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LTD. BLUE SEAGLASS WAVE TRANSLUCENT VINYL

Last spring, Devendra Banhart and Noah Georgeson started to make a record that was like nothing they had made before _ an ambient album that would be both a haven from a suddenly terrified world and a heartfelt musical dialogue between two artists who have been friends and collaborators for over two decades. Refuge is an album of profound meditative beauty which offers the listener a much-needed sense of peace and renewal. But while it was recorded in 2020 its roots go back much further _ all the way to the start of their friendship and, beyond that, to the shared sounds and ethics of their childhoods. Devendra grew up in Venezuela while Noah, six years older, is a native of Nevada City, California. But as they got to know each other, they realised that they had a similar history in the New Age subculture of the 1980s: a world of meditation, Eastern music, the Bhagavad Gita and The Whole Earth Catalog. Childhood memories were coloured by the aromas of health food stores and the sound of New Age labels like Windham Hill Records. Noah, whose production and mixing credits include Joanna Newsom and the Strokes, came on board as co-producer of Devendra's 2005 album Cripple Crow and they have been working together ever since. It was while making Devendra's 2019 album Ma that the pair finally decided to make their ambient record. Despite complicating logistics, 2020 created an emotional craving for music with this contemplative, therapeutic quality. Inspired by both memories of the past and the needs of the present, Refuge is an act of companionship and generosity which gives the listener room to breathe. "We're hoping to create a sense of comfort and coming back to the moment," Devendra says. "It's really important to have a little bit of space between us and our anxieties and impulses. What you do with that space is up to you." Dorian Lynskey May 2021

Fake Laugh & Tarquin first became acquainted a very long time ago, before they were either Fake Laugh or Tarquin. Two humans in their late teens with a keen interest in sound, they would indulge each other in whatever conversation they could muster while loitering in the corridors of their sixth-form college. Their place of learning existed in a sleepy Sussex town where once a year, the skies are filled with explosions, while burning effigies are carried through the cobbled streets by inebriated locals. The two did not suspect that much would become of their light friendship - but in good time that would all change…

In the years that followed, the two young artists moved to London and embarked upon their own totally distinct musical journeys - Fake Laugh was playing in venues with ‘rock bands’, while Tarquin was carving out a niche for himself in the bubbling, lava-like instrumental grime scene, which brought a new kind of heat to the clubs of the city. His vibrant, unapologetically obtuse (and at times absurd) brand of club-music delighted the ears of listeners, the feet of dance-floor dwellers and the brains of music theorists - all in one fell swoop. Having released with Mr. Mitch’s crucial Gobstopper imprint as well as big-guns Rinse, Tarquin has become a household name in the homes of those that know. All the while, Fake Laugh was in his bedroom writing scores of songs and occasionally releasing collections of the strongest cuts on a variety of indie labels who believed in his talent for timeless melody, focussed through his own rose-misted, yet modern lens.

It wasn’t until the fabled summer of 2019 that Fake Laugh & Tarquin would make music together in the same room. The first session resulted in album opener Slow, a song which for the previous two years, lay dormant in an acoustic form on a dusty Fake Laugh hard-drive. Fake Laugh had the idea that perhaps the song could be transformed into something far bigger and better in the hands of Tarquin - a theory which was proven correct.

Throughout Fake Laugh & Tarquin the pair continuously confound the listener, fusing sharp and glacial synthetic elements with warm organic tones and heartfelt vocal performances. Money was written at the start of the global pandemic, a time in which people had more financial concerns than usual. Rejecting total doom and gloom, Fake Laugh & Tarquin turn this dystopian angst on its head and create a one-of-a-kind club mover that pulls inspiration from the super-slick grooves of early noughties stalwarts Moloko and Groove Armada. The album twists, turns, morphs and mutates until it’s peaceful conclusion in the form of existential piano-ballad Meaningless Thin

