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NEW LIVE ALBUM RECORDED DURING GONG'S 2019 TOUR - DUE FOR RELEASE ON KSCOPE - 2LP 140Gram Gatefold Sleeve

Formed in 1969 by Daevid Allen, one of the founding members of Soft
Machine, classic albums such as 'Camembert Electrique', 'Flying Teapot' & 'You' established Gong as one of the most unique, innovative & experimental rock groups of the Seventies. Before he sadly passed away in 2015, founding Gong member, Daevid Allen, laid
out his hopes for a future Gong, that it should be uplifting, exploratory & a positive force. Kavus Torabi, Fabio Golfetti, Ian East, Dave Sturt & Cheb Nettles, chosen by him, continue his vision.

'Pulsing Signals', recorded live at The Wardrobe in Leeds, The Cluny in Newcastle & Rescue Rooms in Nottingham in 2019 during 'The Universe Also Collapses' tour finds the group in spirited form, unbeknownst to them, it being their final tour before the global pandemic took charge.

Owing to Gong being an international band, lockdown & restrictions on travel made it impossible to convene & work on new music. The band received many requests by fans to release a live album & fortunately enough, the band had multitrack recordings of several shows from the 2019 tour. Bassist Dave Sturt went through all the master tapes & selected the best performances which
became 'Pulsing Signals'.

The album was recorded by Pete Wibrew & mixed by Frank Byng, while mastering was handled by Andy Jackson. The stylish artwork was designed by Steve Mitchell, who has worked closely with the band since 2016's 'Rejoice I'm Dead'.

With touring now set to recommence & bookings going long into 2022 & beyond, Daevid Allen's vision for the future looks set to be fulfilled. 'Pulsing Signals' will be released as a 9-track gatefold double LP on 140g black vinyl.

As pieces of musical curation go, Kenny Dope’s reimagining and reediting of the Wild Style breakbeats is outstanding. While the music from the ‘Wild Style’ OST is truly seminal, the story behind it is even more fascinating.

Underneath the voices of important rappers from hip-hop’s first wave – Cold Crush Brothers, Double Trouble, Rammellzee, Busy Bee and more – were a selection of backing beats that have underpinned and influenced a whole lot of hip-hop ever since.

It would be easy to mistake them for genuine breakbeats dug out of crates, but they’re not. Overseen by hip-hop impresario Freddie Braithwaite – better known as Fab 5 Freddy – in collaboration with Blondie’s Chris Stein – the songs from the Wild Style soundtrack are all unique creations intended as a homage to the early breakbeats.

Drummer Lenny Ferrari – who had played for Aretha Franklin before emerging on the punk scene – and bassist David Harper played many of the iconic grooves, two somewhat forgotten participants in shaping a legendary sound. They – and Chris Stein – weren’t even in the same studio at the same time.

Kenny Dope, a long-time fan of the music, later acquired the original reel-to-reel tapes from Charlie Ahearn, the film’s director. Using the Wild Style breakbeats – many just a minute or so long – he transformed them into longer edits that give them more room to breathe. ‘Down by Law’ and ‘Subway Beat’ are two of the most famous, breakdance classics that summon up visions of graffiti’d trains speeding through the South Bronx.

Limited Brown Vinyl

Brown Rice is probably the most accessible entry point into Cherry's borderless ideal, jelling into a personal, unique, and seamless vision that's at once primitive and futuristic in the best possible way. Its title track is a sensual fusion of various styles and sounds from the African, Indian and Arabic traditions. It also represents the spiritual multiculturalism that Cherry was interested in exploring during this creative period. With ex-Ornette Coleman cohorts on board – Billy Higgings on drums and Charlie Haden on double bass (also heard on electric) – the album (originally released in Italy in 1975) is a cult on its own.

On a balmy Brazilian night in February, 1981, a crowd gathered in Rio de Janeiro's Gávea neighbourhood under the iconic dome of the city's Planetário (Planetarium). Alongside musicians like Helio Delmiro and Milton Nascimento (who were in the audience that night), they were there to see the great "Bruxo" (sorcerer) Hermeto Pascoal live in concert, with his new band formation which would become known simply as "O Grupo" (The Group).

Growing up on a farm in Brazil's northeastern state of Alagoas, Hermeto has always been deeply in tune with, and inspired by nature. In his youth he would make his own flutes to play call and response with the birds and frogs. He would build scrap-metal instruments in his blacksmith grandfather's forge, and sit for hours by the lake listening to the sounds of nature. On the Planetário Da Gávea recordings though, Hermeto is cast as the "sorcerer" or the "cosmic emissary" (as the great Brazilian guitarist Guinga once called him), exhibiting an intuitive sense of harmony and melody beyond that of our own world.

"Tudo e Som" (All is Sound). It's a phrase Hermeto regularly returns to, and it points to the fact that not only can music be made from anything, but also alludes to something much more profound. It's an understanding of the universe as being in a state of constant movement, forever vibrating at the quantum level, like the string of a guitar, or a saxophone's reed. "Tudo e Som" is a declaration of the mystical and spiritual power of sound, as a fundamentally vibrational force.

The series of concerts at the Planetário marked the birth of "O Grupo" which would last with the same line-up (apart from Zé Eduardo Nazário) for the next eleven years. Every member of O Grupo was a phenomenal musician in their own right. It was one of saxophonist/flautist Carlos Malta's first gigs with the group, and the concert unusually featured two drummers, Zé Eduardo Nazário and Marcio Bahia. Nazário, from São Paulo, had played with Hermeto during the mid-70s (as well as with Milton Nascimento, Egberto Gismonti and Toninho Horta, to name a few). Bahia though had just joined the group. Acclaimed keyboard player Jovino Santos Neto was on keyboards, piano and organ, and the great Itiberê Zwarg (who remains in Hermeto's band to this day), played bass. Rounding the group off was the percussionist Pernambuco. During this period (up until the early 90s) the group would rehearse for hours on end, virtually seven days a week, with a total dedication to music and Hermeto's musical vision.

Most of the compositions performed that night at the Planetário had never been recorded before, and many are unique to this album, including the wild 'Homônimo Sintróvio', the exaltant 'Samba Do Belaqua', 'Vou Pra Lá e Pra Cá' and 'Bombardino', which features Hermeto's wonderfully absurd call and response mouthpiece soliloquy. Then there's the stunning 7/4 Samba 'Jegue' which builds with inventive dissonance, before releasing yet another celestially colourful, celebratory refrain. The show also features the first recorded performances of 'Era Pra Ser e Não Foi' and 'Ilza na Feijoada' (inspired by Hermetos' wife Ilza's famed black bean and meat stew), which Hermeto later recorded on his 1984 studio album "Lagoa Da Canoa Município De Arapiraca".

Dubbed by Miles Davis as "one of the most important musicians on the planet", a Hermeto Pascoal live show was (and still is) an experience like no other. Across the recording of the Planetário concert, wild improvisation meets groovy, virtuosic vamping on progressive, extended psychedelic jams. The tracks are generally built around a beautiful, transcendent melody; instantly recognisable as being Hermeto's, and for the most part, the musicians then solo over extended two chord vamps. There's a plethora of powerfully delivered rhythms, wild solos and the performances are punctuated by Hermeto's unpredictable, at times comical sonic antics.

Over forty years since this historic happening, Far Out Recordings is overjoyed to release this magical recording of Hermeto Pascoal e Grupo Live at Planetário Da Gávea, on double vinyl LP, CD and digitally for a February 4th 2022 release.

Not to add to the deluge of artistic clichés brought on by the Global Event Which Shall Not Be Named, but spending more or less a year in the house offers plenty of time for reflection, reevaluation, and revision. Though there was a lot to process already in those months, it was an opportune time to try and get your shit together, whatever that may mean for you. For Jakob Armstrong—in addition to many other things like the rest of us—part of it meant fine- tuning a collection of songs first recorded in late 2019. A prolonged process leading to five of the seven songs on Get Yourself a Friend retooled into their better-than-even final form. Jakob Armstrong—youngest son of Green Day frontman Billie Joe—began playing guitar at seven years old and honed his craft privately until about sixteen, playing in bands in and around Oakland after meeting friends with like-minded tastes in music. Soon enough, with the memories of Ultraman action figures fighting in his mind, he and a group of friends he cultivated from those years playing around and pouring over records, formed Ultra Q (its name inspired by an Ultraman prequel series). Opening double-shot “Pupkin” and “It’s Permanent” soar to the heights of Ultra Q’s powers in much different ways; the former a black-clad romp through a rainy graveyard, the former pushing straight to the clouds with its soaring chorus. “Straight Jacket” veers pleasantly close to the jangle-pop of the Go-Betweens. “Bowman” features guitars like cats getting into a scratch-fight while an astoundingly metronomic drumbeat is played live rather than punched out on a beat pad. Closing the EP is its title track, an affecting end credits anthem full of nostalgia and a twinge of regret. As a whole, Get Yourself a Friend marks the synthesis of a songwriter’s vision and his band’s ability, forged through an invisible existential threat and an ever-changing world, eager to show what they’ve found while we were all inside

FFO: Arthur Russell, Stealing Sheep, Neu!, Agar Agar, Galaxians
Holodrum are a new disco-infused synth-pop group, who feature members of Hookworms, Yard Act, Cowtown, Virginia Wing, Drahla and more.

Maybe Holodrum were destined to start at this point. This might be the first time they’ve all officially worked together, but between Emily Garner (vocals), Matthew Benn (synth/bass/production), Jonathan Nash (drums), Jonathan Wilkinson (guitar), Sam Shjipstone (guitar/vocals), Christopher Duffin (sax/synth) and Steve Nuttall (percussion) they’ve shared bands, mixed each other’s records, promoted live shows and made music videos together in and around Leeds. As Holodrum, this is the 7 piece’s debut album, but the interlocking grooves and hot headiness of their repeato-rock-via-CBGBs dopamine hits have in one way or other been fermenting for years.

“When it comes to doing music most bands fall between two extremes of doing it for some goal or as an end to itself” says Shjipstone. “I think Holodrum is about the joy and complexity of living, and I just hope to god everyone gets to have a good time doing it.”

Ultimately the core of the group comes from Shjipstone and his former Hookworms bandmates Benn, Nash and Wilkinson. After their abrupt dissolution in late 2018, the four of them spent six months apart; Benn still had Xam Duo, his ongoing project with Virginia Wing and some-time James Holden & The Animal Spirits live member Duffin, Nash remains vocalist and guitarist of long-running DIY rockers Cowtown and helms his solo project Game_Program; and Shjipstone plays guitar with Yard Act. However, the four of them missed the sixth sense synergy they’d built-up playing together over a decade and soon enough demos were being swapped and new ideas were discussed.

The vision of a large live electronic ensemble formed quickly. Friends were added: Duffin and Nuttall – who was keen to resurrect the double percussion interplay that he and Nash had been exploring as part of motorik trio Nope joined first. Then animator and VIDE0 singer Garner crystallised the line-up by joining on vocals.

