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He might be vocalist in bands such as Brighton-based progressive act Diagonal and psychedelic outfit Baron, but when it comes to his solo work Alex Crispin has typically worked in more wordless fields. Last year the songwriter, vocalist and producer released a triptych of ambient albums, consisting of two older albums in 'Idle Worship' and 'Open Submission', as well as new meditative work in 'Resubmergency'. On his new self-titled album, however, Crispin re-emerges from the cavernous soundscapes to – for the first time – put his vocal and song writing stamp on a record under his own name. “I personally find it easier to create more guarded, moody music, but I was at a point where I wanted to embrace a more universal, intimate and open side to what I might say” Crispin says. “Over time I’d got over certain blocks or preoccupations and so wanted to create something accessible and open hearted, which became a big driver for this record.” Pointedly self-titled to reflect the newfound confidence in his song writing away from the collective of a band, the album’s nine tracks are a warm embrace amidst troubled times. Musically there’s nods to everything from tropicalia and Brazilian MPB, to 80’s dusk pop balladeers The Blue Nile and Paul Simon’s explorations into African music. Lyrically aware of the snowballing turbulence that surrounds us, Crispin in reaction tries to see hope and looks around at the relationships and connections in his life that provide him strength. He opens 'Invisible (To Us)' with the words “Before the world did end, there was just one moment when, everybody thought there might be time, to look around again, to laugh to cry to sing.” Elsewhere, 'Listen & Learn' strikes at the heart of other underlying themes of the record, of the rarity of people opening up, taking on new ideas and allowing change. It’s accompanied with a rich, maximal sound palette of flute and sax that play around each other as Crispin’s vocal chips in with gentle encouragement. “One of the main markers on the album that I was aware of from the start, was to let myself express joy and positivity in the music” he says. “I have come to greatly prize the power of accessibility and universality over artistic 'coolness or trend', much in the same way that so often for me, the greatest pieces of art humans make nowadays are things like Pixar movies, with their combination of undeniable human talent and craft, alongside genuinely moving and accessible themes.” Indeed, there is a cinematic feel to much of Crispin’s own music, something brought over from his ambient creations – although his self-titled album possesses a panorama all of its own. Something like 'When I Reach The Ocean' has a hazy, pastoral feel to it like something out of the Canterbury Folk scene; there’s space between the notes though, which in turn pushes the track out to a greater expanse than the comparatively soft-edged and modest sound palette used to create it. Similarly, the likes of 'Effert' revel in the space afforded to them - in the case of the aforementioned in particular, Crispin lets his voice take a back seat and creates an open wash of sound that he allows the guitar to probe and explore within. “In making any music I am definitely conscious of trying to put in only what is effective” Crispin says. “It is so easy to clutter tracks without realising it, just having the ability to add stuff can just become addictive as it’s so easy to do with recording setups now.” The album started coming together at the end of 2020, with Crispin getting most of the songs to a concrete state, before starting recording in May 2021 with Diagonal bandmates Luke Foster (drums) and Daniel Pomlett (Bass), who put down rhythm tracks. Jazz saxophonist Rob Milne then added parts which would become the glue that held the whole organic aesthetic of the album together. There’s no doubt that lockdown played a part in proceedings, with a kind of forced focus resulting in a need for joyful expression. However, Crispin and his partner also suffered a bereavement which led to her travelling for large periods of time. “It was a very intense and difficult time and I think some of the intensity of emotion of that situation coupled with being alone must have inevitably contributed to the work itself” he says. It's perhaps why when even in moments of sheer happiness, such as the 'Sabu’s' breezily euphoric opener, Crispin ponders: “No-one really cares beyond this moment, and even when it's here, it's never here”. It’s the first of several bittersweet moments on the record that give the album its weight. On this new LP, Crispin recognises that sadness doesn’t mean throwing out hope, and that even in moments of joy there’s still a path ahead of you to take.

It’s going off and The Chisel are back to cause a bit of bovver. Following a trio of explosive singles, the band finally bring us their debut full-length album, Retaliation, on the London-based punk institution La Vida Es Un Mus. Having formed in early 2020 and featuring a crew of members with long-term associations to the London punk scene, The Chisel quickly secured a reputation as one of the most exciting bands from a pool of contemporaries that includes Chubby & The Gang, Stingray and Big Cheese. Their sound is rooted firmly in Punk but with influences that run across the board to create a distinctive blend of Oi!, anarcho, UK-82 and hardcore. Retaliation is an unmistakably British record that draws a line from 1982 up to the present day, pushing its way into your collection and torching your stereo. Opening with the agitated force of ‘Unlawful Execution’, the tone is firmly set by a song that addresses the brutality of the Met Police (“Tell me what’s the difference between right or wrong / When a copper gets to blast a lad who did nothing wrong”). ‘Come See Me’ is a ferocious ode to camaraderie in the face of mouthy boneheads and bellends. ‘Shit Life Syndrome’ is a poisoned reference to the same cynical phrase used by physicians to describe the effects of people living under poverty and in the grips of substance abuse (“How can you expect people to act nicely, they’ve all been left on the edge of society”). It’s one of many songs influenced by singer Cal’s experiences of growing up in the working-class town of Blackpool. Cal states: “Blackpool as a town is often overlooked or even looked down upon, I wanted to write lyrics which gave the people of my town a voice”. With tunes like these The Chisel show that they’ll never pull any punches. However, beyond the fury and the swagger there’s another side that plays to an additional strength; the ability to write a memorable hook. Songs like ‘Retaliation’, ‘Tooth & Nail’ and ‘Not The Only One’ could be described as modern day anthems (the latter has become a fan favourite since the arrival of their first live shows) and cement their identity as a band not to be defined by their influences. Recorded by Jonah Falco at Total Refreshment Centre, London, March 2021.
Mixed by James Atkinson at the Stationhouse in Leeds. Mastered by Daniel Husayn at North London Bomb Factory. Cover painting by Tara Atefi.

Relentless techno powerhouses Octave One stride in 2022 with a brand new release that re-affirms their status across two essential tracks. 2021 was another busy year for the Burden Brothers, who re-introduced the world to their Never On Sunday alias. The project first started in the 90s as an outlet for deeper, more introspective sounds and was fittingly brought back last year to great acclaim. The Detroit duo’s Locus of Control series also hit volume number three and the iconic Octave One live show continued to light up clubs everywhere from Barcelona, Paris and Geneva to LA and New York. Despite that, they still had time to cook up more of their famously soulful techno in the studio, the first two tracks of which are presented here.Opener ‘The Blue Drift’ surges ahead on waves of rattling metallic synths. Well swung claps bring that irresistible sense of groove, while twisted melodies add raw dynamics. Add in the heavy underlying bass and you have a classic Octave One track that is both physical yet emotional. On the flip side is ‘It-Just-Is’ a powerful statement of intent. It’s a stripped back track where house and techno meet - there is a seductive slide to the drums and potency in the turbulent synths which bring the energy. The melody is melancholic and as the emotive pads ring out they lodge deep in your brain to make for another standout cut. This vital new release proves Octave One remains right at the forefront of underground music more than 30 years after they started out.

Something's happening in country music. Newer artists and younger audiences are embracing instrumentation, vocal stylings and song structures long thought drowned in the ocean of slick, snap-track productions. Not easily dismissed as merely regional or a novelty throwback, the trend could be on its way to full-blown movement. If so, Kimberly Kelly's Show Dog Nashville debut album may prove to be the clarion call. Either way ... she's not asking. I'll Tell You What's Gonna Happen is more than her (abbreviated) album title, more than a reference to her connection with a Country Music Hall of Famer, and much more than a historical footnote. Rather, it's a statement of musical confidence earned the only way that happens: talent, work ethic, experience, vulnerability, and courage. For Kelly, it's all of a piece. "I like to think of it as a sub-genre of country music called 'country music,'" she says with a wink. A native of Lorena, Texas, Kelly has multiple connections to the Nashville industry. She has also been unafraid to defy convention. "This is not my first rodeo," she says of her label debut. "I worked really hard in Texas before I came to Nashville. I wrote songs, put out records, did a radio tour, and played every weekend while earning a Master's degree. They say don't have a 'plan B,' but I watched my mom struggle to get that next level of pay. My mom earned her bachelor's degree when she was 60, so school was important to me to know I could take care of myself.

Take a Trip was born of a love of Acid House and wanting to explore my mates 909 & 303!! The way they sing when programmed is mind blowing. There’s magic inside of them that creates something special. From Chicago’s Warehouse to London’s Shoom and Hedonism, Manchester’s Hacienda’s Hot and Nude nights, parties such as R.I.P., Spectrum, Zoo, The Trip, Apocalypse Now, Legends, the State, Rage an Sunrise. It’s a sound that will never fade.

Alan Dixon is back with his first ever acid track and it’s instant love. The disco producer hits the target with no compromise.

Overcome is a new Dave Douglas recording, alongside vocalists Fay
Victor and Camila Meza, trombonist Ryan Keberle, bassist Jorge Roeder,
and drummer Rudy Royston, who banded together over a period of
months to create a new album of songs
A statement of purpose, an acknowledgement of forebears, and an exhortation to
activism, Overcome involves the six musicians in an emotional and powerful
statement of human engagement towards justice: Racial justice. Climate justice.
Voting justice. Gender justice. The project began with a reimagining of the Civil
Rights anthem, "We Shall Overcome," featuring Victor and Meza each singing a
verse before joining for arousing final verse. As Douglas began working on the
originals for the album, this unique communal vocal interplay became a key
element of three more pieces: "Overcome" and "When We Are Together Again" are
both inspired by the challenges of pandemic isolation; "Good Trouble" celebrates
activist John Lewis. Victor takes the spotlight on "Peace" as she voices poignant
poetry from Langston Hughes. And the free- spirited Royston original
"Perspective" brings a nice balance to the proceedings. This is spirited communal
music on a mission. Released direct- to- fan previously, the LP is available
worldwide for the very first time. Pressed on 180 gram black vinyl.

The wiggy wanderings of Oog Bogo wind up on the same island of lost joys all at once, manufacturing a virtual jukebox of singles and side flips that won’t unplug, and just keeps reeling and raging on instead. A bright metallurgy of guitar pop, psych, post-punk and apocalypse disco embosses the sleek, multicoloured flash of ‘Plastic’.

