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2025 Blue Vinyl Repress

WRWTFWW Records is very honored to announce the official reissue of Grauzone's essential 1981 maxi single with timeless classic "Eisbär", proto-techno beast "FILM 2", and romantic synth ballad "Ich Lieb Sie", just in time for the 40th anniversary of the Swiss band's formation. The three-track vinyl is sourced from the original reels, cut at 45rpm, and comes with its iconic artwork on a 350gsm sleeve.

Ich möchte ein Eisbär sein...Written by Martin Eicher after a nightmare in which he saw talking polar bears on the walls, and with music by the Grauzone crew consisting of Martin and his brother Stephan Eicher, Marco Repetto, Christian "GT" Trüssel, and Claudine Chirac (on saxophone), "Eisbär" is the most recognizable title from the band, a sublime mix of ingredients reflecting the transitional era it comes from - the raw energy of punk music still palpable, combined with the audacity of early electronics, the warm groove of a disco gem, beautifully fragile lyrics, and one of the best basslines ever. It became a mega hit, totally unplanned, but how could you resist such a track

"FILM 2" is the ultimate b-side monster, a menacing all-instrumental pre-techno masterpiece, slowly building to a magnetizing frenzy. An instant underground favorite, it was famously heard played at both speeds depending on the scenes and DJs you were frequenting, 45rpm as it was first intended, and 33rpm for the cosmic experience (search Daniele Baldelli's Cosmic C75 1982 mixtape online for a great example of this).

The maxi single ends with "Ich Lieb Sie", a synth-pop meets doo-wop ballad, a true love song oozing with innocence. Simple, stylish, and just right.

At the crossroads of post-punk, new wave, pop, and electronic experimentation, the Eisbär maxi offers three songs that are technically different but hold the same spirit, the perfect embodiment of Grauzone's music - wild, unpredictable, and youthful, yet sophisticated, catchy, and ingenious. The magic recipe for the good stuff.

Stephan Eicher went on to be, arguably, the most successful Swiss musician ever, with an international career extending from pop chanson to experimental escapades and collaborations with Moondog, artists Sophie Calle and John Armleder, and author Martin Suter among many other luminaries. Marco Repetto flourished as a techno and ambient producer, releasing multiple projects including releases on Aphex Twin's Rephlex label.

Grauzone and WRWTFWW will continue to collaborate on the band's 40th anniversary reissue campaign, with numerous projects planned for the year, including a vast selection of music, visuals, and literature never available before.

Koinè is the new album by Pellegrino & Zodyaco, a record that explores the desire to escape by interpreting it as an act of emancipation, an aimless journey in search of creative freedom. The demonstration that escapism, when it is conscious, can bring us back to the heart of things. Inspired by Éloge de la fuite by Henri Laborit, the album embarks on a journey to discover a “common language” (Koinè), blending Neapolitan roots with a global and contemporary musical vision. It blends melodic traditions with disco, funk, jazz fusion, and world music, experimenting with vintage instruments, ethnic percussion, and Mediterranean atmospheres. Pellegrino, a pioneer of the “new school” Neapolitan sound, after 4 years since his last LP “Morphé” (2020) continues the path started with Zodyaco I (2018), painting an authentic portrait of modern Naples and celebrating musical contamination as a form of creative euphoria.

Konsudd finds the hyperkinetic Konduku teaming up with close pal Aa Sudd as they match subtlety with intensity. Their high-definition production leads on these spacious works of art, with dynamic layers of atmospherics punctured by dense kick drums. They take care to address soundsystem physicality, loading their kicks with irresistible subs down low and finely chiselling the double-time rhythms up top for an extra boost of energy.

A collaboration between US label Astral Spirits and Sweden’s Thanatosis Produktion, It could / If I marks the debut album from Stockholm-based duo Johan Jutterström (saxophone) and Alex Zethson (piano). Together, they reinterpret jazz standards and explore an eclectic mix of compositions by Leonard Cohen, Pet Shop Boys, John Lurie, and 19th-century composer Alexander Fesca.

Jutterström and Zethson’s musical partnership dates back to their teenage years, when they bonded over a love for jazz and the struggle to find their own voice within it. Their duo work has always been about navigating that tension—trying to capture jazz, failing, and finding another way forward. This album continues that pursuit, emphasizing not just what is played, but how it is played.

The record’s title reflects their approach: a process of reaching for something just out of grasp. Songs are deconstructed, rearranged, and treated like palimpsests—scrubbed clean and rewritten while allowing traces of the original to shine through. The result is a dynamic and deeply personal exploration of sound, filled with both reverence and reinvention.

Both musicians have extensive backgrounds in jazz, improvisation, and experimental music. Zethson, a prolific pianist and composer, has worked with ensembles like Fire! Orchestra and Trondheim Jazz Orchestra, and plays keyboards in ensembles such as Vilhelm Bromander Unfolding Orchestra, Goran Kajfes Tropiques, Vathres, and Angles (current with the jazzopera The Death of Kalypso). Jutterström, a saxophonist with an artistic PhD, has performed internationally and runs the ensemble STHLM svaga, a band who have performed commissioned pieces by jazz legends such as Ron Carter, Archie Shepp and Roscoe Mitchell.

With It could / If I, the duo crafts an intricate, ever-shifting dialogue—an ongoing attempt to "stick jazz music," as they put it, constantly approaching, never quite arriving, and finding beauty in the pursuit.

This is the northeast calling, with songs of stillness, reflection, renewal, defiance, hope, classic melodies and, at certain perfectly judged moments, furniture-shifting riffs. With a powerful album shaped by pandemic-era loss (of momentum, and of a band member), and by the wins brought by what singer/songwriter/guitarist Adam Hope describes as a “weight lifted off my shoulders”. With a fresh, front-footed, fired-up approach that owes everything to a band returning to their roots in Wallsend and Newcastle – and, for the first time, making their music entirely on their own independent terms: self-produced and self-confident. “The Big Sad: an album born from the ashes of dark times but representing a beacon of light for the future. An album of honesty and purity, one that our current fanbase sonically may not be expecting. The sound of a band that got tired of slamming on the fuzz pedal to tick the ‘rock’ box and dares to try something new, dares to shock, dares to be great.

H.D. Reliquary is the first eponymous release from Ben Shirken a.k.a. Ex Wiish, and finds him returning home to his own label, 29 Speedway. The songs sparked during sessions with close collaborators - across 11 pieces, artists such as Pavel Milyakov, MIZU, Dorothy Carlos, Kevin Eichenberger and Muein breathe personality into the record. H.D.R. coaxes beauty from a serrated, raw, yet subdued palette drawn from improvised recordings of trumpet, violin, upright bass, cello, and modular synthesis.

The title references the hard drive as a sacred container for relics, contemplating how digitally archived fragments of one’s existence can burn eternally after death. Archives, and in this case recordings, splinter and warp. Some distort what they contain. Some vanish, and others are eternally preserved, immune to deletion. Your information on these digital drives becomes archival shrapnel, the music that survives the remnants of collaboration. Pieces of recordings were fed into a series of proprietary neural networks, generating MIDI information and audio that reacted to on-the-fly soloing, imaginary sessions between players and algorithms invented posthumously (in post).

Shirken will release H.D. Reliquary alongside a sound installation on April 11. Where his prior work was geared towards dissociation, H.D. Reliquary invites us to contemplate how our tools for understanding and containing the world fundamentally alter our relationship with it. He has performed in spaces such as The New Museum, Pioneer Works, Public Records and Nowadays in New York City; Dripping Music And Arts Festival in New Jersey; La Station in Paris; and Cafe Oto in London.

L.A. Witch haben schon immer eine Aura müheloser Coolness ausgestrahlt, sei es in Form des Americana Noir und des lakonischen Back-to-Basics-Rock'n'Roll ihres selbstbetitelten Debüts oder des glühend strengen Abenteurertums ihres zweiten Albums "Play With Fire". Die Band - bestehend aus Sade Sanchez (Gitarre/Gesang), Irita Pai (Bass) und Ellie English (Schlagzeug) - begann als informelle Angelegenheit, aber die schwülen und betörenden, von Hall umhüllten Songs, die sie schufen, fanden beim Publikum Anklang und brachten das Projekt über den isolierten Raum von Freunden und Gleichgesinnten in Südkalifornien hinaus in die weite Welt. Auf ihrem neuesten Album "DOGGOD" geht das Trio über die bisherigen kreativen und geografischen Grenzen hinaus - das Material wurde in Paris produziert und die Tracks im Motorbass Studio in der Rue de Martyrs aufgenommen. "DOGGOD" erkundet ein breiteres klangliches Terrain, setzt ein größeres Arsenal an Sounds ein und erforscht größere existenzielle und kosmische Themen, ohne dabei den für die Band typischen Sinn für das Verbotene, das Verlassene und die Vorahnung zu verlieren. "DOGGOD" ist ein Weg, das universelle Rätsel der spirituellen Natur von Liebe und Hingabe anzugehen. "Ich habe das Gefühl, eine Art Dienerin oder Sklavin der Liebe zu sein", sagt Sanchez. "Ich bin bereit, für die Liebe zu sterben, indem ich ihr diene, für sie leide oder nach ihr suche - so wie ein treuer, ergebener Diensthund es tun würde." Der Titel des Albums ist ein Palindrom, das DOG und GOD zusammenfasst - eine Verherrlichung des Unterwürfigen und eine Subversion des Göttlichen. Es ist eine Anspielung auf die Reinheit von Hunden und eine Anerkennung ihrer bedingungslosen Liebe und ihres beschützenden Wesens, die im Widerspruch zu den verschiedenen abwertenden Assoziationen stehen, die mit dieser Spezies verbunden werden. "Es gibt diese symbolische Verbindung zwischen Frauen und Hunden, die die untergeordnete Stellung der Frau in der Gesellschaft zum Ausdruck bringt", erklärt Sanchez. "Und alles, was solche göttlichen Eigenschaften verkörpert, hat es nicht verdient, als Schimpfwort benutzt zu werden." Diese widersprüchlichen Erkundungen von Liebe und Unterwerfung manifestieren sich in der sanften und rauchigen Garagerock-Alchemie der Band, mit einer neu entdeckten Nutzung der disziplinierten Zurückhaltung und eisigen Instrumentierung des Post-Punk. Der Album-Opener "Icicle" zeigt, wie L.A. Witch aus dem Proto-Punk, der Psychedelia und den düsteren Riffs der 70er Jahre in die von Refrains durchtränkten Gitarren und den verlorenen Minimalismus von Joy Division und den frühen The Cure reist. Es wird eine Parallele zwischen romantischem Selbstmord und Märtyrertum gezogen, die sich im zweiten Song, "Kiss Me Deep", fortsetzt. Hier beschreibt Sanchez eine Liebe, die so rein ist, dass sie die Zeit übersteigt und sich über mehrere Leben erstreckt. Es ist ein Lied über Leidenschaft, vorgetragen mit dem weltlichen und verletzten Stoizismus der frühen Goth-Pioniere. Von dort aus geht die Band zur Leadsingle "777" über, einem Song über Hingabe bis hin zum Tod. Ein treibender Beat, ein treibendes, verzerrtes Riff und Sanchez' ätherischer Gesang vereinen sich zu einem Song, der sowohl düster in seinem Fatalismus als auch sinnlich in seiner treuen Leidenschaft ist. Auf dem gesamten Album "DOGGOD" weichen L.A. Witch nie von ihrer Muse ab. In "I Hunt You Pray" legt Pai einen hypnotischen Basslauf hin, während English einen zyklischen Krautrock-Groove einsetzt und Sanchez das Bild eines verlassenen Hundes am Straßenrand malt, der allein in der Nacht ist und sowohl als Jäger als auch als Gejagter lebt. Auf "Eyes of Love" macht sich die Band die meditativen Mid-Tempo-Wiederholungen, dekonstruierten Akkorde und esoterischen Betrachtungen über Liebe, Tod und Spiritualität zunutze, die Lungfish zu einer so beliebten Band gemacht haben. Es unterstreicht die Parallele zwischen der unerschütterlichen Liebe in den Augen eines Hundes und der Selbstaufopferung eines Erlösers. Auf "The Lines" nimmt die Band den treibenden Puls des Post-Punk und fügt dem Mix eine Extraportion Chorus hinzu. "Chorus ist ein moderner Effekt, der auf der Idee beruht, die leichten Tonhöhenunterschiede eines Chors nachzubilden. Es gibt eine schimmernde Qualität, die uns zurück zu diesem spirituellen, göttlichen Gefühl bringt", erklärt Sanchez. Gepaart mit dem Einsatz von Orgel und einer grüblerischen Moll-Melodie, beschwört der Song gleichzeitig das Heilige und das Sakrileg. Der Titeltrack "DOGGOD" hat vielleicht die größte Ähnlichkeit mit dem Material des Vorgängeralbums "Play With Fire", in den schlanken und gemeinen Gitarren auf eine raue Rhythmusgruppe und verträumten Gesang treffen. Aber während ihr vorheriges Album ein Aufruf war, seinen eigenen Weg zu gehen, bleibt "DOGGOD" dem "Bis dass der Tod uns scheidet"-Thema des Albums treu und geht sogar so weit, ein Maß an Unterwerfung zu beschreiben, das in gefährliche und ungesunde Gefilde übergeht, wobei Sanchez singt "hang me on a leash / `til I wait for my release". Letztendlich ist "DOGGOD" eine perfekte Verkörperung des Ansatzes von L.A. Witch. Es ist gleichzeitig romantisch und bedrohlich, ehrfürchtig und profan, eine Feier und ein Klagelied. Es spannt den Bogen zwischen Vergangenheit und Gegenwart, indem es vertraute Klänge aufgreift und sie für die Jetztzeit aufbereitet. Aber es läutet auch eine neue Ära für die Band ein, die über die Kodachrome-Erinnerungen an das Amerika der Jahrhundertmitte hinausgeht und tiefer in den mittelalterlichen und gotischen Energien von Paris und darüber hinaus gräbt, während sie gleichzeitig ein besudeltes Herz erforscht.