“Apart from Emily, all of us had actually played together before in a covers band at a New Year’s Eve party at the Brudenell Social Club a couple of years ago, so we knew we could have fun together” says Benn. “So we set up to be a live party band early on. We wanted lots of people on stage having fun, playing for people that also wanted to have fun. It makes sense we take inspiration from bands like Tom Tom Club and Liquid Liquid; they were trying to help people to party at a point when New York was quite a scary and dangerous place we’re doing the same, albeit in the face of a decaying world and a global pandemic.”

Covid-19 hasn’t given them much opportunity to do that yet, with two fledgling shows in late 2019 to their name before festival appearances at the likes of Bluedot, Sounds From The Other City and Gold Sounds were scuppered last year. However, the 6 tracks on Holodrum crackle with the energy of the dancefloor. Opening cut 'Lemon Chic' described by Garner as her “workout track” starts out sparsely, with tight drum claps and burbling synths holding a teetering suspense before the whole thing’s prised open, allowing beaming saxophone skronk to shine in. Garner’s vocals bob and weave around the syncopations of the track’s building cacophony.

It sets the stall for an album heavy on euphoria, built atop crisp interplaying percussion and acid-flecked grooves. At times Shjipstone provides a raw counterpoint on vocals, while elsewhere - like on the strutting, swirling disco of 'Free Advice' and 'Low Light'’s late night ping pong synths - the pair indulge in playful call and response as the instrumentation builds and contorts around them. 'Stage Echo' provides a respite of sorts halfway through, a swirling, fever dream of a track that peaks with big squelchy frequencies and cavernous reverb, before the album returns to its repetitious exercises in body-moving catharsis underpinned at all times by a relentlessly propulsive rhythm section.

Dark Hardcore privacy !

Vinyl Only

iO (Mulen) is ready with his 4th album. Now he's coming back to the home of his special releases - Mulen Records. This time - with "Oldivibes". And, no, we're not talking about his label - we're talking about his vision of "oldie vibes". Prepare for the superhot meal of iO (Mulen)'s signature basslines, double dose of energy, premium collection of chords and a delicate pinch of those "oldie vibes" that are at the background of every single track in this 3x12". 1992, 1996 or 2005 - you'll decide the date of retro journey by yourself - the year doesn't really matter here. What does - we're having one more album, designed straight for the dancefloors. 12 tracks that could make any dancer happy - no less.

CAM Sugar is proud to present the first physical release, on LP and double CD, of the original soundtrack to the TV series “MEDICI - MASTERS OF FLORENCE” (2016-2019), that received international praise following the Netflix distribution. The original score composed by Paolo Buonvino brings the Italian Renaissance back to life. The soundtrack mixes traditional instruments belonging to classical music (a common practice with historical dramas) with smooth electronic elements, allowing the listeners to take a journey of exploration through one of the most exciting periods of European history as much as into one’s intimacy.  The result is a score that is impactful and enjoyable for a broad audience, also thanks to the voice of Skin (Skunk Anansie), who performs “Renaissance” and “Revolution Bones”, respectively the theme songs to season 1 and season 2 & 3. The LP version offers a selection of the best tracks composed for the 3 seasons, while the double CD edition features the series’ complete soundtrack.

GENOCIDE PACT return with their eponymous new album. An overdose of gut-wrenching Death Metal, Genocide Pact is heavy, engrossing, and undoubtedly brutal. "This album reflects on the feeling of watching the world crumble while dealing with personal tragedy," says guitarist/vocalist Tim Mullaney. True to his word - every track on Genocide Pact is a sonic assault brimming with palpable malaise. From the guttural screams in the album's opener "Led to Extinction", to the driving double bass that carries "Perverse Dominion", and a head rattling low end on "Deprive Degrade" - Genocide Pact is wholly negative Death Metal. The fury behind Genocide Pact captures the band's collective frustrations and personal journeys through these turbulent times. "You turn on the news and see mass shootings, a global pandemic, endless war, and corporations and politicians trying to sell you bullshit. You pick up your phone and another friend or family member has died. On top of that, you’re broke as fuck and work endlessly for a boss that doesn’t even know your name. You find yourself paranoid, pissed off, and embracing nihilism," Tim Mullaney says. GENOCIDE PACT have learned to embrace the negativity, churning out one of 2021's ugliest and unforgiving records.

Léonie Pernet's second album Le Cirque de Consolation, to be released November 19th on InFiné & CryBaby, inhabits a world where borders dissolve and everyone makes their own unique and singular utopia. Hereby, the record questions the links between pop music, African cultures and electronic music, neo-classical music or the role of voice, whether human or synthetic. Sophomore albums can be a painful process for an artist - how refreshing it is to hear one so decidedly optimistic.

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The sought after whirlwind of French Pop that exploded onto the scene with her debut "Crave", Leonie Pernet, returns with her second album, "Le Circque de Consolation", a sort of double negative of her first. While the yearning that sat at the center of "Crave"might not have been resolved, the young multi-instrumentalist and singer has found a new perspective - a more open and positive outlook on her own life and work. Perhaps telling, then, that the title was the first element of the album to exist: as it is and has always been a journey of personal (and collective) consolation first, a musical confrontation with the self.

"This record parallels my life's journey," confirms Léonie, "it reflects what has happened in my life since 'Crave' came out and how I feel today. There's still a lot of melancholy, but a lot more sunshine and light. In four years, I've become sober, which has saved me; I've worked a lot on my voice, which is a part of a desire to speak, to address my audience more directly, and also a more pronounced pop desire." In line with her new-found "openness", Leonie invites another musician into her creative process for the first time on "Le Cirque de Consolation": Jean Sylvain le Gouic, who lended his coproduction and perspective to her, while Leonie still plays almost all instruments herself with an astounding prowess.

Leonie's voice oozes with a new-found self-confidence and takes center stage amidst eclectic, distinctively fun and open-minded production. Sometimes she sings in English, mostly in French: "I worked a lot on my voice," confirms Léonie, "I didn't dare to sing before, neither live, nor on record, nor in the studio." Surrounding her astounding, intoxicating voice are forays into any direction imaginable: from harsh, experimental electronics to the more sombre, organic and quiet moments - and everywhere, there is the vision of Africa, (also Middle East) it's many sonic gifts and cultures.

Leonie has found a universal utopia that she craves for - a musical, cultural amalgamation that is decidedly non-western, political and poetic, rooted in self-discovery and the connection with other humans: African and oriental percussion, synthesizers, drum-machines; Léonie mixes genres and instruments with ease and precision. The French novelist and philosopher Édouard Glissant - whose work and writing had a big influence on Pernet - coined the term "Creolization ", the "bringing together of several cultures or at least several elements of distinct cultures, in one part of the world, resulting in new data, totally unpredictable in relation to the sum or the simple synthesis of these elements."

From "Hard Billy ", a techno-influenced rebellious anthem, to "Les Chants de Maldoror," a club and dance song propelled forward by feverish derboukas, to the deeply moving "A rebours" and its Afro-electronic rock. Léonie Pernet inhabits a world where borders dissolve and everyone makes their own unique and singular utopia. Hereby, the record questions the links between pop music, African cultures and electronic music (Intérieur Négro), neo-classical music (Le Cirque de consolation, Dandelion), or the place of the voice, whether human or synthetic as in the atmospheric "Vowel". Sophomore albums can be a painful process for an artist - how refreshing it is to hear one so decidedly optimistic.

After the huge northern hemisphere summer of 2019, filled with amazing events and awesome music, Avalon releases his long awaited second album 'RISE' to great critical acclaim.
Every track a story, every track a magical moment lifting dancefloors to new realms of psychedelia!
Set almost ten years apart from his classic debut album 'Distant Futures', Avalon has since climbed to dizzying heights to become one of the leading and most in-demand artists of the global Psychedelic Trance scene. Chart topping number ones have lined-up one after another between massive collaborations, two remix albums, three collaboration albums (as Killerwatts with Tristan and Future Frequency with Sonic Species) and a gigging schedule that has placed him at every major festival and music loving country possible.
'RISE' shares with us many solo productions, filled with the classic Avalon trademark elements that first garnered him so much success. Twisting and mixing-up his quintessential sounds with the newest and biggest production techniques, plus four amazing collaborations with friends and Psychedelic alumni; Tristan, Dickster, Ajja and Mad Maxx, ensured this album has become a force to be reckoned with!

'RISE' expresses an artist at full potential, utilising all he has learned from a deep dive into psychedelic music and taking things to the next level.

Get ready to Rise!!

We are very proud to now be able to offer this amazing album as a Special Limited Edition double Vinyl.

After humble lo-fi beginnings in the Australian Art-Pop Underground, Donny Benet has expanded his cult-like following across the Globe with a resonant Array of danceable Repertoire dealing with Love- and Affection. New album "Mr Experience" marks a new chapter, informed by a wealth of musical- and personal development.

For Mr Experience, Donny envisioned a Soundtrack to a Dinner-Party- Set in the late 1980's. While his earlier Recordings drew Inspiration from DIY Pop Conspirators such as Ariel Pink & John Maus, Donny channelled the Stylings of Bryan Ferry & Hiroshi Yoshimura as the Impetus for new Material, evident on the Intimacy found on ‘Girl Of My Dreams’ and it's lush production- with a soothing whistle-along Chorus for good Measure!

Sincerity has been a key component of Donny Benet’s output since the beginning. His songs deal with genuine Emotion served on a kitsch Platter. An alter-ego manifested in the beginning of the 2010's, Donny has blurred the Lines of Artifice to create a back- Catalogue that can embrace- and challenge, often simultaneously, - the notion of Irony in Art.

"Mr Experience" moves further away from ironic Notions as Donny explores lyrical- and musical themes which embody Observations of Maturation in his audience, his tightknit musical Community- and himself. While ‘mature’ is a term that often rings hollow as an album descriptor, the term couldn’t be more apt for Mr Experience.

Previous album The Don was created with the luxury of time. The phenomenal Response to that Album across Europe- and the United States - fuelled by accompanying Music Videos clocking in Views in the Millions- meant that there were scant Windows of Opportunity to write- and record a follow-up.

With a legacy in Sydney’s music community, working with Sarah Blasko, and tightknik collaborators Jack Ladder & Kirin J Callinan, Donny Benet is accustomed to collaboration on the Stage- and in the Studio, mostnotably on the 2014 full-length release Weekend At Donny’s.



“There is such immense talent evident in every aspect of the Donny Bene experience - the vision of the character, the steadfast adherence his narrative and the musicality of Benet himself all combine to makesomething truly genius.” - Double J, Australin.

“Donny Benet makes feminine music for everybody” - Vice, Netherlands.

“The Don does not sound like amusical copying machine”. - 3voor12 National, Netherlands.

“The set was punctuated with virtuosic solos and exquisite harmonies, and added another layer of genius to the show.
We almost couldn’t handle it... Donny for president!" - Indie Berlin.

