Cerca:demons

On their sophomore effort Tusky, surrealist duet Robbie & Mona ascend beyond the lo-fi scrawlings of their debut album to something altogether more grandiose. Between the lights down drama of sprawling opener ‘Sensation’, to the ‘roll credits’ coda of closer ‘Always Gonna Be A Dead Man’, Tusky exists as a glitzy, lucid journey playing out before the listener.
While debut album EW captured William Carkeet and Ellie Gray as they were finding their feet with one another, creating Tusky was a wholly symbiotic process from day one. “We got better at knowing what each other wanted,” William offers. “This was the album that we were trying to make from the beginning.”

Simultaneously evoking multiple eras of music, the album drifts through worlds of synth pop, jazz, trap, drill, ballroom waltz and leftfield electronica, with the scatterbrain sound palette melded by a peppering of instrumental motifs and William’s addiction to sampling sounds across multiple tracks. “I wanted there to be this weird dimensional thing going on,” William explains, “where songs from the album are playing in multiple places.”

The record sees an expansive cast of musicians assembled, with a much heavier focus on live instrumentation than previous outings. Alongside the expected fare of crackly synths, samplers and drum machines, Tusky gets its glossy sheen from a rich tapestry of jazz drums, double bass, grand piano and saxophone.

Most of the tracks are laden with improvised saxophone from Campbell Baum (Sorry, Broadside Hacks) and Ben Vince (Housewives, Joy Orbison), much of which was scrambled by William in post-production, lifting scraps from one song and layering them atop an entirely different track. Elsewhere, session musicians were cherry picked, including Bingo Fury, his drummer Henry Terrett, and a string ensemble led by Caelia Lunniss and Jo Silverston (Spindle Ensemble).

Most surprising is a rap feature from Monika (of South-East London collective Nukuluk), who brings album centrepiece ‘Mildred’ to new heights with a fiery verse on pain. Aside from being the most unlikely addendum to a sombre piano ballad, it demonstrates Robbie & Mona’s natural state of playfulness, forever following emotions and sensuality over any notion of traditional compositional boundaries.
Many of Tusky's tracks owe their inception to cinema, be it the soundtrack to Betty Blue, the glowing films of Wim Wenders, or the surprising parallels between La Belle Et La Bete and Bad Boys. Equally, much of Robbie & Mona's new-found sense of tension and spectacle comes from William’s recent work soundtracking independent filmmakers, while Ellie gave greater priority to threading a narrative through her stream of consciousness writing style.

In all its majesty, Tusky celebrates creativity with creation. “If you begin to see fiction as real, you can reincarnate and become different things. You can grow,” Ellie implores. “Nothing stays the same. You can shed old characters in yourself. There’s great joy in that.”

**Limited edition single-sided LP 300 copies**

David Horridge's unreleased bedroom studio tape material (1982).

Shortly after releasing the inimitable Light Patterns, David Horridge recorded a handful of demos. These sole artifacts from Dave capture the same Mancunian melancholy presented on
Light Patterns, and offer an insight into David’s contributing piece of the puzzle. It comes as no surprise that every track laid to tape from that era is an absolute gem.
David’s playing comes in the form of well-timed melodies and carefully placed basslines.

Nothing forced or rushed, and each movement really sits with a mood. Journey Within is an even more sedated, mellow effort than Light Patterns. The songs were perhaps even sketches for a
follow up that never manifested. The album’s greatest strength is in setting a peaceful, pastoral mood that allows for a relaxed listen all the way through. Hypnotic stuff.
The only deviation is the final song, One Note Bossa, which came as a surprise with its use of a drum machine. A feature that demonstrates what might have been were David have continued to
experiment and release albums...

RIYL: Durutti Column, Woo, Pat Metheny, and Steve Hiett.

When Belgian Adolphe Sax invented the saxophone in the mid-19th century, he could not have imagined what he had set in motion with his invention. Neither in classical music nor in military music did his new woodwind instrument find much appreciation. It was only long after his death that it became the most important instrument in jazz music via swinging big bands. It would probably have amazed Mr. Sax if he had been able to witness a young trio from Germany playing loudly against climate change and the lack of political consequences with two noisy saxophones and a drum set on a stage in front of the Reichstag in Berlin in front of more than 50,000 people jumping up and down during the climate strike in September 2021: BRASS RIOT.

The trio around Constantin von Estorff (Sax), Simon Sasse (Drums) and Carl Weiß (Sax) have been a band since their school days in Lüneburg. What started there as street music became a permanent and sought-after formation through the proximity to political initiatives, above all the Fridays-For-Future movement, and appearances at countless demonstrations. The band's name is slightly misleading, as "brass" in music refers to brass instruments such as the trumpet or tuba, even though most brass bands always include a saxophone. Moreover, the word "brass" means something in the German language, which in turn fits perfectly with this young, energetic trio: Fury.

On the heels of their debut album "Matschsafari" (2018), their second studio album "The Never Acting Story" is now released on Fun In The Church. The album title, in critical allusion to the world-famous fantasy book by Michael Ende, sums up well what the music of BRASS RIOT is about at its core: the possibility to get a noisy outlet for all the fury about the failed politics of the last decades and the frustrations and fears that go with it, and to free oneself from it for a moment. That this path has produced the wildest live music on this crisis-ridden planet is an irony of history - and certainly not the first time it has happened. It's no different in the jazz of Charlie Parker than in the songs of Patti Smith, the raps of Little Simz or the Afro-beat of Fela Kuti.