 Oog Bogo are a four-piece rock band from Los Angeles and their new album is ‘Plastic’, an electrifying set of songs and sounds that just don’t stop, working like a machine that makes joy and endless flips and repetitions, whether in front of the turntable or out in the real world.
 In the past several years, Oog Bogo dropped two records that previewed this explosion in wildly divergent ways: 2019’s ‘Oogbogo’ EP, with wigged-out production, its contorted fun house mirror images pulling punk, psych and new wave in and out of focus in a chaotic procession of mutant tunes. 2021’s ‘EP2’ radiates a starkly different vibe, as chilled-out guitar-pop tunes conjure a flowing medley of plaintive echoes and atmospheres in a mellow mist of hiss.

 Kevin Boog recorded these records in a largely hermetic state: at home on 4-track, playing all the parts, slowly drawing out the sounds. The songs for ‘Plastic’ were demoed this way too, as a starting point for a group interpretation - but when, for obvious reasons, logistics prevented everyone from getting in the same room to even rehearse, the planned recording session at Ty Segall’s Harmonizer Studios took on a different shape.

 Starting off with only drummer Thomas Alvarez (Audacity) to accompany him, Kevin
realized that any obstacles to getting the record made were also opportunities, for
something else that was also right to happen. Rather than reach for the design of the
demos, he kept himself in the present moment, approaching every passage as fluidly
as possible, playing what he needed to play, staying open to what he needed to
know. It didn’t hurt that the laptop with all his songs crashed right after he walked into
the studio! There was no way possible but forward.
 The direction was right on with the guys at Harmonizer - Ty Segall’s sense of
imagination made him the ideal production counterpart to walk together with Kevin
into this world, psyched to experiment and ready to get weird at any time. Ty and
engineer Matt Littlejohn met all requests and requirements in the form of sounds, with
gear and approaches that amazed and delighted, and an eternally ebullient spirit.
 As this was Oog Bogo’s first time recording away from home, Kevin was a kid in a
candy store - where the store owner turns out to be a Wonka-esque philanthropist.
As band members Mike Kreibel (Dirty & His Fists) and Shelby Jacobson (Shannon
Lay) joined the session, there was a synchronicity and community with everyone
involved, finding an unexpected road to realizing the songs, with all the colours and
hues they added making everything pop that much harder.
 Fluidity was key: ‘Plastic’’s tunes depict a polymorphic cast of characters. As in life,
they leap avidly from style to style; from pretty psych rock to new wave apocalypse
disco and harsh post punk bleakness, sometimes in a verse and a half. Corkscrewing
over and over like a riff-driven space-coaster, morphing in and out of each
successive moment with increasing momentum and gravity, ‘Plastic’ defines and
redefines Oog Bogo, with sweet tunes, barely-controlled intensity and sharp
production moves - a killer first album and an equally killer evolving state of mind.

The wiggy wanderings of Oog Bogo wind up on the same island of lost joys all at once, manufacturing a virtual jukebox of singles and side flips that won’t unplug, and just keeps reeling and raging on instead. A bright metallurgy of guitar pop, psych, post-punk and apocalypse disco embosses the sleek, multicoloured flash of ‘Plastic’.

 Oog Bogo are a four-piece rock band from Los Angeles and their new album is ‘Plastic’, an electrifying set of songs and sounds that just don’t stop, working like a machine that makes joy and endless flips and repetitions, whether in front of the turntable or out in the real world.
 In the past several years, Oog Bogo dropped two records that previewed this explosion in wildly divergent ways: 2019’s ‘Oogbogo’ EP, with wigged-out production, its contorted fun house mirror images pulling punk, psych and new wave in and out of focus in a chaotic procession of mutant tunes. 2021’s ‘EP2’ radiates a starkly different vibe, as chilled-out guitar-pop tunes conjure a flowing medley of plaintive echoes and atmospheres in a mellow mist of hiss.

 Kevin Boog recorded these records in a largely hermetic state: at home on 4-track, playing all the parts, slowly drawing out the sounds. The songs for ‘Plastic’ were demoed this way too, as a starting point for a group interpretation - but when, for obvious reasons, logistics prevented everyone from getting in the same room to even rehearse, the planned recording session at Ty Segall’s Harmonizer Studios took on a different shape.

 Starting off with only drummer Thomas Alvarez (Audacity) to accompany him, Kevin
realized that any obstacles to getting the record made were also opportunities, for
something else that was also right to happen. Rather than reach for the design of the
demos, he kept himself in the present moment, approaching every passage as fluidly
as possible, playing what he needed to play, staying open to what he needed to
know. It didn’t hurt that the laptop with all his songs crashed right after he walked into
the studio! There was no way possible but forward.
 The direction was right on with the guys at Harmonizer - Ty Segall’s sense of
imagination made him the ideal production counterpart to walk together with Kevin
into this world, psyched to experiment and ready to get weird at any time. Ty and
engineer Matt Littlejohn met all requests and requirements in the form of sounds, with
gear and approaches that amazed and delighted, and an eternally ebullient spirit.
 As this was Oog Bogo’s first time recording away from home, Kevin was a kid in a
candy store - where the store owner turns out to be a Wonka-esque philanthropist.
As band members Mike Kreibel (Dirty & His Fists) and Shelby Jacobson (Shannon
Lay) joined the session, there was a synchronicity and community with everyone
involved, finding an unexpected road to realizing the songs, with all the colours and
hues they added making everything pop that much harder.
 Fluidity was key: ‘Plastic’’s tunes depict a polymorphic cast of characters. As in life,
they leap avidly from style to style; from pretty psych rock to new wave apocalypse
disco and harsh post punk bleakness, sometimes in a verse and a half. Corkscrewing
over and over like a riff-driven space-coaster, morphing in and out of each
successive moment with increasing momentum and gravity, ‘Plastic’ defines and
redefines Oog Bogo, with sweet tunes, barely-controlled intensity and sharp
production moves - a killer first album and an equally killer evolving state of mind.

Repress incoming...

Far Out Recordings proudly presents Milton Nascimento's Maria Maria. Recorded in 1974 and unreleased until almost thirty years later, the album was written as the soundtrack to a ballet which dealt with the legacy of slavery in Brazil. Raw, atmospheric and emotionally charged, Maria Maria reveals one of Brazil's greatest ever songwriters at his creative peak. Featuring an all-star cast of fellow Brazilian legends including Nana Vasconcelos, Joao Donato, Paulinho Jobim, and members of Som Imaginario, Maria Maria holds what Milton considers to be the definitive versions of some of his classic songs, including 'Os Escravos De Jó' and 'Maria Maria'.

Originally released in 2003 as a double CD package, with Milton Nascimento's 1984 follow up ballet soundtrack Ultimo Trem, Maria Maria will be available on vinyl for the very first time from December 2019, with Ultimo Trem set for vinyl release early 2020.

Milton Nascimento possesses one of the most immediately recognizable voices in Brazilian music: high and sweet and as breathtakingly sublime as that of any soul singer. It was this voice that the legendary Brazilian singer Elis Regina fell in love with back in 1964, having heard Milton perform his song 'Canção do Sal (Sultry Song)' at a private party in Sao Paulo. Ellis went on to record the song in 1967 -giving Milton his first hit in Brazil and beginning a career that has spanned over 50 years.

Born in Rio on the 26th October 1942, Milton moved with his adoptive parents at the age of 18 months to Tres Pontas, a rural town in the state of Minas Gerais, 500 miles north of Rio. He began his musical career as a young teenager, singing in a crooner style he learnt from listening to Brazilian singers and US groups such as The Platters on the radio. Hungry for more opportunities to perform, Milton moved to Belo Horizonte, the capital of Minas Gerais, at the age of twenty. By the beginning of the 60s Milton had made a name for himself both as an accomplished singer and guitarist.

Milton became part of a local network of musicians, film makers, dancers, theatre directors and writers that included the journalist and song writer Fernando Brant as well as lyricist Marcio Borges and his younger brother Lo Borges. Together these four wrote and produced what would become Milton's milestone album, 'Clube da Esquina (Club on the Corner)'. The originality of 'Club da Esquina' shaped the local scene, and it reflects the essence of 'the Nascimento Sound'. Milton's religious upbringing as an Afro-Brazilian Catholic saw him exposed to church choral music from an early age. His love of this genre of music is apparent in both his celestial falsetto and vocal choral arrangements. This collection also displays his early fascination with evocative, non-verbal, scat-style singing, spare, harmonic guitar work and local folk music, jazz and rock.

In 1976, Milton and Fernando Brant teamed up with a new contemporary dance company called Grupo Corpo, whose Argentinian choreographer Oscar Araiz, would become a collaborator with the two musicians. Together, they conceived a show based on the composite life story of the daughter of a black slave called Maria. Nascimento wrote music to Brant's lyrics and "Maria Maria" was premiered in the main theatre of the Belo Horizonte Palacio das Artes that year. "Fernando wrote the lyrics for the ballet, but there were originally no lyrics for the theme song, "Maria Maria'". Milton and Fernando worked on the lyrics together, basing them on folk stories about black women of the countryside. Adds Milton "These memories are mostly things that we witnessed – Fernando and I – rather than what we experienced ourselves.

Milton's music is impressionistic, emotional and romantic. Relying on songs without lyrics as well as evocative vocalizing and choruses, Milton experimented heavily with Afro-Brazilian percussion and taped jungle sounds. His composing method for these recordings was highly unconventional: "I wrote the music for 'Maria Maria' in a tiny Rio apartment with friends and their kids running around and having fun! I love to be in noisy places, surrounded by people", he says.
The music on 'Maria Maria' was performed by an impressive group of young musicians who are today household names in Brazilian music, including Naná Vasconcelos (percussion and effects), Toninho Horta (guitars) and Paulo Moura (sax). Several vocalist including Naná Caymmi, Fafá de Belém, Beto Guedes, and Milton himself, had hits in years to come with reworkings of these songs.

Milton says his compositions follow his visions "like a movie", and he believes that reflects his long love affair with cinema. "I only began composing because of enjoying the movies so much," he says. "I wrote my first song "Peace for the Coming Love" after seeing 'Jules et Jim' (the cult 60s French film directed by François Truffaut), with my friend Marcio Borges. We went early in the morning and watched it four or five times in a row, then went to Márcio's home and wrote the song."