“Everyone loves Donny Benet” - Feature in Gonzai, France.

“Phenomenal Australian Showman... Offers Top-Class Dance Music with Virtuose-Bass Guitar- and Keyboard Parts & incredible Sound-Colour feel.” - Podujatie.sk, Slovakia.

Donny has toured Europe five times since the start of 2018 and has played in the UK, Austria, Germany, Slovakia, France, Netherlands, Spain, Portugal, Belgium, Denmark, Switzerland, Czech Republic, Greece and Sweden. The Don will revisit Europe twice in 2020, once for his own headline shows in May then back again in August for festivals!

Keplar re-issues the fourth album 'Chessa' by Dan Abrams' project Shuttle358 on vinyl for the first time. The double LP edition includes 3 previously unreleased tracks from the same recording sessions back in 2004, as well as an extended artwork with unseen photographs by Dan Abrams.

While undoubtedly associated with the microsound and 'clicks & cuts' movement around the turn of the millennium, on 'Chessa' Shuttle358 left behind the classical rhythmic patterns of the genre and shifted further towards warmer territories, meandering between modern digital minimalism and the soft tones of ambient music. Counter to his microsound synthesis approach on Frame (2000), Abrams created Chessa by writing software that manipulated samples from his unreleased songs, guitar pieces, and vintage japanese films sampled from video tape. In particular, a special granulating technique was written and performed at intentionally low sample rates that gave the uniquely fragile, yet dense sound to the album. Over fourteen tracks Abrams arranges slowly evolving sonic entities of unfading elegance. Strayed and hazy melodies pulse and cascade, elongated but brittle harmonies shimmer and disappear, echoing far-off in the rounded corners of the mind. The patient and detailed way Abrams combines the broken with the beautiful in creating organic collages of sound that retain the euphonic essence of a song, makes this piece of work so powerful and timeless, sounding just as relevant today, as it did 17 years ago.

Under modern scrutiny in Abrams latest studio, he refocused the original recordings to emphasize the elements most important to the original vision. The final mastering and vinyl preparation was done in collaboration with Stephan Mathieu, vinyl was cut by LUPO.

From the original press release in 2004 by Taylor Deupree:

Without a doubt Shuttle358 has become one of the most admired artists to emerge from modern electronic music’s sea of musicians. From the humble beginnings of a demo CD in 12k’s mailbox to 4 critically acclaimed CDs, Dan Abrams is, to some, the one credited for bringing a warmth and human touch back into what has often been considered a very cold, sterile genre. It began with 1999’s Optimal.lp (12k1005), a groundbreaking debut release that immediately defined the Shuttle358 sound; a hybridization of the then-emerging “microsound” genre with Eno’s true ambient explorations. In 2000 Abrams outdid himself with Frame (12k1011) by honing his sound design and exploring production techniques at rates that made his “now” quite brief and creating what was to become one of the most sought-after CDs in the 12k catalog.

Chessa is the third release from Abrams’ Shuttle358 moniker on 12k and he continues to do what he does best: attempt to move microsound away from the world of theory and towards absolute real life. Like his photographs, Chessa is music about, and to be listened to in, unexpected places. It is a narrative, a simple slice of life that plays out through the incidental photography of the cover artwork. To achieve this Abrams fuses irregular granular sound particles, like the movements of everyday life, with a deliberate melodic base that captures emotion and simplicity.

Double Ultra Clear LP, Gatefold Jacket, Insert, Printed Inner Sleeves
A graduate from the prestigious Berklee College of Music, Ashe has been lauded by the likes of The FADER who raved about her ‘effortless voice’; People called her music, ‘deeply emotional yet so fun,’ Consequence of Sound
described her songs as, ‘accessible yet emotional’ and NME declared she’s ‘a
formidable new force in the pop world,’ among other accolades. Ashe’s touring resume includes performances at Coachella with Big Gigantic, and opening
slots for The Chainsmokers, LAUV, Louis The Child, Lewis Capaldi and more.
On TikTok Ashe gained 1 million followers, hitting over 2.5 billion video views
and 2.5 million videos created. On Instagram she has over 950K followers and
growing, approaching 520K followers on Twitter, and over 7.3 million monthly
listeners on Spotify. Her double EP Moral of the Story Chapters 1 & 2 is out now.
In 2020, Ashe also released the single ‘Save Myself,’ which garnered over a
million streams a week last summer, while the official music video saw #SaveMyselfMV trend on Twitter worldwide after its debut, including the U.S. at #5.
She recently contributed an original song, ‘The Same,’ to the new film and
soundtrack, To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before, her second placement in the
wildly popular Netflix franchise.
Ashe made her stunning late-night TV debut alongside Niall Horan on The Late
Late Show with James Corden, taped at London’s famed Royal Albert Hall and
her daytime debut on Ellen at the top of 2021. ‘Till Forever Falls Apart’ is the
first hint of more exciting new music which Ashe and FINNEAS recently performed on Jimmy Kimmel Live! Ashe’s debut album Ashlyn includes 14 songs
which she describes as ‘...deeply reflective and honest, full of stories of my
experiences with fear and pain and turning those hard things into joy and independence.
I’m an experiential writer and there was no way I was going to make an album
that didn’t address my personal journey, from my brother’s death this last year
to my own experiences with emotional abuse. I think you have to be vulnerable
to create something really great and I believe I did that. Writing this album was
also an opportunity to show that I’m not just a songwriter and a singer but a
producer and a musician with a very clear vision for my art.
Joni Mitchell refers to herself like a bee, gathering stories like pollen and trying
to make honey from it, ‘whether or not the flavor suits people is something
beyond my control.’ I really tried to take that approach to writing this album,
making something I loved above everything else. I couldn’t be more proud of
Ashlyn and I hope many people happen to love it too.”

Get on Down is proud to present A Wolf in Sheep's Clothing, the debut album by Black Sheep, available for the first time ever as double vinyl release. On the initial release of this classic it was 'The Choice Is Yours' that blew the roof off with even the most of novice rap fans gravitating to the song's energy. The cut has gone on to be featured in a long list of films and commercials (including the KIA campaign with the hip hop hamsters). Singles like 'The Choice Is Yours' and 'Flavor of the Month' made a perfect landing strip for those to delve deeper into the duo's debut. Often humorous ('Strobelite Honey'), often serious ('Black with No N.V (No Vision)', Black Sheep were able to craft an album that displayed their witty sensibilities while also staying conscious in true Native Tongue form. From the moment the album starts with Prince Paul introducing the 'lowlifes of the family tree' you know you are in for something special....and different. Mista Lawnge's production is every bit as textured as fellow counter parts Tribe or De La, while standing out as being completely original and fresh. Tracks like 'Butt in the Meantime', 'Try Counting Sheep' and 'La Menage (Featuring Q Tip)' are great examples of the duo's original style - complex layered beats (everything from Jazz, Soul and Rock all meshed together perfectly) to compliment Dres' distinct voice and word play. With other standout album cuts like 'For Those That Slept' and 'To Who It May Concern' it seemed as if they had an endless bag of treats, each offering something different while preserving the groups style. Polar opposite to what other groups at the time were doing, Black Sheep hit a homerun with their debut that few hip hop acts would ever reach. VH1 called 'The Choice Is Yours' one of the Top 100 Hip Hop tracks of all time and with not one bad or filler track, this full album certainly ranks as one of the best hip hop releases of the 90s.

Michael Mayer’s latest EP, Brainwave Technology, comes at you purposeful, stealthy and sly. It’s a glorious left turn for the redoubtable producer, one that sees his typically lean and lithe productions buffed to a metallic, futurist sheen. There’s a gleam in the eyes of tracks like “Brainwave Technology” and “Alpha” that speaks of serious fun, of the intersection of the pleasure zone and the frontal lobe.

“Brainwave Technology” itself is informed by Mayer’s deep dive into the thorny terrain of artificial intelligence, transhumanism and posthumanism. Inspired by reading German philosopher Richard David Precht, Mayer found himself heading down the “proverbial rabbit hole,” as he describes it, “watching hours of YouTube material by self-proclaimed prophets of these ‘inevitable’ changes to come.” Never one to be taken in by the egotist’s dance, Mayer’s cynicism about the whole endeavour is tempered, a little, by the deeper questions that these figures gesture towards: “Is it really an evolutionary step that man and machine become one? Or is it rather a marketing plot by Silicon Valley billionaires?”

On “Brainwave Technology”, Mayer plays the charlatans at their own game, turning their logic against them by exposing the fruitiness of their ‘visions’. “I chose irony as my sword with which I chopped off some quotes from some of those batshit crazy prophets and self-promoters,” he explains of the drooling psychobabble he drops in the track’s lacuna. There’s a sense of humour here – how could you not laugh at these hungover egotists? – but there’s levity too, a sense that Mayer’s using sound to expose the contradictions and double-speak at the heart of these half-formed ideas. It’s a Burroughsian tactic, to slice into the heart of the voice to see what hidden truths surface.

It was Burroughs, too, who once said that “when you cut into the past, the future leaks out”; Brainwave Technology cuts into the logic of the futurologist to leak out the messiness of modern reality. On “Alpha” and “Gamma”, Mayer seems to conjure up the stark, ominous music that’d soundtrack a science fiction reinterpretation – or preinterpretation – of our modern malaise, all funereal wreaths of electronic noise and clatterboxing beats. As the EP resolves with “Device For The Young At Heart”, Mayer’s questions are piling up: “Do we want to become immortal and live on as a download? Do we really give up on Earth and put all our effort into colonising Mars?” There are no answers, of course, but plenty of imaginings-to-be. Brainwave Technology soundtracks both dystopian and utopian possibilities of what could come next.

This is incredibly Trees Speak's third album on Soul Jazz Records to be released in the space of one year - and it's amazing! Trees Speak's new album 'PostHuman' once again blends 1970s German electronic and 'motorik' Krautrock instrumentals (think Harmonia, Can, Cluster, Popul Vuh, Neu!), haunting and powerful 1960s & 1970s soundtracks (think Italian prog-rock Goblin and John Carpenter horror movies, Morricone and existential John Barry spy movies), together with a New York no wave electronic synth and guitar analogue DIY-ness (think Suicide, anything on Soul Jazz's New York Noise series or Eno's New York No Wave)! Drawing further upon German krautrock high-concept albums from the likes of Tangerine Dream and Klaus Schulze from the 1970s, Trees Speak create their own powerful new landscapes of sound that manage to be at once contemporary as well as both timeless and with a sense of science-fiction futurism. Trees Speak' segue together all these elements into 'PostHuman,' which follows on from their criticallyacclaimed debut LP 'Ohms', and 'Shadow Forms' released on Soul Jazz Records less than six months ago. This powerful new album is a high-concept collage of retro-futurist science-fiction music, fantastically illustrated by the artist Eric Lee, a dramatic vision of life after humanity. Trees Speak are Daniel Martin Diaz and Damian Diaz from Tucson, Arizona and their music often draws on the cosmic night-time magic of Arizona's natural desert landscapes. 'Trees Speak' relates to the idea of future technologies storing information and data in trees and plants - using them as hard drives - and the idea that Trees communicate collectively. The album includes an exclusive bonus 45 single 'Machine Vision' and 'Seventh Mirror' that will only be available with the first order of the vinyl edition of this amazing and ground-breaking new album. With 'PostHuman,' Trees Speak once again manages to take the listener deep into their unique musical world of unknown visions of the past and the future.