Musically, BRASS RIOT move more in the area of the melodic ska-pop of Madness, the fake jazz of the Lounge Lizards and contemporary rave brass ensembles like MEUTE between house music and electro beats. The fact that they have managed to politicize their sound so strongly over the years, despite all the party that goes with it, and without any song lyrics at all, is truly phenomenal.

Richie Culver had been waiting his whole life to record I was born by the sea. His debut album immediately and messily inscribed the artist into the canon of outsider music and experimental electronics, serving both as an arresting statement of intent and a painful reckoning with the difficult path that lead up to it, stealing one last glance back at a place he always knew he had to escape. Between grim lamentations, faded memories and anxiety attacks, all told with searing honesty and disarming openness, I was born by the sea excavates a space for hope, finding Culver digging through Humberside silt to find a world weary optimism, the raw material from which his visual and sound art is shaped. For this collection of expansions and inversions, Culver invites a collection of kindred spirits, contemporary inspirations and old heroes to wade into the salt water of his formative years spent living for impromptu raves and afterparties, connecting vivid memories of his birth place of Withernsea to artists hailing from as nearby as Preston and Bridlington, further afield, from Manchester and London, Berlin and Paris, before returning back to Hull, to where it all began.

For some, responding to I was born by the sea means diving even deeper into the record’s furthest reaches. Space Afrika clear away the pummelling loops of noise from ‘It’s hard to get to know you,’ revealing a cool and cavernous expanse in its wake. Distant chatter, previously heard as though through thin, plasterboard walls, now echoes from outside the maddening claustrophobia of the original’s Sisyphean sonics, illuminated as a dense storm cloud suspended amidst a more open scene, washed clean by a lighter rain, allowing the tender heart of the track to beat clear. London producer MOBBS stretches out ‘Pigeon Flesh’ into an epic, 10-minute, cold-sweat spiral, strung-out tension wrung from disconnected phone tones twisted in unexpected directions, snatches of Culver’s voice turned inside-out and deep fried bass threatening to tip the track over into oblivion, the build-and-release of a nervous breakdown experienced in real time. In an act of subversive self-reflection, Morgane Polanski switches one kind of ennui for another in her adaption of ‘I was born by the sea,’ swapping the sea for the city, English seaside towns in January for summer evenings in Paris and flashing lighthouses and sparkling oil rigs for the Eiffel Tower and the traffic around L’Arc de Triomphe. Even Culver finds time to revisit ‘Dream About Yourself,’ a track taken from his EP Post Traumatic Fantasy, breathing new words into its glacial drift, the half-remembered testimony of a shut-in: Woke up in the evening / Pray for me / Don’t trust anyone / Pray for algorithm. Reframed in a more melancholy light, the track’s reverberant keys even more clearly evoke a mournful nostalgia, fresh pain felt in old wounds.

Others find a parallel universe in Culver’s visceral world building. Rainy Miller flips the script with a scorched, avant-drill rework of ‘Daytime TV’, threading puncturing hi-hats and queasy low-end surge through the track’s steady ambient cascade, invoking the irresistible Preston beat magic of Miller’s own essential debut album, Desquamation. Aho Ssan melts away the crystalline textures of ‘Love Like an Abscess’ with the ominous crackle of a nascent fire, building through swathes of organic Max/MSP squelch and brittle, nails-down-chalkboard scrape, swelling and metastasising the original to spill over Culver’s desperate hymn to corporeal desire, at once flesh and not. Teresa Winter transports us an hour up the coast from Withernsea to her native Bridlington, replacing the sea wall of synthesis on ‘Nervous Energy’ with muffled ASMR murk and fever dream whispers, transforming Culver’s unflinching observations into a haunting call-and-response, filling in the blanks with her own eerie utterances, a fleeting conversation with a ghost. In a touching victory lap, Fila Brazillia, eccentric stalwarts of beloved ‘90s trip hop imprint Pork Recordings, whose performances at Hull institution The Lamp convinced a young Culver of the necessity to make his mark on club culture, resurface for their first remix in 20 years. Steve Cobby and David McSherry lead a low-slung, heartfelt stroll back through a suite of tracks from I was born by the sea, tracing a full circle saunter from Culver’s origins to his current musical practice, the sounds of his present repurposed by the sound of his youth. In a gesture that reflects the emotional complexity of the project, Fila Brazillia find joy at the end of Culver’s troubled reflection, picking out an undeniable groove in the stasis of feeling trapped in your hometown. Underlining Hull’s vital musical legacy, from Baby Mammoth to Throbbing Gristle, Cobby and McSherry demonstrate that, though there are certainly storms, by the sea there is also sun and through the fog, if you listen, you can hear a singular sound, a sound now carried by Richie Culver.

Participant is a record label and creative studio run by William Markarian-Martin and Richie Culver

It's always good to have Norbak onboard again with this brand new slice of plastic. Four cuts of precise and gymnastic techno aimed for the most advanced dancefloors energetic and intelligent at the same time, as we like.

A side starts with "Tell me I'm wrong" a fast paced hypnotic exercise with adrenalinic synth lines running over complex rhythms, properly arranged in a constantly changing structure.

"Amongst Them" follow, textured flanged sounds running across the stereo field, shuffled beats and lots of space, the definition of how profound techno should be.

Flipping the vinyl, B1 is "Pure and Faithful", funk infused sequences constantly altered in shape, complex grooves and as always a profound structure full of twists.

Last cut in this exercise is "Unbearable Lightness", continuous and repetitive randomized synth lines spiced with lots of reverb over a well crafted drum workout, intense and spacious at the same time.

