Cerca:ep 4

Parisian label Chuwanaga proudly presents the first opus of its new 12inch series, starting with the brand new EP of Koji Ono: Ricochet / Maloja Pass. Recorded during a short week-end in Paris, it is the result of a true collaboration by a team of musicians who wanted to bring a modern twist to a classic and timeless sound, staying true to the original late seventies/early eigthies dance music spirit and the passion of Chuwanaga for the original Britfunk.
On bass, you’ll hear Lester Batchelor aka LB from Atmosfear, the legendary British JazzFunk band best known for their En Transe LP and the classic track « Dancing In Outerspace». Killing it on the drums, Roy Mistry is their 2020 official drummer. Recording together in Studio Delta, with Koji playing almost all the other instruments, from keys to guitars to percussions, they all had a blast collaborating on these two new tracks. Add a blazing Rhodes solo by Jean-Michel Bernard on « Maloja Pass », some precious magic from producers Seiji Ono & Saint-James, a great dose of savoir-faire by sound engineer David Cukier aka Greita (Disques Flegon)… And you end up with two killer tunes ready to blast their way through your speakers.
On both tracks, you’ll immediately recognize Koji Ono’s touch – as found on his previous Incognito EP : simple but uplifting melodies on synthetizers, sparkling guitars and a certain playfulness in the arrangements. On side A, « Ricochet » sounds like an irresistible mid-tempo boogie banger. On B side, the uptempo « Maloja Pass » is faster paced and bursts with energy, giving the listener an irresistible urge to travel endlessly through the night.

2020 Repress!

Allen Saei, also known as Aubrey, has the experience of a record shop owner mixed to the one of a warned label manager. His music tastes are very varied. With his first love of Hip Hop as a teenager moving quickly onto the emerging Acid House scene from Chicago, then to Detroit Techno and New York House, his music productions testify the perfect knowledge of all three genres.
First taste of this record is Pleased to meet you, an original track from the Texture 005 released in 1997. As his fellows, all songs on this wax, except the most recent one but non-the less, Air Strike, were recorded on Digital Audio Tape format and come out of analog machines.
A2 - Taken Away is a dance floor killer. Recorded in 1996 this theme follows a straight but efficient techno rhythm that reminds the French Touch at the same period of time in Paris, kind of a darker British Knight Club' song.
The vernal Equinox is the last piece of this EP, recorded in 1998 but never released, it is more techno and rave oriented than the others.
Discret for a long time and with recent releases on Syncrophone, Komplex de Deep, and Ferox Records, Allen delivers a wide retrospective of his work and surely gives some perspective for the future.

In a world governed by stereotypes, Lachinos break down the boundaries between people and gender. It is impossible to clearly distinguish the origin, roots and cultures that are specific to each of its members. An association that turns out to be as unexpected as it is effective on their first EP America Lachina, out on Goutte d’Or, a sub-label of french team Cracki Records.
America Lachina is also and above all an ode to Latin American music. One travels to the rhythms of merengue, cha cha cha, cumbia or even Brazilian surf, always with a musical commitment to rock accents.

(LP + 12 page booklet) This ancient psychedelic folk with jazzy improvisations from the North West of Greece is unique and will touch your soul so deeply that epirotika aficionados always remember the place and the moment when they got to know this hypnotic and mes-merising music. In a similar way to the music of Alice Coltrane or Mulatu Astatke, it can take you out of the here and now - the pure beauty of the magical epirotika sound can make your mind drift off to otherworldly places.

Clash lands once again on his very own label with a powerful statement: "Nuevo Orden Mundial" (spanish for "New World Order"), a taste of the singular and trademark sound from the Madrid-based producer, but in a very particular way... A release fully oriented to the dancefloor!

Five cuts of raw techno and modular sounds with a rave touch, influences that come together to give shape to this EP. The release includes three original productions by Clash: "Overflow", "Alone" and "Pills"; along with two totally killer remixes.

The first one by the Russian duo PTU (formed by Alina Izolenta and Kamil Ea) who took “Overflow” and dismantled it and then blended it back together to leave their characteristic stamp, a strong and energetic sound, a proof of frenetic rhythms. This track has been an essential part of the shows the duo has been doing live during the last few months.


The second remix comes by the berlin-based italian techno veteran Davide Carbone, better known as D.Carbone. In his "Pills" remix, Carbone injected all of his industrial techno power and translated the track to a rave oriented atmosphere. There's no doubt his remix will definitely be considered a dancefloor anthem for this post-pandemic times to come.

Hailing from Buenos Aires, like a massive tentacular burst of lightning, electrifying everything and everybody along their way, SUSPENSIVOS INFLAMABLES since 2001, have been blasting stages and dancefloors across south america with unprecedented sonic and ultra sonic power. Flowing unobstructed between lavish dubs and feverish psych punk rock, this 8 member ensamble performs live submerged on a visual psychedelic orgy of self designed animations and video footage projected onto themselves. This new EP was composed, performed and recorded from their houses in the middle of Quarantine and Social Isolation.

Two years after the release of 'Kreise' Selm have once again peered out from the torture racked enclave they call a studio. Originally conceived as two separate EP's and later stacked into an all-consuming album over 44 minutes 'TiiiER / Post-Adrenaline' pushes Selm's agenda of black dwarf techno and physically exhausting industrial churning to new levels. The opening salvo of tracks that form the 'TiiiER' disc (tracks 1-5) posit a techno minimalism coated in the incredible, almost edible crust of controlled distortion and flaking edges garnered through masterful gain staging. Opener 'Sin' accrues greater density with each iteration and pass. 'Kreise' is classic DBX style beep ran into manic filters and weight gain classes.'Moger' is a truly sinister and clinical piece of industrial sound design raising blood pressure with its stainless steel poise. 'Laus' is a real percy, syncopated just the right side of falling over and baked into the toughest compression throbs. It closes the first 'disc' and perhaps what could be considered the more straight forward tracks of the album. 'Post-Adrenaline' the second disc of the set is where Selm's love of intensely textural sound design work can be best felt. 'Nineteen Voices' opens with its disembodied conversations utterly smothered by the roiling mass of bass synth which surrounds on all sides. 'Irr' terrifies the young with it's truly OTT undulance of seismic tone, as reverential to death industrial as it is to guitar music, the riff laid bare. 'Brett' is a damp, warm environment of intelligent growth. Fermenting itself again in a stew of gnashing bass heaviness now crowned with glowing bowed metal and tuned feedback. 'Sommeil' closes the second disc with not a single positive note played, it's a dreary escalation of all the albums previous incarnations, flickering noise shaped rhythm, serpentine bass formations and no rush to please or to entertain. At just under 6 minutes, it and the album are over. Selm do not hold up on this follow up to Kreise. While the albums share ideas they are refined to a point of punishment here. 'TiiiER / Post-Adrenaline' is hyper-modern music that sounds like it's made from air, stone and rust.

Ralph Heidel is one of the young musicians that represent the spirit of Berlin’s new musical ecleticism better than others. He is part of the avantgarde circles that mix modern jazz and contemporary classical music with elements of new electronica and experimental ambient music. This is the vibe of Germany's next generation.

Heidel creates a sonic universe that is unique. He takes the listener into a deep, atmospheric travel that stimulates emotions and feelings on a different level. Heidel brings together two worlds: what he learned at Musikhochschule München, Germany’s leading academy for classical music where he studied saxophon and composition and the moods happening in Germany's new electronic circles.

On „Relief“ Heidel created six songs. Except one, all of them are instrumental music. Partly composed and often improvised these sounds take the listener into Heidel's specific sonic universe. Raw beat structures, emotive horn lines, strong harmonical tensions and dramatic build ups. Heidel’s signature sound.
In fact Heidel is a multiple influenced artist with a strong personality that absorbs whats around him, connects it with his own wide artistic knowledge and fullfills it into magical musical moments.

Relief is the next step in what could become a longtime artistic career.
After a (very composed) debut album for string quartet and rhythm section for Kryptox (Moments of Resonance 2019), it was important for Heidel, to process current feelings of daily life.
Not just his cultural learnings, but also emotions connected to the hard COVID times and a lot of personal experiences.

Relief are six abstract, distorted patterns. Long deep transitions that lead into euphoric parts of sonic greatness. Heidel's sense for sound design and the soft tone of his saxophone phrases, add a personal note that is somehow alone in the current music scenario. Sampling his saxophone (reeds, keys etc.) to create very organic beats is one of the many techniques to create that special „Heidel“ sound. Also his calm and wide harmonies over disquiet, rough drums are part of his unique ambivalent, disrupted moods.

Most of this EP has been played by Heidel alone. For a few parts he was joined by musicians from the local scene. In fact besides his albums on Kryptox Ralph Heidel is very connected in Berlin’s current cultural playground: He creates music for underground performance art happenings in Neukölln as well as for new German theater (Volksbühne, Berliner Ensemble). Also German rapper Tarek from K.I.Z heard about Heidels string debut album, so they collaborated for an album, where Heidel reworked his record for stringquartet, piano, drums and bass.

Veyl presents 'Nuit' - a split-EP between two excellent projects we're enraptured to share with you. Both hailing from France, Blind Delon (Toulouse) and Contre Soirée (Paris) share a similar vision, bringing music from before any of their birth dates into the world of today.
Dedicating their sound to cold bass lines and synthesizers, the 80s, french post-punk and black romanticism, both acts spent their nights observing, describing, thinking, crying, each in their own way.
Building a bridge between the melancholy and urgency defining that era, ’Nuit' is the fruit of this labour.

Hyperspace will be Beck’s 14th album, following 2017’s Colors, which won Best Alternative Music Album and Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical at the 61st GRAMMY Awards earlier this year. Hyperspace’s new dimensions in sound are the result of Beck’s most collaborative efforts to date. Seven of the album's 11 tracks—including single “Uneventful Days” and “Saw Lightning” (as featured in the Beats by Dr. Dre Powerbeats Pro campaign and also included with pre-orders)—feature co-writing and co-production from Pharrell Williams. Elsewhere in Hyperspace, “See Through” is co-written/co-produced by frequent Beck collaborator Greg Kurstin, “Star” is co-written/co-produced by Paul Epworth, “Stratosphere” features back-up from Chris Martin, the album’s title track features guest vocals from Terrell Hines, and “Die Waiting” is co-written/co-produced by Cole M.G.N. with backing vocals from Sky Ferreira. Longtime Beck bandmates Jason Falkner, Smokey Hormel and Roger Manning Jr. feature on much of the album as well.

only 1 copy exists of this heavy melodic progressive concept lp valued in excess of £10,000. fresh from the incredible success of Rick Wakemans early concept lps (he drummed with Wakemans band) Barney and his ex band mates Warhorse made this sensational lost heavy prog lp as a promo acetate to get an official release, Barney wrote all the songs and sings. Musically complex it begins with a spoken intro and tells the tale of Koneg Son Of Odin, as he quests to find meaning and death in battle. Keyboards and guitar interweave, with further spoken interludes, and culminating in an epic prog workout featuring fluid soloing electric leads as Koneg dies on the battlefield and is taken by Valkyries to Valhalla. The original gold hand made cover is reproduced as a gatefold with sleevnotes by the actual Rick Wakeman. Barney James, an ex British Army Commando, and ex Gracious, Legend, and Warhorse, and actor in The Sweeney and Derek Jarmans Jubilee, is also now in Valhalla, and his lost lp is here Issued for the first time with the full permission of his two daughters.

‘‘I am not as other detectives!’
Presently in triple gatefold vinyl for the very first time, Dirk Gently – The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul sees Harry Enfield return as the singular detective in this full-cast BBC radio dramatisation of the novel by Douglas Adams. First broadcast on Radio 4 in 2008, these fantastically entertaining comedy sci-fi dramas are adapted and directed by Dirk Maggs, acclaimed for his dramatisations of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Good Omens, Neverwhere and many others.
When Dirk Gently’s long-suffering secretary, Janice, resigns to work in an airport, it’s the beginning of a very strange adventure for both of them. The detective takes to reading palms whilst dressed as an old gypsy woman, but meanwhile the ancient Norse God Odin has fallen into the hands of an unscrupulous advertising executive (and her husband). Bring on Odin’s son, Thor, a godlike curse that turns Janice into a vending machine, and countless other interconnected things…
Starring Harry Enfield as Dirk Gently and Olivia Colman as Janice, with Billy Boyd as Richard MacDuff, Laurel Lefkow as Kate Schechter, Stephen Moore as Odin, John Fortune as Dr Standish, Philip Jackson as the Vagrant, Jan Ravens as Cynthia Draycott and Peter Davison as Simon Draycott, with a guest cast including Rupert Degas, Morwenna Banks, Sally Grace, Jon Glover, Michael Fenton Stevens and Susan Sheridan, and music by Philip Pope. Adapted by Dirk Maggs and John Langdon from the novel of the same name by Douglas Adams. Directed by Dirk Maggs.
Three 140g coloured vinyl discs – in Holistic Red, Yellow and Blue - are presented in an illustratedc triple gatefold sleeve, with an exclusive sleeve note by Dirk Maggs.