The songs also include solo spoken passages set to music, clearly influenced by this style of French art cinema. On the title track, Maria's story is narrated and translated to music through the use of African Percussion, drums and metal signifying the field slave tools of the day. 'Trabalhos (Works)' runs to work rhythms and whipcracks: no words, just pain. 'Lília' documents the beating of the slave woman. After 'A Chamada (The call)' and the triumphant 'Era Rei e Sou Escravo (I was a king now I am a slave' things begin to turn and Milton employs tropical jungle cries to symbolize freedom. 'Santos Catholicos x Candomble (Catholic Saints vs Candomble)' represents the battle between African and European religions through the music of both sides. Milton's heavenly falsetto pours into 'Francisco' and 'Pai Grande (Great Father)' and the outstanding 'Eu Sou Uma Preta Velha Aqui Sentada no Sol (I'm an old black lady, sitting under the sun)' conjures images of an old woman sitting deep in the forest, her memories painted in drums, piano and voices.

While awaiting the release of Dignity Of Labour, The Ex headed back into the studio in early 1983; this time with a new friend – The Mekons' Jon Langford – helping produce.

Originally released in April 1983 (only a month after Dignity Of Labour), Tumult marks a major evolution in Ex-sound. Opener "Bouquet Of Barbed Wire" emerges snarling out of post-punk atmospherics with Terrie Ex's glacial guitar, Bas Masbeck's loping bass and cascading tom-toms from new recruit Sabien Witteman, while "Fear" and "Survival Of The Fattest" bring to bear the rhythmic core of the band, their signature angular style.

Lyrically, the songs on Tumult cycle through a series of familiar concerns: animal rights, squatters, the working class, punk's penchant for radical chic and the creeping fascism of nationalist sentiments. G.W. Sok's voice is squalling and perfectly wry throughout.

Tumult remains a high-water point of early Ex, serving as both developmental guide and way-station. The next 18 months would see the departure of Bas and Witteman and the arrival of long-serving bassist Luc Klaasen and drummer Kat Bornefeld (whose supple rhythms propel the group to this day). The album stands as one of the most compelling and unique documents of early '80s DIY exploration. If Mark E. Smith had only one favorite Dutch punk band, then it would undoubtedly be The Ex.

This first-time vinyl reissue comes with 28" x 39" full-color poster

Robin Pecknold brings light to the bleakest of winters with Fleet Foxes' 'A Very Lonely Solstice,' a 13-track career spanning collection recorded in December 2020, at Brooklyn, NY's St. Ann & the Holy Trinity Church. Now being released for the first time on vinyl, CD and digital formats, 'A Very Lonely Solstice' captures a poignant moment in time. The recording was originally broadcasted as a live-stream event on the winter solstice of 2020, just days after New York declared a state of emergency tightening restrictions again in response to increasing COVID-19 cases. Pecknold describes the set as "me by myself on the longest night of the year... honoring the loneliness of 2020 with a nylon string and some songs new and old." Fans worldwide tuned in while quarantined at home, finding solace and a sense of community in a period of extreme isolation. Much of 'A Very Lonely Solstice' showcases a solo focus on Pecknold who offers up acoustic arrangements of fan-favorite songs spanning Fleet Foxes' catalog. Selections cover all four of the band's studio albums, including their 2008 self-titled debut album ("Tiger Mountain Peasant Song") to 2011's Helplessness Blues ("Blue Spotted Tail") and 2017's Crack-Up ("If You Need To, Keep Time On Me"), all the way to their latest release, Shore. Resistance Revival Chorus joins Pecknold on Shore tracks "Wading In Waist-High Water" and "Can I Believe You." Also featured: a cover of Nina Simone's "In The Morning" and a rearrangement of the traditional "Silver Dagger."

Kaiju is the floor-shaking, speaker-knocking new album from Canibus, one of hip-hop’s greatest lyricists who continues to push himself as an artist. It also serves as his first solo release since 2015’s excellent Time Flys, Life Dies... Phoenix Rise, which was produced entirely by Bronze Nazareth. It’s only fitting, then, that ‘Bus would once again work with only one producer for this project, which finds him spitting mind-melting bars over beats from Oxnard, CA beatsmith/rapper Body Bag Ben.

The 11 tracks on Kaiju strike a balance between personal experiences and striking grandiosity that ‘Bus expertly crafts with his pen. They also all boast the rewind-worthy lyrics you’d want from one of the genre’s most creative and truly timeless talents. You can hear this immediately on the opening track, “Curmudgeon,” where he spits raw bars with his signature growl over BBB’s monstrous production. That vibe carries on throughout the record, from the snarling, DMX-assisted “Entameta (Remix)” through to the hip-hop epic of “Verzuz.”

This is truly Canibus at his best, blending surrealist wordplay and turns-of-phrase with sharp, witty commentary about the state of the world today. Even better, he’s backed by some of BBB’s best production to date, which rumbles and stomps as much as it sounds like it’s covered in a thick layer of grime. It’s much like the inspiration for the album’s title—a giant monster (kaiju, in Japanese) like Godzilla rising from a slumber, ready to wreak havoc on his opponents.

20th Anniversary edition pressed on Californian Sunburst vinyl with
newly designed artwork and bonus 7” featuring ‘Brown Eyes’ and the
previously unreleased ‘The Earth From Above’.
 ‘California’ was released in 2002 to massive critical acclaim and reached
a much wider audience across Europe. Features the hit singles ‘This
Life’ and ‘Ordinary Day’.
 The album features Glenn Garrett on bass, Neil Conti (David Bowie /
Prefab Sprout) on drums and Dickon Hinchcliffe (Tindersticks ) and Rick
Carter (The Sisters of Mercy) on keyboards.
 ‘California’ was mostly co-written with Italian composer Marco Sabiu,
who collaborated with and was mentored by the late, great Ennio
Morricone.
 Perry Blake, Sligo-born singer / songwriter, is one of music’s great
untapped resources. After his first three singles - taken from his debut
album - received Single Of The Week on Jo Wiley BBC Radio 1, Blake
moved to France, where he was met with critical acclaim with his next
four albums, touring Europe with Carla Bruni and writing two songs for
Francoise Hardy’s Platinum-selling album ‘Tant de belles choses’,
appearing on various TV shows in France as her special guest.
 You may very well wonder what to expect of an album with American
West Coast orientations from an Irishman who happens to be critically
acclaimed on the Continent but is largely ignored in Britain. Thankfully,
Blake lives up to his billing with apparent ease. His song writing is
evidently mature and melodic; he incorporates lush orchestral
arrangements with tender vocals; and combines pop-like hooks with a
deep sonic texture.
 ‘California’ is a thriving and absorbing collection of songs in which
orchestral arrangements strain with emotion, melodies thrive and bloom,
like The Verve at their peak, though far more fragile and balmy.
 ‘California’ is ether for the soul - a truly magnificent and touching
collection of frankly beautiful songs, which is up there with class of Bryan
Ferry, The Blue Nile and anyone else who can turn a night around.
 Blake’s glimpses of people living a state of mind is one of those great
escapes it’s very hard to get away from. His gift here is to take a
subdued, grown-up collection of songs but make them sound like they
deserve daytime radio.
 Radio - Radio 2 Jo Whiley session.

Oslo-based American-Norwegian trio Buster Sledge releases their first
studio album Call Home in May 2022, following up on their self-recorded
and self-released debut Spirit (2020)
Fiddle, banjo, guitar and three voices are the vehicle for lyrical storytelling against
an orchestral background anchored in the acoustic music traditions of the United
States. Hailing from northern California, lead vocalist and songwriter Michael
Barrett Donovan mixes themes from personal experience with folk and country
music archetypes to breathe new life into time-tested song structures. Banjoist
Mikael Jonassen and guitarist Jakob Folke Ossum both share a thorough
appreciation for the fundamentals of bluegrass music, clear melodies and
harmony- singing through the lens of being trained jazz musicians. In eleven
tracks, Call Home tips its hat to artists such as Norman Blake, The Punch
Brothers, Tim O'Brien and John Hartford. Buster Sledge was the first group to
record in the recently relocated Globus Studio of Sjur Lyseid (Little Hands of
Asphalt) and his influence from behind the mixing board pushed the band into a
slightly-augmented acoustic sound with more streamlined arrangements which is
a suiting duet with the album art by William Hay that realizes a scene of a rider
overlooking a large river-valley in impressionistic swaths of color.
Banjoist Mikael Jonassen, from Bodo in the far north, is Norway's first and only
higher-education certified banjo player. Despite beginning with an electric banjo
and playing exclusively fusion jazz, Jonassen currently focuses his efforts on
Scrugg's style acoustic banjo and the playing of Bela Fleck and has taken several
trips to the US to learn from the masters. Jakob Folke Ossum, jazz- guitarist
turned flat- picking aficionado, discovered the sound of acoustic flat- picking
through Tony Rice and Bryan Sutton and meticulously taught himself from
records and videos. Fiddler Michael Barrett Donovan made a living as a musician
in New York City doing a master's in classical composition while touring with a
Grateful Dead tribute band. The three met in a comment section on a bluegrass
forum after Donovan moved to Norway in 2019. The rest of the story you'll have
to ask them at a show sometime. Buster Sledge has been on stage in many small
venues in southern Norway, don't miss them the next time they come to town!

Grammy award-winning blues icon returns to his Delta blues roots for the
most captivating musical statement of his long and legendary career
Charlie's first new solo studio release in seven years is stripped-down and semiacoustic, driven by his deft guitar playing, while also featuring the masterful harp
and soul-deep vocals for which he is famed.
'Mississippi Son' is front porch country blues that is at turns raucous and languid,
haunting and impossibly soulful. The track listing includes Musselwhite originals
and songs by Charley Patton, Yank Rachell and Big Joe Williams. This warm,
intimate recording is loaded with feeling and exhilarating, timeless music.
Essential listening for any blues fan.
Blues Matters feature interview plus review confirmed
ADVERTISING: Blues Matters, Blues In Britain, Blues & Rhythm

Perhaps the best Soul / Funk LP Athens of the North has ever released and you know we have high standards, not one filler and mostly unreleased tracks – Essential LP

The Up Tights were formed by Henry Bradley in Forrest City, Arkansas in March of 1967 while most of the band members were attending Lincoln High School.They took their name from the Stevie Wonder song "Uptight - Everything's Alright." Playing at school functions, they quickly branched out to playing bigger shows and headlined the 1968 St. Francis County Fair in Forrest City.

The Up Tights first recorded for Action Records in Memphis as Noble and the Up Tights. The 45 featured an original song by singer, Izear "Ike" Noble Jr. titled "Don't Worry About It."