Another demonstration of studio skills and sound design from this young Portuguese producer.

The continuing growth of Maik Krahl as a melodic improviser, bandleader, and composer is distinctly evident in this new release. In-Between Flow, Krahl’s third outing as leader, is a portrait of a young artist who has gone through many years of dedicated hard work, study, experimentation, and refinement in order to achieve this level of instrumental and artistic progress. Krahl belongs to a new generation of improvisers who have acquired a breadth of technical and theoretical facility, while not losing the spontaneity and rawness of this music we call jazz. As a bandleader, he chooses his colleagues wisely and for this date is joined on a few tracks by the visionary guitarist Kurt Rosenwinkel, whose brilliant playing adds a cherry on top of this already delicious line up.

The title In-Between Flow refers to ever evolving progression of our human condition. As in nature, the human spirit can expand and unfold, maturing to a new state where it may settle for a while until some new impulses inspires another transition. These transitions, sometimes subtle, sometimes abrupt; as well as the times of contentedness and serenity are the inspirations for this music.

The record opens up with an ode to the town Krahl calls home. Cologne 4 AM, begins with a haunting melody by Krahl’s soft yet powerful horn before settling into a perfect vehicle to display his command of melodic and motivic story telling. There is something about the time of 4 AM that seems to permeate literature and music, and this track will add to the canon of artistic references to this magical time where the night meets the morning.

Mr. Rosenwinkel joins the band for Slosetta, which is a great example of Krahl’s ability to craft a tune. As is to be expected, Rosenwinkel weaves through the changes with grace and mastery, obviously enjoying the communication with the rhythm section, who are undeniably inspired by his harmonic, rhythmic and melodic ingenuity.

Jakob Kühnemann, a Bandleader and composer is his own right, has been an in demand bassist on the German and European scene for several years, and his contribution to this record is proof of why that is. Although Krahl takes the lead on Drizzle Counter, in a great display of technical virtuosity, it is Kühneman who stands out on this track. It is not only in his improvisation, but more so in his poly rhythmic pulses dancing up from the deep and the harmonic insinuations in his accompaniment of Krahl’s solo that demonstrate his musical mastery.

Rosenwinkel joins again for No Claim Claim, a composition so balanced that I would not be surprised to hear other artists recording or performing it in the future. After Krahl’s melodically inventive statement, Rosenwinkel shifts the band to the next gear building the intensity towards the out head.

Constantin Krahmer has been Krahl´s piano player since his debut record, Decidophobia. His patience, ingenuity, and big ears make him a perfect accomplice to Krahl, and his sensitive yet powerful approach and accompaniment on Reconstruction of a Dream as well as his harmonic and melodic inventiveness on Vinaceous Clouds (where he plays Fender Rhodes) make it clear why he is an integral part of this unit.

Ms Ludgate is a funky composition with angular melody that is another feather in the cap of the band leader. Kurt Rosenwinkel is back, and seems more than willing to engage in some rhythmic dialogue with the spectacular young drummer on the date, Fabian Rösch. Throughout this entire record Rösch is subtly but strongly guiding the band, playing his role as a supportive and interactive proponent to the music. We will surely be hearing much more from this young man with such a refined sound and clear rhythmic conception.

Flawless Sunday, a perfect closing statement for this record. The melody is another great example of Krahl’s growth as a composer. The whole rhythm section really shines on Krahmer’s choruses, where the three colleagues push and dare each other rhythmically as well as harmonically before Krahl enters and brings the record to a close with his beautiful rich tone and melodic playing.

It is a great pleasure to hear the growth of a young artist with such dedication and vision. Hearing how Krahl and his band mates navigate through the vicissitudes of this music is an inspiration that can be mirrored in everyday life. A lesson in accepting the ever changing flow from one state to another. Growing, learning, and evolving into a new state, until the process begins anew. In-Between Flow.

Kusōzu : Nine Death Stages is the second album by the Tokyo trio Archeus, which consists of Keiko Higuchi (voice, percussion, trombone, shamisen), Shizuo Uchida (bass strings), and TOMO (hurdy gurdy, voice). It follows their debut, self-titled and self-released CD and cassette from 2021 and is further proof – if any were needed – that these musicians, who’ve known each other for some time, but only started playing together relatively recently, share a telepathic communication, improvising together, fully in the moment, and as one. Where their debut album featured four extended improvisations, Kusōzu is an object lesson in economy and clarity – nine tracks, thirty-three minutes, everything that needs be said and nothing more.

All three musicians are incredibly active in the Japanese underground. Higuchi currently plays with Sachiko in Albedo Fantastica, adding Uchida for Albedo Gravitas; Uchida and Higuchi team up with Masami Kawaguchi (guitar) in vDBG. She’s also recorded with improvisers such as Naoto Yamagishi, Yasumune Morishige, and Shin-Ichiro Kanda. Uchida is also a member of MAI MAO, Kito-Mizukumi Rouber, Hasegawa-Shizuo, UH, and TERROR SHIT, and he’s recently recorded with improvising guitarist Takashi Masubuchi; TOMO has previously been a member of Tetragrammaton and Pouring High Water, and has recently performed live with Mick of Kousokuya, Mitsuru Tabata, Keiji Haino, and Daisuke Takaoka.