South Londons’ indomitable Medlar delivers an ambitious new album

The long-time underground favourite has collaborated with the likes of Dele Sosimi, Rebekah Reid, Deevoenay, Finn Peters, Sam Virdie, Afla Sackey and Arnau Obiols on an album that finds him taking his production to new levels.
From roots playing illegal raves in the South West to building up a cultured catalogue that bounces between house and garage, Medlar has long been part of the underground conversation. He has dropped a previous album and many innovative remixes and edits for the likes of Billy Cobham and Shirley Lites, worked in the studio and on stage with Afro legend Dele Sosimi and most recently released an album under his own name that collected myriad different sonic sketches from the past 15 years.

Islands is an altogether different proposition that comes after establishing himself as a mix engineer and producer of other people's music. In that time, Medlar has honed his skills, learnt new tricks and grown more able to express himself in sound. The result is an album that explores a more electronic palette inspired by '80s fusion sounds whilst maintaining a loose, organic flow through his use of live instrumentation. “The idea for the LP was for a collection of music which could sit alone as club tracks, but would work equally well as part of a whole. The name Islands came from this, as there's some connecting ideas but the tracks sit independently in their own little sonic worlds. I took a lot of inspiration from early 80’s electronic music produced during early years of MIDI technology… proto house, jazz fusion, electronic disco and experimental ambient. I wanted to juxtapose some of these methods with more contemporary production and make something that's ultimately quite fun!” says Medlar of the record which could easily soundtrack a summer road trip.

Across 11 tracks, he blends old-school techniques like a fusion of live instruments, FM synthesis and MIDI triggered vocal samples with more contemporary touches such as punchy, club-friendly drums and dub inspired, speaker-wobbling low end. The result is less reliant on samples than his previous works and makes for a perfect blend of retro authenticity and future freshness.

Knapp zwei Jahre nachdem Pearl Jam ihr Album „Gigaton“ veröffentlichten, erschien d iesen F ebruar das langersehnte dritte Studioalbum von Pearl Jam Frontmann Eddie Vedder: „Earthling“. Nun ist das Warten endlich vorbei - das Album erscheint jetzt endlich auch als schwarze Standard LP und Deluxe CD!

Neben dem Song „Long Way“ gibt auch „Brother The Cloud”, ein Tribut an den verstorbenen Chris Cornell von Soundgarden, emotionale und musikalische Einblicke in das Album, welches auf das 2011 erschienene ”Ukulele Songs” folgte. Die Produktion von „Earthling“ übernahm Andrew Watt, gemeinsam mit PJ-Tourmitglied Josh Klinghoffer, Bassist Pino Palladino, Multiinstrumentalist Glen Hansard und dem Red-Hot-Chili-Peppers-Schlagzeuger Chad Smith. Die Aufnahmen für das Album fanden in Watts Studio
in Beverly Hills statt.

"No Warranty Dubs" is made by a logic powerhouse combination, Jimi Tenor & Kabukabu meets DJ Sotofett, with most of what you can expect from all parts involved. You're served Afro Dub & Jazz in a bold and classic sonic execution. Through all 15 cuts the echoes are real and rhythms upfront, with proper extended Disco Dubs and versions of Afrobeat and Free Jazz contrasting body and soul. The album is tuneful and rugged, some cuts have vocals & synth swimming alone, while others glue the drummers groove to slick piano from beginning till end.

Followers of Jimi Tenor's life in music will be able to dive into his trademark song writing, signature flute breathing and indistinguishable style of saxophone playing, as well as his tender and electrifuingly psychedelic vocals known from early days of Puu/Sähkö and Warp releases. Kabukabu's heavyweight instrumental performance trancends regular studio recordings with joy and precision as a core element. Kabukabu's Ekow Alabi Savage aka Ekowmania (from last years "Dr.Afrodub" album) embeds deep rhythm knowledge throughout the entire musical landscape. Last in the chain is DJ Sotofett, producing and mixing his probably most classically crafted output to date. With silky gloves and clanking wrenches every element has been tweaked, re-mixed & dubbed excessively to justify a fully musical, psychedelic, warm and rhythmically rich experience.

"No Warranty Dubs" is as warm as the chords of "Money Palaver (Extra Warm Mix)", and as bombastic as opening track "Fujitronic (Flute Mix)". The album reaches it's most tender moments with the sweet "Musical Message (Disco Dub)" and dives straight into obscurity when guest drummer Ilmari Heikinheimo contributes to "Otto Part 4", a rare freejazz cut with TR-909 tickering from start til end. The simplicity of "Tronic Rhythms (Flute Dub)" is worthy a tear in an eye, while brittle souls can scatter to the thunderous horns and drenched rhythms of "Kabu Anthem (Cosmic Dub)".

Priori’s hit EP Pareidolia gets a well deserved remix treatment. The relation between Priori and Midgar started early 2023 with the release of his Pareidolia EP, where a remix for Keplrr followed quickly the year after. Now, early 2025, a group of close friends and admired artists were invited to rework the Pareidolia’s originals. Midgar affiliate Forest Drive West uses the opportunity to present not one but two remixes.
Presenting one half-time 85 bpm twist of Hazard and another slowpaced murky techno groover. Originally from Montreal, Maara forms the Canadian connection and she turns Memory Palace into a beautiful bouncy dub-techno floater. Sound experimentalist Notte Infinita takes his turn on Pareidolia’s title track and creates some magnificent eyesclosed drum & bass hypnotism. At last, Amsterdam’s upsammy brings back the light with her iconic playful approach. She flips the steady groove of Glass Shards into a jumpy interplay of rhythms and joy

Footshooter is the moniker of Barney Whittaker, a south London-based producer and DJ. His production style takes in influences from broken beat, jazz, house and more, working with rappers, poets and vocalists to create a soulful sound referencing the past while being firmly future-facing in its approach. His records as Footshooter and SAUL have earned airplay and support on BBC Radio 1 & 1xtra, BBC 6 Music, NTS Radio, Jazz FM and Rinse FM, from the likes of Gilles Peterson, Bradley Zero, Errol (Touching Bass), Alex Nut (Eglo Records) Shy One, Virgil Abloh, Zakia, Jyoti, Nabihah Iqbal, Bonobo, Jamz Supernova, Maryanne Hobbs, Mr Scruff and more.

His musically diverse live band sets and DJ sets over the past seven years have taken him to Boiler Room London, Tate Modern, Alexandra Palace, The Jazz Cafe and the Barbican Centre, as well as performances at Brainchild, We Out Here and Love Supreme Festivals. A Balamii Radio resident for the past 5 years with his monthly show 'Sonic Fruits', Footshooter's DJ sets are as versatile and wide ranging as his production credits, spanning the finest soulful house, broken beat, UK Rap, soul, jazz and beyond.

"This is the sound of London right now, and it is fantastic" - Juno Records

Edinburgh-based three-piece funk band High Fade are set to release their debut album 'Life’s Too Fast'.

Capturing the raw, on-stage energy that has been the driving force behind High Fade’s meteoric rise was never going to be easy, but that’s exactly what Harry, Oli and Calvin set out to do with a clear creative vision to record their album live at the iconic RAK Studios in London.

'We recorded in RAK Studios, with the desk built for the Rolling Stones in ‘76, with the same cigarette burns still on the faders. It instantly had a vibe of raw energy and liveliness to it that matched the way we wanted to record - live.' – Calvin

The result? 'Life’s Too Fast' – a blistering 10-track debut from one of the UK’s most exciting bands that manages to deliver the same tight, groove-laden funk rock that has put the group on the radars of Jack Black, Cypress Hill and Rage Against the Machine’s Brad Wilk, has seen them tour with The Cat Empire, and tick off iconic venues including Glastonbury, Jazz Cafe, and Boomtown Festival.

'We decided to record the album live rather than through the normal single track overdubbed method – we felt this would help to fully convey the band’s power, sound and energy across to the listener! More like we’re playing a gig and having it recorded – it was a tough process, but we went about it in the best way for both us and the audience, to ensure they’re getting the most authentic High Fade sound and experience possible.' – Oli

Having spent much of the last three years on the road seeing to a punishing tour schedule, 'Life’s Too Fast' is a chance for the band to stop and take stock, to reflect on their whirlwind success, and create an artistic milestone that demonstrates who High Fade are today. 'It’s the most accurate representation of what High Fade is, what we sound like, and who we are' explains Harry. Telling a clear story that matches their own experiences over the last few years, the album is a snapshot taken by a band who are accelerating towards real success and recognition.

'I’m glad we finally have a body of work that we’re proud of and feels like a collection of songs that nicely represents where we are right now. It’s organised chaos and shows that we like to play, but can also write a catchy tune.' – Calvin

Launching into proceedings with the effortlessly uplifting 'Take Me To The Floor', every track is a demonstration of the band’s technical prowess and broad sonic palette. A forward-facing selection of completely original material, the album also gave the band the opportunity to re-imagine fan-favourite 'Sharpen Up' as a stripped-back cut that reflects the band’s current lineup.

'Honestly, I kinda feel like I could explode with excitement about getting it out for everyone in the world to hear because it has been a long time in the making! A culmination of what all the singles have been working towards! I guess the album represents us and the direction we’re taking the music, it represents us as a trio and the gel that is High Fade.' – Oli

Mit 'Ekko' legt die in Berlin lebende irisch-norwegische Künstlerin Tara Nome Doyle ihr drittes Album vor - eine Reise ins Unbekannte und in die Tiefen des eigenen Ichs. Auf dem Weg dorthin geht es um Schmerz, Abschied, Neuanfang und schließlich um Akzeptanz.

In nur 30 Minuten strahlt das Album eine bemerkenswerte Klarheit aus - nicht nur in seiner Kürze, sondern auch in seiner emotionalen Tiefe.

Tara hat 'Ekko' größtenteils selbst produziert und die musikalische Palette bewusst einfach gehalten. Sie arbeitete mit dem Grammy-prämierten Produzenten und Toningenieur Simon Goff (The Joker, Chernobyl) zusammen, um eine präzise, zurückgenommene Klanglandschaft aus Stimme, Klavier, Gitarre, Streichern, Mellotron und gelegentlichen analogen Synthesizern zu schaffen.

- Ltd. Col. LP: (Klares, transparentes Vinyl, bedruckte Innenhülle mit Songtexten)

Crystal clear vinyl. 'PO$T AMERICAN' is the second full-length album by Dead Pioneers. Written in February and recorded in July, it preempts the 2024 American election but wraps up the fears and frustrations as eloquently and, crucially, humorously as the band's 2023 self-titled debut. "Currently, we are amidst the gross existence of capitalism, colonialism, white supremacy and the many oppressive forces that have come to inform everything around us" says vocalist and songwriter Gregg Deal. "The title PO$T AMERICAN informs a collective disenfranchisement and disillusionment to the so-called American dream, while moving forward with hope of a desired designation of unity outside those that would use us for their own capitalistic power grab." The aural palate is broadly the same, but it feels expanded, stronger somehow: drawing on the confrontational writing of Rage Against The Machine, the unapologetic voice of Chuck D and Public Enemy, the storytelling of Johnny Cash, the evolution of IDLES, and punk stalwarts including Black Flag, Rollins Band and Dead Kennedys. Overall the resulting feeling across the new album is one of cautious optimism: "Although we didn't expect the political relevance to become more relevant, we have no illusions to the American dream, or to where we seem to be going. But we have hope that we can get to a better place for people to have what they need." It is an album that speaks to and for this precise time and place; that perhaps could not exist at any other time. It is an album for now.

Cold Specks kehrt mit ihrem vierten Album 'Light for the Midnight' zurück.

Nach den Erfolgen ihrer ersten drei Alben 'I Predict a Graceful Expulsion' (2012), 'Neuroplasticity' (2014) und 'Fool's Paradise' (2017) hat Cold Specks (Al Spx) ihren Ruf als einzigartige Stimme der modernen Musik gefestigt. Von ihrer fesselnden Acapella-Performance bei Later... with Jools Holland bis hin zu Kollaborationen mit Moby, Massive Attack und Michael Gira von Swans hat Cold Specks immer wieder Kunstwerke geschaffen, die nachhallen.

Mit 'Light for the Midnight' begibt sie sich auf ihre bisher persönlichste Reise. In seinem Kern ist das Album eine rohe und zutiefst emotionale Reflexion über Ausdauer, Überleben und Transformation. Es ist eine Sammlung von inbrünstigen Balladen und atmosphärischen Popsongs, die Spx' gefühlvolle Stimme in weitläufige Klangwelten kanalisiert.