Gerd Janson, Lexx, Bell Towers, Belia Winnewisser, DJ Kaos and Never4ever remixed Ethimm’s By Night EP.

We all know Nights are nicer when you are with your friends, so Ethimm asked some of his old friends and favorite acts to remix his recent EP ‘By Night’. Quite a few hopped on the bandwagon: Germany’s most prolific remixer and DJs DJ Gerd Janson turned Ethimm’s ‘Lies’ into a relentlessly deep and driving house cut with drums reminiscent of New Order. Balearic boss Lexx stripped the track down to its bare vocal and rebuilt it with a 90ies New York vibe. Bell Towers added his prototypical leftfield approach to ‘Don’t Go Away’, while Berlin’s legendary DJ Kaos remade it into a classic acid stomper. The remix EP is completed by newcomer Never4Ever’s breakbeat treatment of the same track and swiss experimental queen Belia Winnewisser’s treatment of ‘Island Jam’.

What hides in the fog that keeps people apart, and what does it take to cut through it? These questions hang heavily over
Sarah Beth Tomberlin's music, whose hushed and intimate tones orbit answers as much as they savor the unanswerable.
To be in relation to another human being is to engage with a deep mystery: We are all fundamentally alone, siloed into
confusing bodies, and yet occasionally we ¬nd someone who lets us feel as if we weren't. Tomberlin, the Louisville native
who recently relocated to Los Angeles, delights in articulating and amplifying that mystery, picking out its details and
marveling at its scale. In singing her aloneness she soothes it, and extends a hand to others reckoning with their own
solitude--a paradox that warms her spectral songs.

Tomberlin's new Projections EP continues the arc of her critically acclaimed 2018 debut At Weddings, weaving new collaborators and new techniques into her signature dusky milieu. Since the LP's release, Tomberlin has toured with Pedro the
Lion, Andy Shauf, American Football, and Alex G, played a Tiny Desk concert for NPR, and given a riveting performance on
Jimmy Kimmel Live! The ¬ve-song EP, capped with a cover of Casiotone for the Painfully Alone's stunning "Natural Light,"
re ects this period of intensive growth and self-discovery. "I wrote these songs while getting to know myself outside of
people's perceived notions of who I was," says Tomberlin. "I just started being like, What am I interested in? What do I want
out of relationships and friendships? What am I looking for that I don't have in myself already?"

It was 1977, there may well have been “knives in West 11”, but at a student’s hall of residence in Leicester, a packed room of cross legged intellectuals were about to witness the debut of The Disco Zombies; Andy Ross on vocals and guitar, Geoff Dodimead on bass, Johnny ‘Guitar’ Hawkins on guitar and Andy Fullerton on drums. They were loud, fast and they had some witty one-liners.
The four-piece became five with the addition of Dave Henderson from The Blazers, a chirpy power pop punk quintet, who were part of a burgeoning scene in the city that included The Foamettes, Dead Fly Syndrome, Wendy Tunes, The RTRs, Robin Banks And The Payrolls and many more. Wine bars, canteens and bowling alleys in pubs were the home of this phenomenon until Subway Sect and The Lou’s arrived for The Great Unknown Tour. They needed a local band for support and the Disco Zombies obliged.
Record Shop owner - and now Mayor Of Mablethorpe - Carl Tebbutt was keen to ride the punk rollercoaster and decided to launch Uptwon Records with a Disco Zombies EP. Recorded in Chester in one four hour session, it included The Blazers’ ‘Top Of The Pops’ and Andy’s ‘Time Will Tell’, ‘Punk A Go Go’ and ‘Disco Zombies’.
Carl had done a deal with a one-stop music production company who went bust almost immediately and the record was shelved. Unperturbed the band pressed on and recorded a session at the local radio station, ‘TV Screen Existence’ being the only track that survived. A tour of Leicester – five pubs in five days – was the end of that era and the band without Johnny ‘Guitar’ who had another year to do at Uni, relocated to London taking with them The Foamettes’ guitarist Steve Gerrard who wisely returned to Leicester and become part of The Bomb Party. Steve was replaced by Mark Sutherland in what was to become the recognised line up of The Disco Zombies for several years, playing lots of London gigs from The Hope And Anchor to The Moonlight Club, North London Poly to the Scala.
By 1978, there was an eruption of small DIY indie labels and Andy Ross launched South Circular Records to release the band’s debut single, ‘Drums Over London’ - an ironic stab at people’s hostility to the arrival of other cultures, a piss-take of Spear And Jackson-wielding Tory attitudes. John Peel played it regularly until Rock Against Racism complained even though Peel explained that it was actually supporting their views. Ho hum. South Circular wasn’t to last but Dave Henderson launched Dining Out. Dave and Andy journeyed to Ipswich to record the debut EP from the Peel-approved Adicts, the plan being to follow it with a Disco Zombies’ single and regain momentum. ‘Here Comes The Buts’ was the second Dining Out release, featuring the breakthrough Dr Boss drum machine; it was greeted with great enthusiasm in some quarters, although strangely it was likened to The Cramps meets Neil Young in NME.
Dining Out was always just one step ahead of going out of business and even though the follow up had been recorded - ‘The Year Of The Sex Olympics’, backed with ‘Target Practice’ and ‘New Scars’ – it never saw the light of day as the money finally ran out.
Somehow, Dining Out had a second lease of life and Andy wanted to record a new track for a new release amid 45s from The Sinatras, New Age and Spit Like Paint. By now, the Zombies had been through their dark post punk phase and ‘Where Have You Been Lately Tony Hateley’ was a clever upbeat anthem which told the tale of the nomadic footballer. The test pressing gained many Peel minutes but by the time it was ready to release, the band had finally split up. It eventually saw the light of day on the Cordelia label’s ‘Obscure Independent Classics’ album. Very fitting.
So, it was 1980: Mark Sutherland opened a studio in Bow, Dod got a day job, Andy Fullerton already had one. Andy and Dave went a bit experimental in Club Tango; Andy eventually discovering Blur for Food which he started with The Teardrop Explodes’ David Balfe, while Dave flirted with Worldbackwards.
In 2011, the drum machine line up descended on Mark’s studio, rehearsing for a show at the Bull And Gate. They recorded two of their lengthier tracks – ‘Night Of The Big Heat’ and ‘LHO’ powered by a waning Dr Rhythm – these were pressed as an extremely limited edition ten-inch. A few years later Andy Fullerton returned to the fold recording three more originals ‘Hit’, ‘Lenin’s Tomb’ and ‘Paint It Red’ for an even more limited edition ten-inch in 2018 and a show in October that year at The Dublin Castle.
Since then, meandering lunchtime discussions in restaurants that were popular in the ‘70s (Joe Allen, Café De Pacifico, etc) have led to arguments about the lost tracks – ‘Man From UNCLE’, ‘I Need You Like I Need VD’, ‘Throwaway Line’, ‘I Thought You Were Only Joking’, ‘London Nights’, ‘Cosmetics For China’, ‘When Doo Wop Hit Hampstead’. It’s only a matter of time. Until then.....

BLACK vinyl with deluxe origami fold out sleeve & obi strip & DL Card. CD Wallet. The third album from Dutch punk-laced noiseniks adds new maturity and a conceptual feel that pulls the extremes of their sound together. A psyche-fuelled journey into the id punctuated with rhythmic kabuki modal mood swings, thunderstorms, digital beeps, traffic noise, and just plain old beautiful cacophonous reverb-drenched sound when needed. The 'third chapter' refers to the last five years that the Dutch band have spent creating their "difficult" third album. Each song spins a yarn; there are plagues, dreams, wind and fire, 'mythical' characters, and the search for the secret government warehouse. Lead single, Tokyo Music Experience, resonates with a conveyor belt-propelled modal guitar, reflecting the halcyon days of Japanese super-productivity; a mesmerising mantra, infected with news bulletin on-the-hour bleeps underlining its time-sensitive nature; a pristine super-commercial anthem to drive loyalty and reinforce solidarity with the party! Having been described as creating "underground noise with a bracing, warped pop appeal" (Mojo), their new album is a coming-of-age post-classic with a unique worldview - inspired by Van Dyke Parks (Song Cycle) Scott Walker (3 & 4), Moondog (Elpmas), White Noise (An Electric Storm) and Beach Boys (Smile). If their previous effort (Tape Hiss) was their very own sketch of a sketch for an incomplete concept album, a noisy reaction to their previous life, then 'Excerpts From Chapter 3..', with all its interlaced intricacies, is the realisation of their transition from punk-spiked-pop to psyche-pop protagonists. Evolving, testing, infectious...

For the 30th anniversary of the legendary SNK Corporation’s Neo-Geo, Wayô Records is proud to present this new complete edition of the Magician Lord soundtrack in both vinyl and CD digipak formats, featuring a new illustration by Eisuke Ogura! This iconic game has been released in 1990 and was one of the launch titles of the cult arcade system by SNK, and 1991 on the home system. It is still regarded today as one of the legendary game made by SNK on these systems.

In addition to this release, the soundtrack is accompanied by a brand-new virtuoso piano arrangement, especially produced by Wayô Records, and recorded in studio on a beautiful Steinway model C by Nicolas Horvath (official Steinway Artist). This new piano arrangement is part of our Wayô Piano Collection and is a unique way to rediscover the fabulous Magician Lord soundtrack.

The new illustration designed and hand-signed by Eisuke Ogura is available with this vinyl edition, as a collector japanese-made Shikishi, offered to the first 150 orders!

Originally conceived as a quarantine EP collecting material recorded in Memphis during sessions for ‘The Unraveling’, the project quickly grew to include provocative new songs written and recorded over what Drive-By Truckers co-founder Patterson Hood calls “this endless summer of protests, riots, political shenanigans and pandemic horrors.”
Tracks such as Hood’s ‘Watching The Orange Clouds’ - inspired by the protests which followed George Floyd’s murder by Minneapolis police - and a fiery cover of The Ramones’ classic ‘The KKK Took My Baby Away’ (vocals by bassist Matt Patton) were exchanged between Hood, cofounding singer / songwriter / guitarist Mike Cooley, bassist Patton, keyboardist / multiinstrumentalist Jay Gonzalez and drummer Brad Morgan and then mixed by long-time Drive-By Truckers producer David Barbe.

Summer 2011, we discovered Triptides’ music through a music blog aggregator and immediately fell in love with it. Just after that, we decided to interview the band for our own blog and to release a single, their first-ever vinyl record, through our beginning sister label Croque Macadam. The single contained two songs Going Under & Outlaw, both coming from and self-released tape named Psychic Summer. One year later, Triptides released a CD album Sun Pavilion and we were releasing again another 7” record with the main single Bright Sky and an exclusive b-side (Darling). Both albums never were released as vinyl. 10 years later we are now releasing a beautifully remastered version of these two lovely albums. Since then, Triptides became one of the most endearing contemporary psych band alongside the dynamic Californian scene with which they share or shared members (Mystic Braves, Levitation Room, Frankie And The Witch Fingers…).
The Band then formed by the duo Glenn Brigman & Josh Menashe used to make their song from their Bloomington student home studio on an old Tascam 8 track tape recorder, already showing a deep interest for the sixties influenced music. If their first EP were showing some touching errors, despite the years passing, both Psychic Summer & Sun Pavilion are still offering a very nice musical experience for the listener. Their songwriting remains flawless and the DIY lo-fi production makes it sound as spontaneous and charming as it was back then. Our favorite songs such as Going Under, Who Knows, Satin Skies, Bright Sky, English Rain or Sun/Shine shows a great kraft for beautiful and catchy songs anchored in both a sixties tradition and the then-burgeoning modern indie-pop sound through very interesting surf influences and uses of a drum machine.
The reissue is a great opportunity to rediscover Triptides in their beginnings. The objects had been carefully made, Psychic Summer for example had a brand new artwork by psychedelic collage master Andrew McGranahan, both have color vinyl version and standard black. Far from being rough drafts, these two albums are still showing a beautiful angle on Triptides’ music and their always strong discography.