Joshua is the follow-up album to Olympic. While the second album, typically, often shows what critics call “maturity”, here Simon has released instead an album of adolescence. The musician opened up his own memory box to contemplate his childhood souvenirs, and dust them off of all nostalgia. At that time, he would VHS-record movies from TV and tape record soundtracks directly from the TV speaker, so he could listen to them in his bedroom. This is when he “discovered the power of music, the way it makes you enter another world, far from reality. I wanted to pay tribute to the era I shaped myself in – the ’80s and ’90s”. Tangerine Dream, Kraftwerk and Soft Machine. Logically, these are the sonic signatures that seem to haunt the album. The timeless pioneers of synthetic music constitute the sound references, without any established chronological timeline, that blend with the atmosphere of typically “French Touch” movie soundtracks – long before the term was even coined. “I use a musical palette that acts as a flashback to my favourite teenage movies: the synth sounds of Close Encounters of the Third Kind; the synth pads in Jean-Jacques Cousteau’s fascinating documentaries about the sea world; the melodies in the manner of François De Roubaix; the themes that evoke the soundtracks of late-night TV sessions (those by Verneuil, those with Belmondo, Depardieu, etc.); and the sci-fi ambiences like in Blade Runner.” In short, an aesthetic was decided on by Simon very early on: French analog synths instead of North American symphonic orchestras.

The name Joshua has two meanings for French 79: one is linked to the idea of nostalgia, the other to adventure. On the one hand, the computer in the 1983 movie Wargames, and on the other, the boat of French sailor Bernard Moitessier.

The track titled Joshua synthesizes the spirit of the album – an odyssey, a neverending crossing of the world in search of oneself, a spontaneous escape into the future, under the benevolent eye of the past. This epic invites everyone of us to a specific place in our imagination, which is also the source of an indescribable pleasure for French 79: a gust of wind, a sailboat ride, a skateboarding trick, the smell of freshly fallen snow, or the dull roar of an impatient audience.

The same aesthetic preferences are found in the videos that illustrate Joshua’s first tracks: for Hold On, the skateboarder chose to recall the cult ’90s skate videos that he would watch on repeat as a teenager, while Hometown hints at Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Although he now calls Marseille home, Simon continuously draws with passion from the anachronic contemporaneity of his childhood in the Eastern French region.

“I need escape to be able to create. A two or three-day sailing trip gives me enough inspiration to lock myself in the studio for a week when I’m back on dry land.” His boat takes him far away from everything, far from the Old Port where she moors, the rest of the time Simon would escape by walking the streets of his city or climbing the Alpine mountains.

Not only does the new version French 79 reveal a few biographical pieces of Simon henner's history, but it also inaugurates the first vocal track for the musician. One feels a guilty pleasure when hearing him take the lead on the first track, The Remedy. The electronic fugue that opens the album sets the tone: Simon has found the cure for his inner turmoil and wants us to discover our own treatment too. Hold On is a sonic explosion that celebrates the feeling of freedom - what's more of a teenage dream than this feeling - and it eventually command one to feel the same way too. Echoing Olympic, the electronic argonaut invites his muse again, singer Sarah Rebecca. On By Your Side and Touch The Stars, the native of Ocean Springs, Mississippi, now based in Paris, hoisted the mainsail of dream pop. First, though a dialogue that surfaced their unfailing attachment to the bonds of friendship, then through the light hearted atmosphere that leaves us with no choice but to believe in our own dreams and do anything possible to fulfill them. The quest for peace in the midst of the daily din is heard in both Code Zero and the title track Joshua, two majestic journeys in search of hedonism, combined with introspection.