Henry Bradley was drafted into Vietnam in 1968. He served in the 1st Squadron, 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment. While he was away, the Up Tights continued with Henry's brother, Arthur, taking over all the guitar duties. The band also hired a manager named John Mitchell. In 1968, the band met Joe Lee, who owned Variety recording studio in Jonesboro, Arkansas.

For the band's first recordings at Variety, Lee chose two originals by Noble titled "Look a Little Higher" and an updated version of "Just a Dream" which Lee released on his Alley Records label in 1968. Lee continued to record the band over the next several months. He liked to experiment in the studio and produced many versions of the group's original songs, adjusting the mix and adding elements to each unique take.

For the group's second Alley release, they appeared simply as Ike Noble on the record label. Lee brought in a local songwriter named Charles "Jamie" Holmes, who had previously written for Alley records and Joe Keene's studio in Kennett, Missouri

The resulting 45 from this collaboration was "It's Bad" backed with "That's What I Get," two Holmes originals. Another Holmes original was unreleased at the time, but available here titled "There's Gonna Be a Better Day Coming." Stax Records was interested in signing the group and wanted to re-cut "It's Bad" at their studio, but ultimately the label passed since they generally had a policy of working with Memphis based groups.

As the band grew in popularity, they began appearing with and competing with Memphis legends, the Bar-Kays. The group's biggest show in Arkansas was an opening slot at Barton Coliseum, one of the largest venues in the state, in Little Rock in mid-1969. As a result, the band was offered a spot on George Klein's "Talent Party" television show on WHBQ in Memphis in July of 1969..... Further Sleeve notes on back of the LP

Joona Toivanen Trio makes their We Jazz Records debut with their new album "Both Only", out 25 Feb 2022. A landmark work for the long standing group, the album showcases a new sound for the band, trekking deep into new ideas for an acoustic jazz piano trio. Since their formation as teenagers in mid-1990's, the trio of pianist Joona Toivanen, bassist Tapani Toivanen and drummer Olavi Louhivuori (of Superposition, Ilmiliekki Quartet and Linda Fredriksson "Juniper") has developed their remarkably coherent band sound step by step, touring the world over. Nowadays, the trio is geographically split between Gothenburg, Sweden (Joona), Copenhagen, Denmark (Tapani), and Helsinki, Finland (Olavi), but the unit has never sounded so together as one, and as adventurous as on "Both Only".

"Both Only" by Joona Toivanen Trio is a cocoon, a welcoming shelter of sound that opens up naturally for the listener to inhabit. The album is moody and introspective, even dark at times, but by the time you get to the closing track, "This and This", you'll likely notice something hopeful brewing up. This is not music dealing with nostalgia or a world lost. Instead, it's a body of work with delicate dynamics, taking a minute just to listen and to look inwards to learn something, to move forward.

The first single "Enlightened" is perhaps the most traditional piece on the album, yet it flows like a vessel beyond genre, conveying a mood, a feeling and an idea. Listen to how the piano, bass and drums discuss, how the groove moves with the instruments having their clear roles but also supporting each other and documenting a musical aging process exactly as that of a quality bottle of red wine. As a song like "Direction" proves, the melody is there all the way, yet there is nothing obvious about how it's carried by the trio. Things remain surprising, fresh and moving at all times. "Except For" keeps its intensity, while nearly erupting into a full on 4-to-the-floor banger. Nearly! The key here is how the energy sustains itself, building the intensity within the music.

"Both Only" is a powerful statement from a band ready to renew itself time and again, and one willing to do it slowly, outside of the hype. This process makes the impact enduring, nuanced and lovely.

WJLP37 Joona Toivanen Trio "Both Only" is available on vinyl as a black vinyl edition and as a LP+7" bundle also including WJ0716 "Except For (7" Edit)" / "Keyboard Study No. 2".

“More excellent poetic soundscapes from We Jazz! Love the flow through the tracks here – textural pieces moving into more rhythmic jazz abstractions. Beautifully recorded too.”
Quinton Scott — Worldwide FM

“Following on from the excellent Linda Fredriksson album We Jazz extend the journey with this innovative Joona Toivanen Trio set.”
Paul Bradshaw — Straight No Chaser

“You’ll look in vain here for extravagant splashes of color or bright swathes of sound, but what you will discover are a finely-chiselled set of compositions that make the most of the trio’s limited palette: flint-sharp melodies hewn from the ice, crisp and crackling rhythms.”
Cal Gibson — Ban Ban Ton Ton

“Incredible album from Joona Toivanen Trio and a strong start to the new year from We Jazz.”
Kerem Gokmen — Dubmission

“Encapsulating a new movement in jazz.”
Jay Scarlett — Sounds Supreme

“Interesting listen on the shortest day of the year. They have a very definite and saturated style.”
John Chacona — All About Jazz

“Airplayed the track”
Tom Ravenscroft — BBC6 Music

“Jazz album of the year released already in February?”
Ralf Sandell — Hufvudstadsbladet

“★★★★★”
Iida Simes — Voima Magazine

"Points of Light” is the debut album from Sơn FM, consisting of Nic Ford and Attiss Ngo. After being part of the Vinyan cassette, the Vietnam-based duo returns to Siamese Twins Records with the label's first album in 2xLP format.

The album is an ode to the patterns of nature, which are repetitive but never quite identical. Playing with the endless possibilities of phase-shifting is at the core of Sơn FM's heavy ambient sound, shaped by their signature live performances across art galleries or surrounded by nature. Weaving dreamy kinetic sound tapestries into morphing texture movements. Analog synthesizers loops slowly decay and unfurl, ranging from melodic elements to droning sequences in a fourth world atmosphere.

This is music for inward journeys and exploring the interstices between cosmic patterns. Commanding harmonies evolve in soft-focus, phase-shifting soundscapes reminiscent of how sound is perceived underwater, at mountain summits, in the womb, or in altered states. Resembling liminal spaces between places, like dreams that haven't been dreamt yet or forgotten visions at the edge of consciousness, gently corralling its audience towards transcendental points of light.

'Ride with the Rasses' was an unequivocal statement of Prince Lincoln's
Rastafarian faith and a discernible demonstration that his "determination
(was) inexhaustible"
The LP found favour with listeners worldwide, but, without the extensive,
expensive promotion and publicity a major label could provide, the album went
relatively unheard outside of those who had kept the faith with conscious music
making. This Burning Sounds re- release will, hopefully, secure a long overdue
measure of re-appraisal and positive reassessment.
Vocals – Prince Lincoln Thompson
Album first released 1983
Released on 180 gram RED vinyl
Promotion across social media platforms
Advertising in Riddim, Black Echoes and Record Collector Magazine

Ivo Neame's twisting grooves and harmonic ingenuity have helped
establish his distinct voice in international contemporary jazz
The celebrated Phronesis pianist returns to Whirlwind for 'Glimpses of Truth', a
powerful artistic statement marking the first time Neame's big band
compositions have been committed to disc. Neame's most assured body of work
to date will undoubtedly be remembered as one of this period's most impressive
artistic achievements. "Having lots of people play this intricate polyrhythmic
music can be really emotionally powerful," says Neame. Taking inspiration from
Phronesis' large ensemble projects, the compositions also played a didactic role,
as a way of introducing newcomers to complex rhythmic structures. The
pandemic flipped that idea on its head: faced with dwindling opportunities to hear
these compositions live, Neame thought "'I'm just going to plough on regardless
and record it all'." Composed, multi-tracked (Neame plays all the tutti sax lines),
videoed, mixed and mastered remotely over the pandemic period, 'Glimpses of
Truth' embraces the digital on a global scale, as Gilad Hekselman, Jim Hart and
Ingrid Jensen appear alongside a stellar selection of UK musicians.
Neame stumbled across an article which claimed that 12 million Americans
believe interstellar lizards run the United States. "I wanted to write a tune that
would encourage people to wake up and question their beliefs" - 'Rise of the
Lizard People' is what followed, immediately dropping you into Neame's world of
pulsing rhythms and shifting feels.
The album finds Neame well equipped on his continued search for hard- fought
truths.

A deeply meditative soundscape for inner exploration and a dance of sonic textures. composed to be experienced inside a floatation tank, Noiro creates a moment of calm over the 50 minute concept record (2x 25 minute sides). Think Space-Music..
The debut LP is his first entirely solo Ambient Electronic LP, encouraged by the purchase of an old piano with warmth and plenty of character. Recorded in London during the sweltering summer of 2018, the final product is timeless and powerful, whether experienced afloat or just in a horizontal position.

Inside the tank is a whole different experience, touching on the euphoric. The depravation of other senses lead to the music stimulating the mind to fully transport the listener to another realm with maximum effect.

Feelings of immense calm and reassurance come from the experience. Intimate and delicate melodic moments let the mind settle and explore the ambient scape. Later moments build with a sense of the epic, where the listener is left feeling that any obstacle can be overcome.

A rigorous recollection of all the music that went into last year's Netflix smash The Queen's Gambit. You were probably too busy trying to keep up with actress Anya Taylor-Joy's timer-stopping and piece-placing chops to notice the ingenuity of the soundtrack; packed with contemporaneous music to the time in which the series is set, from Donovan to The Monkees to The Vogues, we're duly thrown back by this new 2xLP edition (which comes to a special black and white colour vinyl). Check it, mate.

Clear Vinyl

I met Thomas Roussel in 2017 at a Pigalle fashion show in Paris. As always with Stéphane Ashpool, the designer of Pigalle, casting is perfect and the clothes are modern and groundbreaking. But my eyes and ears were intrigued by this retro-futuristic instrument next to me, the Cristal Baschet. French composer and conductor Thomas Roussel wrote the soundtrack of the show.
He add this magnificent instrument in his "not very classical" orchestra, this is what I immediately loved with him!
He invited us into his world of classical music with a fresh twist, simplicity and audacity.
At the same time I was scratching my head to find something different to celebrate the 15th anniversary of Ed Banger records.
For a long time I had this idea of mixing both electronic and classical music together. Exactly like my heroes Metallica did in 1999 with the Symphonic orchestra of San Francisco! Thomas Roussel seems the perfect man for this crazy idea. We did Ed Banger 15 together and we became friends.
Thomas Roussel grew up in Dijon, spent his days at the conservatory and his nights at L’An-Fer, one of the most respected Techno club in France. Probably the reason why he ended up working with Jeff Mills, on two projects mixing Jeff’s 909 and a classical orchestra.
By experimenting new ways of using an orchestra, by creating state-of-the-art scenography and producing more ambitious music he quickly became the man in charge of everything "classica". The list of his collaborations is too long and will ruin this little introduction.
It could sounds like this : Chanel, Apple, Cartier, Kenzo, Nike, Dior…
Performing from Paris to Macau, from Monte Carlo to Dubai and from New York to Beijing!
In 2017 Thomas Roussel released his first album as Prequell with Universal Music.
A successful collaboration that really allows Thomas Roussel to become an artist.
In 2022 Ed Banger records is proud to release Thomas Roussel "LATE METAL" a 3 tracks EP.
Where uplifting orchestration and electronic music composing collide. The perfect soundtrack of a block buster movie mixing George Lucas & Christopher Nolan generations. It’s also a marker of our time, music boundaries are explosing. It’s time to hear the London Symphony Orchestra’s strings battling with a Drum’n’Bass beat, a way to DEIFIED classical music.
It’s also a record for your eyes. Art director Andy Picci created an algorthym and gave life to a mercury abstract form. This collaboration
marks the need for Thomas Roussel to always push the boundaries and take his project to another LEVEL.

