them out as
mod. In the deluxe booklet, Piller has written a 5000 word note describing what it meant to him and has granted access to
his own scrapbooksfrom his many years of gig-going from which pages and memorabilia are reproduced.
• Eddie Piller’s Mod Revival is a personal appraisal from the founder of The Modcast, on what the mod explosion of the late
70s and 80s means to him…

Spanning four decades over 32 years, The Trojans have constantly evolved, re-inventing themselves through several incarnations
while always remaining one happy family.
Formed By Gaz Mayall in the Autumn of 1986 after the demise of his first band, Gaz's Rebel Blues Rockers, The Trojans filled a gap
on the ska scene of the time of the time with a sound that encompassed ska and reggae with a dash of soul, funk, R&B and world roots.
During the first few years they recorded several albums that were well received on the UK underground, all on Gaz's own
independent label Gaz's Rockin' Records. The first was 'Ala-Ska' which featured the classic single 'Gaelic Ska' and launched a whole
new genre of Afro-Celtic fusion that has since become a hallmark of The Trojans' sound.
The 12 tracks included here cover the three main incarnations of The Trojans line-ups and features guest appearances from Prince
Buster, Jennie Bellestar and Zoe Devlin. Now available exclusively for RSD 2019 on 180g vinyl - a very limited Red edition and a
limited Black version

Emotional Rescue and HMV Record Shop (Japan) team up to present six limited edition 7"s of DISCO REGGAE LOVERS music. Featuring Sugar Minnott, Dambala, One Blood, 101 Band, Red Cloud and here to start, for the first time ever as a single, Ernest Ranglin's, cover of The Dramatics R&B classic, In The Rain.

A defining guitarist and composer in the development of Jamaican music, Ranglin's career spanned mento to reggae, playing on the groundbreaking recording of My Boy Lollipop itself, before going on to work with the likes of the Skatalies, Jimmy Cliff and Bob Marley.

Moving to Florida in 1982, he teamed up with Noel Williams to mix the bass heavy sound the producer was famous for with Ranglin's unique playing. Featuring a who's who of the Miami scene including Bobby Caldwell, Timmy Thomas, Betty Wright and Williams himself, In The Rain continued the link between R&B and reggae to sweet perfection.

To accompany, for half this series, a modern producer offers their own remix. Here Nik Weston, DJ, promoter and owner of the respected Mukatsuku label, releasing afro, jazz dance and more and with a long standing association with Japan, presents here an instrumental dub - letting the groove roll and Ranglin's ubiquitous playing to shine."

Clear Vinyl

Freddy Fresh is a legend. Period. From a plethora of 12“es on labels like Nu Groove, Drop Bass Network, Forced Nostalgia, Spaziotempo, Lone Romantic or Toolbox Killers to albums on 90s scene mainstays like Harthouse, Anodyne or Eye Q to countless releases on his own imprints like Howlin Records, Analog Records USA and Electric Music Foundation. From remixes for the likes of GusGus, Heaven 17, Kitachi, Steve Stoll, Frankie Bones and many more to hitting the UK Top 40 with the massive BigBeat smasher „Badder Badder Schwing“
produced alongside Fatboy Slim. The man has done it all. Nearly.
And therefore Intrauterin Recordings is proud to present the first ever Drum'n'Bass release in the more than 30 year spanning career of the one and only Freddy Fresh!
With „333“ Freddy Fresh is going down a twisted, hard stepping and yet positive alley of what the man himself refers to as Modular Drum'n'Bass that is unmistakably cooked up live and direct in his Minneapolis-based studio. Expect a whirlwind of swirls, swooshes, bleeps and FX alongside raw junglistic beats and the most positive Synth bass motif you've heard in a long while.
Yet the singles' main dancefloor smash is to be found on the flip side. „Watch It Go Roun Roun“ is a raw classic, a heavy original JumpUp banger driven by a killer vocal performance by Mike Gates a.k.a. Mikey Dredd. Likely better known to many for his Techno productions on labels like Kanzleramt, Creation Rebel or Howlin Records rather than for his MC skills this is the very first time Mikey Dredd's secret love for taking up the microphone as a proper Jungle / Drum'n'Bass MC is officially recognized and revealed on wax as a late tribute to and
honoration of a large scale talent which passed away way too soon in 2019. Lighter crew!
Initial pressing will be limited to 225 copies on 7“ whitelabel vinyl. Hand-stamped with stickered cover.