First ever vinyl reissue of rare private pressed Florida Funk/Soul from 1980. Featuring founding members of 'The Winstons' (the 'Amen Break', most sampled track in electronic/hip hop music). 180g Black Vinyl Edition limited to 500 copies, comes with obi strip and insert featuring unseen pics & liner notes. Streetlife was a short-lived soul-funk band from the Tampa Bay area and released just one album in 1980. The group was composed out of several dynamic musicians (ranging from street players to college professors) but at that time nobody knew (yet) that their Nite Songs LP would become such a much sought-after private pressed holy grail within the record collecting community! Streetlife was founded in 1979 by Sonny Pekerol and Phil Tolotta who were both members of the top-selling 1960s Washington DC Grammy Award-winning hit band 'The Winstons'. Their track Amen, Brother is the most widely sampled instrumental in the history of the electronic music & hip hop genres_it would become known as the Amen Break. When `The Wintstons' story came to an end, Sonny Pekerol (founding member and originally playing the bass - then successfully evolving into the manager and promoter) and pianist/vocalist extraordinaire Phil Tolotta would continue their musical friendship/collaboration under the name `Streetlife'. Their high-energy sound got the attention of local crowds in no time_so the decision to record and cut a vinyl album came as a natural thing. Nite Songs (produced by Sonny & Phil, who also wrote the bulk of the songs) saw the light in 1980 and quickly gained attention and airplay (receiving radio & television coverage nation-wide). Described as the hottest band from the state of Florida, `Streetlife' had the magnetism to captivate you, be it on concerts, nightclubs or on vinyl. Other members included: Octavia (responsible for the amazing lead & backing vocals on the album), Mark Halisky (on keyboards & the writer of two songs on Nite Songs), Ray Butler (on drums), Mike Milhoan (on trumpet), Bryan Mann (on the guitar) and Stephen Nathan (playing the trombone, flugelhorn & doing the arrangements). Charles Davis also played bass in the band for a while (he and bandmate-drummer Ray Butler were members of the `Washington Jamb Band' back in 1977). Mike Flore (Sax) and Ramon Lopez (from the well-known `Stan Kenton Orchestra') would also join them on the Nite Songs recordings. Collectively `Streetlife' had more than 75 years of experience_and these extraordinary talents (with almost as many varying backgrounds) are meticulously coming together on the album we are presenting you today. The entire album is filled with sexy (yet strong) unique vocals that make the listener experience a lot of emotions, aggressive `slap & thumb' bass lines & small yet groovy horn sections _one can clearly hear the influences of artists like Otis Redding, Curtis Mayfield, as well as several Motown, acts like Marvin Gaye softly slipping in. If you like your songs either slow, sexy and groovy or prefer them fast-paced and more experimental & cosmic_look no further, Nite Songs has it all. This is THE perfect combination of slick soul, blasting Hammond B-3 organ funk, smooth jazz and melancholic R&B piano works. This album just begs for a prominent space in record collections fans and crate diggers worldwide!

Repress !

Where We're Calling From
The Liminal Zone: Reflections on Duval Timothy’s Sen Am
Lamin Fofana

Sen Am is an enduring and tender album, rich and beguiling and generous in a quiet way. Over the last few years, I find myself returning to it, listening and absorbing, reflecting on the voices and working through the multiple layers of feelings and themes it announces with confidence and equanimity. Notions of care and contradiction, expressions of joy and desire and the underlying feeling of unease and turmoil; there is an urgent appeal to the listener for generosity, to strengthen our capacity to hear multiple voices simultaneously, to exist in multiple places at once.

Duval Timothy’s music was dropped into our world from another realm sometime in the spring of 2017. We received the call and we answered it. The rhythm and spirit was transmitted via London’s NTS Radio on the Do!! You!!! Breakfast Show with Charlie Bones and a short while later we were listening to the first vinyl edition of Sen Am in our living room in Berlin. The record got a lot of plays (at home and at some shows, before and after performances). It was like sunlight filtering through a cracked window and remaining there for a moment, dancing. Blue music emanating from a liminal zone, an in-between space, somewhere on the outskirts of Freetown, or rural Sierra Leone, or the outer edges of South London, or Bath, UK, or some undisclosed orbit, unfixed location. The music is soaked in diasporic experiences. It refuses to settle but still invites us to enter and stay awhile in that zone, where multiple forms exist (all) together with jazz, hip-hop, various strands of expressive electronics and experimental music all breathing together and moving around. It is a portal to a place of possibilities, a space for building and repairing possible and lost connections. But life in that liminal zone is precarious; it is life under duress; under pressure – not merely the pressure to produce a presentable, categorizable, and salable body of work, but the pressure that compels us to experiment and create new concepts and things that will help us imagine a different existence, a way out of the turbulence.

Freetown is a marvellous and sometimes sad place. It is one of those unmistakable locations inscribed diasporic memory; a place that touches you, a place that holds you and demands you bear witness: witness to pain, poverty, joy and desire. You remember the voices and the eyes of people even in momentary encounters. In Sen Am, you hear not only Duval’s recollections and sounds of Freetown, you hear family and friendship, people coming together and forming bonds, creating surrogate families. Forging community wherever you go is a practice, and community is at the core of this music. It’s in all the voices, from Emmerson and 6pac to Aminata and Aruna. It opens up a space for Black voices, for Sierra Leonean voices, and those voices extend through the succeeding projects, the 2 Sim EP and the album Help, and all that radiates from Duval’s Carrying Colour imprint.