Summer 2011, we discovered Triptides’ music through a music blog aggregator and immediately fell in love with it. Just after that, we decided to interview the band for our own blog and to release a single, their first-ever vinyl record, through our beginning sister label Croque Macadam. The single contained two songs Going Under & Outlaw, both coming from and self-released tape named Psychic Summer. One year later, Triptides released a CD album Sun Pavilion and we were releasing again another 7” record with the main single Bright Sky and an exclusive b-side (Darling). Both albums never were released as vinyl. 10 years later we are now releasing a beautifully remastered version of these two lovely albums. Since then, Triptides became one of the most endearing contemporary psych band alongside the dynamic Californian scene with which they share or shared members (Mystic Braves, Levitation Room, Frankie And The Witch Fingers…).
The Band then formed by the duo Glenn Brigman & Josh Menashe used to make their song from their Bloomington student home studio on an old Tascam 8 track tape recorder, already showing a deep interest for the sixties influenced music. If their first EP were showing some touching errors, despite the years passing, both Psychic Summer & Sun Pavilion are still offering a very nice musical experience for the listener. Their songwriting remains flawless and the DIY lo-fi production makes it sound as spontaneous and charming as it was back then. Our favorite songs such as Going Under, Who Knows, Satin Skies, Bright Sky, English Rain or Sun/Shine shows a great kraft for beautiful and catchy songs anchored in both a sixties tradition and the then-burgeoning modern indie-pop sound through very interesting surf influences and uses of a drum machine.
The reissue is a great opportunity to rediscover Triptides in their beginnings. The objects had been carefully made, Psychic Summer for example had a brand new artwork by psychedelic collage master Andrew McGranahan, both have color vinyl version and standard black. Far from being rough drafts, these two albums are still showing a beautiful angle on Triptides’ music and their always strong discography.

‘Instant Opaque Evening’ is an epic offering from The Underflow, the new trio of Mats Gustafsson, David Grubbs and Rob Mazurek. It makes vast strides on the heels of their self-titled 2019 debut (Corbett vs. Dempsey/Underflow Records) with nearly 90 minutes of intensely focused live performances from January 2020 shows in France, Belgium, Italy and Poland. That tour was a revelation for all three members, experienced as they are, with this still-new group’s freedom to walk onstage each night determined to surprise one another, moving from long instrumental improvisations into and out of songs and covering a terrific amount of ground at each of these concerts.
‘Instant Opaque Evening’ conveys this broad sweep, from the full-tilt electronics of ‘Self-Portrait As Interference Pattern’ and the climax of the seventeen-minute ‘Instant Opaque Evening’ to the inspired, alternate universe chamber music of ‘Planks’ and ‘A Thin Eternity’ and the group’s spontaneous arrangements of three previously recorded songs by Grubbs, ‘Gethsemani Night’, ‘An Optimist Declines’ and ‘Cooler Side Of The Pillow’.
The short version of the long tale of intersecting paths bringing together these three musicians begins in Chicago in the 1990s, with all three active participants in numerous convergences among jazz, free improvisation, experimental rock and more. Both Gustafsson and Mazurek appear as guests on Gastr del Sol albums (‘Upgrade & Afterlife’ and ‘Camoufleur’ respectively; that’s Rob’s cornet taking ‘The Seasons Reverse’ to new heights) and shortly thereafter Grubbs and Gustafsson recorded two duo albums, including the deep minimalism of ‘Apertura’, a talismanic favourite of both musicians.
David Grubbs has played in Gastr del Sol, the Red Krayola and Squirrel Bait and performed with Tony Conrad, Susan Howe, Pauline Oliveros, Will Oldham and many others. He’s the author of the books The Voice in the Headphones, Now that the audience is assembled and Records Ruin the Landscape.
Saxophone player, improviser and composer Mats Gustafsson is known as a solo artist and for international tours and projects with, among many others, Sonic Youth, Merzbow, Jim O’Rourke, Barry Guy, Otomo Yoshihide, Yoshimi, Peter Brötzmann, Neneh Cherry, Christian Marclay, Albert Oehlen, Ken Vandermark and the working groups FIRE!, THE END, LUFT, ANGUISH and Gush, as well as collaborations with contemporary dance, theatre, art, poetry and projects with noise.
Rob Mazurek is a multidisciplinary artist with a focus on electro-acoustic composition, improvisation, performance, painting, sculpture, video, film and installation, who spent much of his creative life in Chicago and then Brazil. He currently lives and works in Marfa, Texas. He leads/co-leads many ensembles of various sizes and shapes including his flagship large ensemble Exploding Star Orchestra, Chicago Underground and São Paulo Underground. He has
collaborated with Bill Dixon, Pharoah Sanders, Roscoe Mitchell, Jeff Parker, Nicole Mitchell, Chad Taylor, Jim O’Rourke, Naná Vasconcelos and many others.

2015. Two boys with guitars on their chests, stretching songwriting muscles and finding, to their delight, new possibilities at every run up the neck. This means trading vocal parts mid-song, then trading back again, modulating madly through rhythm changes, looking for a note in the harmony they’d never played or sung before. All in the service of locating the feelgood pop alchemy in a song in which no parts are repeated. Laying it all down with a sweet solid state vibe.
“Whatever happened to ‘She’s a Beam’!?!” has been a question/passive-aggressive demand from Ty and Cory aficionados over the past few years. This is what happened. It went to Heaven and lived a beautiful life there. This is the sound of it. Guitars and harmonies. Helium-coated keyboards. A celestial, Steve Millerish synth transformation. Positivity. Lightness. Rock. Epic. Energetic. Happy, headbanging days.
‘Milk Bird Flyer’ is a perfect other ‘A’ to pair with ‘She’s a Beam’, hovering on a fade-in fanfare of gleaming guitar godness before shifting into a countryish tripper with cheerful Psilo-sci-fi-bin lyrics to bend and stretch the ecstatic shuffle of the beat. As with ‘She’s a Beam’, Ty and Cory are floating so tight in the harmony that we’re like “Who’s who?”
The pure sounds of yesterday are bright like a moment in time just waiting for its chance to exist, a nugget of potency landing right between the eyes in any era. Turn it up and smile, smile, smile.

22-20s is the debut self-titled album by English blues rock band 22-20s. The album was met with critical acclaim upon initial release in 2004. NME called it one of the best British rock albums of the year, praising the band’s ability to sound fresh and vital, while remaining intense. The album features the track “Devil in Me”, which was famously used on a Vauxhall Astra commercial in 2016. It provided the band with a rise in popularity, even though by that time they had already split up. Their eponymous debut is now available on
180 gram audiophile vinyl and comes in a gatefold sleeve.

City Slang is thrilled to announce the debut album of London based singer-songwriter Anna B Savage! Her 2015 EP was deeply intriguing and quickly drew the attention of Father John Misty and later Jenny Hval, both of whom brought Savage out on European tours.

City Slang is thrilled to announce the debut album of London based singer-songwriter Anna B Savage! Her 2015 EP was deeply intriguing and quickly drew the attention of Father John Misty and later Jenny Hval, both of whom brought Savage out on European tours.

Cobalt Chapel release ‘Orange Synthetic’, the follow-up to their much lauded self-titled debut album and its companion piece ‘Variants’. ‘Orange Synthetic’ is an exploration of the epic county they call home, Yorkshire. Written during this tumultuous turn of the decade, it is inspired by the humanity, anecdotes and folklore of the region, and the surrounding landscape.

The album delves into stories which exist at the edge of history and myth: the drowning of a village under Lake Semerwater, the mystery of the lost geodesic domes of RAF Fylingdales, the fate of John Hotham of Hull, beheaded for treason during the English Civil War, a psychedelic folk song about an infamous Cragg Vale farmer killed in a fight over a flock of sheep, the cry of Skylarks over Erringden Moor.

The album’s name stems from a line in the title track, telling the story of the fateful Yorkshire Folk, Blues & Jazz Festival in Krumlin, fifty years ago. Hit by a violent storm, it resulted in the devastation of the site, near-deaths from exposure and the promoter being found wandering the moors, days later.

Cobalt Chapel’s atmospheric style remains distinctively their own, through Cecilia Fage’s crisp English vocals and choral arrangements, and Jarrod Gosling’s use of organs such as the Vox Continental, Philicorda, and the USSR-era Elektronika Organ. These are the foundations of their rich, experimental yet melodic sound, and this album sees them expand on it with the addition of mandolin, guitars, and drawing on Cecilia’s classical background, with clarinets and recorders.

Today Margot share new single Walk With Me via Full Time Hobby. The Peckham band ended 2019 supporting Swimming Tapes on their U.K. as well as releasing their debut EP earlier this year. New single Walk With Me is a song about empathy, depression and the power of talking. All channelled by frontman Alex Hannaway's pastel vocal hues and searingly honest delivery. Walk With Me works as a conversation between someone experiencing a depressive episode and another trying to understand. "It’s about listening, friendship, understanding, I’ve had experiences where friends, family members have been patient, they’ve been persistent and caring, and it’s this that has really helped me in my life" explains Hannaway. In addition to the official video, the band have also shared a 'Karaoke Video' for the single. "We've been using home karaoke sessions to blow off steam during the lockdown period. Often feeling confined, bored, angry, frustrated; the elation and release of belting out familiar songs in our living room felt cathartic. So it felt perfect for the video, capturing not only the isolation of lockdown but also the communal, spirited moments too" explain Margot. Margot comprises of five friends who moved from the suburbs of south London to Peckham after finishing University. In two separate bands at the time, drunken nights out discussing the merits of a merger evolved into the first few rehearsals. It went well - Margot formed in 2018 and released a steady stream of singles across the year. The band employ a DIY ethic, self-producing their recordings in their home studio. After ending 2019 supporting Swimming Tapes on their UK tour, the band released their debut EP in February 2020 and are set to support Dana Gavanski on her upcoming tour in March 2021. Margot's nuanced blend of dream-pop, neo-psychedelia and jangle-guitar create a propulsive, cruising feel reminiscent of Real Estate or War on Drugs. Expect to hear more from them in 2020.

An exploratory record that dances across time and genre, guided by fidgety miniatures and jazz inflected collage. Throughout, the band pool together their instrumental chops, moving from fluid and serpentine R&B to meditative, minimalistic piano, evoking a contrast of virtuosity and self-surrender.

While constructed from the inspiration of soul, funk and film music, BÉE mediate those influences having first digested them through the productions of Madlib & the RZA.
A sticker on the sleeve tells us Self Help “combines jazz-funk and mysticism,” a signpost to where its musical and spiritual concerns align. The jazz-funk component translates to arresting hooks in sideways song forms: echoes of Gainsbourg spooled through Azymuth-style Brazilian jazz and punctuated by the whip and snap of Steely Dan. “The Sound Where My Head Was,” the instrumental centrepiece, exemplifies present-wave jazz but also ancient sounds, giving off the mothballed air of a Hiroshi Yoshimura record in a library-music archive.

Self Help’s mysticism emerges in broad and specific ways, denoting not only a search beyond cliché and intellect but also an inquiry into the beat, the spirit, the one will. This isn’t new territory for them: Turnbull—the artist formerly known as Slim Twig, who writes and performs with U.S. Girls and various other Toronto concerns—named the group’s Nature, Man & Woman EP after the Alan Watts book. Building these songs from his drafts over three weekends at Toronto’s Palace Sound studio, the ensemble was free to tap out of the city and into some other place, taking up residence in a collective mind maze. The album produces, in equal measure, familiar surprises and the surprisingly familiar. Intoxicated jazz riffs swerve left at phantom intersections. Rhythms cut loose and tie you in knots. But wired in to each song is a sense of gentle accumulation, making every featherlight flourish weigh a ton. U.S. Girls’ Meg Remy brings serenity to “Sing a Silent Gospel,” and wears its antic melodies lightly. The soul shimmer of “Unity (It’s Up to You)” lets the players pool their R&B chops into something fluid and serpentine while, on guest vocals, the musical performance artist James Baley issues urgent declaratives: “Water must pool, as a rule, before tasted/Or else the water is wasted.” The words throughout the record complement the ensemble music while riffing on the precarious nature of unity itself. Then, closer “Extinct Commune” finds Turnbull deserted at the piano, playing phrases of meditative minimalism taking after the composer Joanna Brouk.