Das Album entstand in einer herausfordernden Phase in Spx' Leben. Die Arbeit begann 2019 inmitten von Kämpfen mit der psychischen Gesundheit, Erfahrungen, die tief in die Musik eingebettet sind. Doch trotz seiner persönlichen Ursprünge betont Spx seine Universalität: „Ich wollte auf jeden Fall über die letzten Jahre reflektieren, weil sie mich so sehr beeinflusst haben, aber ich wollte auch, dass das Publikum mit diesem Album weggeht. Die Songs gehören ihnen, sobald ich sie veröffentlicht habe.“

Das Album wurde in Toronto und Bristol aufgenommen, wobei Spx zusammen mit Adrian Utley von Portishead und Ali Chant (bekannt für seine Arbeit mit Perfume Genius, Dry Cleaning und Aldous Harding) als Co-Produzent fungierte. Es enthält Streicherarrangements von Owen Pallett (Taylor Swift, Lana Del Rey, Sampha) und zusätzliche Beiträge von Graham Walsh von Holy Fuck. Spx arbeitete auch mit einer Reihe von hervorragenden Kollaborateuren zusammen, darunter Chantal Kreviazuk (Drake, Kendrick Lamar), Malcolm Middleton von Arab Strap, Ben Christophers, Ed Harcourt und Jonathan Quarmby.

'Light for the Midnight' zeigt Cold Specks von ihrer verletzlichsten und kraftvollsten Seite, indem sie die Geschichten ihres Kampfes in atemberaubende Kompositionen verwebt, die einen tiefen Eindruck hinterlassen. Es ist ein Album der Hoffnung und der Transformation.

ver the years, Andreas O. Hirsch has shaped a distinctive sound, exploring the possibilities of the electro-acoustic instruments he const- ructs. The Carbophone as well as the Electrified Palm Leaf are plucked instruments akin to the African Kalimba or Mbira. In combination with effects and loops, Hirsch creates an experimen- tal space, influenced by early electronics, Asian and African music as well as the possibilities of editing and collage. The majority of the pieces on The Salamander Treaty were made using the Carbophone Jr., a small traveling version of his original Carbophone which was the basis of the previously released Early Carbophonics. Shaped by the joy of discovery, the eight tracks traverse peculiar worlds of sound, carried by a warm downbeat and analogue vibe. Alongside the Car- bophone Jr., other instruments come into play: a vibrato-soaked guitar leads through the slowly evolving ‘Rise’, marked by a recurring Shepard tone and sounds made by striking the bars of an antique wall clock. In the straightforward yet sub-aquatic ‘Te- atime Unlimited’, a pitch-shifted Morse key wanders erratically in the background. Tape-delayed har- monicas serve as a flying carpet for ‘Drifting Newts’, and rubber bands make their melodic-rhythmical appearance through ‘Back Door Minimal’.

The Salamander Treaty refers to War with the Newts, a prophetic and black-humoured science fiction novel by Karel Čapek from 1936, which tells the story of the rise of the salamanders, who become in- creasingly intelligent and eventually begin to compete with mankind. The album is a pacifist response to this dark scenario: Hirsch’s salamanders prefer to hang out under the stars (‘Drifting Newts’), drink tea (‘Tea Time Unlimited’) and — as illustrated on the back cover — write conspiratorial-pacifist demands instead of calling for war (e.g., ‘Teaoism International’, ‘White Lilies’, ‘For Congress’). In image and word, the album invites looking at the term ‘treaty’, which phonetically contains the words ‘tree’ and ‘tea’, as a friendly reminder that the drafting of every treaty and agreement on this planet should be accompanied by a peaceful spirit.

Music, mix and artwork by Andreas Oskar Hirsch. Mastered by Volker Hennes. Pressed on BioVinyl by Optimal, who state that their manufacturing process reduces CO2 emissions by approximately 90% for the PVC component. 12“ LP, coloured sleeve, download code included,

LIMITED TO 100 COPIES!.

‘SUN SHONE’ is a multidisciplinary music and art project of Istanbul-born, Amsterdam-based Deniz Omeroglu AKA Loradeniz,. ‘SUN SHONE’ marks the arrival of her debut full-length album: eight tracks of ambient electronic music painted masterfully with a palette of synthesizers, effects, percussion and ethereal voice.

‘SUN SHONE’ was conceived in two parts: the first tracks coming spontaneously to life in the aftermath of heartbreak, with Omeroglu trusting the creative flow and using it as a method of self- healing. What was initially planned as an EP release grew into a full-length album as she spent one month consciously working on the perfect B-side to complement the music.

Omeroglu wrote, performed and produced everything on the album, drawing on her deep knowledge of music theory and production; in addition to studying classical piano in the Conservatory from an early age, she holds both a Bachelor’s degree in Composition Studies and a Masters degree in Sound Design.

Many of the compositions on ‘SUN SHONE’ centre around interplaying synth arpeggios, oscillators expertly tuned for an equal degree of menace and sweetness that balances on a knife-edge. This ambiguity is echoed lyrically across the record, with its recurring themes of love lost and memories revisited. From the spoken word of opener ‘Saint Odds’ and ‘Swimmer’ to the layered choral swells of ‘No Moon’ and the melodic hooks of ‘Brick House’, Omeroglu’s voice is central to ‘SUN SHONE’, employed with impressive versatility. At times, it feels simultaneously fragile and powerful, perhaps nowhere more so than in the yearning swells of “Cloud Sofa’, a healing lullaby for lost love that offers up one of the most delicate moments on the album. 


Whilst this may loosely be referred to as an ‘ambient’ album, Loradeniz’s knowledge of modern day production techniques and experience as both a sound designer and seasoned DJ (both in clubs and on radio) makes its presence felt throughout; echoes of Artificial Intelligence-era IDM appear in the dancing arpeggios and rhythmic pulses of ‘Sea Serpent’ and ‘Waterbear’, while the album closer ‘Aftersun’ could easily be imagined working as the euphoric last tune of a club set at sunrise. 


With her debut album, Loradeniz weaves together an impressive breadth of styles and sounds, all held seamlessly together by a feeling; a cathartic desire to bring out all the melancholia from within. The album opens with the words ‘The search of love continues in the face of great odds’ a suitable mantra for a record that manages to combine melancholy with intense rushes of positivity and hopes for the future.

Die Vintage Sounds Vinyl-Reihe ist zurück mit einer neuen Ausgabe, die diesemal der kubanischen Musik gewidmet ist. Eine Auswahl mit 16 Tracks der größten klassischen kubanischen Songs. Darunter: COMPAY SEGUNDO, JOHNNY PACHECO Y SU CHARANGA, PÉREZ PRADO und viele mehr!

Crystal clear vinyl. 'PO$T AMERICAN' is the second full-length album by Dead Pioneers. Written in February and recorded in July, it preempts the 2024 American election but wraps up the fears and frustrations as eloquently and, crucially, humorously as the band's 2023 self-titled debut. "Currently, we are amidst the gross existence of capitalism, colonialism, white supremacy and the many oppressive forces that have come to inform everything around us" says vocalist and songwriter Gregg Deal. "The title PO$T AMERICAN informs a collective disenfranchisement and disillusionment to the so-called American dream, while moving forward with hope of a desired designation of unity outside those that would use us for their own capitalistic power grab." The aural palate is broadly the same, but it feels expanded, stronger somehow: drawing on the confrontational writing of Rage Against The Machine, the unapologetic voice of Chuck D and Public Enemy, the storytelling of Johnny Cash, the evolution of IDLES, and punk stalwarts including Black Flag, Rollins Band and Dead Kennedys. Overall the resulting feeling across the new album is one of cautious optimism: "Although we didn't expect the political relevance to become more relevant, we have no illusions to the American dream, or to where we seem to be going. But we have hope that we can get to a better place for people to have what they need." It is an album that speaks to and for this precise time and place; that perhaps could not exist at any other time. It is an album for now.

All Portrait, No Chorus is the new album from indie rap pioneer doseone and NYC producer Steel Tipped Dove. Together, these two artists have crafted an uncompromising masterpiece. Knowing the caliber of MC he is paired with, dove skillfully paints with every color on the palette, and doseone skates effortlessly on every track, whether skating languid figure 8s or landing lyrical triple axels. Somehow the veteran sounds sharper than ever and the songs are lean and hungry, cut to the quick. It is no accident that this project is released under the Backwoodz Studioz imprint; the road that leads to this collaboration starts with, of all things, a ShrapKnel demo. Here is how dose explains it: "I have been inspired by Backwoodz for a while, in many ways, but the most potent being all these distinct pens. September 2023, I had heard a nearly done version of ShrapKnel's latest record, and something snapped in me. Hearing that perfectly hungry, inspired rapping turned my power back on. For me, being inspired warrants telling those who are inspiring you, so once I heard Decay I reached out and sent Fatboi Sharif and Dove some kind words about that record. The rest is history." At the end of December 2023 Dove sent dose the first beat pack. Somewhere around the second week of January 2024 dose already had five songs written and recorded. By the middle of March, a rough album framework was essentially done, and they brought on Minneapolis producer Andrew Broder to freak the turntables across the whole project. Then, as a final piece, dose and dove added select collaborations from some of their favorite rappers. By the end of April it was done. "I'm not really a features guy, but to align with and connect with those who inspire me, I called in some beautiful humans I had never worked with but always meant to: Open Mike Eagle, M.Sayyid, billy woods, Fatboi Sharif, and Myka 9 connect eras, artists, and styles of unconventional rap I hold incredibly dear," doseone explains. Listening to All Portrait, No Chorus you can hear the battery in doseone's back as he pythons his way through each instrumental. For his part, Steel Tipped Dove_a prolific producer over the last two years_delivers some of the most diverse work of his career. The result is a dynamic, propulsive listen that casts its crackling energy in every direction except backwards.

Closing out the Special Sound Series in style, we are proud to present the long-awaited vinyl reissue of Shigeo Sekito’s 1985, an instrumental masterpiece that arrived nearly a decade after his iconic Kareinaru Electone Special Sound Series of the 1970s. A true pioneer in the world of Electone music, Sekito’s name—instantly recognizable in katakana—has left an indelible mark on the genre.

This album showcases his signature artistry across eight captivating tracks, blending originals and covers with his distinct sonic palette. The cosmic allure of the original composition “Amish At Dusk” stands out among the set, while the Manhattan Transfer cover “Twilight Zone, Twilight Tone” brims with dynamic, fast-paced arrangements. Meanwhile, Sekito’s take on The Crusaders’ “Rhapsody And Blues” unfolds with a laid-back groove, gradually building into an uplifting crescendo.

Drifting between chill-out and ambient sensibilities, 1985 captures a wistful, melancholic beauty—where the rich textures of the Electone transport listeners into a world of nostalgia and dreamlike introspection.

This final reissue in the series is a must-have for collectors and fans alike. Experience 1985 in its warm, analog glory—now on vinyl.

Closing out the Special Sound Series in style, we are proud to present the long-awaited vinyl reissue of Shigeo Sekito’s 1985, an instrumental masterpiece that arrived nearly a decade after his iconic Kareinaru Electone Special Sound Series of the 1970s. A true pioneer in the world of Electone music, Sekito’s name—instantly recognizable in katakana—has left an indelible mark on the genre.

This album showcases his signature artistry across eight captivating tracks, blending originals and covers with his distinct sonic palette. The cosmic allure of the original composition “Amish At Dusk” stands out among the set, while the Manhattan Transfer cover “Twilight Zone, Twilight Tone” brims with dynamic, fast-paced arrangements. Meanwhile, Sekito’s take on The Crusaders’ “Rhapsody And Blues” unfolds with a laid-back groove, gradually building into an uplifting crescendo.

Drifting between chill-out and ambient sensibilities, 1985 captures a wistful, melancholic beauty—where the rich textures of the Electone transport listeners into a world of nostalgia and dreamlike introspection.

This final reissue in the series is a must-have for collectors and fans alike. Experience 1985 in its warm, analog glory—now on vinyl.

"Petrol", one of Manu Kenton's most iconic tracks, makes its highly anticipated return in a limited edition that will appeal to both collectors and techno enthusiasts. This special version features not only the original track, but also exclusive remixes that reinterpret the piece from different angles, offering a diverse and exciting sonic palette.

Manu Kenton, staying true to his creative genius, revisits his own track by adding an energetic and catchy vocal, bringing a fresh new dynamic to the already electrifying atmosphere of the original.
The Gregor Size remix is a true powerhouse: dynamic, industrial, and powerful, it transforms "Petrol" into a heavy, punchy piece, with dark textures and irresistible rhythms that leave a lasting impression.
Greg Denbosa, on the other hand, delivers a progressive techno remix, with a dynamic and repetitive beat that builds tension, creating a hypnotic experience perfectly suited for the dancefloor.
Finally, Bestien offers a nervous, straight, and punchy version, ideal for the peak moments of a night. His explosive remix ramps up the intensity on the dancefloors, with raw energy and power that demands attention.

Visually, this vinyl stands out with its "Yolk" effect, a unique blend of white and white with luminous accents, creating a striking and modern design that will enhance any collection.

Français

"Petrol", l'un des morceaux les plus emblématiques de Manu Kenton, fait son grand retour dans une édition limitée qui séduira aussi bien les collectionneurs que les passionnés de techno. Cette version spéciale inclut non seulement la version originale du titre, mais aussi des remixes inédits qui réinterprètent le morceau sous des angles différents, offrant ainsi une palette sonore variée et excitante.