b B1: Watch It Go Roun Roun featuring Mikey Dredd

For this 1969 recording Wolfgang Dauner expands beyond his more typical jazz settings, introducing psych and eastern raga touches with the fuzz guitar and sitar of Siegfried Schwab. The trippy ‘Sun Is Rising’, aka ‘Take Off Your Clothes to Feel the Setting Sun’, is perhaps the highpoint of Dauner’s short-lived Oimels band. Side B’s ‘A Day In The Life’ reworks the Beatles cover into a minimalistic masterpiece. Previously released in edited form on an impossibly rare 1970 MPS single, this release now features the full length 3:56 version on the A side.

"Gaspard Auge is releasing his Debut Album “Escapades”, out in June 25th
He is best known as one half of Justice, the duo that united rock and rave and whose dancefloor smashes defined a generation.
Gaspard made an instrumental album whose sound will be familiar to Justice ’s fanbase , echoing some previous works & inspirations of the cult duet.
Escapades sounds like a UFO landing from another galaxy, or time, a baroque masterpiece that reimagines European classical music for this century. OFFICIAL BBC THEME FOR THEIR COVERAGE OF THE EUROS."

Muse celebrate the twentieth anniversary of ‘Origin Of Symmetry’ by releasing ‘Origin Of Symmetry: XX Anniversary RemiXX’ on Warner Records. The new edition features remixed and remastered audio plus re-imagined artwork and will be released on digital formats on June 18th before two vinyl packages follow on July 9th.



As the album’s anniversary approached, Muse asked the Grammy-winning producer Rich Costey, who has produced or mixed material on almost every subsequent record, to revisit the original recordings. Whereas most remix albums aim to radically rework the material, or to switch to an entirely different genre, the band and Costey wanted to provide a renewed clarity with a more open, dynamic and less crushed sound. This highlights parts and ideas previously buried or muted on the original mixes, like a harpsichord on ‘Micro Cuts’ and Abbey Road recorded strings on ‘Citizen Erased’, ‘Megalomania’ and ’Space Dementia’.



And that’s precisely what has been achieved. From the visceral opening riff of ‘New Born’ to the cinematic melancholy of the closing ‘Megalomania’ via the staggering scope of fan favourite ‘Citizen Erased’, the remix unveils every facet of the album’s intricate production alongside a new-found warmth. It further benefits from mastering courtesy of Alex Wharton at Abbey Road Studios.



Matt Bellamy said:



"In revisiting the album what we found was the original mixes on the singles, like ‘Plug In Baby’ and ‘Bliss’, were pretty good so they were the hardest ones to improve. It was the deeper album tracks like ‘Micro Cuts’ where we were able to make massive breakthroughs."



The ‘XX Anniversary RemiXX’ also adds ‘Futurism’ to the tracklist. Originally a bonus track on the album’s Japanese edition and subsequently tagged to the end of the album on streaming services, ‘Futurism’ now adds a burst of energy to bridge the gap between ‘Feeling Good’ and ‘Megalomania’. This reflects its placing on the 2019 box set ‘Origin of Muse’.



‘Origin of Symmetry: XX Anniversary RemiXX’ is completed with a modernised reimagination of the album’s cover art courtesy of Sujin Kim. The visual artist has created a hyper-realistic 3D rendering of William Eager’s original cover image.



‘Origin of Symmetry: XX Anniversary RemiXX’ is now available to pre-order, with ‘Citizen Erased’ provided as an instant download. A limited edition exclusive 140 gram coloured double-vinyl set is available from the band’s official store. A striking package and a must-have item for collectors, it features LP1 on translucent sun yellow vinyl and LP2 on translucent orange vinyl. It will also be released on double black vinyl and digital formats. Both versions of the vinyl feature an unorthodox detail: the sides are marked M, U, S and E rather than the standard format