For all the record’s reach, it is these contrasting quiet moments that bring Self Help’s communal spirit into focus. A note on personnel: Badge Époque Ensemble now has a seventh member in Karen Ng, the saxophonist and sometime collaborator of Do Make Say Think, Feist, and others. In BÉE, Ng joins Chris Bezant and Giosuè Rosati, her bandmates in the Andy Shauf live band, as well as U.S. Girls co-conspirators Turnbull and Ed Squires, and other Torontonian cross-pollinators listed below. Guest vocalists across Self Help include Meg Remy, who sings with Dorothea Paas on the opener, James Baley, and Toronto singer-songwriter Jennifer Castle on the remarkable “Just Space for Light.” Words by: Jazz Monroe

Skylax Armagnac's darling who released his first EP just a year ago, which had an international resonance with rave reviews from Resident Advisor, Bicep, Chaos in the CBD, Peach or even soul clap. Rightly some saw it as a resurgence, a modernized version of 90s New York house, silky and elegant in the Bobby Konders, Mr Fingers way. For this new EP, with fantastic remixes of the brilliant Simoncino, our French prodigy is inspired by the beginnings of trance on the title song (and title of the ep by the way) "The world as we know it (masterclass mix)", UK dub and rave influences, as on some Nu Groove releases (notably the first joey beltram) - the lead vocal sample comes from a speech in which Noam Chomsky describes the United States as a violent country and hard. According to the author "If this piece says something, I believe it is that the music and the party should not serve to forget the problems of the world, but rather to find the strength, the resources, the inspiration to solve them." On "Oh La Musique" Armagnac used the sound of his neighbors as a voice sample ! Indeed, during this incredibly complicated period that we are living in, confinement due to the devastating effects of covid 19, one of his neighbors played music really loudly and for 20 minutes ignored the other neighbors who were screaming "oh oh, the music" through the window. "Turning this moment of irritation into a sample to the glory of the music strikes me as pretty funny." Still according to the author. On B1, it’s a house masterclass lesson by the phenomenal & ultra prolific Simoncino, but do i need to remind you how much italians are masters in their way of paying homage to all the best house music that has ever been created & produced ? Good taste is often on their side ! The red zone club is a tense and incredibly effective mix that can be enjoyed either on a house or techno dancefloor, it is clearly a banger. B2 saw the italian master offers us a beautiful ambient mix. And to conclude "On My Own" is according to Armagnac "a title that speaks of the trust that one can place in one's fellow human beings and of emancipation." A superb EP that adds to the long list of must-haves from Skylax Records.

"On The Other Side" ist das lang erwartete Debütalbum des Londoner Künstlers Josh Edwards aka Blanco White. Mit drei bislang veröffentlichten EPs - "The Wind Rose" (2016), "Colder Heavens" (2016) und "Nocturne" (2018) - konnte Blanco White derart beachtliche Erfolge verzeichnen, die ihm monatelange Tourneen durch die ganze Welt ermöglichten. Josh studierte Gitarre in Cádiz (Spanien) und das andine Zupfinstrument Charango in Sucre (Bolivien), so verwundert es nicht, dass er Elemente der andalusischen und lateinamerikanischen Musik mit traditionellem Folk seiner Heimat verbindet. Das Album wurde hauptsächlich in London aufgenommen und von Josh selbst produziert. Für den Mix zeichnet sich Jake Jackson (Air Studios) verantwortlich.

Ever since his early teenager days Kareem El Morr has been working on tracks in the studio. Techno was and has always been the basis. Dirty, raw and in a positive way escalating are his sets, which he has been playing since the mid of the noughties. Not being limited when playing in the clubs or producing in the studio makes him undisputedly one of the most versatile artists in Munich. How multi-faceted he is, is now being shown on his latest RFR release.

“Supersonic” throws the gate open wide to electroid sceneries. Not a few will be reminded of I-F’s “Playstation” by the first sounds of the decently wobbeling bassline. Sick bassline variations, breaky drum parts and a pinch of Neo-Goa – any questions? „Quake“ portrays Morr’s infinite and unconditional love to Techno. Reminiscences of Detroit’s High Tech Jazz are floating relentlessly through widely varied rooms, which we absolutely adore since the Basic Channel era.
On the flip Morr expands his driving functionality by a melodic component. “Blaze” kicks in with a lot of delay, distorted bells and Highspeed drums. This ain’t no dance, this is a ceremony! „Trance with Benefits“ marks the ending of the “Supersonic EP”. Pictures of wafts of mist, whose intensity is being ruptured by the first rays of sunlight penetrating the club on an early Sunday morning. Happy people lying in each other’s arms, unified by the principle that Techno would be nothing without Trance.

Having established himself as a core Apollo artist with three fantastic EPs since 2016, Sieren now steps up with a first full length for the label. 'Timelapse' is a majestic 13 track trip into this unique artist's very emotional fusion of post-bass bliss. Sieren aka Matthias Frick is a master of intricate electronics and bittersweet emotions, of deep atmospherics and compelling rhythms. He has been building a dedicated following for some years now, putting out his debut album on Christian Loffler's Ki Records in 2016. Inspired by a rich history of bass-driven UK sounds, he pairs that with a love of field recording and experimental soundscaping, and now shows he is an ever evolving master of his art on this stunning new record.

Superb epic acid tribe renewer... A modern and sophisticated sound. Defenitly full of story-telling.

One of the best record on this label.. .and in this style !

The Anticipatory Organization is an energetic EP that could only be the work of The Sun God. There are three rousing tracks to stir the attention. The Things We Don't Know is a mesmerising key driven journey. It features gorgeous keyed sparkles, washing waves of acid and clopped beats. The Disbelief Habit is driven by a strong melody that really grabs you and won't let go. This is accompanied by a strong bassline, focused keys and closely held percussion. The Achievement Factory rounds off the EP with another distinctive musical effort that marches straight into the middle of the dancefloor. Punishing percussion and an in-step cavernous bassline are joined by loose acid and riffing keys. Once more, The Sun God delivers as only he can.

Without bottle opener

The eighth chapter of the Apparel Wax saga brings with it, as always, a multitude of sounds and suggestions. The masked producer always manages to renew himself, bringing something new and special to each record but always remaining faithful to his musical line. APLWAX008 will be released in January and consists of four tracks: the first is a track with a very marked dynamics and is characterized by a solid rhythm section, a bass line that recalls the UK garage, vocal samples and a beautiful harmonic evolution produced by evolving chords. The second track, A2, winks at Jazz and Soul with a production rich in rhythmic virtuosity, keyboard solos and an almost hypnotic vocal loop while the second side starts with B1, which takes us back to an imaginary dancefloor with a powerful beat and airy disco chords. The EP closes with B2 that softens the tones giving a more intimate, classy and deep end, with references to Funk and R&B. In short, an EP that touches many genres while remaining compact as a whole. Another small masterpiece of production and music selection by Apparel Wax.

Hailing from the city of Hamilton, outside Ontario, melodic Canadian punk band Teenage Head was formed at Westdale High School in 1975; later, co-founder Frank Kerr became lead singer Frankie Venom, and guitarist Gord Lewis brought in bassist Steve Mahon and
drummer Nick Stipanitz. Major label Epic issued debut singles “Picture My Face” and “Top Down” in 1978, paving the way for acclaimed debut LP, Frantic City; aside from punkish
covers of Eddie Cochrane’s “Somethin’ Else” and Vince Taylor’s “Brand New Cadillac,” power-pop punk originals like “Let’s Shake” and “Infected” helped the disc go gold.

A folk/bluegrass troubadour from Vermont who delves into shape-note traditions and Appalachian ballads and makes it all beguilingly his own. His guitar lines have the fancy fingerwork of a crack banjo player and his banjo lines have the tugging suspensions of a jazzer.’ – Guardian

‘Amidon is a rare Americana artist whose … signature banjo-strewn style … and disparate mix of influences play into a sound that is at once archaically rootsy and savvily refined.’ – Wall Street Journal

Sam Amidon considers his new self-titled album the fullest realization to date of his artistic vision. It comprises his radical reworkings of nine mostly traditional folk songs, performed with his band of longtime friends and collaborators. Amidon produced the record, applying the sonic universe of his 2017 The Following Mountain to these beloved tunes, many of which he first learned as a child. ‘Pretty Polly,’ for example, was one of the first traditional tunes he learned to play, and ‘Time Has Made A Change’ is a song that his parents – singers who were on the 1977 Nonesuch recording Rivers of Delight with the Word of Mouth Chorus – sang around the house when he was young. Amidon will perform two concerts at Kings Place in London on October 3. A limited number of tickets will be available in the venue, as well as tickets to stream the event from home. Further details are available here.

Amidon and his frequent band of multi-instrumentalist Shahzad Ismaily and drummer Chris Vatalaro were joined in the studio by Belgian guitarist Bert Cools (who played on his last EP), as well as Amidon’s wife, Beth Orton, who adds vocals on three songs. Acoustic bassist Ruth Goller and saxophonist and labelmate Sam Gendel also play on the album, which was mixed by Leo Abrahams. Sam Amidon was mostly recorded live in the studio. Amidon arranged the songs, which are traditional tunes, with the exception of Taj Mahal’s ‘Light Rain Blues’, Harkins Frye’s ‘Time Has Made A Change’, and ‘Hallelujah’, which is an 1835 William Walker shape-note tune using earlier words by Charles Wesley, found in the Sacred Harp collection of early American folk-hymns.

Sam Amidon is Amidon’s fifth recording on Nonesuch and follows the 2019 EP Fatal Flower Garden (A Tribute to Harry Smith). Additional recordings include his 2017 album The Following Mountain and Kronos Quartet’s Folk Songs the same year, on which he was a featured singer along with Rhiannon Giddens, Natalie Merchant, and Olivia Chaney; Lily-O in 2014; and his label debut, Bright Sunny South, in 2013.

The fourth 10-inch EP from the 10th anniversary of U Know Me Records series comes from Immortal Onion. The album consists of 5 pieces. For those missing live concerts there are 2 songs taken from the band's performance on 8th of August at Jassmine club in Warsaw. The B-side starts with a rework of the song called "Leaving", originally composed by Hania Rani (who often performs with 2 members of Immortal Onion). The next song ("Zu Hause") was created especially for this album as the result of the band's experiments with electronics. The EP closes with a rework of "Eye Tracking" - a song from "XD Experience Design - made by Kadrych.

The rework of "Leaving" will be released only on vinyl and won't be available on streaming services.

Strictly limited edition - 300 hand-numbered copies. The first hundred will be released on red vinyl and copies from 101 to 300 as classic black ones.

The album was created with help of trusted people, who also worked on "XD Experience Design" - graphic design by Martiszu, mix by Envee (except the last song mixed by Maciej Stendek) and mastering by Eprom.

“The earth shall rise again...”
AMOR/LEMUR finds the Glasgow quartet AMOR in partnership with Norwegian improvising ensemble LEMUR to hopeful and ecstatic effect. Conceived before the onset of Covid 19 but finished during spring lockdown, their eponymous EP is the most loose, alive and elevated recording in AMOR’s catalog. AMOR/LEMUR takes the template of throbbing avant disco expanded upon on previous recordings for Night School and lifts it into new

territories, with new tonalities and unexpected turns on the journey. More than anything, the expanded, near- cinematic expression of human connectivity feels like a lightning new energy to grasp in the dark.

Following a revelatory concert in Glasgow in January 2020 wherein the two sets of musicians met and performed together for the first time, a recording session was arranged the following day, resulting in the most elevated permutation of AMOR’s art to date. Each track was built upon a rhythmic bedrock of percussion and drums performed by Paul Thomson and samples/synthesizer by Luke Fowler. Thomson used bamboo Javanese gamelan (most notably on For You) and scrap metal, as well as traditional percussion and drums while Fowler incorporated processed ambient field recordings recorded in enclosed acoustic spaces around Glasgow. Singer/pianist Richard Youngs contributes some of the most bright and mindful work of his career. Acoustic bass player Michael Francis Duch, whose lush playing as ever provides the elastic spine to each song, scored the string parts for LEMUR on piano at home in Norway. The addition of swelling strings and drones fills out the AMOR sound significantly, lending a sonorous tone to 8 minute, epic closer For You or an ascending melodic introduction to Stars Burst that feels like a new morning dawning on a world saved from certain death. With the circumstances of lockdown forcing the musicians to work differently, a thread of optimism and utopia grounded in the moment weaves through these tracks. Unravel reveals a spine tingling vocal from Youngs. It’s a song about the simultaneously grounding and ecstatic effect of love, feeling connected to others. It’s a simple message, “I’m finding myself in your smile, always unravels me” speaks of ego death, the dissipation of the material into a nirvana of pure energy, the power of surrender. This isn’t a quasi-religious message, this is the power of each other, a love song to connection in a temporary age of isolation. Stars Burst is a play on the inner and outer cosmos, with narrator Youngs exploring wonder to a pounding galloping rhythm and snake-charming synth. It’s an open dance, with the group locked in together for the wild ride. Fear is the centerpiece of the record, starting with drones and scraped overtones before swirling synth notes filter upwards to meet reverberating minor chords. Over 8 minutes of tight but loose playing, Youngs is the shaman instructing us to use Fear as a celebration of the moment, embrace it and jump into the unknown. The only way to overcome your fear is to feel it, use it as an energy. The use of the studio as an instrument throughout side 2 is particularly important, with the dubbing and mixing prowess of engineer Paul Savage (who mixed unattended due to lockdown restrictions) and tape manipulations performed by Jason Lescallet coming into play. For You closes out with a largely instrumental, evolving composition that uses many of the abstract and novel aspects of this permutation to aid the trance. It’s massive, an unfurling creature with unexpected tonalities and serious heft.