Manu Kenton, fidèle à son génie créatif, revisite son propre morceau en y ajoutant un vocal énergique et entraînant, donnant une nouvelle dynamique à l'atmosphère déjà électrisante de l'original.
Le remix de Gregor Size est un véritable tour de force : très dynamique, industriel et puissant, il transforme "Petrol" en une œuvre lourde et percutante, avec des textures sombres et des rythmes irrésistibles qui marquent les esprits.
Greg Denbosa, quant à lui, propose un remix techno progressif, avec un beat dynamique et répétitif qui crée une tension croissante, offrant une expérience hypnotique et parfaitement calibrée pour les sets dansants.
Enfin, Bestien livre une version nerveuse, droite et percutante, idéale pour les moments intenses d'une soirée. Son remix explosif fait monter l’intensité sur les dancefloors, avec une énergie brute et une puissance qui ne laisse personne indifférent.

Visuellement, ce vinyle se distingue par un effet "Yolk", un mélange unique de blanc et de rouge lumineux, créant un visuel frappant et moderne qui enrichira toute collection.

Transparent yellow vinyl, limited to 300 copies. GSA exclusive Indie variant. 'PO$T AMERICAN' is the second full-length album by Dead Pioneers. Written in February and recorded in July, it preempts the 2024 American election but wraps up the fears and frustrations as eloquently and, crucially, humorously as the band's 2023 self-titled debut. "Currently, we are amidst the gross existence of capitalism, colonialism, white supremacy and the many oppressive forces that have come to inform everything around us" says vocalist and songwriter Gregg Deal. "The title PO$T AMERICAN informs a collective disenfranchisement and disillusionment to the so-called American dream, while moving forward with hope of a desired designation of unity outside those that would use us for their own capitalistic power grab." The aural palate is broadly the same, but it feels expanded, stronger somehow: drawing on the confrontational writing of Rage Against The Machine, the unapologetic voice of Chuck D and Public Enemy, the storytelling of Johnny Cash, the evolution of IDLES, and punk stalwarts including Black Flag, Rollins Band and Dead Kennedys. Overall the resulting feeling across the new album is one of cautious optimism: "Although we didn't expect the political relevance to become more relevant, we have no illusions to the American dream, or to where we seem to be going. But we have hope that we can get to a better place for people to have what they need." It is an album that speaks to and for this precise time and place; that perhaps could not exist at any other time. It is an album for now.

'In de verte, dit uitzicht’ is Abel Ghekiere's second album. It is a celebration of beauty and sudden bursts of euphoria and melancholy, hidden in the distinctive soft and fragile sound of Ghekiere's music. Much more personal than on his debut record, he calls out to the world.

Working with voice samples and field recordings, voice and improvisation take centre stage. Sounds from outside are subtly interwoven with instruments, while conversations and memories act as a thread running through the compositions. The music flows into the room, bringing with it remembered places and voices.

The music was recorded very nomadically, in different places, with different people. Most of the parts were written and played by Abel Ghekiere himself but with guest contributions from Vitja Pauwels, Nicolas Rombauts, Leo Adamov, & Jan de Vroede, among others, the record breaks open into a soft sound palette.

"Children Will Be Furious" ist bereits das dritte Album der Hamburger Band Palila. Das Indie Rock Trio entwickelt sich in Sachen Punch, Druck, Groove und kompositorischer Dichte immer weiter und erschafft noch rauere und zum Teil angriffslustigere Songs als zuvor. Palila nennen Bands wie Built To Spill, Guided By Voices, Dinosaur Jr., Nada Surf, Pixies oder die frühen Smashing Pumpkins als Einflüsse, schaffen aber ihren ganz eigenen Sound, der sie bereits u.a. auf das Orange Blossom Special und das Rolling Stone Beach gebracht hat.

Scientist's name will be found on many dub releases in peoples record collections.His connection to King Tubby's studio is inseparable and many say when the dub end of Reggae music had fallen on quieter times it was Scientist with his often stripped back style and at other times, wild off the wall remixes that breathed life back into the dub cannon.

Scientist (born Overton Brownie,1960, Jamaica) was in many ways King Tubby's apprentice. Having helped his own father out repairing televisions and such like, he would help Tubby on winding transformer coils, that the amps of the day all needed. His interest in recording grew as he watched the many sessions taking place at Tubby's Dromilly Avenue Studio, learning the ropes as the musicians came and went. His first break happened when King Jammy (then Prince Jammy) was too tired to work on a session booked for producer Errol 'Don' Mais. Scientist engineered the session to every one’s bewilderment and great satisfaction.

His first hit would be a mix of Barrington Levy's 'Collie Weed' and his reputation built on the many versions he cut at Tubby's where he would become the engineer of choice. His pared down mixing style suited the new Dancehall reggae sound that came at the tail end of the 1970's and rolled into the 1980's. Such was his stature that albums were now sold with his name on their jacket, 'Scientist Vs Prince Jammy, 'Scientist meets The Space Invaders' to name but two.

His time at King Tubby's was followed as chief engineer working for the Hookim Brothers at the mighty Channel 1 Studio's and on many of top producer Henry 'Junjo' Lawes tracks, that were hit after hit at the time.

We have compiled some tuff tracks from the late 70's / early 80's just before everything went digital. Some great dub versions to some killer tracks that rocked the dancehalls around this golden time.The mighty Tristan Palmer whose killer cuts 'BadBoys','Stop Spreading Rumours','Eveready' and 'The Greatest Lover’ alongside Michael Palmer's debut release 'Mr Landlord' and Robert Trench's 'Mr Babylon'. The songs stand back-to-back with Tony Tuff's timeless 'Never Trouble Trouble' and the biblical Rod Taylor's 'The Lord is My Light'. Sammy Dread's 'Wah Dah Wah' and the always respectful Dennis Brown's 'Time and Place' all benefited a touch of magic from The Scientist and his laboratory of effects.

Hope you enjoy the set.....

Halo Studios und Laced Records haben sich zusammengetan, um die ikonische Musik der ursprünglichen Halo-Trilogie zum ersten Mal auf Vinyl zu veröffentlichen.

Diese Box enthält 83 Titel aus den ersten drei Halo-Alben, die speziell für Vinyl neu gemastert und auf acht heavyweight LPs gepresst wurden. Jeder Soundtrack befindet sich in einer breitrandige Außenhülle und einer bedruckten Innenhülle. Diese wiederum befinden sich in einer stabilen Sammlerbox aus Karton mit silbernem Laminatüberzug und geprägtem Halo-Logo.

Das Original-Cover-Artwork stammt von Art Director und Concept Artist Isaac Hannaford (alias Rhizus / Space Ship Guru), dem ehemaligen Lead Concept Artist und Mitwirkenden an Halo 3, Halo 3: ODST und Halo Reach. Das zusätzliche Artwork der Box wurde von der Grafikdesignerin Maren Landsnes erstellt.

Halo: Combat Evolved war der Inbegriff des Konsolen-Ego-Shooters und sein Soundtrack legte den Grundstein für den legendären Sound der Serie. Der Soundtrack ist von verschiedenen Genres inspiriert und kombiniert schwungvolle Orchesterklänge mit marschierenden Militär-Snares, Prog-Rock-Percussion und - wer könnte den gregorianischen Mönchsgesang vergessen?

Für Halo 2 taten sich die Komponisten mit hochkarätigen Musikern zusammen und verpassten dem Halo-Thema mit dem neuen „Mjolnir Mix“ ein Heavy-Metal-Makeover. Es war der erste Videospiel-Soundtrack, der es in die Billboard 200 schaffte.

Halo 3 zeichnete sich durch Tribal-Drums und Prog-Rock-Refrains aus, während Klaviermelodien, begleitet von einem 60-köpfigen Orchester und einem 24-stimmigen Chor, dem Soundtrack emotionale Tiefe verliehen.

- 83 Tracks aus Halo: Combat Evolved, Halo 2 und Halo 3
- Speziell für Vinyl neu gemastert
- Cover-Artwork von Isaac Hannaford (ehemaliger Lead Concept Artist, Bungie)

Halo Studios und Laced Records haben sich zusammengetan, um die ikonische Musik der ursprünglichen Halo-Trilogie zum ersten Mal auf Vinyl zu veröffentlichen.

Dieses Doppel-LP-Set enthält die Musik aus dem Spiel, mit dem alles begann, speziell für Vinyl neu gemastert und auf heavyweight LPs gepresst. Die Schallplatten befinden sich in einer breitrandigen Außenhülle und zwei bedruckten Innenhüllen.

Das Original-Cover-Artwork stammt von Art Director und Concept Artist Isaac Hannaford (alias Rhizus / Space Ship Guru), dem ehemaligen Lead Concept Artist und Mitwirkenden an Halo 3, Halo 3: ODST und Halo Reach. Das zusätzliche Artwork des Sets wurde von der Grafikdesignerin Maren Landsnes erstellt.

Halo: Combat Evolved war der Inbegriff des Konsolen-Ego-Shooters und sein Soundtrack legte den Grundstein für den legendären Sound der Serie. Der Soundtrack ist von verschiedenen Genres inspiriert und kombiniert schwungvolle Orchesterklänge mit marschierenden Militär-Snares, Prog-Rock-Percussion und - wer könnte den gregorianischen Mönchsgesang vergessen?

- 26 speziell remasterte Titel aus dem Spiel von 2001
- Cover-Artwork von Isaac Hannaford (ehemaliger Lead Concept Artist bei Bungie)

Kaum hatte Stella Chronopoulou mit dem Schreiben von Adagio, ihrem fünften Album als Σtella, begonnen, wusste sie, dass die Zeit endlich gekommen war, um in ihrer Muttersprache Griechisch zu singen. Es wäre eine Premiere. Sie begann mit dem Album fast zufällig im Jahr 2019, während einer 11-stündigen Bootsfahrt zur Insel Anafi. Σtella hatte kürzlich eine persönliche Krise durchgemacht und brauchte eine Pause von zu Hause. Auf der Fähre zückte sie ihr Handy, während das Boot durch das Mittelmeer glitt, und begann mit einer einfachen Melodie, aus der sie nach und nach ein grobes Instrumentalstück zusammensetzte.

Als psychedelische Keyboards über stakkatohaften Drums flimmerten und schwankten, suggerierte der Track ein tiefes Ausatmen, als ob Σtella lange überflüssigen Ballast loslassen würde. Für eine Weile legte sie das Instrumentalstück beiseite. Sie war noch nicht so weit und hatte es auch nicht eilig. ?tella ist schließlich in einer langsamen Umgebung aufgewachsen. In ihrer Jugend in einem relativ ländlichen Vorort von Athen, Griechenland, spielten sie und ihre Freunde ungehindert auf leeren Straßen, machten sich keine Gedanken über Autos oder Genehmigungen, und das Leben fühlte sich einfach an. Doch in den letzten zehn Jahren ist das Leben von Σtella, die jetzt im Herzen von Athen lebt, immer geschäftiger geworden. Mit drei anspruchsvollen, verspielten und mit internationalem Elan vorgetragenen Pop-Alben ist sie zu einem der beliebtesten Musikexporte des modernen Griechenlands geworden.

Nach ihrem Sub Pop-Debüt Up and Away im Jahr 2022 überschritt sie die Marke von drei Millionen monatlichen Spotify-Hörern. Dieser Erfolg war ein Segen, aber Σtella sehnte sich manchmal nach dem langsameren Tempo ihrer Jugend. Diese Sehnsucht ist der rote Faden, der ihr fünftes Album, das bezaubernde Adagio, locker zusammenhält. Der Name leitet sich von dem Begriff für Musik ab, die langsam gespielt werden soll, Adagio ist dabei ein Pop-Album, das sich wie eine warme Decke anfühlt; es umhüllt seine Hörer mit nylonbesaiteten Gitarren, federleichter Percussion, psychedelischen Keyboards und Stakkato-Schlagzeug.

Geschrieben und aufgenommen über einen Zeitraum von fünf Jahren mit einem Konsortium von internationalen Kollaborateuren, darunter Rafael Cohen von !!! und der britische Songwriter Gabriel Stebbing, ist Adagio eine 27-minütige Meditation über Liebe und Sehnsucht, Ruhe und Zeit. Obwohl der Großteil des Albums auf Englisch gesungen ist, wie alle ihre Alben, wartet Σtella auch mit ihren ersten beiden Songs auf Griechisch auf: „Omorfo Mou“ und eine Coverversion eines griechischen Kultklassikers von 1969, „Ta Vimata“ von Litsa Sakellariou. Es ist ein Zeichen des Selbstbewusstseins, das diese zarten und verliebten kleinen Stücke ausstrahlen. Von Anfang bis Ende klingt Σtella auf Adagio entspannter und wohler als je zuvor. Diese bezaubernden Songs werden ihre Karriere nicht bremsen oder ihr den Wunsch des Titeltracks erfüllen, aber für eine halbe Stunde lockert die Zeit ihren Griff, auch auch wenn sie nicht langsamer wird.