The third highly anticipated full-length album by WORMWOOD, follow-up to the praised in the media album
“Nattarvet”
Wormwood are one of the leading bands on the Swedish metal scene!
Contains 3 bonus tracks, “Shipwrecked & Northbound – Redux”, “The Weeping Song” (Nick Cave cover),
”Caravanserai” (Loreena McKennitt cover).
Vinyl version includes the novel for “The Archive”, book written by Swedish author Mikael Strömberg in a
32 page 12” booklet. Both in Swedish and English.
BOTH ON CD AND DOUBLE TRANSPARENT WHITE LP FOR RSD
Mixed and Mastered by Jonathan Ojeda, Break the Norm Productions. Well known engineer in the
mainstream pop genres (Molly Sandén, Mohombi, Jay Sean, Wyclef and more).
The concept of the album is based on humans' destructiveness and inability to adapt to nature and how we
in the end deserve to die.
Alongside the album release, a cinematic music video "The White Archive" follows the desperation after an
unprecedented catastrophe in Sweden.
WORWOOD has a very strong and dedicated fan base that’s growing rapidly, especially in Europe
(Germany, France, Netherlands etc), UK and the US.

Hitting number two in the UK album chart and with over a billion streams, in Dissimulation KSI creates space for both his public persona and the personal: big hit features with the likes of Rick Ross and Lil Baby (Down Like That) and AJ Tracey (Tides) sit alongside more intimate, honest tracks. No stranger to defying expectations, Dissimulation received critical acclaim. Clash labelled it “an excellent body of work”; “he’s absolutely smashed it” proclaimed Metro.

It’s no surprise that KSI has been seen on the cover of The Sunday Times Magazine and Music Week; The Observer Magazine, Viper and Notion. Other labels and artists want a piece of the KSI pie too: just look to the success of his features on S1mba’s Loose and Nathan Dawe’s BRIT nominated Lighter. 



With his second album on the horizon, a 2021 tour which sold out in seconds, the launch of his own label and a single with Craig David (Really Love), Anne-Marie (Don’t Play) and YUNGBLUD (Patience), KSI is proving that music is very much his domain. 



KSI brings with him the unrelenting work ethic and infectious energy which YouTube instilled in him. Despite his debut’s success, he’s certain Dissimulation just scratched the surface: the next record, he’s clear, will showcase his artistry’s further progression again. Given FAULT Magazine described KSI as “one of 2019’s biggest success stories - “an emergent hip-hop star” said The i - all eyes will be on his follow up. KSI’s task - writes The Observer - is “not just to make “YouTube rap” but the real thing”. Their verdict? “Mission accomplished.”

• Within a year of her ground-breaking Double-Album “Bad Girls”, Donna Summer left Casablanca Records
to become the first Artist signed to the new Geffen Records label, with “The Wanderer” being the first
album released on the label.
• Legendary producers Giorgio Moroder and Pete Bellotte remained at the helm.
• With the US #3 hit of the title track and other standout tracks ‘Looking Up’, ‘Cold Love’, ‘Who Do You Think
You’re Foolin’’ and ‘Nightlife’, “The Wanderer” continued Donna’s creative output.
• “The Wanderer” was released the year after the ‘Disco Demolition Night’ event - which was held,
ironically, two days before ‘Bad Girls’ became a US #1 single - and introduced more rock-infused
dance/pop tunes – which paved the way for many Artists throughout the 1980s.
• Donna received two Grammy Award nominations. Best Rock Vocal Performance, Female for ‘Cold Love’
and Best Inspirational Performance for ‘I Believe In Jesus’.
• In 2020, “The Wanderer” had a resurge in interest and a re-appraisal, with several tracks being remixed for
a new generation, resulting in a one month stop at #1 on one of the UK’s top Soul radio stations.
• This special edition revisits the original album on 180g White Colour vinyl

"These Exit Times" is the name of a newsletter sent by an environmental organisation advocating the extinction of the human race as a solution to save the planet. When Victor Ramirez first came across the group on the internet a couple of years ago, it brought a smile to his face. But after some pondering on the subject, he decided that "Exit Times" would be the name of his sensational third album as Ramirez Exposure.

The record started to take shape in early 2020, after a musical hiatus that had lasted a year. It had been somewhat of a dark period, and Victor felt it was time to go back to recording songs. It would be the first time he would be doing so at home. He had managed to set up a small studio that would allow him to make some proper recordings, and without having to use a computer. He'd also started a new job, as an orderly in a hospital, which gave him time to record and cash to pay the rent.