Thank you for the invitation to write about the album Sen Am, on the occasion of its re-release which also coincides with the release of the exquisite double 7” Smɔl Smɔl with cktrl — a wonderful piece which calls on the listener to play both records at the same time to hear the music or play them separately and hear different versions. Duval is strengthening us, encouraging us to feel comfortable with discomfort, with incompleteness, with the hard-to-understand. This is a beautiful thing.

"The definition of a hidden gem" - John Peel / "The world seems finally to be catching up to Leslie Winer, whose startling intelligence and singular vision shine through her copious recording life." - Max Richter / "She might just be the coolest woman on the planet!" - Boy George "When I Hit You - You'll Feel It" is a 16-track anthology that celebrates the extraordinary work of musician, poet, and author, Leslie Winer. The collection spans Winer's three-decade-long musical career: from her groundbreaking solo work in the early '90s to her latest inspired projects. Featuring musical contributions from Jon Hassell, Helen Terry, Jah Wobble, Renegade Soundwave's Karl Bonnie, and others, the collection also spotlights Winer's diverse collaborations, unearths previously-unreleased recordings and was newly remastered by the GRAMMYr-nominated engineer John Baldwin. The album includes a new interview with Winer, captured by the compilation's co-producer, acclaimed author and critic Wyndham Wallace. Rounding out the package is an insightful essay by the award-winning writer and scholar Louis Chude-Sokei and an original cover collage by the renowned British photographer and artist, Linder, featuring photography by Mondino, and design by designer Christopher Shannon. Musician, poet, iconoclast, model, artist, enigma. Leslie Winer is many things. She grew up in Boston with a voracious appetite for music and the written word and embraced the city's lively jazz and folk scene in the '70s. Moving to New York for art school, she formed an unlikely friendship with writer and artist William S. Burroughs and lived on-and-off with Jean-Michel Basquiat. In London, where Winer began her musical ventures in earnest, she was a regular at Leigh Bowery's underground club Taboo, where she met many of her collaborators, including filmmaker John Maybury, Kevin Mooney (of Adam and the Ants), and Boy George. Winer's striking looks also attracted fashion designers and photographers. Throughout the early '80s, she was an in-demand model-appearing in campaigns for Valentino, Christian Dior, and Yohji Yamamoto, and serving as a muse for a young Jean-Paul Gaultier, who later dubbed Winer "the first androgynous model." She posed for Helmut Newton, Irving Penn, and Pierre et Gilles, and graced the covers of The Face, French and Italian editions of Vogue, and Mademoiselle. But music was Winer's true passion and, at the turn of the '90s, she would unknowingly help invent the massively popular genre known today as trip-hop. On her debut, Witch, Winer masterfully blended the uninhibited sampling of early hip-hop with dancehall basslines and programmed beats, while weaving mesmerizing - and coolly-detached - spoken-word vocals into her ambient tracks. It was unorthodox in the most delicious ways. While Witch was finished in 1990, it wouldn't be released for three years, due to the whims of Winer's label. By the time the album saw the light of day (released under the pseudonym "c"), trip-hop was gaining mainstream traction via acts like Portishead, Massive Attack, and Madonna. Although Winer eventually gained wider acknowledgment (prompting the NME to give her the dubious distinction of "The Grandmother of Trip-Hop"), Witch initially went sorely unnoticed. Winer continued to record, undeterred by the elusive nature of mainstream success in the modern music business. Her network of inspired collaborators continued to grow and expand, yet her influence remained largely a secret except to those in the know, such as Grace Jones and Sinead O'Connor, who would cover her songs. In the modern era, one is hard-pressed to find an artist who continues to push the creative envelope as much as Winer does. And yet, three decades after her revolutionary debut, her work remains just as startling and fresh.

Café Society opened the 69th annual Cannes Film Festival to rave reviews. Woody Allen became the first and only director to have three opening night films selected for the Cannes Film Festival.