Produziert von Will Yip (Turnstile, Title Fight, Mannequin Pussy, etc.), der auch schon an der 2023er "Psychic Dance Routine" EP der Hardcore-Band Scowl aus Santa Cruz mitgewirkt hat, findet man auf "Are We All Angels" die giftige und antagonistische Band, die ihre Aggression durch eine expansivere Version ihrer selbst leitet. Das Album wurde von Rich Costey (Fiona Apple, My Chemical Romance, Vampire Weekend, etc.) gemischt. "Are We All Angels" ist geprägt von Entfremdung, Trauer und Kontrollverlust, und setzt sich größtenteils mit ihrem neu gefundenen Platz in der Hardcore-Szene auseinander, einer Gemeinschaft, die die Band in den letzten Jahren sowohl umarmt als auch zu einer Art Blitzableiter gemacht hat. Auf "Are We All Angels" erkunden Scowl auf Schritt und Tritt ehrgeizige neue Richtungen und verbiegen Genre-Normen. Sängerin Kat Moss macht die am unmittelbarsten erkennbare Entwicklung, indem sie einen strukturierteren und manchmal zarten Ansatz wählt. Sie spielt mit Harmonien und melodischem Feingefühl, das selbst die eingefleischtesten Scowl-Fans überraschen dürfte. Moss nennt eine breite Palette von Einflüssen außerhalb des harten Rock - alles von Billie Eilish bis Radiohead, Car Seat Headrest bis Julien Baker. "Die meisten von uns waren wirklich keine geübten Musiker, als die Band begann", gibt sie zu. "Es war in dieser Hinsicht sehr Germs-esque, wie die erste Hardcore-Band eines Babys, was großartig ist. Jetzt wissen wir vielleicht immer noch nicht, was wir tun, aber wir haben eine bessere Vorstellung davon, was wir tun wollen." Instrumental gibt die Band Einflüsse von Negative Approach, Bad Brains, Hole, Mudhoney, Garbage, Ramones, Pixies, Sonic Youth, Rocket From The Crypt und anderen an. Bassist Bailey Lupo merkt an: "Das Songwriting für die neue Platte war das bisher kollaborativste in der Geschichte von Scowl. Jeder hat so viele Ideen eingebracht, und wir konnten sie alle in Ruhe analysieren und uns Zeit nehmen. Wir haben alle so unterschiedliche Geschmäcker, Einflüsse und Persönlichkeiten, und das kann man auf diesem Album wirklich in jeder Ecke hören." Selbst durch diesen eklektischen Ansatz verlieren Scowl nichts von ihrer Schärfe und schaffen es immer noch, die Wut und Frustration zu vermitteln, die dahinter steckt. Sie sind zutiefst dem Ethos des Punk und seinem Gemeinschaftssinn verpflichtet. "Hardcore und Punk haben uns geprägt, wie wir arbeiten, was wir als Band tun wollen und wie wir uns beteiligen", sagt Greene. "Im Kern sind wir eine Punk- und Hardcore-Band, unabhängig davon, wie sich der Song verändert." Das Album wird von dem bereits veröffentlichten "Special" eröffnet, einen Song mit großer, hymnischer Energie, der die rohe Intensität von Scowl beibehält. Scowl haben sich schnell als einer der dynamischsten und fleißigsten Acts in der Rockszene etabliert und ausgiebig in den USA und international mit Bands wie Limp Bizkit, Destroy Boys, The Bronx, Militarie Gun, Show Me The Body, Zulu, Touche Amore, A Day To Remember, Speed, Sunami und vielen anderen getourt, sowie Festivalauftritte beim Coachella, Reading & Leeds, No Values, Outbreak, Primavera und Sick New World, um nur einige zu nennen, absolviert. Die Band - Malachi Greene (Gitarre), Bailey Lupo (Bass), Cole Gilbert (Schlagzeug), Mikey Bifolco (Gitarre) und Kat Moss (Gesang) - gründete sich 2019 und feierte 2021 mit ihrem Debütalbum "How Flowers Grow" ihren Durchbruch. Seitdem sind sie unaufhaltsam auf dem Vormarsch.

Inspiriert vom Leben und Mythos des Schauspielers Dennis Hopper haben Mike Scott und The Waterboys - die schottische Rockband bekannt für ihre Hits 'The Whole Of The Moon' und 'The Big Music' - dieses umfangreiche Album als Hommage an eine der faszinierendsten Persönlichkeiten der amerikanischen Popkultur geschaffen. Das Album mit ausschließlich eigenen Songs ist sehr konzeptionell angelegt und bringt hochkarätige Künstler wie Bruce Springsteen, Fiona Apple und Steve Earle zusammen, um Hoppers Leben musikalisch zu durchdringen, einschließlich eines Songs für jede seiner Ehefrauen.

- Die Verpackung enthält Fotos aus dem Archiv von Dennis Hopper

- Col. 2LP: (Burnt Colored Vinyl in Gatefold-Hülle mit bedruckten Innentaschen)

Inspiriert vom Leben und Mythos des Schauspielers Dennis Hopper haben Mike Scott und The Waterboys - die schottische Rockband bekannt für ihre Hits 'The Whole Of The Moon' und 'The Big Music' - dieses umfangreiche Album als Hommage an eine der faszinierendsten Persönlichkeiten der amerikanischen Popkultur geschaffen. Das Album mit ausschließlich eigenen Songs ist sehr konzeptionell angelegt und bringt hochkarätige Künstler wie Bruce Springsteen, Fiona Apple und Steve Earle zusammen, um Hoppers Leben musikalisch zu durchdringen, einschließlich eines Songs für jede seiner Ehefrauen.

- Die Verpackung enthält Fotos aus dem Archiv von Dennis Hopper

- Ltd. Col. 2LP: (Psychedelic Waves Colored Vinyl in Gatefold-Hülle mit bedruckten Innentaschen)

Green Vinyl

Smith/Kotzen ist die musikalische Zusammenarbeit zwischen den Musikern Adrian Smith von Iron Maiden
und Richie Kotzen, der Mitglied der Winery Dogs und selbst Solokünstler ist.
White Noise ist die Debütsingle des mit Spannung erwarteten zweiten Albums Black Light/White Noise
des Weltklasse-Duos der Sänger/Gitarristen Adrian Smith und Richie Kotzen. Dieser mitreißende Track
hebt ihre einzigartige Zusammenarbeit auf die Spitze, da ihr moderner Ansatz, sowohl auf dem Griffbrett
als auch stimmlich, ihre Liebe zum klassischen Hard Rock hervorruft. Dieser hymnische Aufruf zeigt einmal
mehr das Songwriting-Können dieser beiden Musiker für ihre weltweiten Fan-Legionen.

Genau genommen stammt die Idee zu Who Believes In Angels? von drei befreundeten Musiker:innen:
Neben Elton John und der 11-fachen GRAMMY-Gewinnerin Brandi Carlile aus dem US-Staat Washington
war auch der vielfach preisgekrönte US-Produzent und Songwriter Andrew Watt (zweifacher GRAMMYGewinner) von Anfang an am kreativen Prozess beteiligt. Ihre Vision war eine echte Zusammenarbeit: Sie
wollten einen Longplayer aufnehmen, der ein echtes Gemeinschaftsprojekt ist, der durch und durch auf den
Faktor Kollaboration setzt. Konkret schwebte ihnen ein Mix aus Stücken vor, bei denen mal Elton, mal
Brandi am Mikrofon den Ton angeben sollte, wobei die Songtexte sowohl von Brandi als auch von Eltons
angestammtem Kreativpartner Bernie Taupin stammen sollten. Als Produzent und Co-Songwriter kam
obendrein Andrew Watt ins Spiel, dem als kreatives Bindeglied und Vermittler eine zentrale Rolle zukam.
Schon im Oktober 2023 kamen sie alle in den Sunset Sound Studios in Los Angeles zusammen, und nach 20
Tagen war schließlich alles im Kasten. Unterstützung bekamen sie dabei von weiteren Weltklasse-Musikern
– u.a. von Chad Smith (Red Hot Chili Peppers), Pino Palladino (Nine Inch Nails, Gary Numan, David
Gilmour) und Josh Klinghoffer (Pearl Jam, Beck).
Erhältlich als CD I LP I CD Box (CD & DVD & Aufklappbare Box)

Almost as soon as Σtella Chronopoulou began writing Adagio, her fifth album as Σtella, she knew the time had finally come to sing in Greek, her native tongue. It would be a first. She started the record almost by accident in 2019, during an 11-hour boat ride to the island of Anafi. Σtella had recently gone through a patch of personal turmoil and needed a break from home. On the ferry, she pulled out her cell phone as the boat clipped through the Mediterranean and began with a simple melody, steadily piecing together a rough instrumental. As psychedelic keyboards twinkled and swayed above staccato drums, the track suggested some deep exhalation, as if Σtella were letting go of long-unnecessary baggage. For a spell, she set the instrumental aside. She wasn’t ready yet, or in a rush. Σtella, after all, grew up in a slow place. During her youth in a relatively rural suburb of Athens, Greece, she and her friends played unfettered in empty streets, not worried about cars or permission, and living felt easy. But in the last decade life has steadily become busier for Σtella, now based in the heart of Athens. She has become one of modern Greece’s most popular musical exports, with three sophisticated, playful pop albums rendered with international élan. After her Sub Pop debut, Up and Away, in 2022, she catapulted beyond three million monthly Spotify listeners. That success was a blessing, but Σtella sometimes found herself pining for the slower pace of her youth. That longing is the thread that loosely binds together her fifth album, the entrancing Adagio. Borrowing its name from the term for music that’s meant to be played slowly, Adagio is a pop record that feels like a very warm blanket, its nylon-string guitars and featherlight percussion swaddling its listeners for three minutes at a time. Written and recorded over the span of five years, with a consortium of international collaborators including !!!’s Rafael Cohen and British songwriter Gabriel Stebbing, Adagio is a 27-minute meditation on love and desire, rest and time. Though the bulk of it is sung in English, Σtella delivers her first two songs in Greek here—“Omorfo Mou,” the one that began on the boat, and a cover of a 1969 cult classic of the Greek New Wave, Litsa Sakelariou’s “Ta Vimata.” It is a sign of the self-assurance that radiates throughout these tender and smitten little tunes. Start to finish, Σtella sounds more at ease and comfortable than she’s ever been on Adagio. These fetching songs will not slow her career or grant her that title track’s wish. But, for half an hour, Adagio adds a measure of warmth to the world, with time loosening its grip even if it doesn’t slow down.● Athens, Greece-based Σtella’s new album Adagio is a pop record that feels like a very warm blanket, its nylon-string guitars and featherlight percussion swaddling its listeners for three minutes at a time.● Features Rafael Cohen and British songwriter Gabriel Stebbing.• Σtella’s breakout hit “Charmed” from her 2022 album Up and Away has nearly 100 million streams, and was recently featured in the hit Max show Industry.• On Spotify, Σtella has 3.4 million followers, 66k monthly listeners.

This is a recorded document performed by Mark Holub, Johanna Pärli and Sofía Salvo.

As a trio, they had not met until sound-checking for their gig at Berlin’s Cashmere Radio on September 1, 2023 — a fact that may be concealed by their immediate understanding as a musical entity but is obvious by their artistic freedom and curiosity towards each hoc encounters, flexible and steadfast in its performance, and that culminated in an experience that shook the floor of the radio station’s headquarters.

The day after, Sofía, Johanna and Mark gathered in Adam Asnan’s studio and deepened their quest for a communal language. They ignored any musical fetters or conventions, enjoyed the possibilities of a wider time frame without a live audience — and exceeded all hopes of what three personalities can achieve when they are given the space and time to experiment, detached from any restrictions.

Mark Holub is a drummer of outstanding versatility and responsiveness, full of ideas and quick on his feet. Through his playing as well as his experience as a band-leader and composer he is able to steer this coequal group towards thundering crescendo, but sits equally comfortable in the centre of complex and fine rhythm probing in response to impulses thrown in by his companions.

Johanna Pärli makes use of her double bass’s entire body, extracting an armada of multi- layered sounds with an immensely high sonic spectrum that is also reflected in the diversity of her musical projects. She is both patient and wildly adventurous in her performance, and in this trio her contribution wanders from considerate bow work to brisk fingerpicking, gnarly string strikes and pedal use to startling effects.

Sofía Salvo unleashes the full unbounded potential of her voice by taking advantage of her baritone saxophone’s broad range of possibilities. She is one of Berlin’s most singular musicians and her widely proven capabilities cover gentle additions to support and underline pulsive interplay just as masterfully as rapid licks and roaring bursts of noise, spurring the collective to unpredictable intensity.

If music of this particular kind often gives the impression of a constant search, this international trio certainly managed to find common ground and capture a special moment in time for listeners to (re-)discover. Contrary to what frequent misconception sometimes suggests, it’s also tremendous fun.

NERR — Filling Open Spaces was instantly composed and performed live in studio by Mark Holub on drums, Johanna Pärli on double bass and Sofía Salvo on baritone saxophone, recorded in Berlin on September 2, 2023 and mixed by Adam Asnan. Mastered and cut by Rashad Becker, vinyl pressed at Pallas. Artwork and design by Stefan Lingg, produced by Christoph Berg and Stefan Lingg.