An absolutely legendary album from Lebanon by Issam Hajali’s group Ferkat Al Ard, “Oghneya” stands out as one of the great musical gems of the Arab world. A groundbreaking release from 1978 that represents the meeting point of Arab, jazz, folk and Brazilian styles with the talent of Ziad Rahbani, who did the albums arrangements. Filled with a variety of sounds and genres, from Baroque Pop to Psych-Folk to flashes of Bossa Nova, Tropicalia and MPB, “Oghneya” is like if Arthur Verocai took a trip to Beirut in the 70’s to record an album.

In 2015 we heard Ferkat Al Ard’s music for the first time, a Lebanese trio compromised of Issam Hajali, Toufic Farroukh and Elia Saba. It was a stunningly unique release that blends traditional Arabic elements, jazz and Brazilian rhythms hand in hand with poetic-yet-politically engaged lyrics. The band was active in the left-wing movement of Lebanon of the time and they communicated their political ideas candidly through their songwriting.

In our mind the idea was to see whether Issam was interested in re-releasing “Oghneya.” He was not opposed to it, but also made it clear that it was not his priority for a first project. He suggested we start with his first album, before Ferkat Al Ard was formed, “Mouasalat Ila Jacad El Ard,” which was recorded in 1977 in Paris together with his friend Roger Fakhr (whose work we have been privileged to re-release in the meantime as well.) “Mouasalat Ila Jacad El Ard” is melancholic, stripped-down, guitar-based folk intertwined with jazz-fused breaks, and the unique sound of the santour glistens through. While the music is very accessible, some song structures are rather atypical, neglecting common patterns of verse, hook, verse, hook. The lyrics mostly trace back to the poetic work of Palestinian author Samih El Kasem, with one song also written by Issam, who composed the music for the whole album.

We re-released Issam’s “Mouasalat Ila Jacad El Ard” in 2019 to a great reception, with positive reviews all over the place and an ongoing appreciation for the album. This meant it was time for us to undertake an “Oghneya” re-release again!

If you compare “Mouasalat Ila Jacad El Ard” and “Oghneya,” one apparent distinction is the strong Brazilian influence in the music. Issam Hajali explained that you can already hear traces of this influence on his debut, but it’s “Oghneya” where this musical relationship really peaks. Lebanon and Brazil have had a strong connection for nearly a century due to the continuous flow of immigrants from one country to the other. Today, Brazil has the largest Lebanese diaspora in the world, the “Brasilibanês”. The migratory route was not a one-way street, however, and some Lebanese returned to their home country, taking recordings of the music they learned to love in Brazil with them. They were followed by Brazilian musicians who visited primarily Beirut during the 1960’s and the first half of the 1970’s, just like many other musicians from around the world. In these years between the independence and the beginning of the civil war, Beirut became even more of a cultural center and regional hub than it already was.

Bossa Nova, at that time, was one of the defining sounds of Brazilian popular music. Issam Hajali remembers hearing it at a bar in Beirut’s Hamra district in 1974, which hosted musicians from Brazil playing the occasional gig. When Issam had returned from Paris in 1976 he got to know Ziad Rahbani, son of Fairouz, who had a shared passion with Issam for a lot of things, among them Brazilian music. Issam showed him some of the tracks he was working on, and Ziad agreed to help with arranging. The music that evolved from this cooperation between Ferkat Al Ard and Ziad Rahbani’s arrangement is, to put it lightly, outstanding. Issam’s singing is embedded into the uniquely beautiful string arrangements backed by the band’s poignant, swinging groove. The lyrics of the songs on “Oghneya” are based on poems by Mahmoud Darwish, Samih Al Qasem and Tawfiq Ziad, three pillars of Palestinian poetry within the last century, and their influence on “Oghneya” was itself a strong political statement during the Lebanese war.

“Oghneya” was eventually released in 1978 by the band themselves on cassette tapes. Finding a blank tape that fit the playing time proved to be impossible during the war so they needed to open up the case of each cassette to physically cut down the tape and customize it to the playing time. The album was well received, though some cultural critics deemed it too “occidental” in its sound. While the cassette was circulating, Ziad Rahbani started a label called Zida, together with Khatchik Mardirian. They decided to help the band with a re-release on vinyl in 1979, a year after “Oghneya” was originally released on cassette.

Sadly, there are two tracks from the original release of “Oghneya” that did not make it onto the reissue. “Ghfyara Ghaza” was replaced by the song “Juma’a 6 Hziran.” while “Huloul” was taken off without a replacement. This happened as a precondition from the band for this reissue to happen. We would have loved to include all tracks, but the decision ranged between having either a reissue like the one we put out or no reissue at all. Thus, an easy choice for us.

As always both vinyl and CD come with an extensive booklet with an interview with Issam as well as unseen photos from the recording sessions.

Camisole is proud to unveil another part of the french cold wave history with the reissue of "Paroles Absurdes" LP by White Pain.

Hailing from Lyon the band began as a duo with Patrick Saveau and Patrick Gravier in 1984.Active figures in the underground scene of their city, they played some gigs and even had their own show on the local radio station.They developed a small following around them and recruited other members to record this album in 1986.

"Paroles Absurdes" is driven by the feeling that you can't escape your fate. Saying Words that you sometimes regret but you feel to be true.This testimony infuses this whole album.However, positive assumptions flow from time to time and left their more pop appeal roll into some songs.

This reissue also includes the first two tracks of the group only released on tape in 1985.As a duo, White Pain was a synth and drum machine band inspired by early 80's german pioneers like DAF or Din a Testbild.They used to have a raw, powerful, and dark sound quite unique in France at this time."Vienna" is probably the best way to resume their first intention.

A spellbinding tribute from one multi-faceted artist to another. New York-based artist Aki Onda (b. 1967) conjured a transduction to the Korean multi-media pioneer Nam June Paik (1932-2006). Aki himself describes the project:

“Nam June’s Spirit Was Speaking to Me occurred purely by chance. In 2010, I was spending four days at Nam June Paik Art Center in South Korea for a series of performances and had plenty of free time to wander. The building was packed with Paik’s artwork and related material. I have always felt a close kinship with him as an artist, and so it was a great opportunity to immerse myself in his works and ephemera.

It was that night I made the first contact, via a hand-held radio in a hotel room in Seoul. It was literally out of the blue. Scanning through the stations, I stumbled upon what sounded like a submerged voice and I began to record it in fascination. I concluded this was Paik’s spirit reaching out to me.

The project continued to grow organically as I kept channeling Paik’s spirit over long distance and receiving cryptic broadcasts/messages. The series of séances, conducted in different cities across the globe, began in Seoul in 2010, and continued in Köln, Germany in 2012, Wrocław, Poland in 2013, and Lewisburg, USA in 2014. The original recordings were captured by the same radio which has a tape recorder, with almost no editing, save for some minimal slicing and mastering.

Paik is known for his association with shamanism, a practice that constantly surfaces in his works all through his career. In an interview, he stated “In Korea, diverse forms of shamanism are strongly remained. Even though I have created my work unconsciously, the most inspiring thing in my work came from Korean female shaman Mudang.” Paik himself was a master shaman and vividly used shaman rituals and symbols for staging his performances and installations.

These recordings also became a way for me to explore the mythic form of radio—a medium which is full of mysteries. The transmissions captured may be “secret broadcasts” on anonymous radio stations. There are in fact hundreds of those stations around the world, although the numbers dwindle as clandestine messages can now be sent via encrypted digital channels. Some of these stations were likely for military use or espionage or relics of the Cold War. But many others continue without apparent explanation. These are just some of the questions that remain unanswered.”

Commissioned in 2017 by documenta 14's radio program “Every Time A Ear di Soun,” these recordings were continually broadcast on eight radios stations around the world that year. Nam June’s Spirit is a beautifully formed homage, I cannot think of any other like it. An intimate, flickering language discovered through the air. The LP comes replete with a booklet of photographs of Paik on the set of Michael Snow’s unreleased film Rameau’s Nephew (1974).

Sean McCann, 2020
Aki Onda, 2017

20-page art booklet including rare photographs of Nam June Paik from the set of Michael Snow’s film Rameau’s Nephew (1974), two essays on radio-wave phenomenon (by Onda and Marcus Gammel), and a remembrance of Paik by Yuji Agematsu

Johannes Kolter is Kolter, an artist formerly known as DJOKO, and now a hotly tipped breaks and garage head who has already got plenty of attention. Here though he makes a grand and widescreen statement with the first release on the all-new Pilot label. It is a stylish and adventurous record with plenty of killer cuts from the downbeat hip hop opener to the deep house delights of 'Journey' via the elastic and energetic future house kicks of 'Roboflow.' Showcasing both a knack for well craft synths and expert drum programming precisions, this record plays out like a mini DJ set with all the twists and turns you need to keep you on your toes and fully engaged.

Post-Soviet punkrock/hardcore hailing from Riga, Latvia, with melodies and socio-political subtext leaving no one uninspired. HAVE NO HEROES started in 2016 and are now about to release their 2nd full-length album, titled "Letters to Nowhere" on Swedish record label Black Star Foundation, home of bands like: Atlas Losing Grip, Enemy Alliance, the Idoru, This Calling, Idle Class, Fights & Fires, Meleeh, etc.
Have No Heroes first album "Plastic World" was released by the band themselves. With no promotion and mostly by word of mouth the band's music got spread like wildfire and gained listeners all over the world (statistics says that most listeners are situated in Canada, but then… that's no lie to state that the Canadians know about the best political skatepunk available, huh).
By coincidence Swedish record label Black Star Foundation got to hear the band's music. With a fierce rhythm section, aggressive and melodic guitars, and "in your face" lyrics with actual meaning, it was impossible for BSF to not ask the band for future collaborations.