It’s New York in the 1930s. As he has more and more trouble putting up with his bickering parents, his gangster brother and the family jewelry store, Bobby Dorfman feels like he needs a change of scenery. He decides to go and try his luck in Hollywood where his high-powered agent uncle Phil hires him as an errand boy.

In Hollywood he soon falls in love, but unfortunately the girl has a boyfriend. Bobby settles for friendship - up until the day the girl knocks at his door, telling him her boyfriend just broke up with her. All of a sudden Bobby’s life takes a new turn, and a very romantic one at that. The soundtrack features a great collection of the music from the 1930’s. The music is featured prominently in the movie and has been chosen by Woody Allen himself and features newly recorded jazz standards by Grammy Award winners Vince Giordano & The Nighthawks and classic recordings from Ben Selvin, Benny Goodman and Count Basie.

Woody Allen says about the soundtrack: “The soundtrack consists of music from the 1930s since that’s when the picture takes place. Most of the material is Rodgers and Hart who is very dominant in those year and Lorenz Heart have that bitter sweet romantic quality that defines the spirit of the movie itself.”

This is a limited edition of 500 individually numbered copies on blue coloured vinyl. A 4-page booklet with pictures from the film and credits is included.

Café Society opened the 69th annual Cannes Film Festival to rave reviews. Woody Allen became the first and only director to have three opening night films selected for the Cannes Film Festival.

It’s New York in the 1930s. As he has more and more trouble putting up with his bickering parents, his gangster brother and the family jewelry store, Bobby Dorfman feels like he needs a change of scenery. He decides to go and try his luck in Hollywood where his high-powered agent uncle Phil hires him as an errand boy.

In Hollywood he soon falls in love, but unfortunately the girl has a boyfriend. Bobby settles for friendship - up until the day the girl knocks at his door, telling him her boyfriend just broke up with her. All of a sudden Bobby’s life takes a new turn, and a very romantic one at that. The soundtrack features a great collection of the music from the 1930’s. The music is featured prominently in the movie and has been chosen by Woody Allen himself and features newly recorded jazz standards by Grammy Award winners Vince Giordano & The Nighthawks and classic recordings from Ben Selvin, Benny Goodman and Count Basie.

Woody Allen says about the soundtrack: “The soundtrack consists of music from the 1930s since that’s when the picture takes place. Most of the material is Rodgers and Hart who is very dominant in those year and Lorenz Heart have that bitter sweet romantic quality that defines the spirit of the movie itself.”

This is a limited edition of 500 individually numbered copies on blue coloured vinyl. A 4-page booklet with pictures from the film and credits is included.

Soul Jazz Records’ CD / LP (plus digital download code)
reissue of this very rare album, first released as a private-press
LP in 1978 on flautist Lloyd McNeill’s own Baobab Record label
in Washington, DC. The album has been out-of-print for 43
years and is lovingly remastered by Soul Jazz Records.
‘Tori’ is a stunning album that blends Brazilian and Latin flavours
with deep Spiritual Jazz. The album features a strong line up
which includes legendary Brazilian figures like Dom Um Romao,
Nana Vasconcelos and Dom Salvador alongside jazz
heavyweights such as Buster Williams, Howard Johnson, John
La Barbera and more. These A-team musicians were all
regulars in McNeill’s long-running and highly successful resident
live group in New York, all set up to blend deep jazz, Brazilian
and Latin music together.
Lloyd McNeill is an African-American flautist, painter, poet, and
photographer born in Washington, D.C. in 1935. His multidisciplinary creative life led to encounters and friendships with
Nina Simone, Picasso, Eric Dolphy, Nana Vasconceles and
other legendary cultural figures.
Lloyd McNeill’s hypnotic ‘Washington Suite’ was originally
commissioned as a piece of music for the Capital Ballet
Company, in Washington DC.
McNeill grew up through the era of the Civil Rights Movement in
the 1960s and his life and work is a reflection of those ideals. In
the mid-1960s he moved to France where he became friends
with Picasso, working with a number of émigré-jazz musicians
whilst living in Paris. In the late 1960s he taught jazz and
painting workshops at the New Thing Art and Architecture
Center in Washington. In the 1970s he travelled throughout
Brazil and West Africa studying music and taught music
anthropology in the US.