Four albums in, the convenient and generalized catchphrase for Here Lies Man’s erudite sound — if Black Sabbath played Afrobeat — might seem a little played out. But Ritual Divination is perhaps the best rendering of the idea so far. Particularly on the Sabbath side of the equation: The guitars are heavier and more blues based than before, but the ancient rhythmic formula of the clave remains a constant.
“Musically it’s an opening up more to traditional rock elements,” says vocalist/guitarist/ cofounder Marcos Garcia, who also plays guitar in Antibalas. “It’s always been our intention to explore. And, as we travelled deeper into this musical landscape, new features revealed themselves.”

The L.A. based band comprised of Antibalas members have toured relentlessly following their breakout 2017 self-titled debut. Their second album, You Will Know Nothing and an EP, Animal Noises, both followed in 2018. Third album No Ground To Walk Upon emerged in August 2019. All of them were crafted by Garcia and cofounder/drummer Geoff Mann (former Antibalas drummer and son of jazz musician Herbie Mann) in their L.A. studio between tours. Ritual Divination is their first album recorded as the full 4-piece band, including bassist JP Maramba and keyboardist Doug Organ.
Ritual Divination continues with an ongoing concept of HLM playing the soundtrack to an imaginary movie, with each song being a scene. “It’s an inward psychedelic journey, the album is the trip,” Garcia says. “The intention and purpose of the music is to create a sonic ritual to lift the veil of inner space and divine the true nature of reality.”

Likewise, musically and sonically, the album is self-reflexive. “On this album the feel changes within a song,” Garcia says. “Whereas before each song was meant to induce a trancelike state, now more of the songs have their own arc built in.” Similarly, the guitar sounds themselves herein eschew the fuzz pedals of previous recordings, going for the directness of pure amp overdrive and distortion using an interconnected rig of 4 amplifiers. And, here, the well-versed live band is able to record as a unit, giving it much more of a live and dynamic feel.

Rough Trade named the band’s self-titled debut in their prestigious Top 10 Albums of 2017. BBC 6 & Classic Rock Magazine deemed it among the year’s best, as well as countless other press outlets singing its praises. Each subsequent album furthered the band’s reputation for genre-smashing rhythmic experimentation, topping many year-end lists as well as earning features from countless metal and indie rock outlets, plus cover stories in weekly papers.
“We’re very conscious of how the rhythms service the riffs,” Garcia explains. “Tony Iommi’s (Black Sabbath) innovation was to make the riff the organizing principle of a song. We are taking that same approach but employing a different organizing principle: For Iommi it was the blues, for us it comes directly from Africa.”
Ritual Divination will be available on LP, CD and download on January 22nd, 2021 via RidingEasy Records.

Four albums in, the convenient and generalized catchphrase for Here Lies Man’s erudite sound — if Black Sabbath played Afrobeat — might seem a little played out. But Ritual Divination is perhaps the best rendering of the idea so far. Particularly on the Sabbath side of the equation: The guitars are heavier and more blues based than before, but the ancient rhythmic formula of the clave remains a constant.
“Musically it’s an opening up more to traditional rock elements,” says vocalist/guitarist/ cofounder Marcos Garcia, who also plays guitar in Antibalas. “It’s always been our intention to explore. And, as we travelled deeper into this musical landscape, new features revealed themselves.”

The L.A. based band comprised of Antibalas members have toured relentlessly following their breakout 2017 self-titled debut. Their second album, You Will Know Nothing and an EP, Animal Noises, both followed in 2018. Third album No Ground To Walk Upon emerged in August 2019. All of them were crafted by Garcia and cofounder/drummer Geoff Mann (former Antibalas drummer and son of jazz musician Herbie Mann) in their L.A. studio between tours. Ritual Divination is their first album recorded as the full 4-piece band, including bassist JP Maramba and keyboardist Doug Organ.
Ritual Divination continues with an ongoing concept of HLM playing the soundtrack to an imaginary movie, with each song being a scene. “It’s an inward psychedelic journey, the album is the trip,” Garcia says. “The intention and purpose of the music is to create a sonic ritual to lift the veil of inner space and divine the true nature of reality.”

Likewise, musically and sonically, the album is self-reflexive. “On this album the feel changes within a song,” Garcia says. “Whereas before each song was meant to induce a trancelike state, now more of the songs have their own arc built in.” Similarly, the guitar sounds themselves herein eschew the fuzz pedals of previous recordings, going for the directness of pure amp overdrive and distortion using an interconnected rig of 4 amplifiers. And, here, the well-versed live band is able to record as a unit, giving it much more of a live and dynamic feel.

Rough Trade named the band’s self-titled debut in their prestigious Top 10 Albums of 2017. BBC 6 & Classic Rock Magazine deemed it among the year’s best, as well as countless other press outlets singing its praises. Each subsequent album furthered the band’s reputation for genre-smashing rhythmic experimentation, topping many year-end lists as well as earning features from countless metal and indie rock outlets, plus cover stories in weekly papers.
“We’re very conscious of how the rhythms service the riffs,” Garcia explains. “Tony Iommi’s (Black Sabbath) innovation was to make the riff the organizing principle of a song. We are taking that same approach but employing a different organizing principle: For Iommi it was the blues, for us it comes directly from Africa.”
Ritual Divination will be available on LP, CD and download on January 22nd, 2021 via RidingEasy Records.

Fabrizio Lapiana continues to offer up deep musical escape from these troubling times with another expertly crafted techno EP, Cantamen, on his own Attic Music label. It features four of his own original cuts and builds on the success of his latest release, Collective Chaos, back in March.

For more than a decade, this Italian artist has been at the forefront of a techno scene that deals in deep and rolling drums, well sculpted synths and cavernous grooves that are rich in ambient detail. His Attic Music label has been at the centre of that thanks to careful A&R and always innovative releases, while he has also released on cult imprints such as M_Rec Ltd, ARTS, Figure Jams and Out-Er and many other collaborations.

Sleek opener 'Demons' is a mind melting and widescreen deep techno groove. Groaning synths creep across the face of the track as all manner of earthy and organic motifs drift by, as if you're racing through an underground network of caves. It's music for the mind as well as the body, and the hugely atmospheric 'Cantamen' is just the same - fizzing synth details and alien life forms fill the airwave with tension as the smooth and supple kick drums pound away down below.

The hypnotic masterclass continues on 'Kura' with rattling snares and harder hitting drums making you move your body before coarse claps and a majestic arpeggiated synth hook repeats up top and takes you to another level of rapture. Last of all is the fantastic 'Back Home', which has a skeletal electro groove run through with late night sci-fi pads. Its vast sense of cosmic infinity leaves you feeling floating adrift amongst the stars.

These are four evocative and cinematic techno tracks that take you into another dimension.

THERION have always been a band that have challenged themselves to explore new paths, while remaining true to their musical core values. For their 17th studio album, mastermind Christofer Johnsson and his collaborator Thomas Vikström have created something that has been previously unthinkable to the guitarist and the singer. "We have done the only thing that was left of all the different angles to explore", explains Christofer. "We have decided to give the people what they kept asking for. 'Leviathan' is the first album that we have deliberately packed with THERION hit songs."

True to the Swede's words, the album opens with the catchy and swift tune 'The Leaf Of The Oak Of Far' featuring female and male antiphonal singing as well as a choir that seems to have evolved straight out of THERION's breakthrough full-length "Theli" (1996). This is immediately followed by the obvious highlight 'Tuonela', in which Christofer cleverly underscores this hit-track's Finnish vibe by employing NIGHTWISH’s "metal voice" Marko Hietala. Next up in this parade of future fan-favourites is the title track 'Leviathan' that offers classic THERION material with operatic female vocals and a massive choir.

Christofer Johnsson's passion for classic voices, choirs, and orchestral elements as well as his penchant for epic melodies in combination with rock and metal shines clearly through the following sing-along ballad 'Die Wellen Der Zeit', which indicates another nod to German romantic composer Richard Wagner. "Ever since 'Theli', Wagner has been and will always be at the core of THERION", emphasises Christofer. "When we started to combine metal and opera, it was something new and original. Today, symphonic metal has long been a firmly established genre."

When THERION came into being in 1988 by changing name from the already existing band BLITZKRIEG, which was founded a year earlier, Christofer had rather taken inspiration from SLAYER's "Reign In Blood" among other classic metal albums. At the beginning, the Swedes were firmly rooted in death metal, a genre which they helped to define, as witnessed by their debut album "Of Darkness...." (1991). Yet even back then, there were hints of "something else" lurking beneath the rough surface.

The use of female vocals is another core ingredient of THERION today, which developed gradually. CELTIC FROST had basically introduced the female element to extreme metal on "To Mega Therion" in 1985. THERION began with both a female and male vocalist emulating a church like choir already in their sophomore full-length 'Beyond Sanctorum' (1992). With Symphony "Masses: Ho Drakon Ho Megas" (1993) and "Lepaca Kliffoth" (1995), Christofer continued to developed his trademark sound by gradually drifting towards cleaner vocals and more keyboards. With "Theli", the Swedes had firmly established a reputation of pushing the boundaries of metal in the 90s – among such acts as their compatriots TIAMAT, THE GATHERING, and MOONSPELL that were often referred to as "gothic metal" at the time.
THERION continued to break new ground leaving inspiration for others to follow in their wake: On "A'arab Zaraq - Lucid Dreaming" (1997), Christofer further explored the use of Near Eastern music in metal which he had already begun in 1992, while "Secret Of The Runes" (2001) dared to have Swedish lyrics in some songs. While critics were left confused and fans challenged, THERION were often ahead of their times and vindicated in hindsight. Even the band's 25th anniversary excursion "Les Fleurs Du Mal" has by now overcome the initial shock the album caused and is only beaten in terms of streaming by the classic "Vovin" (1998).
When Christofer faced the question of where to go next after the dramatic "Beloved Antichrist" (2018) had finally fulfilled his musical mission, his answer is "Leviathan" named after a giant sea monster from Judeo-Christian myth that has roots in Babylonic lore: THERION have created a giant hit album – and for the first time in the history of the Swedes, their fans are not asked to explore something new, but simply to lean back and enjoy the best from their band!

Terry Gross is an engrossing trio composed of guitarist Phil Manley (Trans Am), bassist Donny Newenhouse, and drummer Phil Becker. The trio are also connected as owners and engineers at Bay Area recording spot El Studio, where they began improvising together as a way to test the boundaries and gear of the studio. Their loose, organic chemistry burgeoned into a deep camaraderie and a sound both expansive and exacting. The three experienced musicians crafted their first fulllength album through the pure joy of playing together with no expectations. With the tapes rolling on their rehearsals, the band captures the exuberance of live performance and elevates those recordings through a deft use of the studio as their collective instrument. On their debut LP Soft Opening, Terry Gross channels their cosmic powers and considerable chops into a gleefully mesmerizing odyssey fit for an arena. Soft Opening took shape over the course of 2016-2019, with Terry Gross writing and refining their songs. "Space Voyage Mission" and "Worm Gear" parallel one another as sinuous jams that pulse with adamantine fervor. Each mountainous epic churns spellbinding repetition and simplicity into dizzying gallops that take hairpin turns into sinewy riffing and elysian vocal melodies. Phil Manley's guitar takes on a constellation of tones across "Space Voyage Mission" with drifting delays soaring over the Newenhouse and Becker's driving rhythm section which all succumb to frothing overdrives that spin the song into entirely new pastures. The hypnotic throb of "Worm Gear" grows all the more enchanting as Newenhouse and Becker add subtle shifts to the single-chord barrage. "Specificity (Or What Have You)" contrasts these two in its more traditionally pop-oriented structure while retaining its predecessors wide-eyed energy and delves further into the album's lightheartedyet-earnest take on sci-fi tropes from space and time travel to the singularity. As Terry Gross, Phil Manley, Donny Newenhouse, and Phil Becker are sonic scientists traversing the borderlands of rock. Soft Opening captures the simple joy of a no-holds-barred trio in stunning detail, transporting the listener into the splendor and freedom of rock.