’Angelo lost his shit over it. Aaliyah’s 3rd favourite track of all time is on it. David Bowie rocked up with it to a TV interview, declaring it “the most exciting sound of contemporary soul music”.

In 1996, Lewis Taylor released his self-titled masterpiece. A true modern classic, it’s an album that was years ahead of its time. Forget 25 years ago, it could easily have been made in 2021. An effortless blend of neo-soul, sophisticated pop, smart grooves and laid-back white funk, it enjoyed rapturous reviews from critics and music legends alike. But the album never managed to make an impact and given what was likely a token vinyl release at the time, the original records have long since been near-impossible to find. Lewis Taylor’s Lewis Taylor remains a holy relic for some and criminally unknown to most.

Lewis Taylor’s impeccable influences created a dazzling sonic palette: the LP as a whole suggests the visionary brilliance of Prince; the vocal stylings evoke the yearning power of Marvin Gaye; the effortless guitar playing shares the virtuosity of Jimi Hendrix; the haunting tones conjure Tricky; the innovative production and engineering invite comparisons to studio mavericks like Todd Rundgren and Brian Eno; the multi-layered, complex harmonies flash on Pet Sounds-era Brian Wilson; the dark, drama is reminiscent of both Scott Walker and Stevie Wonder; the complex arrangements create textures and moods with the feel of Shuggie Otis on Inspiration Information; the bold experimentation is akin to progressive artists like Faust and Tangerine Dream; the atmosphere is in conversation with Jeff Buckley’s Grace… and we could go on. That might all sound like marketing hyperbole, but not as far as Be With is concerned. It is a genuine wonder how an album this good could’ve passed so many people by.

But despite all the reference points, the similarities are really only skin-deep because the album sounds truly original. It occupies its own distinct, strange universe that feels dark and brooding one moment, bright and joyous the next. Ultimately, Taylor sounds like Taylor.

Although you wouldn’t know it from the credits, the album wasn’t the work of Lewis alone. Sabina Smyth gets an executive producer credit on the original sleeve, but in fact she worked with Lewis on the production and arrangements, did a lot of the backing vocals and she co-wrote Track, Song, Lucky and Damn with Lewis.

Lewis clarified all this in a Soul Jones interview with Dan Dodds in 2016. He explains how not giving Sabina the credit she was due at the time was an unfortunate consequence of where his head was at and he’s now trying to set the record straight.

Together they created an exquisite and sensually-charged record, with a freshness to the writing that makes the songs catchy, melodic-yet-deep and sometimes even funky. The music is predominantly guitar-led and a mixture of organs and synths, live drum loops and electronic percussion make for a sort of modern soul backing orchestra.

On the surface the album is gorgeously laidback, but beneath the lush, sometimes slick, production there’s a murkiness in the seriously gritty funk/hip-hop instrumentation. Lewis Taylor can be a claustrophobic listen. Even its one-word, often seemingly throw-away track titles add to the sense of unease. In its most positive moments, there’s still a sense that things aren’t quite right. The magic comes from this compelling tension.

The languid, strutting “Lucky” is a sensational opening statement. Sinuous electric guitar winds around the shaking percussion with a killer bass line rattling your bones, and Lewis’s voice is sublime. Its six-and-a-half unhurried minutes manage to distill the work of Marvin, Al Green and Bobby Womack because yes, it’s *that* good. Up next is the tough, dusty drum and jazzy, unsettling psych-guitar workout of “Bittersweet”. Aaliyah described it the “perfect song”, which says it all. By turns loping and soaring, tightly coiled and blasting free, 25 years on its discordant, swaggering majesty still sounds like future R&B.

The swinging, blue-eyed funk of “Whoever” oozes sophisticated sunshine soul for hazy days before “Track” sweeps in. The music tries to lift us up, beyond the reach of the vocals trying to drag us back down as Taylor sings “my mood is black as the darkest cloud”. The spare, dubby electro-soul of “Song” closes out the first half of the album with barely contained dread as it creeps towards the lush, synth-heavy coda.

The smouldering “Betterlove” eases us into the second half, coming on like a languorous response to the call of “Brown Sugar”, before sliding into the shuffling, softly-rocking “How”. Somehow the remarkable “Right” manages to both warm things up and smooth things out even more. Taut yet luxurious, it’s definitely not wrong.

“Damn” was to have been the album’s title track and you might also be able to hear its influence on D’Angelo’s Voodoo, maybe most obviously in the chaotic closing moments of “Untitled (How Does It Feel)”. Building to a screeching wall of noise that suddenly cuts dead, “Damn” sounds like the natural end to the album, with the celestial a cappella “Spirit” serving as a heavenly reprise.

When it came to the sleeve, art director Cally Callomon heard Taylor’s music as “sideways off-camera glances at a plethora of influences he had” and wanted to interpret that visually: “I went off into night-time London to see if I could find his song titles in off-beam low-fidelity photographs. I even found a shop called Lewis Taylor”. With a slide for each of the album’s ten tracks, nine of them are on the inner sleeve and the slide for “Damn” makes the front cover. It should’ve been the album’s title, but concerns over distribution in the US scuppered this.

One of UK soul’s most fascinating artists, Andrew Lewis Taylor is an enigmatic figure and a hugely under-appreciated talent. A prodigious multi-instrumentalist who got his start touring with heavy blues/psych outfit the Edgar Broughton Band, he released two albums of psychedelic-rock as Sheriff Jack before Island signed him on the strength of a demo alone. But Taylor was destined to be one of those artists unable (or unwilling) to be pigeonholed and despite the best efforts of Island’s publicity department the music never sold in the quantities it needed to or deserved to. Island eventually let him go in the early 2000s and in June 2006, Lewis Taylor retired from music.

Typical for the mid-90s, this CD-length album was squeezed onto a single LP for its original vinyl release. Simon Francis’s fresh vinyl mastering now spreads out the ten tracks over a double LP so nothing is compromised. And as usual, the records have been cut by Pete Norman and pressed at Record Industry. The original artwork has been restored at Be With HQ and subtly re-worked to work as a double.

This sprawling psychedelic soul opus really is a forgotten should-be-classic. We know that there are those of you who know, and as for the rest of you, we’re a bit jealous that you’re getting to hear Lewis Taylor for the first time.

Composer, multi-instrumentalist, poet, griot, improviser and community
leader William Parker presents a pair of brand new trio albums which further expound on his limitless vision.
One of the iconic and enduring music leaders to emerge in the world over the
last half century, William Parker continues to raise the bar higher.
‘Mayan Space Station’ is his first electric guitar trio album, and features Parker
on bass, alongside Ava Mendoza (electric guitar), and Gerald Cleaver (drums).
Cosmic multi-hued blues, perfect for space and time travel. The unparalleled
rhythmic firmament created by Parker & Cleaver is matched by Mendoza in full
flight. All of the promise imagined by a trio recording of these musicians with
compositions by Parker is delivered to the fullest.
Mendoza’s prodigious talents have illuminated many projects and recordings
as both leader and collaborator over the past decade. As is certainly clear here,
she is committed to bringing expressivity, energy and a wide sonic range to the
music. Gerald Cleaver is an exceptionally gifted poet of drum sound who can
play in the deepest of pockets and manifest all manner of sound to perfectly fit
contours within the most open of forms.
Cleaver & Parker have worked closely on numerous projects, notably within the
nonpareil full-improvising trio, Farmers By Nature, together with Craig Taborn.
William Parker is in vibrant grandmaster blossom here on double bass - in both
pizzicato & bow-as-prism modes.
William Parker: bass, compositions,
Ava Mendoza: electric guitar,
Gerald Cleaver: drums

Having already unearthed three collections of archival ‘70s recordings by Catherine Christer Hennix, Blank Forms continues their annual illumination of the visionary Swedish composer’s music by turning to more recent work with this first-time vinyl edition of Hennix’s “Blues Alif Lam Mim in the Mode of Rag Infinity/Rag Cosmosis,” a 2014 piece first released as a CD in 2016 (Important Records).

The double album captures the April 22, 2014 premiere of Hennix’s composition by by the Chora(s)san Time-Court Mirage, her expanded just intonation ensemble, featuring a brass section of Amir ElSaffar, Paul Schwingenschlögl, Hilary Jeffery, Elena Kakaliagou, and Robin Hayward; live electronics by Stefan Tiedje and Marcus Pal; and voice by Amirtha Kidambi, Imam Ahmet Muhsin Tüzer, and Hennix herself. Intended to reveal the blues’ origins in the eastern musical traditions of raga and makam, “Blues Alif Lam Mim in the Mode of Rag Infinity/Rag Cosmosis” has its roots in Hennix’s 2013 realization of an “Illuminatory Sound Environment,” a concept developed in 1978 by anti-artist Henry Flynt on the basis of Hennix’s own “The Electric Harpsichord.”

As Hennix explains in Other Matters, Blank Forms’ 2019 collection of her writings:

“Rag Infinity/Rag Cosmosis presents fragments of ‘raga-like’ frequency constellations following distinct cycles and permuting their order, creating a simultaneity of ‘multi-universes.’ When two such ‘universes’ come in proximity of each other and begin unfolding simultaneously along distinct cycles, there is a kaleidoscopic exfoliation of frequencies as one universe is becoming two, but not separated—the effect of cosmosis is entrained, binding two or more frequency universes into proximity where their modal properties interact and blend, creating in the process entirely new microtonal constellations in an omnidirectional simultaneous cosmic order with phenomenologically ‘transfinite’ Poincaré cycles (cyclic returns to initial conditions).”

As with Hennix’s best work, the organic unfolding of this quivering drone belies a precision that opens onto the infinitesimal. Upon its mesmerizing ebb and flow, the vocalists incant a devotional poem written in Arabic by Hennix and featuring quotations from the Quran. Also reproduced on the album’s gatefold jacket, Hennix’s reduction of the sacred text to its most elegant formulation invites the contemplator to bring their inner knowledge to the composition for use as a prompt for meditation. Yet the piece offers depth to even the most secular listener willing to immerse themselves in music brimming with such serene intensity.