Have No Heroes is a four-piece band in the category of bands like Propaghandi, Rise Against, and already mentioned Atlas Losing Grip.

Sound Like: Pennywise, Rise Against, Propagandhi, Atlas Losing Grip

Propulsive tabla percussion and meditative drones collide in deep instrumental conversation on Shruti Dances, the debut collaborative album between UK heavyweights Auntie Flo and Sarathy Korwar, forthcoming on the newly relaunched, Make Music imprint.

Across six exchanges of dynamic electronic production and richly layered Indian classical percussion, Shruti Dances discovers two architects of rhythm and movement on an explorative journey through South Asian tonality and diasporic identity.

One an elemental force on drums, the other on the decks, London-based, Indian-raised drummer/composer, Sarathy Korwar and Scottish-Goan producer/DJ, Auntie Flo first connected back in 2019, unaware both were navigating opposite ends of the beat equilibrium. Where Auntie Flo (aka Brian D’Souza) was new to Korwar’s reimagining of jazz, Indian classical music, electronics and spoken word, Korwar was already a big admirer of Auntie Flo’s intl-facing club output, having first discovered D’Souza’s Rainfall On Red Earth off his Soniferous Garden 12” and 2019 SAY award-winning (Scottish Album of The Year), Radio Highlife. Once properly acquainted, Korwar invited Auntie Flo to remix a track off his landmark 2019 album, More Arriving, described by The Guardian as “a stylistic leap from jazz to hip-hop to spoken word…a protest record encompassing the breadth of immigrant experiences”.

The seeds of an unlikely yet powerful musical bond had been sown and when mutual friend, co-founder of Mixcloud, and Make Music label organiser, Nikhil Shah, asked the duo to inaugurate the label’s new live/electronic direction (previously home to Leon Vynehall, U and George Fitzgerald), Korwar and D’Souza hit the studio. Expanding on early conversations around traditional Indian instrumentation, practicing meditation and improvisation, Shruti Dances (a riff on free dance movement, Ecstatic Dance) was born. Meaning 'that which is heard' in Sanskrit, shruti refers to a note in musical terms, but in this case also references the album’s most prominent influence and instrument, the shruti box.

“The shruti box formed the basis of the sound of the project. It’s a drone instrument, similar to a harmonium, and it makes an amazing sound. I’ve spent the last two years studying sound therapy, and immersing myself in ambient and drone through the Ambient Flo project, and am particularly interested in how they can induce meditative states of consciousness. I was really excited to hear what the Shruti box could do with this EP.” Auntie Flo

Across six tracks, (each named after 6 of the 7 main musical notes in the Indian solfege system), Shruti Dances draws on a celestial mix of traditional percussion and processed digital effects. On opening track Dha, Korwar’s sparse tabla rhythms hop across D’Souza’s scattered, arpeggiated synths, where as on Pa, a Balearic shuffle channels Moroccan Gnawa music and Senegalese sabar meets Mark Ernestus’s Ndagga Rhythm Force. Harmonic speed tabla and roaming drones provide a sense of the ethereal and fourth-worldly on Ma, a track that’s resplendent, curious atmosphere would fit snug into the deep listening-focused programming of Auntie Flo’s Ambient Flo online radio station, a curatorial platform and avenue exploring his interest/promotion of mental health, launched over the UK’s first lockdown. Ni sees Korwar pick up the sticks, thrashing toms in a spirited frenzy, whilst downtempo album closer Sa offers some room for reflection, its slow, swirling chords cloud our focus, leaving us with all but the distant sound of birdsong.

"Don’t be afraid, old son, it’s only me,
though not as I’ve appeared before,
on the battlements of your signature,
or margin of a book you can’t throw out"
~ Michael Donaghy

Whytwo is a young, enigmatic artist from Scotland, UK. A talented multi-instrumentalist and performer with an extraordinarily broad range.
First coming to Blu Mar Ten's attention after entering their 2017 remix competition, Whytwo created a wildly different take on their track 'Titans', bending it into a skittering, menacing groove while somehow maintaining a playful edge.

Fast-forward a little and we've now arrived at Whytwo's debut LP, 'Ghost', an exhilarating and elasticated take on Drum & Bass that exists in the hinterland between elation, melancholy and longing.

Mirroring Whytwo's music, the album's title, 'Ghost', is richly layered word, meaning, in different places and at different times; a memory of something or someone; to disappear without communication; to move quietly and quickly; to secretly do work for another; and, of course, a being caught between worlds.
From the old English, 'Gast', meaning 'breath' or 'spirit', the word eventually transformed into 'Ghost' coming to describe "a slight suggestion, mere shadow or semblance". All of these definitions relate, in some way, to the album now before us.

In conversations with Whytwo, he describes how his Jazz musician Grandfather was the person responsible for first giving him music-making software, and whose clarinet features on some of the album tracks. At the same time that 'Ghost' was being created, Whytwo was looking after a young child and some of the drums on 'Ghost' are recordings of the child hitting things. Whytwo describes the feeling of existing between these two extreme states, young & old, naive & experienced, primitive & advanced, and taking the role of a medium 'caught between worlds' whose task was to stitch together this generational fabric.

The result is nothing less than spectacular. Despite having its roots in Drum & Bass, the rules and conventions of the style are ruthlessly disobeyed resulting in glittering cascades of melody, harmony and rhythm that somehow burst with both sadness and joy, hope & loss, memory and anticipation. The music swoops and dips, briefly casting shadows before blasting them away with sunlight, evoking memories both personal and collective. This is 'Lost Soul Music' that manages to speak to all of us.

Despite being deceptively listenable, Whytwo insists this is not relaxing background music. Listeners should fully engage with the music beyond its attractive surface and absorb it at the same deep human level where it was created. 'Ghost's production levels are astoundingly high but focussing on those would be a mistake. They only serve to carry the spiritual content of the music across to the audience and unlock the valves of feeling. The beauty here is not the machine, but the ghost in the machine.

REMASTERED

Grönland Records announce a revised, remastered reissue of “Sleepwalkers” by DAVID SYLVIAN. Available as a gatefold 2LP with exclusive art print and as a gatefold digipack CD, this new edition also features the previously unreleased track “Modern Interiors”.

in the 00s, DAVID SYLVIAN produced two of his strongest and most solitary statements, BLEMISH and MANAFON. but those records don’t tell the whole story. during that the same period, SYLVIAN created an alternate body of work: a series of collaborations and side projects with leading talents of pop and improv, electronic and contemporary classical music. the best of these recordings are gathered here on SLEEPWALKERS, meticulously sequenced and remixed: the fruits of one-off meetings and lifelong partnerships, they jump from bliss to intrigue, romance to sensuality, as arch experiments lead into the lushest pop.

the single ‘world citizen – i won’t be disappointed,’ written with RYUICHI SAKAMOTO, is a sublime example, with an impeccable melody and lyric warmed by SYLVIAN’S gorgeous tenor. SYLVIAN has worked with SAKAMOTO for close to three decades. by contrast, on ‘pure genius,’ a collaboration with CHRIS VRENNA aka tweaker, he sounds like he’s walked into a heist flick, singing the part of a delusional, dangerous bedroom genius. as sylvian explains, tracks like this ‘give me a chance to write in a way that’s completely non-personal, playful. it’s an exercise of some kind, working within the parameters of a given assignment.’

intrigue of a different kind drives ‘sugarfuel,’ with music by JEAN-PHILIPPE VERDIN, aka READYMADE FC. the lyrics offered ‘an opportunity to grapple with a more overt sexual theme than anything i’d previously attempted, as suggested by a vocal sample in the original track provided, a threateningly insistent ‘i’m on your side.’ so i took that as my point of entry and ran with it. i would love to write more on this subject should i find the right context. you’re always aware of walking a thin line exploring sexuality with language alone. the failings of the great and the good are strewn all around.’

NINE HORSES’ ‘wonderful world’ strolls in on a black tie bassline and the echoing coos of swedish chanteuse STINA NORDENSTAM, whose high chirps brush hands with SYLVIAN’S lead; there’s the blistering ‘money for all’ by FRIEDMAN and SYLVIAN, an oblique response to the fallout of 9/11 and the war on iraq. this is followed by the last known recording of SYLVIAN’S singing voice in over a decade, ‘do you know me now?’, a live studio recording later augmented by JAN BANG, EIVIND AARSET and ERIK HONORÉ. it’s certainly a title that’s become more relevant over time as SYLVIAN, in the latter stages of his career, repeatedly comes face to face with a new generation of admirers fixated on the life and times of the band formed by his younger self. SYLVIAN is one of only a handful of musicians to have successfully moved on from overt pop beginnings into a domain all his own but is consistently plagued by the misguided desires or expectations of some unfamiliar with his evolution to do a u-turn, pick up where he left off in the late 90s. although this compilation, as well as his writing for NINE HORSES, adequately shows SYLVIAN’S traditional love of melody is
intact, that it’s consistently remained part of his output, there’s no denying his focus has shifted, evolved.
the refusal to embrace complacency, the need to cover new ground ‘as older generations of popular musicians have a moral duty to explore despite, or because of, the greater possibility of failure’ will, i believe, lead to a reassessment of his later work that embraces a sightly more complex relationship with what we’re referring to as ‘melodic’, accompanied by an exploration of improvisation without dogma or beholden to any ‘givens’ for which he’s not infrequently been castigated. for SYLVIAN, there are no such boundaries. it’s obvious that different facets of his work co-exist without conflict but not necessarily for the majority of his audience. again, this places SYLVIAN in the odd, rare, unenviable(?) position of moving forwards leaving many in his devoted audience behind as, should he decide to return to music, it’s unlikely he’ll be aiming to placate an audience in love with work that preceded the 00s. in fact we’ve no idea where new work, should it surface, may lead.