Rachel Baiman’s ‘Thanksgiving’ EP is a collection of music to inspire an introspective holiday spirit. The songs center around themes of Indigenous Rights, home and homelessness, and love in hard times.
Baiman called upon her superb live touring band (Cy Winstanley, Shelby Means) in addition to special collaborators including flatpicking guitar master Molly Tuttle, who features prominently on a spirited John Hartford cover, “Madison Tennessee” to bring these
thoughtful songs to life. ‘Thanksgiving’ allows Baiman space to stretch out stylistically and marks an intriguing followup to her celebrated full-length debut ‘Shame’.
Baiman moves with ease from bluegrass, to folk, to old-time and country sensibilities over the course of these four tracks. Her adept lyricism is again on full display, as she sheds new light on the complex, bittersweet feelings of both hardship and hope that often intertwine around the holiday season.

Lande Hekt’s voice in music is one that’s socially aware yet often
introspective, drawing awareness to serious issues but at the same time baring her soul. Much of Hekt’s compositions act as a personal diary of what’s going on in her life at any given time.
This is evident in her discography with Muncie Girls, the band which she formed in her hometown of Exeter as a teenager and have released two critically acclaimed albums to date.
This knack of combining her own experiences and feelings whilst highlighting larger socio-economic issues has carried through to her more contemplative solo material, which began life in an EP ‘Gigantic Disappointment’, self-released
in 2019.

Danish indie rock duo The Raveonettes first met in Copenhagen in
2001, after which they quickly began recording their first EP Whip It On. Their first full album Chain Gang of Love followed in 2003, and it quickly gained recognition as lead single “That Great Love Sound” was featured on the soundtrack of FIFA 2004. Upon release, Pitchfork complimented the album for its high-quality production, tightly controlled melodies and called the album a glorious buzz. Mixing raw garage rock with catchy, sweet lyrics, Chain Gang of Love demonstrates The Raveonettes’ knack for crafting compelling songs.

Chain Gang of Love is available as a limited edition of 1500 individually numbered copies on translucent red vinyl.

Magnum II is the eponymous second studio album by English hard rock band Magnum. Originally released in 1979, the album highlights the band’s trademark harmonies and punchy instrumentals very well. Magnum II is a diverse record, as it features ballads and adult contemporary rock, but also hints of prog and heavy metal. A track like “Great Adventure” contains catchy vocals, dynamic guitar riffs and inspired keyboards, while the acoustic “Reborn” showcases a more mellow side of the band. Magnum II is released with a special mirror sleeve, and it includes 2 bonus tracks: “Lonesome Star” and “Everybody Needs”. The limited edition of 1000 individually numbered copies is pressed on silver coloured vinyl.

RCA Records release this anticipated 9 track EP (already available digitally). Part of a (potential)series of four releases across 2021. The band are experimenting with their sound and style across each of the 4 releases. The first release is full on aggressive/industrial/metal. Collaborators include Yungblood, Amy Lee (Evanescence) and Baby Metal. Includes the singles "Parasite Eve", "Heavy Metal" and stand out track "Teardrops".

This edition was produced and finalized in a particular context, Mika Vainio having left us on 12.04.2017

This material is the last concert he has gave. It took place at Cave12 on 02.02.2017.

We needed time to listen to this archive again, which we did in situ in June 2020 with Cindy Van Acker.

fter this listening, we felt invested in having to make this archive public.

Recorded 02.02.2017 at Cave12, Geneva by Benjamin Ephise

Edit by Stephen O'Malley & Carl Michael von Hausswolff at EMS, Stockholm.

Mastered by Denis Blackham

Vinyl cut by Andreas Kauffelt ar Schnittstelle, Berlin

Artworks by Franz Graf, Mika Vainio Archive, Oslo and Cm von Hausswolff collection,

Cave12 / Editions Mego co-release

Tape / Cassette
Russian producer Requiem debuts on Sound+Matter with a four-track EP of raw and demonic electronic cuts. Hard-hitting from start to end, all tracks have been born and raised in a blood bath of influences ranging from witch house to blackened vaporwave and nasty trap. Requiem grabs you by the throat with his menacing wall of synths, thick atmospheric textures, slashing hi-hats and teeth grinding drums. Itʼs not until the closing track Exhale that you are actually allowed to breathe.

SPAZIOTEMPO is proud to present it's fourth release from a legend of the underground, the one and only Miki! The EP is an excursus through Miki's incredible career, proving a full spectrum of his influences.

The opening track is Space Time, an epic progressive ride that is a manifesto of the glorious Tirrenian underground scene. Phosphoros is an hypnotic tool that blends tribal with electronic movements.

B1 is London Irradiation, a groovy cut with dreamy melodies on top of a catchy bassline. The closing track of the EP is Friends in Kampala, a truancy crescendo to fully connect you with your 6th chakra!

Gidge - the Swedish duo consisting of Ludvig Stolterman and Jonatan Nilsson - return with their new album “New Light” on November 6th. Marking their 5th release on Atomnation, this LP can be seen as their second full-length album to date, following up 2014’s mythical “Autumn Bells” LP. Their discography furthermore includes short-film “Lulin” (in collaboration with Lampray), mini-album “LNLNN”, and debut EP “For Seoul”.

When Ajax Tow travels in his Pop Western landscapes, you can be sure there’s always a perfect 70’s road trip soundtrack. Italians cowboys meeting the legendary Miriam Makeba in Rennes suburbs... For his 3rd album The Soul Vegetable Orchestra, Ajax Tow is bringing us on a ten tracks sonic adventure, where many inspirations and references collide. The succession of tracks inspires many feels and moods from sipping a good old bourbon, dance in the kitchen, or gallops though the plains of Napoli.

We can found the influence of Danger Mouse paying hommage to the late Ennio Morricone (Roma, 2011), a cinematic side of Shawn Lee and Misha Panfilov, from music library à la Jean-Claude Vannier to the Band Voilaa, a little glimpse of pimped Ninja tune, a Reworked organic Mo’Wax vibe, all mixed up and spiced up with a Tricky style.

This album is also the result of a collaboration with Dan Voisin (Modul-Club, Eighty…) at the production and drums with Rennes city scene musicians who gives a hand on this album: Romain Baousson (Coupe Colonel, Bikini Machine…) on drums, Sax Machine and Racecar (Saxtoys Records) on horns and vocals, Dj Marrrtin (Funky Bijou, Lord Paramour) on beatmaking, Medline (My Bags) on Flûte.

As a special guest, the late and legendary Miriam Makeba appears on “Magic Miriam”. “Feel it” is definitely setting a west coast on the LP with a Jurassic 5 inspiration, accompanied by a spicy rhythm, MC Racecar (Sax Machine) flows and lyrics brings even more energy to the track. On “Movie” and “Silence”. Ajax Tow give us a nice taste of his favorite psychedelic blends, romantic and intimate at the same time, where we found back Fuzz guitar with 60’s Eric Clapton style (Cream era) and Pink Floyd synths Flavors. The cinematic style and first notes of “So What” reminds Air first EP and the beautiful bass of “Melody Nelson”. For the dessert, “Smallville” is a kind of wedding cake with 70’s loops sprinkling that brings us to Phillipe Sarde’s La Grande Bouffe soundtrack, but with a more contemporary feeling.

Southern Lord announce Crush The Machine, the debut EP from West Coast hardcore punk collective D.E.A (Dead End America), formed by the late, great Steve "Thee Slayer Hippy" Hanford of Poison Idea, with current and former members of Queens Of The Stone Age, Eyehategod, The Accüsed A.D, World Of Lies, Ape Machine, and more.

Captured before Hanford’s passing earlier this year, D.E.A's debut shall be released on 7" and digital EP on 30th October (Non-Returnable) Recording details, liner notes from Mark Lanegan and more info below.

Crush The Machine sees the primary writers, drummer/vocalist Steve Hanford and guitarist Tony Avila (World of Lies, Why Won't You Die, Aborted Cop, Here's Your Warning) joined by lead guitarist Ian Watts (Ape Machine, Minmae) and bassist/vocalist Nick "Rex Everything" Oliveri (Mondo Generator, The Dwarves, ex-Kyuss, ex-Queens Of The Stone Age), with additional lyrics and vocals from Mike IX Williams (Eyehategod, Corrections House, Outlaw Order) and Blaine Cook (The Accüsed A.D, The Fartz, Toe Tag).

"A perfectly appropriate title for this 7 inch EP of jack-hammering, oldschool style hardcore tunes released by Southern Lord, written and played by a rogues gallery of real deal music lifers as a condemnation of the criminal Trump administration and republican party, in the same spirit of those by-gone days when Ronald Reagan or George Bush was the crooked, self-serving president of the crumbling United States empire. Never before has there been a more obvious target, as Donald Trump and his mafia family cabinet rape the country while Rome burns. D.E.A. is Tony Avila, Ian Watts, Nick Oliveri, Mike IX, Blaine Cook and the legendary and beloved, late producer and drummer of Poison Idea, Steve "Thee Slayer Hippy" Hanford. Dying shortly before the completion of this record, it stands as a final testament to his genius, one last hot-wired blast of his epic musical brilliance."

Mark Lanegan
Los Angeles
August, 2020

The fourth 10-inch EP from the 10th anniversary of U Know Me Records series comes from Immortal Onion. The album consists of 5 pieces. For those missing live concerts there are 2 songs taken from the band's performance on 8th of August at Jassmine club in Warsaw. The B-side starts with a rework of the song called "Leaving", originally composed by Hania Rani (who often performs with 2 members of Immortal Onion). The next song ("Zu Hause") was created especially for this album as the result of the band's experiments with electronics. The EP closes with a rework of "Eye Tracking" - a song from "XD Experience Design - made by Kadrych.

The rework of "Leaving" will be released only on vinyl and won't be available on streaming services.

Strictly limited edition - 300 hand-numbered copies. The first hundred will be released on red vinyl and copies from 101 to 300 as classic black ones.

The album was created with help of trusted people, who also worked on "XD Experience Design" - graphic design by Martiszu, mix by Envee (except the last song mixed by Maciej Stendek) and mastering by Eprom.

Non stop 4/4 kicking acid Hardtek in da Nederlandish mood. Acid Casualties sounds, reminding me some Kill It picture disc. Superb second Solo EP for Sifres after his Acidz 01. ENJOY !

LTD. CLEAR VINYL

Repressed in quantity for the first time in years. Includes the hit single "Strange Harvest". Tempers, comprised of Jasmine Golestaneh and Eddie Cooper, have carved out their own niche within dark indie, electronica and synth-pop circles. Their sound is about exploring tonal and emotional tension as much as it is about actual tracks or singular moments. Adrenalizing yet hypnotic landscapes layer mechanical and sensual impulses, as crystalline vocals weave fever dreams of yearning and alienation. Informed by both Golestaneh's involvement in musical performance and visual art and Cooper's electronic production resume, as well as their time in the States and abroad, they operate as a multi-disciplined entity in the spirit and ethos of Factory Records. Tempers describe their creative process as a telepathic kinship they've developed since they started making music together: "We have these sort of unspoken criteria when we're writing music. We never really need to explain what that is but we both know when it's missing or when we've hit it." After a string of critically acclaimed singles beginning in 2013 with "Eyes Wide Wider" b/w "Hell Hotline," the duo released their debut LP "Services" (2015) on cult imprint Aufnahme + Wiedergabe resulting in the underground club hit "Strange Harvest", extensive international touring and sold-out shows. The album's vinyl edition soon became a sought after collectors item. Their 2017 EP "Fundamental Fantasy" was released as a result of the Vinyl Factory's Volcano Extravaganza artist residency on the Aeolian island of Stromboli. Following their unique creative compass, in 2018 they indirectly moved from the dance floor to galleries, releasing "Junkspace" a conceptual collaboration with famed architect Rem Koolhaas. The record is available in the world's most select cultural hotspots, from The New Museum in New York to Walther Konig museum stores throughout Europe, a testament to Tempers' love for experimental output and unorthodox presentation. In 2019 Tempers signed with Dais Records, promptly releasing "Private Life" and the lead single "Capital Pains," a meticulous evolution of the dark pop that marked the duo's earlier output.