Victor was ready to take on the task of making the album with the help—albeit from a distance, this time—of Ken Stringfellow (Posies, Big Star) and Brian Young (Jesus & Mary Chain, Ivy, Fountains of Wayne), both regular accomplices of the Valencian in production and instrumentation. Working with the two of them feels very natural for him, even though they are in three different countries.

Looking back, it seemed as if he'd prepared himself for what was coming.

And so, the pandemic happened, and Victor found himself turning the ideas he had outlined on his phone into the songs for Exit Times. He was in a good place, personally and, despite the situation, he was happy to be able to contribute to society through his job at the hospital and, after coming home, to concentrate on his music and isolate himself from everything else.

Gradually, the sketches turned into luminous songs, with bright harmonies and lyrics that exude a fine irony. Victor admits that he strives to be a good pessimist every day, and the songs reveal a way of understanding life that relativises almost everything in order to stick with what's really important. This subtle sense of humour in the lyrics, like the luminosity of his music, is vintage Ramirez, and is present throughout the album, and even on the cover. The artwork is a painting by German painter Angela Dalinger, depicting Victor himself, their dog, Colombo, and some meaningful objects. The vinyl record featured is George Harrison's Brainwashed.

Exit Times is a shiny collection of songs with a universal vocation, bathed in sunshine pop with touches of new psychedelia. All simmered under the Mediterranean sun—the same sun that illuminates the entire planet.

A deep dive into the one of most collectable jazz catalogues in the world, a selection of some of the rarest and most sought-after recordings from the 60s and 70s, a time when British jazz began to find its own identity. Drawn from the iconic labels of Decca, Deram, Argo, EMI Columbia/Lansdowne Series, Fontana, Mercury, & Philips.



2LPs (+ audio download code voucher)
Vinyl audio remastered & cut by Gearbox Records
180grm Optimal Pressing
16-page 12x12 insert with 20,000 word essay detailing this crucial era of British jazz with track commentaries and artist biographies
2CD Set, hard cover book includes a 20,000 word essay detailing this crucial era of British jazz with track commentaries and artist biographies
Track list below (2CD set is same tracks split LP1 & LP2)









i c1. Neil Ardley, Ian Carr, Don Rendell | Greek Variations: VI Kriti edit

Der in Chicago ansässige Multi-Instrumentalist JODI, aka Nick Levine* (ex-Pinegrove) ist sanft und doch sehr kraftvoll in seinem Songwriting und veröffentlicht mit "Blue Heron", das JODI selbst als "queer country" bezeichnet, - eine Reihe von intimen und bemerkenswert präsenten Momenten, die an Größen wie Jason Molina, Mount Eerie, Duster und Julie Doiron erinnern. Für Levine ist JODI eine Art Alter Ego, eine Linse, durch die es Fragen stellen, Grenzen verschieben und aus der inneren Welt heraustreten kann. Das Album fängt Levines fortwährende Suche nach Bedeutung ein; eine Suche, bei der während des Schreib- und Aufnahmeprozesses ein paar zufällige Begegnungen mit einem Vogel - einem großen blauen Reiher - JODI lehrte, den Zufall des kreativen Ausdrucks zu umarmen und sich seiner Symbolik als Metapher für das Verständnis der eigenen Arbeit und der Welt hinzugeben. Indem JODI sich ganz der Symbolik verschrieb, ließ sich Levine einen großen blauen Reiher auf den Rücken tätowieren und tauchte in einen gefrorenen Teich in Chicago ein, um den Blaureiher für immer als Cover und Titel des Albums zu verewigen. Während "Blue Heron" an den Fäden der Bedeutung kratzt und versucht, der Welt einen Sinn zu geben, ist es ein Werk, das letztlich nur in der vollständigen Hingabe an Kräfte, die größer sind als man selbst, einen Abschluss findet. Es umarmt den Zufall, die Zufälligkeit und das Schicksal mit einer erhabenen Neugierde und findet schließlich einen Sinn in der Zufälligkeit von allem.

Nothing can beat the thrill of thrash at its best, and no one is keeping the spirit and sound of the genre alive quite like Berlin’s Space Chaser. Marking their ten-year anniversary with their third full-length, Give Us Life, they are returning in force and once again establishing their importance in the scene. While they predominantly take their lyrics seriously they also have moments of fun, such as on “Army Of Awesomeness”, but the band are primarily drawn to dystopian sci-fi stories with roots in real-life physics and the works of Carl Sagan, and as they point out “it’s still a lot of fun to sing about a dying sun turning into a black hole and becoming a galaxy devouring behemoth.” The title track might possibly contain the most epic theme ever covered, describing the emergence of life and its inevitable death from the smallest to the largest possible scale.