Catherine Christer Hennix (b. 1948) started her creative life playing drums with her older brother Peter, growing up in Sweden where she heard jazz luminaries, such as John Coltrane, Eric Dolphy, Dexter Gordon, Archie Shepp, and Cecil Taylor perform from 1960 to 1967. Directly after high school, Hennix went to work at Stockholm’s pioneering Elektronmusikstudion (EMS), where she developed early tape music, incorporating computer generated speech done at the Royal Technological University (KTH), where she was an undergraduate student. After traveling to New York In 1968, she met artists Dick Higgins and Alison Knowles who invited her to stay at the Something Else Press Town House where she had the opportunity to meet, among others, composers John Cage, James Tenney, and Phil Corner. During the following years she developed fruitful collaborative relationships with many composers in the burgeoning American avant-garde, including, most significantly, Henry Flynt and La Monte Young. Young introduced Hennix to Hindustani raga master Pandit Pran Nath and she would later study intensively under him as his first European disciple. While Hennix continued to make music performing alongside Arthur Russell, Marc Johnson, Henry Flynt, and Arthur Rhames, she also served as a professor of Mathematics and Computer Science at SUNY New Paltz and as a visiting Professor of Logic (at Marvin Minsky’s invitation) at MIT’s Artificial Intelligence Laboratory. In recent years Hennix has led the just-intonation ensemble the Chora(s)san Time-Court Mirage, which has featured musicians Amelia Cuni, Amirtha Kidambi, Chiyoku Szlavnics, Hilary Jeffrey, Amir El-Saffar, Benjamin Duboc and Rozemarie Heggen. She currently resides in Istanbul, Turkey pursuing studies in classical Arabic and Turkish makam.

The album features a notable line-up of musician such as: Sami Yaffa (New York Dolls/Joan Jett), Dave Richmond (Serge Gainsbourg/Elton John), Christophe Deschamps (Jean-Michel Jarre), Kath Guifford (Stereolab), Will Crewdson (Adam & The Ants/The Selecters), Danny Ray (Bo Diddley/Brian Setzer)...Mastered at the legendary Abbey Road Studios and cut to vinyl across a 180g LP in a gatefold sleeve with booklet. L'homme de l'ombre immerses you from start to finish in a sonic and lyrical journey that rewards your mind and emotions. Here you will find the glamorous rock attitude of Marc O's musicianship colliding brilliantly with the wise and witty writing of french philosopher Bruno Pons Levy. The result is not so much a double identity, but an intangible and powerful third element, much like the mathematical equation described in the song The triangle squared (Le triangle au carré). This song is emblematic of Marc O's persona: a musician of style and vision, crossing cultures and decades to collaborate with a remarkable team and create this, his most personal album. Press quotes: Ten well realised, vintage aesthetic fantasies ****" MOJO "Singular debut set that lurches from glam-punk to Air-meets-Gainsbourg purr, infectiously Pulp-ish electro-rock and gauche, Bowie-esque panther strut. Formidable! 8/10" UNCUT "Never less than fascinating, this is an important and hugely enjoyable work ****" RECORD COLLECTOR "Propelled by his core rhythm section and lyricist collaborator, they address some weighty subjects with passion ****" SHINDIG! "Blends aggressive and powerful textures and melancholic soundscapes to break down language barriers and deliver a powerful, evocative and stunning album" LOUDER THAN WAR "The music is as strong as Pons Levy's lyrics, mingling melodic rock with chanson in the grand tradition ****" RNR

Purple Vinyl

Even if you're well-acquainted with composer and multi-instrumentalist Colin Fisher's richly varied output, his gentle fifth solo album, Refections of the Invisible World may come as a surprise. Psychedelic lyricism has always been a fundamental aspect of his sonic signature, but his second collaboration with producer Jeremy Greenspan (Junior Boys, Jessy Lanza, Morgan Geist) finds the Toronto native luxuriating in expansive atmospherics for its full duration.
That's not to downplay the eclecticism he finds within this ethereal landscape. Each track tills its own discrete sonic acreage, and while every one emanates from a clear focal point, the spontaneous impulse that drives Fisher's more audibly improvisational music always remains close at hand. Some pieces unfold rippling aquatic vistas or delight in prismatic guitar arpeggiation, elsewhere his plaintive, blues- infected tenor saxophone wafts like some strange jazz apparition, or becomes a chorus of cosmic murmurs. The presence of electronics is undeniable, but equally irrefutable is the organic instrumental sources of these disparate hues. In fact he's discovered a rare balance: no matter how effects-saturated, every gesture on the record feels palpably sculpted by Fisher's hands and breath. As such, Refections of the Invisible World carries a sense of intimacy at the heart of its diffuse, dream-like sonics.
Fisher has a been a major presence in Canada's music community for more than twenty years—particularly in more experimental and improvisational circles. Nothing short of a guitar virtuoso, he also wields saxophone, drums, and various other instruments with similarly refined musicality, vivid textural imagination, and sometimes feral abandon. His one-man-band tape Garden of Unknowning for Manchester's Tombed Visions, showcase all of this as he spars with different iterations of himself. The Quietus' cassette critic Tristan Bath extolled it as "miraculous," adding that "it’s a visceral experience soaking up this record, and it’s all down to Fisher’s utterly innate sense of musicality." He subsequently cited it in his 2018 contributor's year-end chart for the Wire.
In 2014 his partnership with Nick Millevoi's trio Many Arms on Suspended Defnition (Tzadik) prompted Spin's Brad Cohan to remark "Many Arms have dug even deeper into math-metal wizardry, bolstering their already imposing lineup with gale-force blowing guest saxophonist Colin Fisher, thus blasting their outré sonic blitz into a fire-breathing free jazz otherworld." Fisher later engaged the band's bassist, Johnny DeBlase, to team up with him and Kid Millions (Oneida, Man Forever) as Monas. As an ongoing collaborator to introspective dance music auteur Caribou, Fisher frst appeared in offshoot project Caribou Vibration Ensemble, and subsequently on acclaimed albums Swim and Suddenly. He's also made two duo albums with celebrated Nova Scotian jaw harp innovator chik white for Dylan and Lisa Nyoukis' Chocolate Monk label. In addition to performing alongside the likes of Jaime Branch, Joe McPhee, William Parker, Laraaji, Gerry Hemmingway, and Fred Frith, he has contributed to recordings by the Constantines (Sub Pop), Bernice (Arts & Crafts), Rhys Chatham (Table of the Elements), Born Ruffans (Warp), Anthony Braxton and AIMToronto Orchestra (Spool), and many more.

Wicca Phase Springs Eternal is the creative persona of Scranton, PA singer, songwriter, producer, and multi-instrumentalist Adam McIlwee. Since 2010, he has simultaneously established himself as a singular voice, adeptly combining his natural songwriting instincts with the digital culture enveloping his world. Through an extensive catalog of collaborations, singles, EPs and 2016’s Secret Boy LP, McIlwee has become a celebrated pioneer in this vital new direction of underground music. Along the way, he assembled

what would become his 2019 Run For Cover Records debut, Suffer On, with the sonic bedrock evolving yet again as he re-embraces an initial vision.

Suffer On is an exploration of familiar forms through the lens of something new and extraordinary. It is the first Wicca Phase record fully written by McIlwee, utilizing guitars and keyboards to create each song’s core and building upwards from there. Themes of longing, entrapment and sacrifice permeate the album - the notion of wanting more and not getting it. Production and lyrics are both intentionally sparse and bleak, reinforcing such feelings and allowing room for the weighty moods to fill the sonic void.

“It’s about making a deal with the devil,” he says. “It’s saying I can pursue this artistic thing as a career, but the consequence is I’m going to put myself out there in an emotional state for everybody to consume.” But it was never really a choice which path to follow - like all great songwriters, McIlwee is driven by the innate urge to express himself through song. And in the end, Suffer On emanates its own magic stemming from its creator.

Run For Cover & Wicca Phase Springs Eternal have partnerted to celebrate the anniversary of this release with a Deluxe Collectors Edition double album of Suffer On. The completely redesigned new version features a companion disc of each song performed acoustically, a new gatefold jacket, updated poster and a photo zine with over 40 photos and Suffer on Lyrics from Adam Mcilwee.

ollowing the demise of emo band Mineral in 1997, singer/guitarist Chris Simpson (Mineral/ Zookeeper/ Mountain Time) and bassist Jeremy Gomez reunited to form The Gloria Record. Taking an acoustic and more organic approach than their previous work, The Gloria Record (with the addition of guitarist Brian Hubbard, drummer Matt Hammon, later replaced by Brian Malone and Ben Houtman on the keys, organs and synthesisers) were unarguably the logical progression from Mineral’s emo throes - quieter, delicate and fervently impassioned. Heralded as a “band with big visions and bombastic sounds”, the quintet fostered their admiration for artists with similar arena sized visions ( Radiohead, REM, U2) to produce a sound that was reminiscent of their British contemporaries and American indies. In 1998 the band released their self-titled EP, followed by the intricate offering of 2000’s A Lull In Traffic and 2002’s full length effort Start Here, before disbanding after extensive US tours in 2004. Start Here, the brilliant debut album from The Gloria Record is back on vinyl at long last. Originally released in April 2002, the ten songs are bolstered with four bonus tracks including rarity The Dead Brother, a live version of L’Anniversaire Triste and demos of I Was Born In Omaha and My Funeral Party. Start Here will be released on black double vinyl in a gatefold sleeve on April 16th. The Gloria Record in the press: “…stacked to the gills with nuances that pay back repeat listens in a big way.” - Austin Chronicle “Where their earlier works were true emotional explorations -- singer Chris Simpson's heart fully on sleeve -- The Gloria Record abandons their emo roots for an indie rock growl” - Popmatters “Simpson’s work in Mineral and the dream-pop act The Gloria Record had long established him as a formidable songwriter…”