Following the November 20th 2020 release on CD and digital, Fogerty’s Factory is now being made available on vinyl.
This album is a ‘time capsule’ of the Fogerty’s Factory sessions that John Fogerty and Family have been sharing on YouTube and with various media during lockdown.
All tracks were recorded since the beginning of March 2020, and feature John along with his children, Shane, Tyler and Kelsy Fogerty. Shane and Tyler together are BMG frontline signing Hearty Har.
Seven of the tracks have never been available commercially before - the other 5 have only been made available digitally as part of the Fogerty’s Factory EP released in May 2020.

Die Wiener Künstlerin Conny Frischauf verbindet in ihren Stücken Elemente aus Kraut, Leftfield Electronica und Synth Pop zu einer Musik, die Traditionen zwar spielerisch aufnimmt, diese jedoch gänzlich neu verhandelt und in einen gegenwärtigen, frischen Klang überführt. Nach Veröffentlichung der beiden EPs "Effekt & Emotion" (International Major Label, 2018) und "Affekt & Tradition" (Kame House, 2019) legt sie mit "Die Drift" nun ihr Debütalbum vor. Darauf gelingt es Frischauf experimentelle Soundstrukturen in den Mikrokosmos eines Pop-Songs zu einzubetten und daraus ein Album zu formen, das die klangliche Tiefe einer freien Musik besitzt und dennoch durch einen unwiderstehlichen Pop-Appeal auch auf einer sehr unmittelbaren Ebene funktioniert.

Marco Shuttle is back on his own label with unreleased material for the first time since 2017. The EP features 4 carefully designed and colourful Techno tracks with a strong electronic flavour, diverse in their elements but still very cohesive as a whole with the signature Shuttle spacey reverbs and organic textures. Dance music for body and for the brain.

LA-based electronic wizard Amon Tobin teams up again with Dutch composer and producer Thys (Noisia) for their cinematic "Ithaca" EP. The fractal five-track offering is an odyssey into the unknown, carefully constructed, intricately layered and arranged with purity of intent. "Ithaca" is an unnerving feast for the ears with a distinct curative vibe. It makes for a wholly immersive and atmospheric experience, delivered by two artists at the top of their creative game.

Art by Khomatech

'Available exclusively on Disney+ beginning Dec. 25, 2020, Disney and Pixar’s feature film “Soul” introduces Joe Gardner, a middle-school band teacher with a serious passion for jazz music. The story is particularly relatable to the artists behind it. For Jamie Foxx, who lends his voice to Joe, it begins with jazz. “Like Joe, I hear music in everything,” said Foxx. “When you’re a jazz artist, man, you talk a little different: ‘Hey, cat!’ I got a chance to go to a few jazz fests and meet Herbie Hancock, Chick Correa—hang out with those guys. They have a way of talking, a way of dressing—everything funnels toward their music, toward the jazz."

“The greatest thing about being a musician is experiencing it with other people,” says Ed Riman, the Brighton-based Eurasian singer, songwriter and sound-scapist who records as Hilang Child. “Whether that’s playing with others, creating together, sharing a vision, whatever, I just think in all aspects it’s a totally elevated experience when you’re not alone.” Proof rings out with force and feeling on Hilang Child’s superlative second album, ‘Every Mover’, released on Bella Union.

In 2018, Riman delivered a serene, textured debut album in ‘Years’, rich in sound and feeling. Lauren Laverne, Q, MOJO and others lavished praise but the “isolating process” of making the album left Riman hungry to find alternative ways of working. Meanwhile, the “lonely, pressured” aftermath of ‘Years’ found Riman grappling with “rough selfesteem and anxiety issues,” amplified in part by social media’s “fulfilment narratives.” Duly, he set out to navigate and overcome these mindsets, drawing deeply on his own insecurities and those he recognised in others.

These themes converge emphatically on ‘Every Mover’, an album steeped in everyday emotional states and crafted for cathartic, communal performance. Drawing on a rich spread of collaborators, sounds and themes, Riman uses his frustrations as the impetus to transform the brimming promise of ‘Years’ into upfront and expansive new shapes. “I wanted it to sound a bit gutsier than the first album,” he says, succinctly, “heavier and closer to the kind of stuff that hits me when I go to shows or blast music in the car. I started out in music as a drummer playing for pop or beat-driven artists and grew up listening to louder stuff, but a lot of the music I’ve made as Hilang Child has been more ethereal. I wanted to bring it back to a place that feels more ‘me’ and make more of a thing of having big hypnotic drums, aggressive bass, ripping distorted instruments and a general energy to it.”

‘Good To Be Young’ serves swift notice of this leap, its banked synths and twinkling sound clusters leading to an assertion of fresh force when the main beat lands and a congregation of friends - AK Patterson, Paul Thomas Saunders, Dog in the Snow, Ellen Murphy, members of Penelope Isles - unite for the gang-vocal refrains. “It’s all iridescent colour I’m on,” Riman exults, a claim lived up to on the full-flush folktronica of ‘Shenley’.

A reflection on spiralling insecurity, ‘Seen The Boreal’ ups the ante again with its monkish chorales, looping samples, spectral woodwinds (from multi-instrumentalist John ‘Rittipo’ Moore, of Public Service Broadcasting and Bastille previous) and ecstatic chorus, Riman transforming a meditation on hindsight’s limiting effects into a spur to look forwards. And surge forwards he does with the glittering synths, spacey guitars and Krautrock propulsion of ‘King Quail’, developed in jam sessions with dream-pop wonder Zoe Mead (Wyldest) in her basement studio.

Brought to a sublime close with ‘Steppe’, the resulting album projects its own epiphanic force. Thankfully, most of the main parts were recorded pre-lockdown between East London, Gateshead, Brighton, Wandsworth and elsewhere, before mixing proceeded remotely. Meanwhile, alongside indie-pop trio OUTLYA’s Will Bloomfield (percussion/coproduction on ‘Play ’Til Evening’), visual design collective Tough Honey (accompanying videos) and other collaborators, Riman’s bond with co-producer JMAC (Troye Sivan, Haux, Lucy Rose) proved crucial. “It felt freeing to work collaboratively and have that push-andpull of ideas,” says Riman. “Even the moments where we didn’t see eye-to-eye made it feel like I wasn’t alone, with someone else working just as passionately on the project.”

LP pressed on red transparent vinyl.

'Available exclusively on Disney+ beginning Dec. 25, 2020, Disney and Pixar’s feature film “Soul” introduces Joe Gardner, a middle-school band teacher with a serious passion for jazz music. The story is particularly relatable to the artists behind it. For Jamie Foxx, who lends his voice to Joe, it begins with jazz. “Like Joe, I hear music in everything,” said Foxx. “When you’re a jazz artist, man, you talk a little different: ‘Hey, cat!’ I got a chance to go to a few jazz fests and meet Herbie Hancock, Chick Correa—hang out with those guys. They have a way of talking, a way of dressing—everything funnels toward their music, toward the jazz."

Philly emo band Marietta's final release. A compilation of all of their tracks from EP's, Splits as well as 5 "new" 2012 demos all on one comfy 12" record. Limited edition one time pressing, never to be pressed again.

In 2011 composer Ramin Djawadi was first asked to score a new TV series called Game of Thrones. In its first season much of the music was written for a small string ensemble, and filled out with synthetic pads and percussion. Over the course of the next six seasons the music budget got bigger and bigger to match the ever-increasing viewing figures the show was enjoying. This release celebrates the rich tapestry of music over the six series with the full firepower of an 80-piece symphony orchestra and choir.

Game of Thrones really is a television phenomenon. HBO's epic small screen adaptation of George R.R. Martin's series of fantasy tomes continues to draw in record audiences around the world and shows no signs of slowing down. Indeed some 8.9m people tuned in to the Season Six finale in the US and with repeats, recordings and on-demand viewings taken into consideration, it is estimated that Game of Thrones enjoys an average of 23m viewers per instalment. With a whopping thirty-eight Emmy Awards (and counting), this series remains the darling of prime-time pay TV.

With so much music created for the sixty episodes so far broadcast, this album can of course only take in so much. The particular cues and themes it does highlight, though, lend themselves beautifully to this symphonic re-imagining.

This album could easily have turned top-heavy. After all, here’s a record which, in just under 40 minutes, covers anything from Arabic scales to Japanese sounds, from free jazz references to concepts by Finnish pianist Kari Ikonen’s favourite painter Vasiliy Kandinsky.
To realise his vision, Ikonen even personally developed a device allowing him to play micro-intervals on his piano. And yet, things turned out differently: If anything, the results sound dream-like and mesmerising rather than stodgy and severe.
The album’s genesis may serve to explain this paradox. In August of 2019, Ikonen suddenly found himself with a month of free time. Without thinking twice and as if in a premonition of the Covid-lock-down, he recorded ‘Impressions, Improvisations and Compositions’ at his own home. His only companion was his beloved Steinway, captured by a personal selection of high-end microphones. Just a few days after the final session, the pieces landed on the desk of ECM- and Blue-Note-engineer Johannes Lundberg who mixed the album at his Gothenburg Epideminstudios. Clearly then, the music is spontaneous. But it’s also refined and deep. The influence of Kandinsky inspired
Ikonen to write some of his most complex and monumental pieces.

Bristol-based trip hop trio Jabu this week announced details of their second album. ‘Sweet Company’ will be released on November 20th via the group’s own do you have peace? imprint.

Sweet Company is the second album by Jabu. Where their first LP, Sleep Heavy, was an unflinching exploration of grief, dark and disembodied, Sweet Company’s deep, sedative soul feels like more of a lovers’ outing: optimistic, becalmed, looking outwards as well as inwards, and longing for the kind of human connections where ego and self-consciousness might dissolve. It is perhaps also an exhortation to love and accept yourself, to recover a lost innocence and peace – that paradise which has always been lost. Released via their own do you have peace? label, Sweet Company is on the one hand a very intimate and private-sounding work - the sound of life played out in a room, a bubble, a home, a head. The rhythms of everyday domesticity: listening to the plants, cars in the street, voices through the wall…. going to work, not going to work, sleeping heavy or not sleeping at all. Wavering on the brink of a revelation, of something just beyond the material world, while you wait for the kettle to boil. The core Jabu trio of producer Amos Childs and vocalists Jasmine Butt and Alex Rendall is present and correct. Sweet Company has theexhilarating sweep and confidence of a collaboration between people who trust and understand each other implicitly, and, secure in that knowledge, are able to give the absolute best of themselves to us. As before, Jasmine’s voice is a textural, painterly instrument, layered and blurred into abstraction, resisting the limits of language; the songs she sings on are portals into vast internal landscapes where the normal rules of gravity are suspended, every sound is smothered in a cathedral-like resonance, and you're both fearful and hopeful that you might never find your way back out again. Alex takes a more narrative, confessional and no less engaging pop tack: as on the gauzy, decelerated 2-step of ‘Lately’, with his masochistic, self-mocking entreaties to “be cruel to me … I like it when you make a fool of me”. Childs has a true hip-hop fiend's ear for a striking sample, and how to loop it to most hypnotic and rapturous effect, but here takes things to ever more powerfully uncanny and auteurish places, drawing inspiration from the voidal bliss-outs of shoegaze (AR Kane’s amniotic dream-pop epic 69 is one influence cited) and the space-time disturbances of dub, commanding both a raindrops-on-cobwebs delicacy and an immense, oceanic pressure. His productions seem to resist linear progression - instead they move by a kind of unstoppable diffusion, like weeds reclaiming an unkempt garden, or alien flora patterning the sea-floor and coral-caves of the subaquatic level of a computer game which may exist only in your, or his, imagination. Perhaps it's Daniela Dyson, the British-Afro-Colombian artist who contributes her vivid, energising poetic mysticism to two tracks, who best sums up Sweet Company's ambition and effect: “Me quiero perder en los momentos tan puros en su esencia que Las Horas mismas se detienen para ser testigo de nuestro amor” (I want to lose myself in the moments so pure in their essence / that The Hours themselves stop to bear witness to our love…). For a precious half an hour, we're invited to celebrate the smallness of our lives - and the limitless grandeur which that smallness contains. When it ends, we step back from the brink but things aren’t quite the same anymore: we’re haunted by what we briefly almost knew.