Soul Jazz Records’ new oxblood red coloured vinyl
LP (plus download code) issue of this very rare
deep spiritual jazz album, first released as a
private-press album in 1970 on flautist Lloyd
McNeill’s own Asha Record label in Washington
DC.
Lloyd McNeill is an African-American flautist,
painter, poet and photographer born in Washington
D.C., in 1935. His multi-disciplinary creative life led
to encounters and friendships with Nina Simone,
Picasso, Eric Dolphy, Nana Vasconceles and other
legendary cultural figures. Lloyd McNeill’s hypnotic
‘Washington Suite’ was originally commissioned as
a piece of music for the Capital Ballet Company, in
Washington.
McNeill grew up through the era of the Civil Rights
Movement in the 1960s and his life and work is a
reflection of those ideals. In the mid-1960s he
moved to France where he became friends with
Picasso, working with a number of émigré-jazz
musicians whilst living in Paris. In the late 1960s
he taught jazz and painting workshops at the New
Thing Art and Architecture Center in Washington.
In the 1970s he travelled throughout Brazil and
West Africa studying music and taught music
anthropology in the US.

Compilation of all new productions from a wealth of international talent, put together by Knekelhuis.

Label Text "This is a story of friendship, about how it grows stronger through the years. But it’s just as much about fledgling togetherness and shared art in times of crisis. The result is an introspective document of contemporary music, in spirit of Eno and Hassell. A space where we embrace our differences and speak the language of collectivity together, where we reflect, adapt and value each artist's contribution equally. To witness a multitude of cultural backgrounds that speak one like-minded language. Soothing and illuminating. And felt like...

Mastered by Amir Shoat and artwork by Keziah Phillips and Steele Bonus."

Here is the the effortless work of a band entirely confident in their own craft - the consolidation of nearly three decades of peerless songwriting and almost telepathic musicianship amongst the band's three founder members: Norman Blake, Raymond McGinley and Gerard Love. Recorded with the band’s soundman David Henderson alongside regular drummer Francis Macdonald and keyboard player Dave McGowan in three distinctly different environments (initially at Vega in rural Provence, then at Raymond’s home in Glasgow before mixing at Clouds Hill in the industrial heart of Hamburg), it’s a record that embraces maturity and experience and hugs them close.

As ever, song-wise the Fanclub present a textbook representation of democracy in action, the record offering four each by Blake, Love and McGinley. From the almighty chime of opener I’m In Love through The First Sight’s ecstatic soul-search and the paean to unerring friendship With You, Here is a a collection of twelve songs about the only things that truly matter - life and love.


Teenage Fanclub will be touring the UK extensively throughout the Autumn, including two London shows – Islington Assembly Hall and Electric Ballroom – both of which sold out within days of going on sale. Glasgow's finest will also be making an exclusive appearance at this year's End Of The Road festival in early September.

Hologram is the first release from New York Post-Punk legends A Place To Bury Strangers on their own newly formed label, Dedstrange. Hologram is the follow up to their highly regarded fifth album, Pinned, and is a sonic return to A Place To Bury Strangers’ rawest, most unhinged sound. With songs addressing the decay of connections, friendships lost, and the trials and tribulations of these troubled times, Hologram serves as an abstract mirror to the moment we live in. Written and recorded during the on-going global pandemic and in the midst of the decline of civilization, Hologram is a sonic vaccine to the horrors of modern life.

We’ve all been fans of each other from the start, says Jimmie Dale Gilmore, “but the thing that’s always struck me about The Flatlanders is that, first and foremost, it’s a band rooted in friendship. Beyond the music, we just connect with each other in these deep and personal ways, and that’s been a lifelong treasure.” Take a listen to Treasure of Love, The Flatlanders’ first new album in more than a decade, and it’s clear that those bonds are deeper and stronger now than ever before. Completed during COVID-19 lockdowns with the help of longtime friend and collaborator Lloyd Maines, the record finds the iconic Texas trio of Joe Ely, Jimmie Dale Gilmore, and Butch Hancock in classic form, serving up a rollicking collection of twang-fueled, harmony-laden performances full of wry humor and raw heartbreak. While a few of the songs here are never-before-heard originals, the vast majority of the tracklist consists of vintage tunes the band picked up during their 50-year career, some stretching as far back as the group’s earliest performances in the honkytonks around Lubbock, TX, where you might have spotted Willie Nelson or Townes Van Zandt in the audience on any given night.