Following the hard-hitting return single ‘Anxious’ and a slew of mysterious ‘West Gazette’ posters appearing around the UK hinting at the announcement (including Birmingham, Manchester, Glasgow, Bristol and London), West London’s AJ Tracey assumes the character of a rising young basketball player appearing in a livestreamed press conference to reveal his next move: a lucrative deal with major
franchise Revenge Athletic ahead of a crucial playoff game. The broadcast ends with the true reveal: AJ’s highly anticipated sophomore album ‘FLU GAME’ will finally arrive.
Always pushing boundaries with his creative output, AJ’s campaign draws influence from the story of Michael Jordan and his Chicago Bulls team in the late 90s, with ‘FLU GAME’ referencing one of MJ’s most memorable championship games where he overcame a nasty bout of food poisoning (brought on by a dodgy takeaway pizza) and took the Bulls to the championship. Revenge Athletic are a franchise on the brink of a massive championship win and AJ is their new star. All we know for now is that AJ is about to take us into this new world, as he dons the number 10 jersey and states he’s “ready to get going and do what I’ve always done.”
‘FLU GAME’ sees AJ showcasing twelve brand new tracks, with tantalising features including Kehlani, T-Pain, SahBabii, NAV and Millie Go Lightly. On the production
front, AJ calls on regular collaborators Nyge, The Elements, Kazza, AoD and Remedee.
The project also features the UK Top Five singles ‘Bringing It Back’ with Digga D, ‘West Ten’' with Mabel and the Platinum smash ‘Dinner Guest’ featuring MoStack. AJ Tracey is a man on an unstoppable, independently built trajectory. 2020 was his
biggest year to date, with (certified Gold) single ‘West Ten’ alongside Mabel landing in the wake of chart-scaling ‘Dinner Guest’ featuring MoStack (Platinum), Number 1 charity single ‘Times Like These’ (alongside Dua Lipa, Rag & Bone Man and The Foo Fighters) and the Platinum-certified TikTok sensation ‘Rain’ with Aitch, which went on
to become the most watched UK YouTube video of 2020. AJ finished the year with a stand-out feature on Headie One’s enormous anthem ‘Ain’t It Different’ alongside Stormzy, a Platinum certified track that peaked at Number 2 in the UK Singles Chart.
In 2019, AJ released his debut self-titled album which, after landing at Number 3 in the UK Official Charts, has gone on to clock over 350 million streams globally and is certified Gold. His Conducta-produced breakout hit ‘Ladbroke Grove’ was officially the
top selling independent single of 2019, spending an astounding 14 weeks in the UK Top 10, and is now certified Double Platinum (over 1.2 million sales). It was nominated for a BRIT, was named Best British Song at the NME Awards and is now the biggest-selling UK Garage record of all time - an incredible feat. AJ rounded off a
huge 2019 with two sold-out headline shows at London’s 10,000 capacity Alexandra Palace.
A music and cultural icon, and boasting over 1 billion global streams independently, AJ’s formidable talent and unmatched creative vision is set to see him scale even higher heights in the coming months.

a Anxious [prod Remedee]
[b] Kukoč (ft. NAV) [prod Pxcoyo + Yung Swisher]
[c] Bringing It Back (with Digga D) [prod. The Elements + AoD)
[d] Cheerleaders [prod Kazza & Swidom]
[e] Draft Pick [prod 5ive Beatz] Eurostep [prod AJ Tracey]
[f] Cherry Blossom [prod Nyge & AoD]
[g] Glockie [prod The Elements & AoD]
[h] Little More Love [prod YOZ BEATZ, RyFy & Mark Raggio]
[i] Top Dog [prod Nyge & AoD]
[j] Summertime Shootout (ft. T-Pain) [prod Nyge & AoD]
[k] Perfect Storm [prod YOZ BEATZ & JBJ]
[l] Coupé (ft. Kehlani) [prod The Elements]
[m] Numba 9 (ft. SahBabii & Millie Go Lightly) [prod The Elements]
[n] Dinner Guest (ft. MoStack) [prod The Elements & AJ Tracey]
[o] West Ten (with Mabel) [prod FRED & Take a Daytrip]

[a] Anxious [prod Remedee]
[b] Kukoč (ft. NAV) [prod Pxcoyo + Yung Swisher]
[c] Bringing It Back (with Digga D) [prod. The Elements + AoD)
[d] Cheerleaders [prod Kazza & Swidom]
[e] Draft Pick [prod 5ive Beatz] Eurostep [prod AJ Tracey]
[f] Cherry Blossom [prod Nyge & AoD]
[g] Glockie [prod The Elements & AoD]
[h] Little More Love [prod YOZ BEATZ, RyFy & Mark Raggio]
[i] Top Dog [prod Nyge & AoD]
[j] Summertime Shootout (ft. T-Pain) [prod Nyge & AoD]
[k] Perfect Storm [prod YOZ BEATZ & JBJ]
[l] Coupé (ft. Kehlani) [prod The Elements]
[m] Numba 9 (ft. SahBabii & Millie Go Lightly) [prod The Elements]
[n] Dinner Guest (ft. MoStack) [prod The Elements & AJ Tracey]
[o] West Ten (with Mabel) [prod FRED & Take a Daytrip]

Helsinki quartet Alder Ego, led by drummer/composer Joonas Leppänen, returns with their new album "III" on 9 April on We Jazz Records. A follow up to their successful 2018 We Jazz album, "III" finds Leppänen and his bandmates extracting more depth and punch out of their tenor sax + trumpet + double bass + drums setup, which echoes the greats in the game, such as Ornette Coleman, yet adds a readily identifiable edge to it all. Leppänen's writing is evolving, becoming more and more of a signature of the band and sounding delightfully angular yet easily flowing. On "III", Alder Ego features Leppänen on drums, Jarno Tikka (of OK:KO) on tenor sax, Tomi Nikku (of Bowman Trio) on trumpet and the new addition Nathan Francis on bass.

Kicking off with a key track introducing the band's deep sound, "Love And Maladies", "III" moves through a sonic landscape which is constantly surprising yet identifiable as Alder Ego guided by Leppänen's musical vision at all times. This is true even during moments when the composer himself steps aside, namely in the Tikka–Nikku duo cut "Impermanence" and Nathan Davis's highly memorable solo outing "Nathan's World".

The album's many highlights include singles "November Ghost" and "I Saw It In a Dream", plus the stunning closing track "Ephemeral", featuring Natalia Castrillon on harp.

Alder Ego "III" is available on We Jazz Records on as orange and black vinyl editions, digitally, plus as a bundle bringing together "III" and the band's 2018 album "II".

Superb unreleased soundtrack from British 1972 sex comedy starring Gabrielle Drake (Nick Drake’s sister) and Rchard O’Sullivan (Gilbert O’Sullivan’s brother!). Brilliant music on many levels, 17 sexy tracks of swinging jet-set jazz, groovy scatty vocals, hell it must be good because it’s on Trunk Records.

Take yourself back to the fleapit cinemas of the early 1970s. My home town of Aldershot had two - the ABC/123 (with three screens) and The Palace (just one screen, and anything but palatial). Au Pair Girls, released in 1972, was exactly the kind of soft porn “comedy” flick with a vague plot that would, without doubt, have been playing as part of a double bill to the regular “dirty mac brigade”. Such films and such establishments guaranteed the small crowd regular titillating wide screen visions of nude women in preposterous situations and fulfilling preposterous fantasies.
The title of Au Pair Girls suggests it all of course; yes, four young women fly into London from Europe and Asia, are sent to their new employers and find themselves in unexpected and unusual situations pretty fast. There is of course full nudity, crudity and a large slab of cheese on the menu.There is also no real comedy, a sprinkling of infamous character actors (Richard O’Sullivan, John Le Mesurier), and “UFO” actress Gabrielle Drake (sister of Nick Drake) wearing nothing at all. If anything, the film has maintained a vague middle aged male following because of Gabrielle.
But there’s little to save this film from contemporary criticism - its outdated view of life, rights, sex and taste sit uncomfortably today. But the jet set soundtrack by Roger Webb was worth saving.
By 1972 Roger Webb’s career in film and TV music was taking off. He was an established songwriter and live pianist with a jazz trio. He’d already penned a few British scores and was just starting on a formidable future with library companies including Chappell, de Wolfe and Capitol. His route to Au Pair Girls was accidentally through Norman Newell, one of the giants of the post war music industry.Actress and performer Dee / Deanne Shenderry had asked Newell to recommend an artist to arrange her up and coming album. New;ee recommended Roger Webb.The two worked together and some music was produced, but to my knowledge only got to acetate stage (possibly for Apple Records). Dee husband was Kenneth Shipman, a co-owner ofTwickenham film studios.And so when Kenneth Shipman started pre
production of Au Pair Girls, Roger Webb was an easy go-to for film music composition.
Many years ago there was an original reel / master for Au Pair Girls. It was transferred to CD, DAT and cassette circa 1990 and the rapidly degrading tape was subsequently misplaced, lost or just binned. So all we had to work with was a rather shaky transfer from nearly 30 years ago, one which included numerous wobbles as well as speeding up and slowing down moments.The job of rescuing all this was left to Jon Brooks, my hero for all such musical problems. The end result is what you hear on this album. It is by no means sonically perfect but it is all we will ever have.
It’s certainly not Roger Webb’s best ever score (I have more of his ace work coming) but it has a certain charm and relentlessness.The lyrics were written by Norman Newell, and I can imagine the pair having a huge amount of fun putting the score together and recording it, with - as you’d expect - a pretty tight band and lively vocal group.The main theme does, as one reviewer state, “go on a bit”, but there’s enough musically here for me to get excited about and really want to “stick it out”. So I have.

An unlikely meeting of two like-minded spirits, »First Man in the Moon« sees the former Swans guitarist and Hallow Ground regular Norman Westberg and the prolific double bass player Jacek Mazurkiewicz collaborate for five evocative tracks. The pair finds common ground beyond the boundaries of atmospheric drone, abstract jazz and experimental music and blurs the lines between the acoustic and the electronic.The two first met when the composer Mazurkiewicz supported Swans with his solo project 3FoNIA on their 2014 European tour. »I really enjoyed his approach,« says Westberg about the Polish musician’s blending of the acoustic qualities of his instrument with electronically generated sounds. A decision to collaborate was made and when the US-American musician returned to Eastern Europe to support Michael Gira on his solo tour in late 2019, Mazurkiewicz reached out to him with the idea of booking some studio time before Gira’s two concerts in Warsaw. »Recording was very fun and easy,« remembers Westberg. »It was just two people enjoying hearing and reacting to what the other is doing.« »First Man in the Moon« is not however a plain document of these improvised sessions, but also shaped by Mazurkiewicz’s approach as a composer. Once the recordings were finished, he selected and edited the recorded material, refining the peculiar dialogue between the guitarist’s meditative drones and bright chords and his own rhythmic yet subtle approach to playing the double bass, sometimes plucking the strings and occasionally using his bow to underscore
Westberg’s fleeting melodies, but also using the instrument in unconventional ways to generate sound. A feeling of weightlessness prevails throughout the aptly-titled »First Man in the Moon.« Even at their most abstract however, these five improvisations-turned-compositions remain tangible, lively, and joyfully explorative. It is a record that you wouldn’t expect from either of these musicians, but
the logical result of two idiosyncratic minds sharing not only space and time, but also their respective visions with each other. Credits:
Recorded at Studio Diamentowy Pies/ Damian Pielka, engineering/Piotr Mazurek, engineering assistance/Jacek Mazurkiewicz, mix/
Lawrence English, mastering/John Fell, photographs.

Back in 2018, Four Flies Records unearthed the previously unheard 'Africa Oscura', considered by many as the "dark side" of 'Zoo Folle' – Giuliano Sorgini's masterpiece (reissued by Four Flies Records in 2016) – and partly recorded during the same session in 1974.
The original work portrays a fictional and mysterious continent, providing a soundtrack tinged with dark
moods and cosmic shades. 'Africa Oscura' was entirely recorded by the composer, who played all instruments in his studio in Rome. This resulted in a formal spareness, a minimalism that gives it a
modern quality, something which makes it stand the test of time, or at least resonate with contemporary taste.
Since its release, 'Africa Oscura' has become a classic – a pivotal release not only within Sorgini's discography, but also one that made his name more known and accessible to a new generation of music professionals, DJs and fans of electronic music.
Four Flies have thus decided to celebrate its modernity with a double 12" featuring 7 reworks by six of Italy's most visionary DJs/producers: Jolly Mare, L.U.C.A. (aka Francisco), pAd, Painé, and Quiroga & Dario Bass.
The original tracks have been reworked with different approaches, sometimes into full reinterpretations, and with demanding dance floors in mind. The result is a stunning collection of electronic, cosmic, downtempo and Balearic reworks that preserve the spirit of the original versions while projecting them into the future.