*repress*

Justin Cudmore returns to the Phonica White shelves with four new tracks, and his long-awaited first full EP since 2017's "Forget It" for The Bunker New York. With the dancefloor seeming far outside our reach right now, 'Train Dance' transports us back to a simpler time lost in the mix.

Across the disc, Cudmore reflects on the sounds and scenes closest to his heart and record bag, flexing his knack for crafting catchy hooks and the kind of ear-worm melodies that helped cement his status as one of house & techno's fast-rising stars. A1 "Train Dance" is his ode to the urban symphony of train cars whirling past his apartment in Brooklyn, with eight minutes of swingy, jacking house built for a sunny afternoon set across the pond at Panorama Bar.

"Club Fetish" shifts to a more introspective, heads-down vibe crafted instead with a dark and sweaty basement in mind. A touch of psych à la classic John Tejada, Cudmore's subtle, squelchy synths rub shoulders with cerebral drums and floating basslines.

The B-side nods to Cudmore's acclaimed acid sound for two deep slow rollers. "Expectation Game" and its no-nonsense 303s chug through a couple of understated breakdowns, while "Realize" was written with a Detroit outdoor patio in mind, with a sleazy acid bassline and cut up vocal groans sounding like Cudmore riffing on a late-night Moodymann jam.

Recorded during a productive time of new beginnings and positive headspace, ‘Train Dance’ comes out during a strange and unclear present for Cudmore and many of his contemporaries in the scene. However given it all, Justin remains excited to share new music and sounds, and hopes to return to the dance floor with everyone again as soon as safely possible.

Artwork as always is supplied by the talented Pedro Carvalho de Almeida

Dexta and Crypticz are delighted to announce their long awaited 12" single, 'Together', featuring two remixes from Munich-based Danny Scrilla. Two years in the making, the project will finally see the light of day on 10th November 2017 via Diffrent Music.

A fusion of Drum & Bass, Jungle, House and Garage, 'Together' is built for the dancefloor. The track borrows vocals and breaks from the early '90s, while blending drum machines, bass samples and vintage effect processes crafted by Dexta & Crypticz.

Danny Scrilla debuts on the label with a pair of remixes. The 'Reslice', is a great example of signature Scrilla, manipulating the original parts into an exploration of dubby, half time soundsystem music. His 'Reflop', meanwhile, is a 140bpm re-think, splicing chopped up breaks and bass stabs from the original along with strong percussion lines and weird vocal edits.

Since his outing on Hospital Records in 2015, and his debut 'SE4 EP' on Diffrent Music last year, Dexta - otherwise known as Londoner Chris Royle - has released the third part in an ongoing series for None60 Recordings, honing tracks for dancefloors and stereos alike.

Somerset's Crypticz (aka Jordan Parsons) has had quite an eventful 12 months, with his 'Echo Sound EP' on Doc Scott's 31 Recordings, and more recently the 'Forever EP' Om Unit's Cosmic Bridge imprint, while evolving his club performance from a DJ set to a custom live show consisting solely of his own music and explorations in sound design. This single comes two weeks after his latest release, the 'Access You EP', also on Diffrent Music, which set a new benchmark for Jordan, refining his sound to its highest quality.

Danny Scrilla (born Daniel Pirkl) has gone from strength to strength this year, dropping a cassette tape project on Cosmic Bridge, compiled of 16 synth and hardware-led experiments. Last month Dan also released a collaborative 12" with Sam Binga called 'Weird In Munich' - a superb effort, pushing boundaries from both their usual styles - before putting out an EP for Amit's AMAR imprint in early September.

'Together' will be available as a limited 300 run of 180gsm coloured 12" vinyl, and will be officially released on 10th November 2017. An exclusive small batch will be available at the Clashmouth D&B Label Market on 28th October 2017 at Cafe 1001 on London s Brick Lane.

Nils Frahm announces the release of Encores 3 on 20 September 2019, the third and final instalment of his Encores series. The three EPs will be available as one full length release titled All Encores featuring 80 minutes of music on 18 October, to follow his masterful 2018 album All Melody. Whilst Encores 1 focused on an acoustic pallet of sounds with solo piano and harmonium at the core, and Encores 2 explored more ambient landscapes, now Encores 3 sees Nils expand on the percussive and electronic elements in his work.

“The idea behind All Encores is one we had from before All Melody; to separate releases each with their own distinct musical style and theme, perhaps even as a triple album. But All Melody became larger than itself and took over any initial concepts. I think the idea of All Encores is like musical islands that compliment All Melody.”Moulded during All Melody but refined by his live performances, All Encores is testament to Nils’ exceptional ability to craft his art on stage.

Artificially Intelligent which showcases his ‘mad professor’ organ, and All Armed which has been a live favourite for some time, appearing on set lists since 2015, are now available to hear on record for the very first time. The final track of Encores 3, as well as the whole series, Amirador, perhaps aptly nods to the Spanish word for ‘lookout’ and hints at what’s to come.

Frahm has been touring extensively following the release of All Melody, bringing his spectacular live show all around the world with sold out performances including the Hammersmith Apollo in London, L.A.’s Disney Hall, Brooklyn Steel, Le Trianon in Paris and Funkhaus in Berlin. Nils returns to the UK capitol for The Hydra’s summer 2019 series, headlining Printworks on August 23, with further European dates following the release of Encores 3 and All Encores. For all dates and tickets: nilsfrahm/concerts.

Repressed in quantity for the first time in years. Includes the hit single "Strange Harvest". Tempers, comprised of Jasmine Golestaneh and Eddie Cooper, have carved out their own niche within dark indie, electronica and synth-pop circles. Their sound is about exploring tonal and emotional tension as much as it is about actual tracks or singular moments. Adrenalizing yet hypnotic landscapes layer mechanical and sensual impulses, as crystalline vocals weave fever dreams of yearning and alienation. Informed by both Golestaneh's involvement in musical performance and visual art and Cooper's electronic production resume, as well as their time in the States and abroad, they operate as a multi-disciplined entity in the spirit and ethos of Factory Records. Tempers describe their creative process as a telepathic kinship they've developed since they started making music together: "We have these sort of unspoken criteria when we're writing music. We never really need to explain what that is but we both know when it's missing or when we've hit it." After a string of critically acclaimed singles beginning in 2013 with "Eyes Wide Wider" b/w "Hell Hotline," the duo released their debut LP "Services" (2015) on cult imprint Aufnahme + Wiedergabe resulting in the underground club hit "Strange Harvest", extensive international touring and sold-out shows. The album's vinyl edition soon became a sought after collectors item. Their 2017 EP "Fundamental Fantasy" was released as a result of the Vinyl Factory's Volcano Extravaganza artist residency on the Aeolian island of Stromboli. Following their unique creative compass, in 2018 they indirectly moved from the dance floor to galleries, releasing "Junkspace" a conceptual collaboration with famed architect Rem Koolhaas. The record is available in the world's most select cultural hotspots, from The New Museum in New York to Walther Konig museum stores throughout Europe, a testament to Tempers' love for experimental output and unorthodox presentation. In 2019 Tempers signed with Dais Records, promptly releasing "Private Life" and the lead single "Capital Pains," a meticulous evolution of the dark pop that marked the duo's earlier output.

Splendid EP, collab masterpiece on the A-side... Starting with a 3-hands-tune, full of surprises and creations as well as reminicenses... So is the second track from Crom and Tettsuo. Big big surprise this one too !! The flip goes Solos tuens from the labels holders... Super mental introspections.

Following 2019’s ‘INSHROUDSS EP’, ‘RESURRECTEDINBLACK’ marks the first Bestial Mouths LP crafted fully under frontwoman Lynette Cerezo’s guiding mind.

Emerging from the shrouds of trauma explored on her debut release as the singular force behind Bestial Mouths, RESURRECTEDINBLACK weaves a world riddled by grief and loss—a world of broken systems, of toxic lands once sacred, of lost saviors and inner voids that may be tented with strong flesh, but remain as raw as the meat surrounding them.

While branching deeper into the searing industrialized electronics and imminently danceable darkwave of the previous EP, RESURRECTEDINBLACK also continues to channel new and experimental paths through the project’s original gothic post-punk roots. Led by Cerezo’s visceral, emotional voice and lyrics, and featuring beautifully brutal production from Brant Showers (AAIMON/SØLVE), Alex DeGroot (Zola Jesus) and Balázs Képli (nullius in verba), it is the journey of a soul shattered—then stapled back together by female rage and self-determination.

First Word Records are extremely proud to welcome aboard Allysha Joy and her first EP

for the label, 'Light It Again'.

Well versed in poetry and performance, Allysha Joy's potent lyricism, unique musicianship and killer vocals have garnered legions of attentive fans the world over. She's an integral member of the Melbourne soul jazz scene, known as part of the acclaimed 30/70 Collective and for her own equally revered solo work.

'Light It Again' is a 4-part expedition across a variety of grooves and deep lyricism that marks a defiant statement of intimacy and hope. Produced and engineered by twice Grammy nominated artist Clever Austin, the EP features accompaniment from an all-star set of Melbourne artists; Horatio Luna, Ziggy Zeitgeist, Danika Smith and Josh Kelly. This EP marks a new sound for the young artist, transmitting her honest and raw expression through the signature crunch and sonic landscape of Clever Austin.

Allysha is already well established across Europe, performing on the live circuit alongside the likes of Sampa the Great, Matthew Halsall, Ezra Collective, Bradley Zero and Children of Zeus, as well as currently hosting two regular radio shows, on Worldwide FM and Reform Radio in Manchester respectively.

Her 2018 debut album 'Acadie : Raw' on Gondwana Records won 'Best Soul Album' at the Music Victoria Awards, was nominated for a Worldwide Award, and featured in many an end-of-year list, including Bandcamp's Top Soul Albums, whilst she's also featured on releases on UK labels such as Rhythm Section, Total Refreshment Centre and now an EP for First Word, 'Light It Again'.

The EP touches on love, shame, mental health, grief & spirituality. 'Watercolours' sets off on a mid-tempo neo-soul jazz tip. Allysha says "I wrote this in the hope that maybe we could all feel the beauty that is present in the every day - in nature, in art, in each one of us mirroring each other so intrinsically. Then maybe we'd all start to live out a message of love."

'Better' follows on an uptempo vibe influenced musically by The Senegambian Jazz Band, who Allysha would watch regularly at Bar Oussou in Melbourne. Lyrically the song explores the external and internal struggles that occur trying to create a more inclusive and compassionate world. "It's about catching myself pointing the finger outwards to challenge social / political systems and certain individuals, then coming to the realisation that I must turn that finger back on myself to ask, "how can I do better, how can I know better?"

Lead track 'Light It Again' begins with Allysha's keys gliding a steppa-like rhythm - head-snap snares and punchy bass accompany ethereal harmonies and delicate vibes on an ever-evolving groove before switching entirely mid-track. This time the subject matter is mental health and "the cycle of addiction and pain, the coping mechanisms that hold us back from reaching our true potential".

The EP closes out with the beautiful 'Mardi'; deep Rhodes, sax and synths build ahead of deliciously slushy percussion and jilted drums. Named for her grandmother, 'Mardi' is a tribute to the spiritual connection they shared before her passing. Allysha writes, "it's about the connective forces of the matriarchal lineage and the drive to step into my own sense of self, in all the beauty and pain which that entails".

Allysha's lyrics weave together a heartfelt mix of love, power, desire, wonder, anger, faith and hope for change. An artist that presents a palette of intricate grace and optimism, whilst unafraid of adding uncomfortable truths. Allysha is an incredibly powerful live performer; her husky vocals sonically synced with her formidable Fender Rhodes playing, whilst her influences are a solid base of jazz, hip hop and R&B; all glazed with the unique special sauce the Melbourne soul scene has become known for globally. A gloriously meditative, raw soul, we are delighted to be able to share her music with you.

'Light It Again' is released on vinyl & digital worldwide, November 20th 2020.

French-native Malikk debuts on Hot Creations this December with the two- track Heu Como Bailar. The EP continues a busy 2020 that has seen him release on labels such as LouLou Records and Two Many Rules.

The title track sets the tone, with punchy kicks sitting alongside driving hats. An irresistible 4x4 groove acts as the backbone, before the infectious Heu Como Bailar vocal helps whip the beat along. Rounding things off is Got The Body, an unapologetic dancefloor cut that you can’t help but dance to. Up-tempo, hard- hitting and with plenty of obscure-sounding squeaks throughout, the near five-minute number showcases the up-and-coming talent at his best.