While Higuchi and Uchida have been making music together for some time now, they appear careful not to impose their previously articulated lexicon to bear on Archeus. There are trace elements of their playerly voices still present – the stretchy, plastic scrabbling on bass strings from Uchida; Higuchi’s murmurations of tone, and sudden plunges back down to earth, vertiginous and woozy – but there are other things going on here, particularly with TOMO joining in the action. His hurdy gurdy is a wild card in a group of wild cards, here cranking out burred, purring drones, there fidgeting through floods of notes, cranked up really high, ducking and weaving between Higuchi and Uchida as the three pursue the eternal now that is core to the best improvised music.

Archeus seem to work alchemically, transmuting their base matter into gold. Named after the Buddhist art practice of kusōzu, the graphic painting of nine stages of a decaying corpse in the open air, “to demonstrate the effects of impermanence,” as scholar Gail Chin once wrote.

Kusōzu : Nine Death Stages is Archeus at their most rigorously attentive to each other’s playing, and by the end, the music is itself thinking and feeling.

Exotica, ye-yé cumbia, guaracha infused twist, rock’n roll mambo, Spanish rumba, boogaloo beat, tropical garage and other unexpected bastard genres are featured in this festive compilation of bizarre hits taken from the glorious catalog of records released during the 60s and 70s on the Peruvian label Discos MAG. Some clearly unite genres, others are projects with creative names, but all are bold musical initiatives that got and will always get people onto the dance floor. “Sabroso Go Go” brings together fourteen musical mixes created in the recording studios of Manuel Antonio Guerrero (MAG), in which music directors combine rhythm with alchemy in a quest to find the philosopher's stone of the dance. Exotica, ye-yé cumbia, guaracha infused twist, rock’n roll mambo, Spanish rumba, boogaloo beat, tropical garage and other unexpected bastard genres are featured in this festive compilation. Although this compilation begins in 1957, experiments like this (some more memorable than others) were not new in Peru. The songs on this album were however much more successful hybrids. Some clearly unite genres, others are projects with creative names, but all are bold musical initiatives that got and will always get people onto the dance floor. At the end of the fifties, rock music shook the foundations of Peru, and orchestras rushed to cover hit songs and explore the possibilities of mixing them with tropical music. Lucho Macedo's orchestra took up the mantle and reinterpreted a well-known guaracha by Celia Cruz ('Rock and Roll') in mambo style, renaming it 'Rock and roll Mambo'. 'Maestro de Rock and Roll', a hit by the Cuban Conjunto Casino, received similar treatment. Another mix in this vein is the rock tune 'El Rock de los Chinos' by the Mexican Manolo Muñoz (author of 'Speedy González') recorded by the Chilean Choche Mérida for MAG in 1961. The following year, Chubby Checker’s 'The Twist' hit the scene and was immediately fused with guaracha by maestro Nelson Ferreyra. A legendary MAG musician, Carlos Pickling, composed 'La Charanga del Espacio' in 1963. The space sounds are produced by Pickling and his inseparable Hammond. He himself is the one who leads the orchestra that accompanies Benny Del Solar, Lita Branda and Pablo "Melcochita" Villanueva in the tropicalized version of Spanish Rumba, when the beats of the Iberian rumba were still exotic in South America. Around that time, the Chilean Willy Marambio was already living in Lima. In the track included on this album, the go-go style showcases his virtuosity on the trumpet. Another outstanding trumpet player, Roberto "Tito" Chicoma from Chiclayo, played as a session musician with MAG from 1959. A few years later, he became one of the most popular Colombian cumbia players, a talent he demonstrates in the song on this compilation, which blends the fun of go-go with yé-yé beats. 'Batijugando' was a hit from Mexico and was played in all the rhythms played across the Hispanic world since 1967. Inspired by the "Batman" series, it was performed at MAG by the Betico Salas orchestra, with vocals by the Panamanian lady crooner Nallye Fernández. 'Computador Electrónico' is another surprise on this album, performed by Panamanian vocalist Patty Pastel, it is the only known version in Spanish of 'Der Computer Nr. 3', originally sung in German by France Gall. Two other songs feature Edgar Zamudio. The versatility of Zamudio y Los Vikingos (originally a Chilean group) is demonstrated in the guitar-heavy song composed specifically for the late sixties skate fashion ('Go Go en Patines') and in his idiosyncratic protest song ('Día de Pago') performed in beat style. In the mid-seventies, Los Kintos, led by guitarist Francisco Acosta, developed different harmonic ideas in an instrumental track that veers from boogaloo to salsa, the fashionable rhythm of the day. Finally, in 1976, when the bumping hips dance craze swept the continent, Manuel Guerrero was quick to jump onto the bandwagon, composing a Bump song, together with his son Carlos. The Italian musician based in Lima, Luciano Luciani performed the song 'A Bailar Bump' backed by his band of local musicians Los Mulatos.

Gacha Bakradze releases his third album on Lapsus entitled "Pancakes", and while the name may appear conventional at first glance, it actually contains esoteric philosophical concepts.

The Georgian producer perceives the making of pancakes -a transformative and healing parental activity that he loves to partake in with his son- as a metaphor for alteration, metamorphosis and change. A reflection that also accentuates the importance of balance during each process of preparing a simple recipe, which in turn highlights key human attributes such as patience, attention to detail and willingness to adapt to shifting circumstances.

On a sonic level, Gacha’s new album embodies precisely that: the contextual reworking of his music, while maintaining the essence of his previous work. "Pancakes" provides the typically melancholic yet vibrant genetics already recognisable in his music, but also embraces new genres, including his unique and personal take on hyper-pop and trance. It is an album of contrasting elements, where bucolic interludes make way for heavier tracks that are more suited to a club environment, an aural universe that hybridises IDM, electro, bass music and cutting edge techno, and once again demonstrates that trying to pigeonhole Gacha Bakradze's sound is a somewhat fruitless task.