Smith/Kotzen ist die musikalische Zusammenarbeit zwischen den Musikern Adrian Smith von Iron Maiden
und Richie Kotzen, der Mitglied der Winery Dogs und selbst Solokünstler ist.
White Noise ist die Debütsingle des mit Spannung erwarteten zweiten Albums Black Light/White Noise
des Weltklasse-Duos der Sänger/Gitarristen Adrian Smith und Richie Kotzen. Dieser mitreißende Track
hebt ihre einzigartige Zusammenarbeit auf die Spitze, da ihr moderner Ansatz, sowohl auf dem Griffbrett
als auch stimmlich, ihre Liebe zum klassischen Hard Rock hervorruft. Dieser hymnische Aufruf zeigt einmal
mehr das Songwriting-Können dieser beiden Musiker für ihre weltweiten Fan-Legionen.

Genau genommen stammt die Idee zu Who Believes In Angels? von drei befreundeten Musiker:innen:
Neben Elton John und der 11-fachen GRAMMY-Gewinnerin Brandi Carlile aus dem US-Staat Washington
war auch der vielfach preisgekrönte US-Produzent und Songwriter Andrew Watt (zweifacher GRAMMYGewinner) von Anfang an am kreativen Prozess beteiligt. Ihre Vision war eine echte Zusammenarbeit: Sie
wollten einen Longplayer aufnehmen, der ein echtes Gemeinschaftsprojekt ist, der durch und durch auf den
Faktor Kollaboration setzt. Konkret schwebte ihnen ein Mix aus Stücken vor, bei denen mal Elton, mal
Brandi am Mikrofon den Ton angeben sollte, wobei die Songtexte sowohl von Brandi als auch von Eltons
angestammtem Kreativpartner Bernie Taupin stammen sollten. Als Produzent und Co-Songwriter kam
obendrein Andrew Watt ins Spiel, dem als kreatives Bindeglied und Vermittler eine zentrale Rolle zukam.
Schon im Oktober 2023 kamen sie alle in den Sunset Sound Studios in Los Angeles zusammen, und nach 20
Tagen war schließlich alles im Kasten. Unterstützung bekamen sie dabei von weiteren Weltklasse-Musikern
– u.a. von Chad Smith (Red Hot Chili Peppers), Pino Palladino (Nine Inch Nails, Gary Numan, David
Gilmour) und Josh Klinghoffer (Pearl Jam, Beck).
Erhältlich als CD I LP I CD Box (CD & DVD & Aufklappbare Box)

Flutter Ridder is the duo of Norwegian multidisciplinary artists Espen Friberg and Jenny Berger Myhre, both of whom play important roles in Oslo’s contemporary art and music underground. The pair first collaborated during the production of Friberg’s debut solo record, “Sun Soon” (Hubro, 2022), quickly recognizing in one another a creative kinship rooted in a playful, intentionally naive approach towards making art. In November of 2023, the pair decamped to the coastal town of Hvisten in southeastern Norway to record what would become this debut, self-titled album in an ancient wooden church. Drawing from a palette of Friberg’s idiosyncratic Serge modular system and the church’s resident pipe organ and intoxicating acoustic reverb, they began recording and sculpting music informed by the notion that air and electricity share a common flow, a continuous current that can be directed through valves and potentiometers. The pair came to think of the Serge and pipe organ as sibling instruments, the former yielding characteristically unpredictable and complex timbres that complement the wooly, reedy drones and strange, microtonal overtones of the latter. At once sublime, liturgical, and whimsical, Flutter Ridder offers its listener a series of moving, cinematic natural landscapes, affirming the sensibilities of its makers and the indelible influence of the environment in which it was produced.

Another foggy day in Yorkshire. A steel grey sky. Raindrops tracing one another down the windowpane. Kirk Barley sits in his studio and assembles compositions from scraps of found sound and live instrumentation. Melodies swell, withdraw and repeat like waves. Time slows. Accelerates. Slows again. The light bends, tweaked at the edges. Twisted by rhythms that never quite resolve.

Written, recorded and produced by Barley in Yorkshire in early 2024, Lux picks up where 2023 LP Marionette leaves off, conjuring a mystical, reflective space between formal minimalism and sonic imaginaries of northern landscapes.

And yet, where Marionette relied at times on more recognisable field recordings, Lux leans into Barley’s skill as an instrumentalist and sound designer, working from a palette of short samples and utilising a variety of alternate tuning systems to build, layer and coax his compositions into being. Most evident on tracks ‘Vita’, ‘Sprite’ and ‘Descendent’, these tunings create an otherworldly harmonic language that is easier to perceive than describe.

Alongside more familiar instruments of guitar, bass, drums, organ and clarinet, here Barley draws on plastic saxophones and bells, and recordings of glass, wood and metal sound objects to provide the organic matter. Rather than directly representative of the natural world, Lux enters into a dialogue with it which, like the grasses and flowers of the album’s cover, exists somewhere between reality and artifice.

On album opener ‘Cache’, Barley constructs his own sense of time from a recording of an umbrella crank, a sparse and spectral piece which hints at memories embedded in the track’s title. Introspection blossoms into new life on ‘Vita’, crumpling again into the percussive ambience of ‘Verre’. A track that takes its harmonic lead from the clinks of glass, it features Barley’s long-time collaborator Matt Davies on drums, whose nuanced, tonally sensitive playing gives ‘Verre’ a fizzing, ice-like quality.

There are several moments where Lux picks up on themes Barley explored under electronic moniker Church Andrews on recent works with Davies, stretching and distorting temporalities most explicitly on ‘Descendent’, whose ritualistic air unfurls around a pattern in exponential decline.

Embracing the surrealism Barley absorbed over years watching classic film noir and the works of David Lynch and Federico Fellini, Lux wends its way through the enchanted sound worlds of ‘Sprite’ and ‘Balanced’ before arriving at the album’s title track.

An expression of his recent experiments in live, prepared guitar, ‘Lux’ brings the album back to earth, returning us to the room where the rain has stopped, the clouds have parted, and the soft warmth of the spring sun is pouring in through the open window.

On a creative roll of late, Linkwoods productions have branched out in many directions, a collaboration LP with jazz Genius Greg Foat, Another with Local Edinburgh Legend Other lands and a load more yet to surface. Linkwood now comes back to solo work with a hyper focused piece of electro goodness. Lo-fi but all the better for it, Mono comprises 14 deeply distilled tracks. After producing some more complex records it was time for a pure palate cleanser so we locked Nick in the Athens of the north studio for a week with his friends Moog and Oberheim to see what might happen. Somewhere between Electro, Early 80s Synth pop and techno the album is an extremely listenable piece as a whole, unpretentious and timeless. Sprinklings ofDave Stewart pop noodles, Newbuild, Early Era Nu Groove but very much Linkwood at the same time, I cant recommend this enough.

"Daft Punk brought me here, he brought me Daft Punk"

Just knowing that this slice of hyper-rare disco dynamite was crafted by Thomas Bangalter's dad should be enough for you to buy this on sight, if only to understand a little bit more about Thomas and Daft Punk's background. But this is so much more than a Daft Punk family curio.

Born Bangalter in 1947, Daniel Vangarde is a French songwriter and producer. In 1975, Vangarde founded his label, Zagora Records, who we have worked closely with on this lovingly curated reissue. For years, Vangarde wrote and produced songs that remained underground, under several pseudonyms and for various artists. Dubbed "the secret father of French disco" this here groove-fulled firecracker - using his Who’s Who moniker - is for disco-funk, library music and cosmic beat lovers.

The intense, evocative opener "Palace Palace" positively throbs with raw energy and sounds, honestly, like something off Daft Punk's Discovery. The title refers to the fashionable Parisian club Le Palace, essentially the Parisian Studio 54. "I’d been to a nightclub in New York, a big ring where people were roller skating with a whistle. The atmosphere was great. The music was all disco. I made this song when I came back. A vocoder transformed my voice. Back then, it wasn’t used much." The track rides a killer groove and is deceptively complex, with layers of fantastic percussion and ace synth work going on all over it. Listed to on repeat, it's brilliance is simply undeniable.

The louche, slo-mo heater "Hypno Dance" is, in Be With's opinion, *the* deadly dancefloor track. A svelte slice of ace space disco again geared towards the roller skating dance mania of the day. So deep, so disco, so instrumental. An unreal track and, as the title hints at, totally hypnotic. The side closes with the somewhat throwaway "Popeden" - it's a jaunty number that you're probably best skipping, in all honesty. Have we ever steered you wrong?

The B-Side opens with the frankly enormous "Roll Jacky Roll" is another thrilling, high class roller-rink jam with beautiful melodies that's adored the world over. The wonky, abstract "Ad Libitum 80" is a super dope, swirling, staccato electro-funk bounce which sounds light years ahead of its time. This might be the real lowkey sleeper gem on this record. CHECK! This remarkable LP rounds out with the huge "Dancin' Machine". It's got sleek drums that emit an absolutely ace swagger and elements of Italo synth funk feels. A relaxed, slow rhythm throughout ensures you can't help but get your funk on when this crashes soundsystems. We'll leave the final word on this to Daniel: "It amuses me to think that my son Thomas was influenced by "Dancin’ Machine" for "Around The World", he says. Both songs being based on an hypnotic repetitive refrain. Both songs being, of course, timeless pieces of Euro genius.

Who's Who really is a fantastic late-70s-early 80s roller disco-funk essential. The audio has been carefully remastered by Be With regular Simon Francis, ensuring it sounds better than ever. Cicely Balston's expert skills have made sure nothing is lost in the cut whilst the records have been pressed to the highest possible standard at Record Industry in Holland.

When it came to the sleeve for this we were presented with an unusual problem: we usually have to rely on an original sleeve as the starting point for the restoration, but instead we were able to scan the original 35mm transparency of the front cover photo. The problem is that with a modern scanner the results were far sharper than when they made the original sleeve. We’ve played around with the exposure and the colour grading but we’re sorry to say that our version of the front cover still ended up looking too good! Don’t hate us.

Was ist ein "Boogie"? In der Umgangssprache ist es ein Tanz oder eine Gelegenheit zum Tanzen. Da es sich hier um ein Destroyer-Album handelt und nicht um den allgemeinen Sprachgebrauch, sind die Implikationen eines Titels wie "Dan's Boogie" verführerischer und gefährlicher zugleich. "Ein Boogie ist ein Täuschungsmanöver, ein Betrug, der nicht ganz funktioniert, die Bewegungen, die wir machen, wenn wir damit konfrontiert werden", erklärt Dan Bejar. "Ich denke an Spionage, Doppelagenten, die mit einem offenen Auge schlafen und die Ausgänge im Auge behalten. Aber ich denke auch an kleine Siege und Niederlagen auf der Straße und an Improvisation". Um "Dan's Boogie" aufzunehmen, musste Bejar eine Reihe von gewollten und ungewollten Hindernissen überwinden, um die Songs zu schreiben. Die Monate nach der Fertigstellung von "LABYRINTHITIS" wurden zu einem Jahr und dann zu zwei Jahren, in denen Bejar sich selbst den Neujahrsvorsatz gab, jeden Tag eine Stunde lang Klavier zu spielen. Das hat ungefähr vier Tage gedauert, aber die Songs, die Bejar als Ergebnis dieses Vorsatzes bezeichnet - darunter "Cataract Time", "Hydroplaning Off the Edge of the World", "Bologna" und "Dan's Boogie" - sind allesamt Destroyer-Songs aus dem breiten Spektrum, das Bejar und seine Mitstreiter für sich selbst geschaffen haben: Spektakuläre Pop-Epen, persönliche Piano-Balladen und schwelende Stimmungsbilder, die die Grenzen zwischen Song, Roman und Kino verschwimmen lassen, jedes voll von der Dringlichkeit eines Staatsgeheimnisses im Kopf eines gequälten Spions. Die Leadsingle "Bologna" ist der radikalste Rahmen für diese Energie, denn es ist das erste Mal, dass Bejar einen Song schreibt, in dem er sich selbst als Nebenfigur vorstellt. In der Hauptrolle ist Simone Schmidt von Fiver zu hören, deren Stimme - hart und ausdrucksstark, durchdringend durch die Düsternis der Szene - ein Sirenengesang ist, der das ganze Album durchdringt. Die Schwere ihrer Stimme ordnet "Dan's Boogie" um ein Gefühl des drohenden Untergangs herum, so wie das Versprechen einer Fatale auf das Ungewöhnliche und Ekstatische die Hauptfigur eines erotischen Thrillers zum Verhängnis wird. "Hydroplaning Off the Edge of the World" ist ein köstlicher Widerspruch, ein schwungvoller Song, der aus der Verwüstung entstand, die Bejar absichtlich mit sich selbst anrichtete. "We are now entering a new phase", intoniert Bejar und führt Schichten von Gitarren und Synthesizern ein, die die Palette erheblich verdunkeln, während er zwischen Gesang und Sprache wechselt. Der Nebel, der Bejar umgibt, wird durch die Reibung zwischen konkurrierenden Wahrheiten und Geschmäckern erhellt, etwa wenn sein Interesse an jazzigen Balladen auf das Interesse des Produzenten und Bassisten John Collins an Bands wie Led Zeppelin und Scritti Politti trifft. Als Bejar Collins erzählte, dass er an Sammy Davis Jr. dachte, entstand der Titeltrack, in dem Bejar mit fast wahnhafter Freude einen Rat Pack-Swagger vor einer verträumten Klangkulisse aus schwebenden Gitarren, üppigen Bläsern, Jazz-Drumming, spacigen Synthesizern und - vielleicht am ehesten dem Selbstverständnis Bejars entsprechend - einem klimpernden Lounge-Piano annahm. Das Herzstück von "Dan's Boogie" ist vielleicht "Cataract Time", ein achtminütiges Epos, das zu den schwersten Texten gehört, die Bejar je geschrieben hat, und eine der musikalisch komplexesten Kompositionen von Destroyer ist. Getragen von einem lässigen Groove, sind Bejars Texte verklärt, ihre Melancholie schmeckt fast widersinnig nach Hoffnung. Es ist ein intimer Song, der Destroyers übliches urbanes Fabel-Milieu gegen eine erfrischende Innerlichkeit eintauscht, aber sein beschwingter Groove lässt eine Zukunft erahnen, der Bejar und seine Band entgegenfiebern. Wo frühere Destroyer-Alben mit der Welt kämpften, tanzt "Dan's Boogie" mit ihr, und seine neun Träumereien verschmelzen zu einem einzigen langen Treiben. Dan Bejar mag die Ausgänge im Auge haben, aber er wird nicht so bald abreisen.





e 5 BOLOGNA [FEAT. FIVER]

That’s the Price of Loving Me marks Dean Wareham’s (Galaxie 500, Luna, Dean & Britta, ) evocative return, rekindling his partnership with producer Kramer for the first time since Galaxie 500's This Is Our Music in 1990.