SLEEPWALKERS also spotlights the innovators who contributed to MANAFON and BLEMISH. CHRISTIAN FENNESZ hangs a crackling, shimmering curtain behind the vocal on ‘transit,’ matching his signature mass of sui generis sounds to sylvian’s stately performance. and the title track began with an instrumental handed to SYLVIAN by MARTIN BRANDLMAYR of POLWECHSEL, soon after the first recording session for MANAFON. spite crackles in the gaps between the percussion, and onkyo artists TOSHIMARU NAKAMURA and SACHIKO M set the stage for the scathing lyrics in the chorus.

it cuts close to the bone and so do the two spoken word cuts, ‘angel’ and ‘thermal,’ produced by SAMADHISOUND recording artists JAN BANG and ERIK HONORÉ (and featuring ARVE HENRIKSEN on trumpet). SYLVIAN describes the latter work as a ‘love poem’ to his daughter. ‘‘thermal’ reflects on a period when our time in sonoma, ca was coming to an end. we’d stayed in temporary accommodation which had lulled us into a false sense of security. we had pear, apple, lemon, and figs trees growing in the yard. a small but exotic paradise. a cocoon. but the cracks were beginning to show in the relationship between ex-wife INGRID CHAVEZ and i which is where i think this underlying sense of anxiety, which runs throughout the poem, is derived from, coupled with the need to provide physical and spiritual stability to the children, the youngest of whom was just under two at the time. the poem is addressed to her. our world was dissipating, coming apart at the seams, but we were an island unto ourselves.’

‘five lines’ marked the start of a new partnership with acclaimed young composer DAI FUJIKURA, who at the time of recording was also working on remixes of MANAFON for what became DIED IN THE WOOL. the string quartet was performed by the celebrated ICE ENSEMBLE and written for SYLVIAN, who FUJIKURA cites as an early influence. says SYLVIAN, ‘the composition moves through numerous changes in time signature but as i had no knowledge of what these were i just relied on my gut instinct, and responded, as i always do, with what felt right to me, composing an entirely new melody in the process. some months later i was working in a studio in london and dai dropped by. i rather tentatively asked if he’d like to hear a rough mix of the song as it stood, painfully aware that my contribution might make no sense to him at all but, to my relief he loved the result.’

there’s one further new addition to this collection, the first official release of a track composed in response to the tsunami in fukushma, ‘modern interiors’, featuring SYLVIAN once again in collaboration with BANG and AARSET.

like 2000s EVERYTHING AND NOTHING, SLEEPWALKERS is a retrospective of a particular decade when SYLVIAN was free of major label interference and could follow his own instincts without having to explaining himself – but it’s also an eye-opening complement to his solo releases. as SYLVIAN explains, ‘some collaborations seem to be a one-off exchange but you can never be too certain of that fact. others have been long term. in this respect, RYUICHI comes to mind. there’s others with whom you hope to continue working as you feel you’ve barely scratched the surface. other times offers come out of the blue, welcome, inspired. regardless, it’s wonderfully explorative to have so many possibilities to juggle with. each collaboration seems timely. it’s as if there’s a rightness to the exchange at a given moment in time.’

in the meantime, we hope you enjoy the work presented here, personally selected, remixed and sequenced and entirely remastered. these are the orphans, abused, estranged, exotic, migrating from diverse corners of the globe, brought together under one roof which they're learning to share despite their differences.

‘as many of you will already be aware, despite relatively continuous work on solo albums, i’ve maintained strong ties with a number of musicians throughout my life in one context or another. on this new collection, let’s call it SLEEPWALKERS 2.0, a selection of collaborative work produced over the period encompassing blemish through to manafon, i’ve included compositions by nine horses as well as more fleeting flirtations and one-offs. neglected offspring. represented also is long term friend and writing partner, RYUICHI SAKAMOTO, as well as more recent but potentially equally productive partnerships such as CHRISTIAN FENNESZ, ARVE HENRIKSEN and contemporary classical composer DAI FUJIKURA.
i hope you enjoy the work presented here, personally selected, remixed and sequenced and entirely remastered. these are the orphans, abused, estranged, exotic, migrating from diverse corners of the globe, brought together under one roof which they're learning to share despite their differences.

we contain multitudes. we’re nothing if not contradictory.’

DAVID SYLVIAN, 2010

(consistency is contrary to nature, contrary to life: aldous huxley)

**180g heavyweight vinyl** Les Racines is the latest solo album from the eminent guitarist and songwriter Vieux Farka Touré, and his first for World Circuit Records. Known as the ‘Hendrix of the Sahara’, Vieux has released 4 critically acclaimed solo albums to date, extending the boundaries of traditional West African music into new and uncharted territory. He has also released audacious collaborations with the likes of Dave Matthews and jazz guitarist John Scofield, and albums with American singer-songwriter Julia Easterlin and Israeli singer-songwriter Idan Raichel. With Les Racines, which translates as ‘the roots’, Vieux documents a deep reconnection with the traditional Songhai music of northern Mali which is one of the traditions that has come to be known in the West as ‘Desert Blues’. Vieux’s roots run deeper than deep – he is the son of Ali Farka Touré, widely acclaimed as the finest guitarist Africa has ever produced. Recorded in Bamako in Vieux’s home studio, the timeless grooves of the album are steeped in the traditional music of West Africa. But the fire of Vieux’s guitar playing and the urgency of the messages in his songs add an entirely contemporary relevance. “We are nothing if we abandon respect for the past,” Vieux says. The resulting album, the most profound statement of his career to date, marks out Vieux as the great Ali Farka Touré’s rightful heir and a major artist in his own right. “Early in my career people asked why I wasn’t just following my father. But it was important for me to establish my own identity,” Vieux says. “Now people know what I can do, I can return to those roots with pride and I hope a certain authority.”

Moundabout is a new folk project from Paddy Shine of Gnod and Phil Masterson of Los Langeros/Damp Howl/Bisect, but the words ‘new’ and ‘folk’ need to be treated with care here. Listening to ‘Flowers Rot, Bring Me Stones’ is like entering a trance state while staring at one of the Knowth spiral carvings at Brú na Bóinne in Ireland - the megalithic art in the neolithic “passage tombs” which also contain the oldest known representation of the moon made by man. As the album moves the listener, they are taken on a geographical and geological journey as well as psychological and spiritual, traveling inwards from the coast as well as down beneath the strata. And when you have been primed, it takes you all the way back to commune with older gods on the album’s epic centrepiece, ‘Dick Dalys Dance’, creating the kind of prehistoric drones and trance-inducing rhythms that the echoing, celestially aligned corridors of the Brú na Bóinne were built to amplify. This is not new music but the deep sensations it provokes will be new to most listeners. Imagine for a few minutes something as glorious as a Nurse With Wound List for the 21st Century - were I given such a formidable task as to organise such a collection of mind-bending music, Flowers Rot, Bring Me Stones by Moundabout would be one of the first records I would include.

"bit by bit" is the first full-length release from Toronto-based singer-songwriter Evan J Cartwright. This self produced album from the go-to drummer/collaborator (The Weather Station, U.S. Girls, Brodie West) presents a highly singular songwriting vision that combines existential lyrics with masterful musicianship. Steeped in jazz melodicism, Cartwright’s trumpet-like phrasing mixed with contemporary composition presents an eclectic art song performed by an artist that could perhaps be best described as a post-modern Chet Baker. Deep poetic observations on love and time paint an affecting picture of an artist reflecting on life’s universal truths. Visual in nature, "bit by bit" places its audience within a world of musical leitmotifs extracted from field recordings of bells and birdsong. Collected during years of touring, these sounds evoke extant spaces beyond that which the music inhabits. The use of this source material in its unaltered form evokes the feeling of a technicolour European film at one moment and then, as the extrapolated melodies are meticulously translated into electronic tone bank sequences, a modernist setting the next. One carillon melody is used as the basis for a wealth of the album’s musical material before its origin is finally revealed by the chiming of bells in the last seconds of the album. The result is a fragment of space between the constructed world of the musical compositions and the candid world of documentation, inviting the listener to ponder whether those two worlds are distinct or whether the songs and music are not simply “field recordings” themselves. Throughout "bit by bit" Cartwright drops staggering revelations hiding in plain prose that often involve the contemplation of time. In I Don’t Know he states “if I only trusted time / then I would wish it all away” and nearing the album’s end he opens impossibly blue with the phrase “the impossible truth of time”, playfully inserting a pregnant pause before the word time. A drummer’s fixation, to be certain, the album’s recurring theme of time is eclipsed only by Cartwright’s contemplation of human relationships. Here he elaborates on some of the album’s subjects: “Many of the lyrics circle, and try to give a name to the illegible space between human beings. “i DON’t know” celebrates the fact that we will never truly understand what love is. Its message is one of assurance. It says that we can never really touch love, and that is ok. “and you’ve got nobuddy” refers to life’s great tragedy: that we are unable to read each others’ experiences, and in reaction to this, we separate ourselves.” The entirety of "bit by bit" is a continuous work. There is seldom a clear demarcation of where one piece ends and another begins and when this does occur, it is done crudely, as if someone is flipping through a series of broadcasted channels. At times words are sliced right out of their lines and replaced by pure tones. This is both a comical interpretation of censorship and a reminder that there are things in life that will forever remain unseen and illegible. In fact, this statement lies at the centre of the LP and although hidden beauty does reveal itself through repeated listenings, "bit by bit’s" eccentric world remains just out of reach — an imaginary second story room viewed from a crowded city street.

Mieko Shimizu is a London based Japanese singer, songwriter, composer and producer. Mieko first erupted onto the UK electronic scene as Apache 61; her searing alter ego, fusing layers of cross-woven breaks and battling shards of sub-bass within stateless melodies drawn from the fringes of the avant-garde. Garnering plays by John Peel she quickly build herself a name across the underground scene. Originally trained in Jazz, she cites the multidisciplinary performance artist Meredith Monk and composer Terry Riley as early influences, but also draws inspiration from many genres.

Phenomena of the mind is a re-mastered EP of selected tracks from the album of the same title released in 2006, the year after the London Terror attacks. Something dispirited and unexplainable lay heavy in the air of this immense city that we lived and breathed. In the title song “ Phenomena of the mind” Mieko’s intense Japanese rap echoed the din of the chaotic streets we walk.‘Visualise’, she says, try to imagine a way to fight our way our way out of this ominous struggle.
In the track “Signal Found”, the theme continues to shattered Dance Hall beats that reverberate to the “Twisted Sound” of “Broken down” “London Town”. “Have you lost a plot? Are you ok?” she asks?

In the track ‘Black Salt” a dark melancholic theme floats over fragmented, glitchy beats compounded by the repetition of the word “black” which hammers the constant bombardment of racism prescient of the call for freedom that “Black Lives Matter.”