Blackened thrash veterans LEGION OF THE DAMNED slay on new studio album The Poison Chalice The LEGION slays again! Dutch thrash veterans LEGION OF THE DAMNED have once again entered into an alliance with the devouring depths of black and death metal and unleash another angry beast, The Poison Chalice, on May 26, 2023 via Napalm Records. The shredding monster delivers the most delicious pitch-black brew and tortures dark souls into demonic underworlds. Founded in 1990 as Occult, the thrash machine around founding members Maurice Swinkels and Erik Fleuren was reborn as LEGION OF THE DAMNED in 2005. On The Poison Chalice, the band unites with Fabian Verweij as second guitarist besides Twan van Geel and hails together with bassist Harold Gielen performing as a five piece for the first time ever on a studio album. Conquering the European charts for decades, the LEGION crowned itself at #17 in the Official German Album Charts with predecessor Slaves Of The Shadow Realms (2019). For almost 35 years, they have formed their aggressive signature sound from the most horrific ingredients of thrash and death metal, combined with brutal blackened influences, resulting in one of the most defined and unique sounds in the scene. The Poison Chalice comes to life by spreading its eerily beautiful wings within the first few seconds, then dives headfirst into a hellishly furious storm before the second song ""Contamination"" absolutely kills. In classic LEGION OF THE DAMNED manner, there is no escape as the track relentlessly drives into the abyss. The album spreads brutal and ice cold thrash soundscapes through relentless attacking drums and incredible guitar harmonies from both lead guitarists, underlined by angry bass lines. Infectious thrash treasures such as “Progressive Destructor”, and the almost seven-minute berserk “Behold The Beyond” break necks with hammering guitar riffs and bloody double bass infernos. “Beheading of The Godhead” delivers what the song title promises, before the past 48 minutes of hate closes with a final deep gulp from “The Poison Chalice” - leaving no one behind. Together with producer Erwin Hermsen, the band has closed the gates of the underworld in Toneshed Studio and demonstrates that they remain the unchallenged masters of brute and unrelenting death-thrash metal in 2023

Eric Emm and Jesse Cohen of Tanlines are indie-rock lifers turned reasonable, happy middle-aged fathers of two, figuring out their place in a chaotic culture and industry that can no longer command their full attention. They are emblematic of a particular time and place that doesn't really exist anymore, yet here they are existing, and thriving, in 2023. The Big Mess came together when Emm and his family moved from Brooklyn to rural Connecticut, while Cohen launched a marketing career and a successful podcast and stayed in the city. Emm continued writing songs_hundreds of them _ through all the weirdness of the past few years, but he wasn't exactly sure who he was writing them for. "I spent years figuring out in my mind, `What is my musical life going to look like?'" he says. "I just kept writing." Cohen gave Emm his blessing to continue Tanlines, even if his own contributions would be limited due to his own non-musical obligations. "I'm like, `Whatever you can do to keep this thing going, do it,'" Cohen says. And with that, Tanlines was reborn. By January 2022 Emm felt he had a body of work that made sense as a Tanlines album. Cohen spent ten days with Emm at his Connecticut studio, along with unofficial third Tanline Patrick Ford (!!!). This was tied together with a sleek final mix from Peter Katis (The National, Interpol) at his famed Tarquin Studios, resulting in a clear vision of what Emm's musical life was going to look like: The Big Mess. The first sounds on The Big Mess are the title track's coiled guitars and thumping drums, building into the kind of outsize, choral rock anthem artists like Tanlines were almost a reaction to. It is warm and nostalgic, and Cohen likens a lot of the prevailing mood to "a sepia filter on a digital photo." He continues, "we were pretty intentional about making this the first song on the album, underlining the way that this is a new phase of the band." Cohen says. The moody, scintillating "Burns Effect" serves as one of the biggest pushes forward for the Tanlines sound, and for Emm as a lyricist. He says that the song is "deep and dark and dangerous, but in a fun way. It's one of the more personal tracks on the album where this ungrounded part of my personality surfaces, but with an over-the-top machismo, almost an ironic character." Other tracks like "New Reality" and closer "The Age of Innocence" are also demonstrably guitar-forward in ways that wouldn't seem obvious for Tanlines (despite Emm's pedigree in austere avant-garde math-rock outfits Storm & Stress and Don Caballero), but Emm is less sure The Big Mess is a total departure. "I'm trying to make these absolutely simple things," he says. "I think of these songs as Rothko paintings: They're big and they're bold and they're seemingly straightforward, but they have a lot of depth and they engage with you and make you feel something."

Abracadaboum is the third studio album for Bérurier Noir.

While the group went on a concert strike in the summer of 1987, they remained active and took advantage of the opportunity to record a new album with a sharp eye on world events.

Les Bérus, always in the vanguard of an alternative youth that challenges taboos and norms, release 10 new hymns to insurrection and try to explode the borders set up by intolerance.

The future is not violence but solidarity!

-

The band's name alone evokes the epic of alternative rock: rebellious and committed.