Recorded in six days in Los Angeles, the album is steeped in lush, haunting soundscapes, driven by Wareham's signature reverb-soaked guitars and melancholic, dreamlike vocals. Britta Phillips joins on bass and harmonies, while Gabe Noel’s cello adds depth and tension. “Two takes yield more treasure than twenty,” notes longtime friend Matt Fishbeck, as Kramer's insistence on spontaneity infuses the project with raw immediacy.

Thematically, Wareham delves into the poetry of memory, set against a backdrop of wistful nostalgia and existential reflection. "Songs are in dialogue with other songs" Fishbeck writes. The lead single, “We’re Not Finished Yet,” is a playful, introspective meditation where Wareham drops his own name while relishing the tactile joy of the guitar. “You Were the Ones I Had to Betray” unfolds like a somber narrative, underpinned by Noel’s cello and crowned with a haunting bass harmonica by Kramer, encapsulating the emotional ambivalence of friendship and loyalty.

“That’s the Price of Loving Me” pulses with conga rhythms and Kramer’s vintage Moog, capturing Wareham’s musings on the life of a performer and the sacrifices it demands. Fishbeck describes “The Mystery Guest” as "an acrostic poem" and concludes by saying "We're not finished yet." 'Loving Me' also includes two covers, Mayo Thompson's 'Dear Betty Baby' and Nico's 'Reich der Träume.' The latter highlights his love for blending history and homage, sung entirely in German for a chillingly authentic touch.

Dean returns with his fourth solo album and his first album for Carpark Records. Inspired by the past yet resonant in its present-day relevance, the album’s sonic palette is reminiscent of Galaxie 500’s dream-pop roots, tempered with the matured introspection of Wareham’s later works. “Dean traffics in memory,” writes Fishbeck, reflecting on the record’s seamless blend of intimate recollections and catchy hooks. The result is a cohesive work encapsulating the duality of Wareham’s career: haunted by the past, yet steadfastly pushing forward. As Fishbeck poignantly puts it, “Imagination is nothing but the working over of what is remembered.”

Toy Tonics Music Berlin presents "Para Mytho Disco". The 2nd "Kapote" album of label founder and creative director Mathias Modica.
Keyboarder, DJ, producer, music nerd, graphic designer, multi-instrumentalist, sub-culture impressario and artist (formerly known as Munk of Gomma records.)

Kapote & Toy Tonics
In the last years Kapote was in the spotlight mainly for building the Toy Tonics label with his friends. Developing a platform for new positive quality dance music with a human touch. Toy Tonics is the opposite of the dark, druggy Techno and Trance sounds of the last years.
The warm inclusive music of Toy Tonics represents a new vibe that a young generation of diverse, stylish and culturally intersted generation of dancers loves now. Kapote's Toy Tonics became the key label for that vibe. (In 2024 Toy Tonics made 150 Toy Tonics events in 18 countries. With more than 150.000 people dancing. 90 millions streams on their music.)
Toy Tonics is more than a music label: It's a audio - visual universe. A community, almost a movement.
Based on a new positive attitude and aesthetic diversity. Mixing musicianship with DJ culture, analogue music with electronic, ideas from the past with sounds from now. To create something new. Connecting dance music with graphic design, art and underground fashion.
Kapote and his gang release vinyl, posters, shirts, art fanzines and make exhibitions and partys.

Toy Tonics started in Berlin as a underground niche project. But now became the key label of the new house, wild style disco and organic dance music scene.
Probably one of Berlin's biggest electronic music phenomena along with Keinemusik and Live from Earth.

It went fast: 2020 Kapote's crew started to make small parties in Berlin's off spaces. The "Toy Tonics Jams". The parties became "talk of the town", and Berlin clubs like Griesmühle and Panorama Bar invited the crew. Then international clubs and festival called. Toy Tonics were invited to SONAR (playing the mainstage with Kaytranada and DJ Tennis), KALA festival, Montreux Jazz festival.
Now TT has a residency at Panorama Bar Berlin and sold out events in Europe leading clubs like Phonox in London, Rex Club in Paris, Tunnel in Milan.
Toy Tonics now is the reference brand of a new generation of music loving dancers. Similar to Gomma records, Kapote's former label (2003 - 2015) that was one of the key labels of the "indie dance" scene of the Y2K years (along with DFA and Output Records).

Kapote created a multi-cultural movement with graphic designers, photographers, illustrators from the Berlin scene.
They publish the Toy Tonics Pocket Poster magazine, posters and design shirts. They organize the Toy Tonics Pop Up Galleries mixing music and art. In underground venues in Berlin and in new gallery spaces and museums around Europe.
Toy Tonics has been invited by Palais de Tokio museum in Paris, Triennale Museum Berlin, Design week Milano to create events.
The new Kapote album
The 12 tracks have a very own style. Based on dance music, but going much further. "Para Mytho Disco' is a futuristic mix of sounds. It's far away from the dark monotone techno and trance music from Kapote's hometown Berlin. Instead, he creates warm friendly atmospheres full of sonic colours and little musical surprises.
Kapote's knowlege of music history and his backround as a jazz piano student and son of classic music composer is clearly inside this music. Before turning into a DJ and electronic music producer he has been playing in bands since he was 13 years old.
The album is full of emotional chord progressions played by Kapote on various keyboards. Sometimes reminding music from the past, without being retro at all. The basslines and melodies are inspired by jazz fusion from the 1970ies. And he programmed syncopated grooves that come from afro-american dance music. There are influences from Japanese electronic music (Yellow Magic Orchestra), from 1980s Synthwave and from 1990s electronica (like Squarepusher and Luke Vibert).

Kapote plays keys, bass, flutes and percussions, he plays synth solos and sings on a few tracks. The complexity of the arrangements makes this music never boring. Lot of melodies and solos that catch the listener. Colourful soundscapes that make you want to listen or dance to this album more, and discover details also after you heard it several times.

Kapote background

Before starting Toy Tonics, Kapote used to run a label called Gomma. He produced four albums under the name Munk and music for other artists.
He produced music with Peaches, Franz Ferdinand founder Nick McCarthy, with New York street art legend The Rammellzee, Italian actress Asia Argento, the first three albums of WhoMadeWho and worked with LCD Soundsystem (listen to "Kick out the chairs", the Munk song with James Murphy )
In those "Gomma days" Kapote aka Munk was also one of the main DJs for VICE magazine parties and made music for art projects and fashion brands (Margiela, Prada, Colette).
In 2015 he stopped Munk and Gomma and started Toy Tonics. He found young producers and helped to develop their sound (Coeo, Cody Currie, Gee Lane, Barbara Boeing, Sam Ruffillo). Later he founded the sublabel Kryptox to release music by Berlin based bands that make new forms of jazz or neo classical sounds.

Under the name Kapote Mathias didnt release much:
Only his Kapote debut album "What it is" (2019) and an EP called "Electric Slide" (2022) and a collabo EP with Italian producer Sam Ruffillo ("Robot Salsa").

An although his Munk and Kapote music was an underground phenomena his music has always been a favourite of many great people from the scene.
Supported by DJs like Harvey, Chromeo, Moodymann, Jennifer Cardini, Gerd Janson, MYD, Andrew Weatherall to Blessed Madonna, Justice and Laurent Garnier… to name just a few.

Following their acclaimed debut album The Shedding of Skin (2022), the formation has deepened their relationship through numerous live jams, intense touring and story sharing, pushing both their skills and the boundaries of the project. For its successor, État Coupable, this growth has been enriched by various collaborations, including one with Lebanese-Canadian producer Radwan Ghazi Moumneh (Jerusalem in My Heart).

The first single, Freedom, Asshole, features live drums by Spooky-J from Nihiloxica. With lead vocalist Saif singing, 'I envy you because you can close your eyes, you can choose,' the track addresses those who need to be addressed in the Western world, resulting in a gutwrenching piece of raw electronica that delves into the very definition of freedom. Alongside the launch of the record , the single will be released on Bandcamp and other streaming platforms on Wednesday, January 29.

A series of live dates have been announced including gigs at Ment Festival (SL), Rewire (NL), Donau Festival (AT) and dunk!festival (BE) among others.

Belgian multidisciplinary artist and long time collaborator of the project, Youniss Ahamad, has shared a that embodies unease through distorted images, a black-and-white palette, and abstract bird loops.

“For me ‘Freedom, Asshole’ is about fighting for freedom even when everything seems bleak”
– Youniss Ahamad

Was ist ein "Boogie"? In der Umgangssprache ist es ein Tanz oder eine Gelegenheit zum Tanzen. Da es sich hier um ein Destroyer-Album handelt und nicht um den allgemeinen Sprachgebrauch, sind die Implikationen eines Titels wie "Dan's Boogie" verführerischer und gefährlicher zugleich. "Ein Boogie ist ein Täuschungsmanöver, ein Betrug, der nicht ganz funktioniert, die Bewegungen, die wir machen, wenn wir damit konfrontiert werden", erklärt Dan Bejar. "Ich denke an Spionage, Doppelagenten, die mit einem offenen Auge schlafen und die Ausgänge im Auge behalten. Aber ich denke auch an kleine Siege und Niederlagen auf der Straße und an Improvisation". Um "Dan's Boogie" aufzunehmen, musste Bejar eine Reihe von gewollten und ungewollten Hindernissen überwinden, um die Songs zu schreiben. Die Monate nach der Fertigstellung von "LABYRINTHITIS" wurden zu einem Jahr und dann zu zwei Jahren, in denen Bejar sich selbst den Neujahrsvorsatz gab, jeden Tag eine Stunde lang Klavier zu spielen. Das hat ungefähr vier Tage gedauert, aber die Songs, die Bejar als Ergebnis dieses Vorsatzes bezeichnet - darunter "Cataract Time", "Hydroplaning Off the Edge of the World", "Bologna" und "Dan's Boogie" - sind allesamt Destroyer-Songs aus dem breiten Spektrum, das Bejar und seine Mitstreiter für sich selbst geschaffen haben: Spektakuläre Pop-Epen, persönliche Piano-Balladen und schwelende Stimmungsbilder, die die Grenzen zwischen Song, Roman und Kino verschwimmen lassen, jedes voll von der Dringlichkeit eines Staatsgeheimnisses im Kopf eines gequälten Spions. Die Leadsingle "Bologna" ist der radikalste Rahmen für diese Energie, denn es ist das erste Mal, dass Bejar einen Song schreibt, in dem er sich selbst als Nebenfigur vorstellt. In der Hauptrolle ist Simone Schmidt von Fiver zu hören, deren Stimme - hart und ausdrucksstark, durchdringend durch die Düsternis der Szene - ein Sirenengesang ist, der das ganze Album durchdringt. Die Schwere ihrer Stimme ordnet "Dan's Boogie" um ein Gefühl des drohenden Untergangs herum, so wie das Versprechen einer Fatale auf das Ungewöhnliche und Ekstatische die Hauptfigur eines erotischen Thrillers zum Verhängnis wird. "Hydroplaning Off the Edge of the World" ist ein köstlicher Widerspruch, ein schwungvoller Song, der aus der Verwüstung entstand, die Bejar absichtlich mit sich selbst anrichtete. "We are now entering a new phase", intoniert Bejar und führt Schichten von Gitarren und Synthesizern ein, die die Palette erheblich verdunkeln, während er zwischen Gesang und Sprache wechselt. Der Nebel, der Bejar umgibt, wird durch die Reibung zwischen konkurrierenden Wahrheiten und Geschmäckern erhellt, etwa wenn sein Interesse an jazzigen Balladen auf das Interesse des Produzenten und Bassisten John Collins an Bands wie Led Zeppelin und Scritti Politti trifft. Als Bejar Collins erzählte, dass er an Sammy Davis Jr. dachte, entstand der Titeltrack, in dem Bejar mit fast wahnhafter Freude einen Rat Pack-Swagger vor einer verträumten Klangkulisse aus schwebenden Gitarren, üppigen Bläsern, Jazz-Drumming, spacigen Synthesizern und - vielleicht am ehesten dem Selbstverständnis Bejars entsprechend - einem klimpernden Lounge-Piano annahm. Das Herzstück von "Dan's Boogie" ist vielleicht "Cataract Time", ein achtminütiges Epos, das zu den schwersten Texten gehört, die Bejar je geschrieben hat, und eine der musikalisch komplexesten Kompositionen von Destroyer ist. Getragen von einem lässigen Groove, sind Bejars Texte verklärt, ihre Melancholie schmeckt fast widersinnig nach Hoffnung. Es ist ein intimer Song, der Destroyers übliches urbanes Fabel-Milieu gegen eine erfrischende Innerlichkeit eintauscht, aber sein beschwingter Groove lässt eine Zukunft erahnen, der Bejar und seine Band entgegenfiebern. Wo frühere Destroyer-Alben mit der Welt kämpften, tanzt "Dan's Boogie" mit ihr, und seine neun Träumereien verschmelzen zu einem einzigen langen Treiben. Dan Bejar mag die Ausgänge im Auge haben, aber er wird nicht so bald abreisen.