Jon Hester returns to Radio Slave’s Rekids label with the second instalment of his ‘Converge’ LP, ‘Converge - Part II’.

The second part of 2020’s ‘Converge - Part I’, a body of music which saw enthusiastic responses from the likes of Surgeon, Lauren Flax, DJ Bone, Anthony Parasole and Jus-Ed to name just a few, sees the Berlin-based DJ/Producer and dancer generously expand on and refine his slick vision of techno on one of electronic music’s key labels.

By encompassing warm and soulful textures within club focussed grooves, Hester continues to explore the far reaches of both the musical cues picked up from his years as a dancer and formative time spent in the Midwest US, connecting influences from Chicago, Minneapolis, and Detroit.
Stretched across a double LP, the album opens with the spacious and icy ‘Stealth’ followed by the machine communications of ‘Artificial Intelligence’. The B-side sees a whirlwind of the synthetic in ‘Instant’ before ‘Contact’ swiftly picks up the pace with it’s warbling pads and slippery percussion.

On the second disc, ‘Circadian Slip’, custom-built for dancefloor pandemonium, continues with off-kilter leads and vocal snippets before ‘Shadows’ brings eerie syncopation to the proceedings. In the final stretch, ‘Silver’ maintains steady energy into the twilight hours, and the gorgeous ‘Wonder’ closes out the LP beautifully, providing a soft landing to an exceptional journey through Hester’s sound.

-LTD. 180G RED VINYL-

Jonathan Bree's fourth album `After The Curtains Close' sees the producers trademark orchestral pop take a few unexpected turns both into the experimental and into kitschy territory populated by some of his french heroes of the 1960s. The end result is an album that retains Bree's musical DNA while being fun and varied. What could be described as Bree's `sleazy' album could also be described as Bree's break-up album. Dealing with the break-down of a major relationship Bree opens up to reveal a year of loneliness and mental trauma while also channelling positive feelings by embracing sex and sleaze in his music, subject material more traditionally reserved for the single man. Bree strikes a great balance here between darkness and silliness and he does this without appearing snide, which is a line some artists can seem all too happy to cross. Bree's vocals are on display in a full range of styles, his baritone croon jumps octaves and everywhere in between across the 12 tracks and he is even present singing his own back-up vocals in child like falsetto. Opening track `Happy Daze' is a ray of heady sunshine and wall of strings celebrating worrying about nothing else while in a lovers arms. First single `Waiting on The Moment' has been accurately described as a celebratory break-up song, with cynical and slightly mean lyrics set to a grand and danceable 80s pop arrangement. Bree celebrates new romantic encounters with fun orchestral pop songs full of double entendres ('Heavenly Visions', 'Kiss My Lips' feat Princess Chelsea, '69' feat Crystal Choi) and his talent for writing for the female lead vocal has not been so obviously on display since his work with The Brunettes, also evident on 'Meadows in Bloom', a tragic Shangri-La's inspired narrative about the pitfalls of sleeping with the drummer, in which Britta Phillips (Luna) takes lead vocal duties.

LTD. BLUE & PINK SWIRL VINYL

"Do you feel what I feel too?" Brijean Murphy floats the question at the start of Feelings, the full-length Ghostly International debut from Brijean, her collaborative project with Doug Stuart. Guided by a lush mix of charismatic keyboard chords, grooving bass lines, and radiant bongo-driven rhythms, the "Day Dreaming" lyric doubles as an invitation and a statement of intention. Brijean want you to move, physically, mentally, dimensionally; this is dance music for the mind, body, and soul. With Feelings, they've manifested a gentle collective space for respite, for self-reflection, for self-care, for uninhibited imagination and new possibilities. The album cultivates a specific vibe, a softness Murphy has come to call "romancing the psyche." Growing up in a family immersed in jazz, Latin and soul music, Murphy would become an accomplished DJ, session and live player in Oakland's diverse music scene and one of indie's most in-demand percussionists (Poolside, Toro Y Moi, U.S. Girls). In 2018, she began recording songs with multi-instrumentalist and producer Doug Stuart, who shares a background in jazz and pop in bands such as Bells Atlas, Meernaa, and Luke Temple. Following their first sessions, which resulted in the mini-album Walkie Talkie (released in 2019 on Native Cat Recordings), the duo continued freeform hangs in Oakland, inviting friends Chaz Bear, Tony Peppers, and Hamir Atwal. "We improvised on different feels for hours," says Murphy. "Nothing quite developed at first but we had seeds. We re-opened the sessions a couple months later, after returning from tours, and spent a month developing the songs in a little 400 square foot cottage." Aforementioned album opener "Day Dreaming" is a dynamic celebration of newness: the excitement in finding deeper understandings of yourself as you get to know someone, something, or somewhere new. "Wifi Beach" drops a pin in pure psych-pop exotica. With Atwal on drums, Stuart on bass, Peppers on keys, and Bear engineering, the group improvised the track's intro sequence based on the vision of a lavish 1970s pool party. Establishing the scene is a mid-frequency drum kit disco shuffle augmented by tight congas and timbale effect, as Murphy sings in spurts: "I want to be / Deep in love / I want to be / Say you love me too / I want to be / Honey." The stanzas cut between "reflective moments of wants and being overwhelmed by feelings of the present," she explains. "A lot of the `love songs' I write are to my psyche, self-reflections on how to encourage tender perspectives and make more time for the sweet stuff." Though there is a loose, dance-oriented motif throughout, the material gives way to somnolent turns. On "Ocean," Brijean's anodyne lyrics, reminiscent of Astrud Gilberto's airy croon, float atop a brushed drum pattern, sparkling rhodes lines, and pittering and softly funky woodblock bops. The opening line sets up the rest, "In this gentle space we lay" _ among the album's propensity for movement, tracks like "Ocean" stand out by leaning back for momentary sways of blissful introspection. Murphy calls the charming "Hey Boy" a "psychedelic guide _ the exploration of finding what feels good _ through sorrow, anxiety, apathy." This mentality applies to Feelings on the whole: in these nebulous and verdant worlds of hazy melodies, feathery hooks, and percussive details, the songs simply want us to feel alive. They radiate in wonderful abandon and with a sense of devotion to the self. RIYL: Stereolab, Astrud Gilberto, Air, Little Dragon, Broadcast, Khruangbin, Poolside.

‘Giants of All Sizes’ was recorded at Hamburg’s Clouds Hill Studio, The Dairy in Brixton, 604 Studios in Vancouver and Blueprint Studios in Salford with additional recording taking place at various band member’s home studios spread across Manchester. As with their previous four studio albums, ‘Giants’ was produced and mixed by Craig Potter. Guests across the album include Jesca Hoop, The Plumedores and South London newcomer Chilli Chilton.

Given such bleak, if ultimately redeemed, subject matter, it is also, perversely, the most relaxed record which elbow have made in some time. On ‘Giants of All Sizes’, each band member extended their usual process of working on demos alone and followed their vision to its conclusion rather than, as Craig Potter puts it, ‘taking the edges off things to find compromise’. In tandem with this, they returned to playing live in the studio, encouraged to experiment with the banks of analogue equipment at Clouds Hill in Northern Germany, giving songs a looser, more live feel. The result is the most starkly dynamic record from the band in recent times, “Sonically unabashed”, as Guy would have it. Whilst album closer ‘Weightless’ has the gossamer melodies and communal harmonies for which the band have latterly been known, this album echoes earlier elbow work at times whilst also breaking new ground.

‘White Noise White Heat’ is motorik, metal machine soul driven by a vocal that is rage incarnate, ‘Doldrums’ mixes John Carpenter with The Plastic Ono Band to brilliantly disturbing effect and ‘On Deronda Road’ hitches stark bass beats and glitches to an ad-hoc choir. ‘Empires’ delivers dark resignation via an insidious melody and ‘Seven Veils’ continues the subversion by inverting the perception of elbow as a band for lovers into a band for haters, a double-barrelled fuck-you song par excellence. ‘The Delayed 3:15’ marries mariarchi guitars to jazz dynamics, Morricone via Buddy Rich, and ‘My Trouble’ is a clockwork, analogue shuffle housing a delicate melody that builds over the course of the song into a fragile monolith to the power of love.

Lead track, ‘Dexter & Sinister’, released on 10” ahead of the album, encapsulates the whole. A seven-minute musical journey that blends deep bass grooves, sudden keyboard stabs, dislocated piano and guitar runs and soul stylings then abruptly shifts gear, parts the storm clouds and takes wing, flying towards the heat of the sun. It is the soundtrack for these ‘hope free, faith free, charity free days’, a denial of the divine and a reconciliation, two songs in one song, two emotions for one emotion, human, fragile and brilliant like the album which it opens.

Over the last two decades, 20syl has crafted a unique, hip-hop infused, electro musical universe. He inherited a rich musical knowledge and a genuine understanding of analog and vintage sounds form years of classic beat making. He first got his start with Hocus Pocus, a band he founded in 1995. As the mastermind behind the band’s five LPs, including their Gold Record Place 54, 20syl has proved himself to be a visionary artist. A member of C2C - a turntablist quartet with whom he has won 4 DMC world titles – he took the genre mainstream with the groundbreaking album Tetra (2012). This successful opus was rewarded with 4 French Grammys and a Double Platinium Record.

In 2014, 20syl launched his solo career while still working with a few hand picked underground artists such as Grems, Raashan Ahmad and Blitz the Ambassador. In the recent years the prolific producer has taken his trademark overseas with popular remixes of ScHoolboy Q, Rihanna, and King Krule – setting up a booming environment for the 2014 release of his anticipated first solo EP, Motifs.

Co-founder of On And On Records, 20Syl has imposed himself as a flagship of the expanding new scene. Passionate about visual arts, 20Syl designs his artwork and direct his music videos.

A free electron, he seduces the public with his sharp identity and his ability to turn his own original creations into major musical trends.

CoOp Presents an all-new double-album compilation entitled 'Plug One'. It features a plethora of global talent from in & around the world of bruk and beyond - some already well-established in the field, some very much on the come-up and some brand new artists - this compilation is an acknowledgment of a continually evolving sound from the label formed by IG Culture & Alex Phountzi a few years ago. 'Plug One' affirms this electric movement, with a deeply fluid current running throughout, with tracks ranging from the cosmic psych jazz of LCSM, to the classic UKG tweaks of Groove Chronicles, to the thought-provoking vibes of Reginald Omas Mamaode IV, to a veritable who's who of 2020 bruk talent including Xtra Brux, Sivey, EVM128, Cengiz, Wonky Logic & many more.