Born by mistake on a February evening in 1983, Bérurier Noir soon found itself the driving force behind a vast "Youth Movement", determined to take control of its life in the face of a society that was ultra conservative at the time. Times have hardly changed.
From the first self-produced records distributed by hand to the creation of self-managed labels, from concerts in squats and wild appearances in demonstrations, on the street or in the metro to endless tours, from interviews given to fanzines and free radio stations to unclassifiable appearances in the mainstream media, Bérurier Noir has waged the most exciting war of independence in the history of French rock, with only a microphone, a guitar, a drum machine, a few red noses and patched-up theatre masks.
The last finger of honour of this turbulent and irrecoverable raia, François, Loran and their "Troupeau d'Rock" commit hara-kiri, at the peak of their glory, during three last concerts in the heart of Paris in November 1989.

Forty years after its birth, Bérurier Noir's work still resonates, whether in demonstrations or free parties, nourishing the hopes of those who wish to overthrow this world to build a truly libertarian, united and fraternal society.

The label Archives de la Zone Mondiale reminds those who missed this unprecedented adventure, 8 discographic parts of the group Bérurier Noir in the form of reissues on particularly original colour vinyls (crown finish), in a limited series and distributed throughout the year.

“Crystal Motion” were a vocal quartet of Cape Verdean descendancy from New Bedford Massachusetts. The group’s original members being lead vocalist “Kevin Gomes”, Kevin’ s cousin, Rodney “Skeeta” Santos, Daniel “Buddy” Monterio and John Paris, the man responsible for coining the group’s eventual performing name “Crystal Motion”.

Entering a local now defunct recording studio “Metcalf’s” the grouped recorded the Kevin Gomes penned demonstration song, the sweet soul ballad “There’ll Be Another”.

A copy of this song was eventually submitted to the recently formed Independent Recording Studio, “Omega Sound Productions” in Philadelphia, PA. The label was owned by Frank Fioravanti who having just hit paydirt with William DeVaughn’s smash hit “Be Thankful For What You Got” continued with his policy of supporting up and coming talent and upon hearing Crystal Motion’s demo decided to offer them a recording contract. Although deciding against using their submitted demonstration song (which was to remain unissued) Fioravanti chose to record the group on a song he had co-written with another Philly writer and recording artist Pal Rakes, the title of the song was “You’re My Main Squeeze (Part 1 & 2)” an exciting disco dance orientated song that Frank released on them in 1975 on his Sound Gems label imprint. The song became a minor hit in Boston MA, Providence RI and Philadelphia areas also receiving extensive airplay in Atlanta GA and Houston TX. John Paris was to leave the group being replaced by a longtime friend of the other group members Douglas “Dougie” Mendes. With attention coming from the producers of “American Band Stand” and “Soul Train” the group toured the East coast circuit throughout 1975 and 1976 in preparation for an upcoming album project which was never finished before lead singer Kevin Gomes left for unforeseen personal reasons and ultimately the group broke up. Little did “Crystal Motion” know at the time but their solitary 45 release was finding a new audience across the pond in the UK with “You’re My Main Squeeze” being championed by inspirational DJ Colin Curtis in the hallowed halls of Blackpool Mecca, a timeless classic that never fails to bring a smile to the listening audiences faces even to this day.

Returning to the groups unfinished Sounds Gems album project only one track was ever completed, the Fioravanti/Rakes composition “Million Dollar Baby” which along with “There’ll Be Another” has been licensed from their respective owners and paired together for a long overdue 45 release for your delectation. With ‘Crystal Motion’s’ “You’re My Main Squeeze” cult and anthemic status being forever assured with Northern/Modern Soul devotees we’d like to think the discovery and release of these two slightly differing Sweet Soul offerings will garner and enhance the group’s wider appeal with the growing aficionados of the Chicano, Group Harmony and Lowrider genres, Enjoy.

Ocean Abyss Colored Vinyl. Edition of 500 copies.

(Whirring Marvels In) Consensus Reality is the new album by Eluvium - the renowned moniker of prolific modern composer, Matthew Robert Cooper . Taking initial inspirations from T.S. Eliot 's The Waste Land and Richard Brautigan 's All Watched Over By Machines Of Loving Grace , (Whirring Marvels) inherently deals both with humankind's need for meaning, and the emergence of algorithms reflecting the feedback loops of humankind's interactions with machines themselves.

This complicated relationship that we have with technology, automations, and algorithms - and the influence they in turn have on shaping our image of the world - is the mechanized heart and soul of an album that almost instantly establishes itself as a peak in Eluvium 's inimitable catalog.

During the writing process for (Whirring Marvels In) Consensus Reality , Cooper began experiencing shoulder and arm pain that rendered his left arm increasingly debilitated. This inspired new compositional methods that blended varying degrees of electronic automations with traditional songwriting. Lyrical themes were built using algorithms to cull content from a notebook filled with years of scribbled thoughts, poems, considerations, conspiracies, scientific notions, and notes on the spirit of existence.

Employing musicians from all around the world - including members of the American Contemporary Music Ensemble ( ACME ), Golden Retriever, and the entire Budapest Scoring Orchestra - much of the music was conducted and recorded remotely via teleconference during the global COVID lockdowns of 2020 and 2021. This approach to composing served as an unintended but serendipitous challenge for an album inspired by the complicated convenience of technology.

(Whirring Marvels In) Consensus Reality blends an ornate combination of ingredients to construct a narrative of our dynamic invention; technological advancement; loneliness and isolationism; and unchecked idealism in a world of never-ending growth. The resulting hope that somehow emerges is itself a marvel of innovation and inspiration.