Wonderland Magazine has described Mieko’s music as “beautiful poetic verses and stunning musical arrangements and Mark Taylor describes Mieko in Record Collector as “An avant-garden artist pushing boundaries”



• Re-mastered EP of selected tracks from the album of the same title released in 2006

• Premiering the re-release at Twenty One in Southend on 21st April

• Mark Taylor describes Mieko in Record Collector as “An avant-garden artist pushing boundaries”

Learning about what Deliluh has been through these past two years
brought the commands on a cassette player to mind: press rewind,
forward, play and eject The band, now a duo of Kyle Knapp and Julius Pedersen, relocated to Europe from their Toronto base with the ambition to plug into a continent that felt more cohesive in terms of a gig circuit and to map new spaces, both terrestrial and spiritual. This bold move came with several adjustments.

Fault Lines is also a European record in its making. It first took shape at a session in Copenhagen in January 2019 where the band, still a four piece, recorded the beds before heading out on tour. The plan was to take a post-tour break and track some ideas that could be worked on remotely until everyone got back together in the early summer. Then everything "kind of went sideways". Fault Lines stayed in an embryonic state for more than half a year, during which Deliluh reconfigured as a two piece. The lockdowns did, however, provide the time to rework material, or reposition ideas in line with the circumstances the pair found themselves in.

Julius Pedersen: "We did a lot of heavy lifting at home together in Berlin and Marseille, taking turns training back and forth, throwing shit at the wall and experimenting."

After all this upheaval, does Deliluh still dream of going to another place? Are places different and do they really have a bearing on the creative path? "There's always another place calling from beyond. Without it we would be stuck and hopeless

On textstar+ Jan Jelinek brings together the material from the CMYK series, four EPs he released between 1999 and 2002 under the pseudonym farben (the German word for both colours and paints), on a vinyl double LP for the first time. The selection of tracks has been remastered from the original tapes, joined by two additional pieces that appeared on compilations during the same period.

A Polaroid. Still life with tangled leads and consumer electronics, late twentieth century. Black and various shades of dirty white are the dominant non-colours. The image’s spatial depth remains diffuse, the links between its elements speculative. A note stuck to the wall (a legend, perhaps, or an all-explaining blueprint in text form?) is impossible to decipher. You can’t see what connects the picture’s signs. You have to hear it.

farben says: Every sound is a text. A bearer of meaning in search of a reader. Hoping the ideas inscribed in its autonomous existence will be understood as intended. While its beauty lies precisely in misunderstanding, in reading the coded message a new way every time. A thousand colours of sound, a thousand different ways to hear, to see, to understand.

On textstar+ Jan Jelinek brings together the material from the CMYK series, four EPs he released between 1999 and 2002 under the pseudonym farben (the German word for both colours and paints), on a vinyl double LP for the first time. The selection of tracks has been remastered from the original tapes, joined by two additional pieces that appeared on compilations during the same period. Another new element is the Polaroid, showing the origins of a world: Jelinek’s home studio in Berlin at the time.

farben says: Move your body! The project has its roots in Jelinek’s love of house as a reductionist vision of soul. Of four to the floor as a proposition that can be accessed anywhere. Of electronic dance music as a realm of possibility that can be continually expanded. farben was written as contemporary house music. As a text about excitement and euphoria. The arrangements were made directly while recording to DAT, on a twelve-channel mixing desk. Several track titles suggest a link to live concerts, coupled with the context of machine music and bedroom recording. Others affirm pop music’s most extravagant stock phrases about various states of love.

Jelinek produced the tracks with the aim of making music for dancefloors. An idea that failed very productively. In the locations to which it was originally addressed, the project barely figured. But people did listen, and they listened all the more closely to this music that opened up new acoustic and associative scope for house. farben is the opposite of genre: a music spawning new terms (clicks & cuts, micro-house) that never manage to fully capture it.

farben says: Signifiers. The four CMYK EPs are designed as a network of references that cannot be missed but that can also never be precisely deciphered. The vectors of sound, word and image point to Isaac Hayes and Ornette Coleman, to Detroit and the first generation of the Red Army Faction, to Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. So multifarious that they are distorted to the point of recognition. Overall we hear sonic docufictions whose appealing vagueness derives precisely from this oscillation between clarity and ambiguity, which is also the source of their poetry: the lyricism of the pure circulation of signs.

The artwork is based on photographs of former Red Army Faction members, broken down into the four colours of the CMYK model. The motifs dissolve into individual dots of a single colour, so close to the faces that their expressions are only hinted at. Taken together, the individual colours compose a new whole out of fragmentary material, defying definition and thus maintaining their vibrancy. The same occurs on the level of sound. The sampler Jelinek used for these tracks had to be fed with floppy disks, imposing a memory limit of 1.44 megabytes per audio quotation from soul or jazz records. As a necessary consequence of this, the individual references, like the dots of colour, are dissolved into details and abstractions. They appear as splinters that recombine in new ways to create new meanings. The joy of collapsing metaphors.

farben says: New departures. Even two decades after its original release, textstar+ does not come across as an epitaph to the modern era. Instead, it appears as a euphoric affirmation of the utopias of the twentieth century, translated into new sound texts via the aesthetic strategies of abstraction, collage, networking and speculation. 1.44 megabytes of history, one thousand signifiers, one album. From “Live ...” to “... Love”.

Arno Raffeiner, 2021

First time on vinyl for this album. Proto Jazz-Punk multi-genre splatter album, released on CD in 1993, My Wife Doesn’t Understand Me is available on vinyl for the first time as a double LP, playing at 45rpm for superior sound quality. The accompanying download includes radio edits of live favourite 6-8-1 (The Burn-Up) and Blue Funk, plus Ructions (60s Stereo Mix) and Qualm-Free Zone. A statement of intent from the off, this is an album first and foremost. No singles, a piece of work to be listened to as a whole - from short shards of humorous observation (Cover Versions), politics (Margaret Thatcher We Still Hate You), straight-as-a-die covers (A Taste Of Honey and Jean-Pierre) to the closing Musique Concrete of the title track, prisoners were never taken. Terry Edwards and The Scapegoats look forward to the vinyl edition of My Wife Doesn’t Understand Me to bemuse, baffle and delight once again as it did on it’s release when Acid House was on it’s way out and Britpop was on it’s way in.

Superchunk’s Incidental Music: 1991-1995 is the band’s second compilation of singles, B-sides, and EPs, originally released in 1995 shortly after their landmark album Foolish. It collects fan favorites from soundtracks such as “Shallow End” and B- sides like “On the Mouth,” as well as covers of The Magnetic Fields, The Verlaines, The Chills, and even Motörhead. AllMusic’s Fred Thomas says it all: “Incidental Music is an essential piece of the Superchunk discography and a snapshot of the band as it transitioned from the scrubby radiance of its early days into the more nuanced songwriting machine it became throughout the mid-’90s.” Exclusively for Record Store Day 2022, the double LP makes its first reappearance on vinyl since its original release, with LP1 on opaque green and LP2 on opaque orange housed in a gatefold jacket.

Joona Toivanen Trio makes their We Jazz Records debut with their new album "Both Only", out 25 Feb 2022. A landmark work for the long standing group, the album showcases a new sound for the band, trekking deep into new ideas for an acoustic jazz piano trio. Since their formation as teenagers in mid-1990's, the trio of pianist Joona Toivanen, bassist Tapani Toivanen and drummer Olavi Louhivuori (of Superposition, Ilmiliekki Quartet and Linda Fredriksson "Juniper") has developed their remarkably coherent band sound step by step, touring the world over. Nowadays, the trio is geographically split between Gothenburg, Sweden (Joona), Copenhagen, Denmark (Tapani), and Helsinki, Finland (Olavi), but the unit has never sounded so together as one, and as adventurous as on "Both Only".

"Both Only" by Joona Toivanen Trio is a cocoon, a welcoming shelter of sound that opens up naturally for the listener to inhabit. The album is moody and introspective, even dark at times, but by the time you get to the closing track, "This and This", you'll likely notice something hopeful brewing up. This is not music dealing with nostalgia or a world lost. Instead, it's a body of work with delicate dynamics, taking a minute just to listen and to look inwards to learn something, to move forward.

The first single "Enlightened" is perhaps the most traditional piece on the album, yet it flows like a vessel beyond genre, conveying a mood, a feeling and an idea. Listen to how the piano, bass and drums discuss, how the groove moves with the instruments having their clear roles but also supporting each other and documenting a musical aging process exactly as that of a quality bottle of red wine. As a song like "Direction" proves, the melody is there all the way, yet there is nothing obvious about how it's carried by the trio. Things remain surprising, fresh and moving at all times. "Except For" keeps its intensity, while nearly erupting into a full on 4-to-the-floor banger. Nearly! The key here is how the energy sustains itself, building the intensity within the music.

"Both Only" is a powerful statement from a band ready to renew itself time and again, and one willing to do it slowly, outside of the hype. This process makes the impact enduring, nuanced and lovely.

WJLP37 Joona Toivanen Trio "Both Only" is available on vinyl as a black vinyl edition and as a LP+7" bundle also including WJ0716 "Except For (7" Edit)" / "Keyboard Study No. 2".

“More excellent poetic soundscapes from We Jazz! Love the flow through the tracks here – textural pieces moving into more rhythmic jazz abstractions. Beautifully recorded too.”
Quinton Scott — Worldwide FM

“Following on from the excellent Linda Fredriksson album We Jazz extend the journey with this innovative Joona Toivanen Trio set.”
Paul Bradshaw — Straight No Chaser

“You’ll look in vain here for extravagant splashes of color or bright swathes of sound, but what you will discover are a finely-chiselled set of compositions that make the most of the trio’s limited palette: flint-sharp melodies hewn from the ice, crisp and crackling rhythms.”
Cal Gibson — Ban Ban Ton Ton

“Incredible album from Joona Toivanen Trio and a strong start to the new year from We Jazz.”
Kerem Gokmen — Dubmission

“Encapsulating a new movement in jazz.”
Jay Scarlett — Sounds Supreme

“Interesting listen on the shortest day of the year. They have a very definite and saturated style.”
John Chacona — All About Jazz

“Airplayed the track”
Tom Ravenscroft — BBC6 Music

“Jazz album of the year released already in February?”
Ralf Sandell — Hufvudstadsbladet

“★★★★★”
Iida Simes — Voima Magazine