Not Waving renders his pop soul on a definitive album opus ‘How To Leave Your Body’, starcrossed with guest appearances by Jim O’Rourke, Jonnine Standish, Marie Davidson, Spivak and Mark
Lanegan
An escapist parable for the times, Alessio Natalizia marks a career high with his most sensitive production and songwriting illuminated by a coterie of notable collaborators. Its 11 songs deal with the necessity of friendship, the fragility of loss and spiritual transcendence via a spectrum of strategies that ultimately arrive at a mutual conclusion: love is the message. It packs sample amounts of nostalgia into a fantasy sequence of elegiac pop, skewed rave and midnight lullabies that fine-tune over 20 years of devotion to his craft, perfectly matching experimental restlessness with enduring pop appeal.
Perhaps unavoidably, circumstances had a hand in the creation of ‘How To Leave Your Body’, forcing Natalizia to work with collaborators remotely. Yet the strength of his bonds bleeds through in the album’s handful of poignant vocal pieces, none more so than the hushed intimacy of Marie Davidson on the bewitching downbeat trance hymn ‘Hold On’, but also in the bruised blush of ‘My Sway’ featuring Jonnine’s spine-tracing lilt over hovering organ and dembow bumps, while the hook-up with Mark Lanegan once again yields bittersweet fruit on ‘Last Time Leaving Home Part 2’, with gravelly blues vox diffused into detuned, miasmic cello that really tugs.
Effortless and made for rinsing, the whole album is testament to the humility and pathos of Natalizia’s oeuvre, which has gotten better with age. It plays out like a lovingly crafted mixtape, decanting all original material with a classic cadence and fleeting play of styles, from aerial jazz notes in ‘You Are Always Younger Than The Future’, to the gnawing club grind of ‘Define Normal’, a noisily gurning ‘Self-Portrait’, and the lushly resolved admittance of ‘My Best Is Good Enough.’
Comparisons don’t really work with this one, it’s just Not Waving.

By 1991, the world’s most celebrated trumpeter could look back on five decades of musical evolution – his own, and that of the world around him. Miles Davis had found ways of marrying jazz with classical ideas, then later R&B, rock and funk, producing hybrid offspring that shaped the course of popular music and had come to define his legend. In 1985, he’d left Columbia after thirty years to sign to Warner Bros. Records, a label riding high with best-selling artists like Madonna, Van Halen and Prince, with whom he had a mutual admiration and friendship.

Miles Davis’s lifelong love for France is well-documented, and in July 1991, he became a Knight of their Legion of Honour. Davis received the award from French culture minister Jack Lang, who described him as: "The Picasso of jazz." A few days before, he played this electrifying set at the Vienne Jazz Festival with the Miles Davis Group. He passed away two months later in September 1991.

Miles Davis’ performance at Jazz a Vienne on July 1, 1991 became one of his final live performances before he passed away on September 28, 1991, and this previously unreleased set includes two songs written by Prince, “Penetration” and “Jailbait”. The package features liner notes from music historian, journalist, and producer Ashley Kahn, with art designed by Bruno Tilley.

Imperium Droop brings two mavericks of sweeping exploration together into new avenues of musical expression. Kid Millions and Jan St. Werner explore a liminal space between improvisation and composition, a fluid yet defined sound-space, founded on the unique chemistry of their friendship and pushing into the future. Kid Millions stands as one of the most sought after drummers and improvisers in NYC, known for his work as the drummer for Oneida, his expansive solo work as Man Forever, as well as collaborations and performances with the likes of Laurie Anderson, Philip Glass, Royal Trux, Boredoms, White Hills, and Spiritualized. Regardless of who he's working with Kid Millions radically redefines the drums as an instrument. Jan St. Werner has consistently remained at the vanguard of electronic music. In his work as one half of the visionary duo Mouse On Mars, as well as his acclaimed solo work both as a composer and sound artist, and in collaborations with The Fall's Mark E Smith, Oval's Markus Popp, Stereolab, and The National St. Werner constantly pushes the limits of recorded sound. Together, Millions and Werner have crafted a monument of unpredictable beauty built on breathless forays into the unknown. Werner's application of a seemingly infinite arsenal of textures unleashes colorful swaths of energy. Mats Gustaffson joins Werner on the maximalist "Color Bagpipes," unleashing torrents of swiveling melody and breathy clicks over the exponential thunder of Millions' drum kit. Pieces like "Dark Tetrad" and "Astral Stare" demonstrate the duo's mastery of space and surprise. Dark flutters flow in slow pulses across "Apotropaic" where erratic swirls of sound twist and mutate on "Sorrows and Compensations," unified as a single force by the overwhelming diversity of sounds. Millions' drums effortlessly rides each wave of Werner's prismatic deluges and channels their energy into dynamic movements. Through his singular prowess, Millions' tireless rhythms and subtle gestures mirror Werner's boundless textural palette and drive each piece towards transcendence. On Imperium Droop, Kid Millions and Jan St. Werner have combined their powers into an incomparable work of gripping and intrepid sonic fluctuations.