Born in Argentina in 2017, Blanco Teta is more than just a band. The project melts experimental rock, punk-pop and trash noise to develop a statement that pass over genre limits. The quatuor digs with intensity into noise, dance, avant-garde but also into politic with a clear speech on transfeminism. From the suburbs of Buenos Aires to some of the most interesting European festival, passing by an outstanding KEXP session, the live iteration of Blanco Teta proposes something so fresh crossing border of performance to create an immersive experience at high level of energy and madness.

Rompe Paga is their third record material but also their first LP. Going from trashy skate-punk vibe tracks to serious noise experiences, the band experiments with no limit. Using a lot of glitches effect or digital mixing tools as autotune, the album is a real mind blower. With very political lyrics, Blanco Teta goes further than just a punky project, it demonstrates the power of music and put the audience into something real.

Tidal Waves Music proudly presents ‘Fly By Night’ for the FIRST TIME on vinyl (the album was only released as a limited compact disc back in the early nineties).
This unique record comes as a deluxe 180g vinyl edition (strictly limited to 500 copies) with obi strip.NonReturnable.

This vinyl edition also features the original painted front cover artwork by Virgil Grady (known for his work with Tribe records) and back photography by acclaimed Detroit scene photographer & author Barbara Barefield, whose work has appeared in many renowned publications such as The New York Times, LA Times, People magazine and countless others.

Released exclusively for Record Store Day 2023 (UK/Europe) and available in participating stores on April 22, 2023.

Wendell Harrison was born in Detroit in 1942 where he began formal jazz studies for piano, clarinet and tenor saxophone. At 14, while still in high school, Harrison started performing & recording professionally with artists such as Marvin Gaye, Grant Green, Sun Ra, Hank Crawford … and many others.

In 1971, Harrison began teaching music at Metro Arts (a multi-arts complex for youth) where he also connected with Marcus Belgrave, Harold McKinney and Phil Ranelin…soon after they formed the (now
legendary) Afro-centric TRIBE record label and artist collective. TRIBE used the Metro Arts complex as a vehicle to convey a growing black political consciousness. Wendell Harrison also published the very popular TRIBE magazine, a publication dedicated to local and national social and political issues, as well as featuring artistic contributions such as poetry and visual pieces.

In 1978 Harrison and McKinney co-founded REBIRTH, a non-profit jazz performance and education organization, in which many notable jazz artists have participated. Around the same time Wendell Harrison
also created the WENHA record label and publishing company, which released many of his (now classic) recordings as well as those of other artists, such as Phil Ranelin, Doug Hammond and Reggie Fields (The Real ShooBeeDoo).
In the early 1990s, Wendell Harrison was awarded the title of “Jazz Master” by Arts Midwest. This distinction led Harrison to collaborate with fellow honorees and gave him the chance to tour throughout the UnitedStates, Middle East and Africa. Even to this day Wendell Harrison's recordings for the TRIBE, WENHA and REBIRTH labels have a large worldwide fanbase.

It is on WEHHA in 1990 that Harrison released (and self-produced) the opus: ‘Fly By Night’ which we are proudly presenting you today. ‘Fly By Night’ is a monster of an album featuring an all-star line-up that
includes Doug Hammond (Mingus, Lonnie Liston Smith) on drums, Kirk Lightsey (Chet Baker, Calvin Keys) on piano, Cecil McBee (John Hicks, Pharoah Sanders, Alice Coltrane) on bass, Jaribu Shahid (Sun Ra) on contrabass and Pamela Wise (Tribe) on Piano. Harrison is killing it here with this selected ensemble (guys he grew up with in Detroit in the late 50’s, when hard bop was the thing and Miles and Coltrane were the heroes of the day). This group of talented veterans are taking this classic album to unseen heights.

On ‘Fly By Night’ the gloves come off…no more jazzy-funk or poppy-jazz. Wendell picks up his tenor for one tune but the remainder of the sessions he performs on clarinet. Wendell’s mastery coaxes the sweet piquant sound of the instrument and as it re-emerges in the contemporary jazz scene. The eight handpicked tunes demonstrate the fertile new directions Wendell Harrison has been working on, combing standards with a fresh new approach.

On these amazing recordings (recorded at the Rebirth Studios in Detroit) the listener is invited to experience a synthesis of what has been and what is now. The record shows Wendell’s trademark proficiency. All of the above makes this incredible record both timeless and as relevant today as it was back when it was initially
released.

Riot Grrrl fire and noise meets musical debauchery from Latin America. Born in Argentina in 2017, Blanco Teta is more than just a band. The project melts experimental rock, punk-pop and trash noise to develop a statement that pass over genre limits. The quatuor digs with intensity into noise, dance, avant-garde but also into politic with a clear speech on transfeminism. From the suburbs of Buenos Aires to some of the most interesting European festival, passing by an outstanding KEXP session, the live iteration of Blanco Teta proposes something so fresh crossing border of performance to create an immersive experience at high level of energy and madness. Rompe Paga is their third record material but also their first LP. Going from trashy skate-punk vibe tracks to serious noise experiences, the band experiments with no limit. Using a lot of glitches effect or digital mixing tools as autotune, the album is a real mind blower. With very political lyrics, Blanco Teta goes further than just a punky project, it demonstrates the power of music and put the audience into something real.