From its beginnings as a classic club night and label in the early 2000's, CoOp always carried an undefinable and potent creative energy. A sense of freedom and uninhibited exploration was positioned at the core of CoOp's sprawling community and consciousness, communicated via movement and sound. From this seed and throughout the years that followed, this same energy permeated the worldwide underground music ecosystem. As CoOp's legacy continued to influence new generations of music makers far and wide. The syncopated rhythms, soulful keys and infectious grooves synonymous with the broken beat sound, now known simply as Bruk, became entwined with new concepts and progressions, leading to new movements carrying on the essence of the bruk energy.

IG Culture and Alex Phountzi took the helm of their CoOp Presents label in 2018, with the vision of championing these new waves of emerging artists, continuing the all-important exchange of energy at the heart of the original CoOp movement, but also giving room for the music to be pushed into new and uncharted territories. With burgeoning producers from around the globe being drawn to the explorative and expressive nature of the project, an incubator was created, providing a space and platform for these ideals to take on new shapes and sounds. Just as every generation must rewrite its own history books, CoOp Presents was born from a combination of influences, ideas and personalities, and in turn is now encouraging the next generation to do some re-writing of its own.

'Plug One' will be released on vinyl & digital on CoOp Presents in November 2020.

To The Other Side is an electronic journey that express the inner visions of sound. Is the first album of The ReLOUD in a limited double vinyl.

All analogue synths + samples from Japan, Ireland, Sicily and the Mars wind from NASA.
It feature singers from Australia, South Africa, America, Europe including the world renown Deva Premal.

Colored Vinyl. 180gr. Triple Gatefold. Hand illustrated by the leading Berlin designer Maddalena Bireau.

Includes the exclusive Lenta Bellezza Vinyl version of 22 Minutes.

Mixed by the legendary Luca Pretolesi, Gianni Bini, Alex Trecarichi, Luigi de Filippo. Mastered for Vinyl by Guiliano Radiciotti.

Tramp Records continues their pilgrimage to the soulful fringes of spiritual jazz and progressive rock and funk with their 3rd and 4th volumes of their "Peace Chant, Raw, Deep and Spiritual Jazz" series, and the world could not be more ready.

As we turn together on this tiny blue ball hanging lonely in space, and as we together face existential threats ranging from climate catastrophe, the rise of brutal authoritarian regimes, the breaking of the industrial storm and the imminent collapse of empire, not to mention the raging covid-19 crisis and the continuing racial and social struggles across the globe, we are thrust into a society-wide grand awakening that has been in the making for a very long time. Of course, our musical teachers have trod this path before us, and have worked out solutions to these problems, the songs of the Peace Chant series ring out loud and clear as our ancestors' proof of concept. They say history repeats herself, maybe it's because we weren't listening the first time. Thanks to Tramp Records, we have been granted another opportunity.

Today, the musical and spiritual truths enshrined within the spiritual jazz diaspora seem to be more and more sought-after, and crucial at a time when we as a society seek higher and farther for those bold truths. With each generation, that truth doesn't change, and the artists featured in the series speak those truths along a continuum that ranges from the late-60s up to the present day.

Volume 4, the second LP opens with a gorgeous and lush Wurlitzer-oriented big band piece that among its many treasures also features the 17-year-old visionary-saxophonist-to-be, Steve Coleman in his alleged first recording! The contributions of Brother Yusuf Salim and Bus Brown, figures who should be very familiar to Tramp Records aficionados, are consecrated here with a live recording of Freedom from one of Brother Yu's last public performances. One of the two European contributions to the comp, Attitude, by Organic Pulse 'onesemble', reads like a double entendre, the word "attitude" meaning simultaneously one's disposition or state of mind, and also one's orientation relative to the horizon. The Peace Chant series continues to touch all the sacred meridians: more devotional music with James Scales & All Stars' Ser-Vi-Tude, trance music of non-dominant traditions with Donn Preston Group's Ghana-Cha!, a modal and blue organ trio offering from Tommy Jones, and closing with a rich and righteous ballad, Quernemoen, from the Wayne Powell Octet.

Peace Chant is the center of the mandala, representing the nucleus of the post-bop, modal jazz, avant-garde, transcendental, spiritual, ethnic, and freedom music universe without necessarily suggesting anything immediately identifiable as any of the above. This is the soundtrack to the raising of human consciousness and the salvation of society's very soul.

We give thanks to Tramp Records for leading our thirsty hearts to this rich fountain.

It's been four years since Sweatbox Dynasty, the fourth solo LP from Pennsylvanian experimentalist TOBACCO. In that time, Tom Fec's project has toured with Nine Inch Nails, provided the theme song to HBO series Silicon Valley, and teamed with Aesop Rock for a collaborative album as Malibu Ken. He now returns to Ghostly International for Hot Wet & Sassy, a full-length album oozing with his most playful and approachable songs to date, which, conversely, express notions of antilove, self-hate, and disappointment in others. Pop impulses have always surged beneath the surface of his sound - blown-out bass, analog synths, drum machines, and Fec's unmistakable analog gurgle and hiss - here they've bubbled to the top. "I feel like it's the most I've been able to refine what I'm doing," says Fec. "For the past decade I've had this motherfxcker on my shoulder that makes me pick away at structure and melody. Purposely covering up moments because I can. That really came to a peak on Sweatbox. So I wanted the opposite this time. Write the songs without ripping them in half. I went from 'what would the Butthole Surfers do?' to 'what would Cyndi Lauper do?'" And what would Trent Reznor do? Fec found his answer straight from the source. Their collaborative track, "Babysitter," fuses their voices into one deranged presence: "I'm the new babysitter," they alert, before pivoting into a menacingly saccharine bridge. The track tumbles on a tom fill, then a punishing synth line rips into a cacophony of drums and feedback like a lawnmower gnawing through the living room carpet. "This was new for me, but I wanted to write a song that was everything I am and have been, and then like one notch further. Trent was the notch further," adds Fec. The collaboration is a work of alchemy seamlessly blending TOBACCO's trademarks with Reznor's industrial rust and sonic gore. Downcast, sincere, woozy, "Jinmenken" might be the closest Fec has come to a ballad. "Maybe you can find me down the line," his vocoded delivery bounces along the beat. "It's me trying to write a Jets song," says Fec. Album opener "Centaur Skin" presents the stylistic concoction that has been the TOBACCO MO from the beginning, crossing dreamy melodic shimmer with the sinister tones and slime. This has become easier to digest, but also far more potent. A motorik beat steadies the track's galloping arpeggio, acting as a springboard for Fec's dark ruminations as well as an uncharacteristically crystalline synth solo. "It's my feel good self hate anthem. Don't worry, I'm good. It was fun to write." TOBACCO hasn't been reinvented, but it has been refined and distilled. Brighter, sharper, and far more dangerous because of it. Hot Wet & Sassy is practically staring at the sun without shades and feeling those corneas roast. Everything looks good as your vision fades. The pop-forward structures exert their undeniable hooks with baneful precision, pulling listeners into their clutches; once there, sugary melody rewards submission.

Between Christmas 2000 and New Year 2001 producers Ekkehard Ehlers and Stephan Mathieu recorded an album of warm, soft, delicately crackling electronic music in the space of that week. It was christened with the ambivalent title "Heroin" and was released on CD via the label Brombron in 2001 and later in 2003 re-issued on Kit Clayton's Orthlorng Musork on double-LP with remixes the pair had commissioned as expansions.

17 years later Heroin sees its first vinyl release to include all 13 tracks from the original CD track-list on this LP + 12“ set. The centerpiece "Herz" finally receives its long deserved vinyl treatment (side C, at 45rpm) and on the flip side Thomas Brinkmann contributes a mirror in a magnificent remix of that very piece on side D.

Ehlers and Mathieu were both highly prolific solo artists during the period 2000-2004, and in just two years after the initial release of "Heroin" each had produced over half a dozen new solo recordings: among them the serial masterpiece Ehlers' "Plays" (Cornelius Cardew, Hurbert Fichte, John Cassavetes, Albert Ayler, Robert Johnson) released as 5 stunning LPs in a series on Staubgold, while Mathieu's 'Full Swing Edits' spread over five 10" records plus his album 'FrequencyLib' on Mille Plateaux, 'Die Entdeckung des Wetters' on Lucky Kitchen and ‘The Sad Mac’ on Atsushi Sasaki’s Headz label were greeted to critical acclaim.

Both artists were expanding their conceptual sonic approaches in the glow of developing laptop technologies which would to these times in 2020 seem quite primitive, but these two in that period used the state-of-the-art to aid and abet their conceptual visions, while at times the duo used unorthodox experimentation - yet always had a distinctively melodic and musical form at its heart and soul.

Ehlers can be seen as a conceptualist, as a meta-musician who interrogates the mediums and methods of sound production - reflecting on the conditions and possibilities of improvisation (e.g. "Plays Albert Ayler") and exploits ideas of mutation and distortion of popular aesthetics played out within a ghostly form of divine pop beauty in his project März.

Mathieu, originally a drummer and co-founder of what has come to be known as the Berlin 'Echtzeitmusik' scene. His approach could be similarly described as working a critical analyst and researcher: Subtly and precisely working in the realm of processing as a method of intervening in melodious/harmonic analog sound sources.

Ehlers and Mathieu may not think too much about their singular productions and publications outcomes, but instead concentrate on the process and musical personality that characterizes their gesture- style itself stays in the background - and they usher a music from small minimal sound sources coaching a patient music of slow intervention - much like a refraction of light than a concrete painting or a blurred photograph - beatus accident.

And indeed, "Heroin" is an album that embraces the happy accident being made up of reduced, often very catchy and very direct micro hooks which seem laser-guided into a space accepting obvious melodic beauty in what feels like an observation of musics unfolding and revealing it's DNA, embed with for a kind of yearning for innocence and naiveté - as if Satie were on the jukebox in "The Crying of Lot 49". Not to say the music is "reduced", but rather: 'restricted' and born from acceptance of limitations, and the artists allowing the sounds to just "be.." with some incremental degrees of coercion.

The album not only sounds like that of 2 producers who are both dreamers and scientists, but that Ehlers and Mathieu chose to work with these means in a dialogue together to reduce pop music to its musical/tonal core, it is not Pop music anymore, rather a ghostly pointilistic itteration of song. "Heroin" is located at this transition, around that point at which tracks, that were or could have become pop compositions, irrevocably slip into a static harmonic nirvana. We are invited to follow the arch of Heroin in a slow-motion morphine musical haze.

Heroin sounded timeless when originally released and proof is that it remains so, one wishes that Ehlers and Mathieu would convene again for a week, a month or an entire year to continue this process of slow rumination, picking affectionately over the sounds they both love - and then maybe when everything is condensed, evaporated they would write more songs with those sonic refractive elements that remain.