Esteban Adame aka Frequencia drops the track list for an intergalactic backyard party with the Chicano Boombox EP. Esteban’s music career started as a DJ in L.A.’s East Side backyard party scene, he then stepped up his musical game by collecting gear and studying the piano. His evolution into a professional musician led him to gigs around L.A.’s jazz and salsa scenes. But he never lost his love for DJ culture and electronic music and that led him to join Mad Mike’s Galaxy 2 Galaxy band through his mutual friendships with UR’s Santiago Salazar and Yaxteq’s own DJ Dex. He’s released music on esteemed labels such as Underground Quality, Dolly, Mister Saturday Night, EPM, Jealous God and more. He also collaborates with DJ Dex as El Coyote.

“Rush The Floor” makes you want to do just that with its hypnotic lead synth and a breakdown that will leave the dancefloor wanting more. “Deep Function” flexes musical chops via soulful chords and a perfectly timed solo all riding over a thumping house beat. “Still Here” recalls classic Detroit Techno methodology as a reminder to keep the inspiration flowing. The EP is rounded out with “The Promise” a driving yet euphoric track perfect for watching the sunrise after a long night.

The legendary composer of Mission: Impossible participates in this tribute album entirely produced and performed by Jean-Michel Bernard and his musicians, himself a acclaimed composer and jazzman / pianist recognized throughout the world. This vinyl edition is exclusive to Wayô Records, after the CD version by Varese Sarabande in the USA.

Jean-Michel Bernard Plays Lalo Schifrin is above all a beautiful story of friendship...

The pianist, conductor, composer and Argentinian arranger Lalo Schifrin is known, among others, for his film music (Bullitt, Dirty Harry, Enter the Dragon…) and tv shows (Mission: Impossible, Mannix, Starsky and Hutch…). On the other side, pianist and composer Jean-Michel Bernard accompanied Ray Charles in concert for the last three years of his life, and is notably the usual composer for Michel Gondry's films.

This album, focusing on the orchestrations of film scores composed by Lalo Schifrin, was born from the friendship that unites the two composers and the success of a concert program put on by Jean-Michel in tribute to Lalo Schifrin at the La Baule Festival (France) in 2017.

With the presence, on three tracks, of Lalo Schifrin as well as Kyle Eastwood on, of course, the music of Dirty Harry…

Based in Berlin via rural Israel, RAS are comprised of of multi-instrumentalists and producers Dekel Adin, Eden Leshem, and Guy Gefen. They came together as RAS in 2018; a deep appreciation of international sounds that cross common ley lines has resulted in a melting pot of influences. Armed with vintage drum machines, guitars, synths, bongos and a Tascam Portastudio 424 tape machine, they quietly released this eponymous debut album in early 2019.

RAS’ creative palette is relatively minimal, opting to work with a toolkit of analogue instruments and improvisational recording styles. Mixing surrealism, in-jokes and nonsensical word patterns, their lyrics are sung in Hebrew. The vocals are there to support the music, acting as another instrument in the overall sound.

Dekel, Eden and Guy managed to create an intricate balance between lofi soul and brighter mediterranean leaning club-jams, ending up with a record we might mistake as a lost treasure of the early 90’s.??A record that perhaps has an unconscious connection to the past, but more importantly to an onward looking story of friendship and a musical journey which has spanned many continents throughout the last ten years.