**BACK IN PRINT ON SINGLE LP**After three albums filled for the most part with quick song bursts and the occasional longer track, the eight-song long Bullhead found the Melvins stretching out a bit more at points, this time allowing the heavily stoned tempos plenty of time to really sprawl all over the place. There are fewer sudden shifts between fast and slow moments as well, and a lot more pure lava-flow beat-over-head feedback sludge and noise. It's not all ten mph deliberation, though - "Zodiac" shows the trio at full speed and blasting aside anything that might be so foolish as to get in its way, not to mention one unhinged Osbourne vocal lead. If grunge was achieving breakthrough status in Seattle, it was being perfected in its rawest sense on this album. Opening cut "Boris" does all this in excelsis - the band's longest recorded song at this point, nearly ten minutes long, it practically drips from the bongwater of eight million potheads, with Osbourne invoking his own brand of demons over the deep crawl of the music. Osbourne here really has got the dramatic, theatrical Ozzy Osbourne attitude down, with the occasional double-tracked vocals adding to the off-kilter intensity of the performances. Crover again shows his worth on the drums - he plays things slow most of the time but, crucially, never once sloppily - while Black keeps the bass going, however relatively unheard under Osbourne's guitar attack. "It's Shoved" is the not-so-secret highlight of Bullhead, Crover's brisker drum work and Black's sharp bass playing heralding a wild lead-guitar melody and a great ensemble performance. However, efforts like "Anaconda," with its slowly uncoiling power, and the intense "If I Had an Exorcism," which gets all the more wired and wound up as it goes (Black's bass here is some of her best), are no slouches. (All Music)

We are thrilled to announce the next release on Pleasant Systems from Nu-Cleo, who is widely known for his impressive musical works as Rhythm Of Paradise, Gourment De Funk or Rydm Sectors alongside Nico Lahs, to name a few. Hailing from Bari, Nu-Cleo has garnered much recognition for his releases, which are easily distinguishable by their rich warmth, profound depth, and unpretentiousness. "Never Satisfied" is another demonstration of his mastery, featuring four instant classics that span from the lighter, groovier side of house to a more introspective and contemplative one.

Carole King’s The Legendary Demos will be released April 24th, 2012 via Hear Music / Concord Music Group. A previously unreleased collection of 13 history-making Carole King recordings of some of her most celebrated songs, The Legendary Demos traces King's journey from her days as an Aldon staff writer in the 1960's, where she crafted hit after hit for other artists, to the dawn of her own triumphant solo career in the 1970's, and contains her original recordings of future standards like "(You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman," "It's Too Late," and "You've Got A Friend." Featuring liner notes by acclaimed author and Rolling Stone contributing editor David Browne, the collection brings to light a heretofore missing link in the chain of King's career. Fittingly, The Legendary Demos serves as a companion to King’s long-awaited memoir, A Natural Woman, which is being released April 10th, 2012 via Grand Central Publishing.

Aldon Music used these demos—short for “demonstration records”—to pitch King's material to other artists, from Gene Pitney and Bobby Vee to Aretha Franklin and the Monkees. While the recordings have long been coveted and collected within the industry, they have never before been released to the public.

Whether it was a potential single for the Monkees or a solo performer like Pitney, King’s demos were remarkable in their completeness. “When she sat down to the piano and played a demo of one of her songs, the whole arrangement appeared right in front of your eyes magically,” recalls Brooks Arthur, who engineered a number of these efficient sessions for King at one of several midtown Manhattan studios. “A lot of the smarter producers would adhere to Carole’s demos. If you stuck to that, you’d come home a winner.”

King and then-husband / songwriting partner Gerry Goffin signed with Aldon Music in 1959, and anyone who listened to the radio during the first half of the ‘60s will recognize the songs of teen passion and devastating heartbreak heard in King’s original recordings. “Take Good Care of My Baby” was a No. 1 hit for Bobby Vee in 1961. Goffin’s gift for tapping into teen anguish—in this case, hiding behind a stoic public face—was never conveyed better than in “Crying in the Rain,” which the Everly Brothers took into the top 10 in early 1962. “Just Once in My Life” was the Righteous Brothers’ follow-up to their still-spine-tingling “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin’,” and King’s demo reveals how she and Goffin were instantly able to tap into the duo’s (and producer Phil Spector’s) dramatic, impassioned sound.

Like many of their fellow songwriters at the time, King and Goffin wrote songs for Don Kirshner’s TV show about a fictional, Beatles-derived pop band that debuted in September 1966. The Monkees turned out to be more credible singers (and musicians) than anyone initially expected, as their high-charting 1967 version of King and Goffin's “Pleasant Valley Sunday” revealed. The Monkees also cut “So Goes Love,” a dreamier ballad heard here, but the track didn’t make their first album and wasn’t released until long after they’d disbanded.

The Legendary Demos includes early takes of six tracks that formed the basis for King’s world-wide solo breakthrough Tapestry. King and lyricist Toni Stern’s ever-poignant “It’s Too Late” is here, along with King’s own “Way Over Yonder,” “Beautiful” and “Tapestry,” all three bursting with the artistic and spiritual renewal infusing King’s life during this period.

Among the collection’s numerous gems is the original 1967 demo for Goffin, King, and producer Jerry Wexler’s “(You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman,” a song that would later appear on Tapestry and of course be famously cut by Aretha Franklin later that same year. King’s version offers several different takes from the Franklin and Tapestry versions. Her delivery in the opening lines is looser (check out the way she stretches out “Lord” in “Lord, it made me feel so tired”), and the bridge is even more imbued with palpable romantic and sexual heat.

And finally, there’s King’s initial take on “You’ve Got a Friend,” a classic entry in the Great American Rock Songbook. Milling around in the Troubadour balcony during soundcheck, her friend James Taylor heard King perform the song on a bare stage and was immediately taken with it; his own version, a massive hit, would arrive the following year.