Born At Midnite is the faux-vanity project of Amery Sandford and David Carriere. Jamming strictly ‘post-party’ with a fnish line posture – either completing or scrapping a song in a single evening – the Montreal based duo began writing together in late 2018.

Employing samplers, tape machines, and an extemporaneous approach to songwriting, the duo establish an eerily familiar atmosphere through an unpolished lens of thin ice. Playing into whilst poking fun at our era’s omnipresent narcissism and self indulgence, the group stitch together an unsponsored sort of ‘product-placement-punk’.

● Double A-side single w/ limited edition 7” pressing.
● Follow up to 2020's debut 7”.
● Past campaign includes coverage from Gorilla vs Bear, The FADER. Past playlisting at Spotify includes Montreal Chill (79k followers), Fresh Finds: Indie (90k followers).
● Features Amery Sandford (Alpen Glow), and David Carriere (TOPS, producer of Sorry Girls, Marcii, TOPS)

Before there was Rimarimba, Suffolk-born, Felixstowe-based musician and home recording enthusiast Robert Cox assembled a cast of friends, some musicians and some not so much, for an experiment in group exploration and ecstatic expression under the name The Same. Sonically and gravitationally defined by Cox’s collaboration with guitarist Andy Thomas (a partnership which formed in 1976 to record as General Motors), Sync or Swim, The Same’s one and only album, also featured keyboards by Florence Atkinson and Paul Ridout, and vocals by Robert’s sister Rebecca.

Originally released in small cassette and vinyl quantities on Unlikely Records, Cox’s imprint and a meeting point for many other musicians found at the fringe, the back cover of the original album jacket is as much a map of the personnel, place, and process

fundamental to Sync or Swim as it is a table of contents for DIY music-making at the beginning of the 80s: “Recorded in peaceful Wiltshire between September 18th and October 6th 1981 (using a miscellany of home made devices) onto a Teac A-3300SX via a Teac A-3440. No noise reduction systems were used.”

The additional equipment listed – a combination of consumer technology and DIY innovation – speaks to an unpretentious, improvisational ethos that pilots Sync or Swim, and Cox’s career as a whole. Rimarimba, whose near complete discography Freedom To Spend made available again in 2019, showcased Cox’s simultaneously hermetic and prolific creative process, while The Same celebrates making sound for sound’s sake and the serendipity surrounding those moments.

Wiltshire, home to the Stonehenge stone circles and a county of empty plains in the southwest of England, is worlds away from the commerce and industry of Glenn Branca’s New York City or Neu’s Düsseldorf. While The Same may feel in some ways like a British blend of these minimalist and motorik machinations, Cox and Thomas were curiously fascinated with The Grateful Dead and Frank Zappa’s brand of psychedelic music.

Cox’s own definition of British psychedelia is “folk music meeting technology and going bonkers.” It’s by this definition that Sync or Swim takes unexpected forms, from tape-speed tomfoolery, concrète sound collage and analog delayed marimbas, to the colorful spectrum of interwoven guitar play between Cox and Thomas reminiscent of Ghanaian Highlife but more accurately indebted to Jerry Garcia.

The European/UK vinyl release of Hokus Bonus: a vinyl-only compilation of ‘bonus tracks’ from special editions of the band’s previous albums, many of which have never been available on vinyl before. The LP, limited to 6K numbered copies, features cover art from long-time Volbeat illustrator Karsten Sand and will be pressed on yellow smoke vinyl. Hokus Bonus brings several songs such as “Slaytan,” “Under The Influence,” and “Immortal But Destructable” to the vinyl format for the first time, and also includes early versions of fan-favorites “Evelyn,” “Black Rose,” and “Die To Live.” “We all spend a lot of time in record stores both at home and on tour,” said the band, “and bringing these songs to vinyl, some of them for the first time ever, brings us great joy.” Hokus Bonus will be available on Friday, July 16th' on Transparent Yellow W/ Black Smoke Vinyl