Die in Virginia ansässige Band Palmyra wird am 28. März 2025 ihr erstes Album Restless über Oh Boy Records veröffentlichen. Das zehn Songs umfassende Projekt zeichnet sich durch die einzigartige Mischung aus traditionellen Folk-Streicherarrangements, üppigen Harmonien und ernsthaftem Songwriting aus. Palmyras Sound, der von NPR als einer der ,Best New Artists of 2024" bezeichnet wird, wird oft als entfernter Cousin der Avett Brothers mit Einflüssen von Pine Grove und Houndmouth beschrieben. Sie nicken in Richtung Appalachian und Midwestern Americana, mit komplizierten Arrangements, die die Illusion eines vollen, größeren Ensembles erzeugen.

We're delighted to welcome these two Australia based producers to the Samurai family with Onyx - a 4 track EP that delivers a blend of tight edits, chest heavy bass, and intricate sound design. Pugilist & Tamen combine nostalgia with forward-thinking production and Onyx traverses a rich landscape of jungle-rooted moods.
Onyx introduces a step forward in the duo's production, utilising sculpted distortion as an instrument. Seen on 3 of the 4 tunes, this approach adds a temperative tension as the tunes give the impression they have gone too far into the distortion no go zone but ultimately finding a balance that compliments and enhances the tunes overall sound pallette perfectly.
Raw and direct with rich layers and honed grooves that ultimately mark the tunes as memorable, Onyx is on a new level for Pugilist & Tamen.

The Smile veröffentlichen heute zwei neue Remixe für Tracks ihres dritten Albums "Cutouts". "Don"t Get Me Started" im Remix von James Holden und "Instant Palm" als Robert Stillman Remix sind ab sofort digital verfügbar. Für beide Tracks hat der Künstler Weirdcore, der bereits für alle Songs von "Cutouts" Videos kreiert hatte, einen "recycled video mix" erstellt. Die Remixe gibt es als limitierte 12". Das Sleeve-Design von Stanley Donwood kommt in Anlehnung an die ikonische Housebag-Serie von XL Recordings. James Holden und Robert Stillman arbeiten beiden regelmäßig sowohl mit Thom Yorke als auch mit The Smile zusammen. Robert begleitet die Band auf der Bühne, um bei ihren Live-Auftritten Saxofon und Keyboards zu spielen. Zudem steuerte er Saxofon zu allen drei Platten von The Smile sowie zu Thom Yorkes "Confidenza" Soundtrack bei. James hat bereits einen Remix zu Radioheads "Reckoner" veröffentlicht und war als Support auf den Touren von Atoms For Peace und bei Thoms Soloshows zum Album "Tomorrow"s Modern Boxes" dabei.

As a founding member of Dublin experimental folk group Lankum, Ian Lynch explores submerged leylines of music and song. Forging a musical path that is all at once dark, mysterious and foreboding, but ultimately transcendental. His new solo project One Leg One Eye sees him taking a fresh approach to musical arrangement culminating in a sound that is more rooted in the raw aesthetics of second wave black metal than contemporary folk. The project was born across 2021, a period in which Lynch was able to enjoy the freedom of experimenting and exploring different paths of sound design without expectation or pressure. Seeking out interesting settings to record music and gather field recordings, there are several environments, external and interior, whose respective essence have seeped into the spirit of the music and come to represent Lynch’s artistic approach and development with this singular debut album, …And Take The Black Worm With Me. Rediscovered spaces in Dublin and the familiar enclave of his bedroom are intrinsic to the distinct and sometimes harrowing atmosphere conjured throughout the album’s five enveloping compositions. One particular location, an abandoned factory where his father worked when Ian was a child, provided a space of great inspiration and intrigue during this time. Lynch frequently visited the large abandoned warehouse and sang with his shruti box, contented in his solitude. ‘I’d Rather Be Tending My Sheep’, grew into existence from those initial sessions, eventually finding a home as an emotive centrepiece to the album. Reflecting on the overall recording of …And Take The Black Worm With Me, Lynch says, “Everything I was doing with these songs was all kind of new to me; experimenting with different sounds, textures and palettes and seeing what I could come up with by piecing it all together. I spent about a year making the album. I loved the whole process because it was basically just me in my bedroom recording everything. The experience of recording like this and having my own time to do it was amazing. I could focus on recording a specific element and happily spend all day working on that one part, doing it as many times as I wanted. At the end of the day if it didn’t feel right, I could just try it again the next day. When you’re on your own you can spend as much time as you want on particular parts until you feel that it’s absolutely perfect. I found that to be a really liberating experience. It was probably my favourite experience recording music.” The collection of songs (and their chronology) featured on …And Take The Black Worm With Me tell a story unique to Lynch’s experiences with anxiety and recognising his shadow self. Whilst the album became an outlet of personal expression for Lynch, the overarching themes and subsequent journey to confront one’s internal dichotomy of light and dark before accepting this inherent duality is universally shared. The eerie and often unsettling world contained within the album’s texturally dense opener ‘Glistening, She Emerges’, driven by the captivating drone of distorted uilleann pipes, immediately immerses the listener in this transportive work. It descends with a great heaviness, yet woven throughout the arrangement is a fascinating and indescribable entity that draws you further into this otherworldly dimension. This mood continues as the tracklist progresses and transitions into Lynch’s haunting realisation of ‘Bold and Undaunted Youth’ which further demonstrates a cinematic influence to Lynch’s compositional style. Sonically, Lynch effectively builds an impressively vast terrain with brilliantly murky lo-fi recording techniques and an unshakable curiosity to move beyond conventional structures and play with the timbre of the instruments available to him. From recording hurdy-gurdy or concertina to tape and experimenting with loops and effects pedals to stitching field recordings together, there’s an intimacy established between Lynch and his audience established through the simultaneously eerie and beautiful tones courting through …And Take The Black Worm With Me. This culminates in ‘Only the Diceys’, the extraordinary closing track in which we reach a place of resolution mapped into the album’s narrative structure. Mixed by longtime collaborator John ‘Spud’ Murphy in his Dublin-based Guerrilla Sounds Studio and mastered by Harvey Birrell …And Take The Black Worm With Me features contributions from Ruth Clinton (Landless) on church organ and vocals by Laurie Shanaman (Ails, Ludicra). Of Shanaman’s participation, in particular, which further illustrates the lo-fi and DIY ethos to the recording, Lynch says, “Laurie is my favourite black metal vocalist of all time and so I reached out to her hoping to have her involved in some way. She did, and she features on the opening track by providing some incredible screams. She recorded them into her phone and sent them over to me; what appears on the album is literally a phone recording of her screaming in her kitchen!” …And Take The Black Worm With Me continues Ian Lynch’s groundbreaking work with Lankum; recontextualising traditional forms and generating new spheres of music in his wake, confirming his status as one of the most interesting and innovative artists working in Ireland today.

US indie-pop darling Chloe Moriondo announces new album oyster, out March 28th

Assembled with a close-knit team of cowriters and producers including Jonah Summerfield (Holly Humberstone, Tommy Lefroy), Chloe Kraemer (The Japanese House), AfterHrs, and more, oyster finds Moriondo pulling from all her musical palettes, delving into the depths of heartbreak and cataloguing the process of surfacing braver, wiser, and ready to dive back in. oyster is available for preorder now

Hailed as “one of indie pop’s brightest stars” (Teen Vogue), Chloe Moriondo's 2022 album SUCKERPUNCH marked a bold leap forward from the understated indie-pop and jittery pop-punk of her 2021 offering, Blood Bunny. The idiosyncratic artist has racked up critical praise from The New York Times, Billboard, NYLON, V Magazine, Consequence, UPROXX, PAPER, Alternative Press and more, with performances on Jimmy Kimmel Live! and The Late Late Show with James Corden. Now, she begins her next chapter with the wistful, pulsing single "shoreline," and more to come in 2025.

Although still very much a secret, Oakland, California's Justin Pinkerton has perfected and expanded his Futuropaco project to a stunning degree over the past seven years. The one-man band is deeply rooted in Pinkerton's masterful drumming, which builds on the legacy of 1960's and 1970's legends such as Tony Allen and Jaki Liebezeit. But he's an accomplished multi-instrumentalist as well, and the Futuropaco sound is a colourful fusion that sees him throw fuzz guitars, flutes, vintage synthesizers and Anatolian string instruments into the mix - seemingly without much effort. The second and final volume of the "Fortezza Di Vetro" series feels like a conclusion, the sound of an artist reaching his creative zenith. It's an experimental album, yet immediately seductive in its energy - channeling the vibey art-rock of Tortoise, Black Sabbath riffage and vintage Italian film music in equal measures. It's such a refined and esoteric blend, yet hits so directly. It's simply impossible not to crank the volume knob once this slab of vinyl is on the turntable, followed by immediate head nodding. Buy the ticket, take the ride. Justin Pinkerton is a vastly talented rhythmsmith, best known as a member of Californian stoners Golden Void. On this project he plays all the other instruments too so he can do what he blooming well feels. And it's not as if the drum solos go on for twenty minutes like those of John Bonham and his pale imitators. Nope. Into tracks that are both jam-packed and concise, Pinkerton has squeezed his love of vintage Italian library music, classic krautrock and heavy psych rock. At one point it suggests Grails have been performing super-speed cover versions of fusion-era Miles Davis with Adrian Younge on production. -The Quietus Futuropaco returns in a big way with Fortezza di Vetro, a buzzing, groove-heavy album that expands on what came before while staying true to the project's origins. Dizzying, fuzzed-out psych with just the right amount of melancholy for good measure. Justin Pinkerton and Futuropaco have done it again. Fantastico! -Complex Distractions

Grimm Grimm's new release, Untitled II (2025), is a distinctive sound collage/mixtape that blends grainy cassette recordings with demo tracks from a 4-channel recorder. The original release, limited to only 30 copies, included a cassette tape, a pillow cover, and a bundle of sleeping pills. Sold exclusively at the London record shop Atlantis Records, it sold out instantly and has become a rare, sought-after collector's item. The album features guest contributions from contemporary artist Naima Karlsson and Colorado-based singer-songwriter Josephine Foster.

That’s the Price of Loving Me marks Dean Wareham’s (Galaxie 500, Luna, Dean & Britta, ) evocative return, rekindling his partnership with producer Kramer for the first time since Galaxie 500's This Is Our Music in 1990.

Recorded in six days in Los Angeles, the album is steeped in lush, haunting soundscapes, driven by Wareham's signature reverb-soaked guitars and melancholic, dreamlike vocals. Britta Phillips joins on bass and harmonies, while Gabe Noel’s cello adds depth and tension. “Two takes yield more treasure than twenty,” notes longtime friend Matt Fishbeck, as Kramer's insistence on spontaneity infuses the project with raw immediacy.

Thematically, Wareham delves into the poetry of memory, set against a backdrop of wistful nostalgia and existential reflection. "Songs are in dialogue with other songs" Fishbeck writes. The lead single, “We’re Not Finished Yet,” is a playful, introspective meditation where Wareham drops his own name while relishing the tactile joy of the guitar. “You Were the Ones I Had to Betray” unfolds like a somber narrative, underpinned by Noel’s cello and crowned with a haunting bass harmonica by Kramer, encapsulating the emotional ambivalence of friendship and loyalty.

“That’s the Price of Loving Me” pulses with conga rhythms and Kramer’s vintage Moog, capturing Wareham’s musings on the life of a performer and the sacrifices it demands. Fishbeck describes “The Mystery Guest” as "an acrostic poem" and concludes by saying "We're not finished yet." 'Loving Me' also includes two covers, Mayo Thompson's 'Dear Betty Baby' and Nico's 'Reich der Träume.' The latter highlights his love for blending history and homage, sung entirely in German for a chillingly authentic touch.

Dean returns with his fourth solo album and his first album for Carpark Records. Inspired by the past yet resonant in its present-day relevance, the album’s sonic palette is reminiscent of Galaxie 500’s dream-pop roots, tempered with the matured introspection of Wareham’s later works. “Dean traffics in memory,” writes Fishbeck, reflecting on the record’s seamless blend of intimate recollections and catchy hooks. The result is a cohesive work encapsulating the duality of Wareham’s career: haunted by the past, yet steadfastly pushing forward. As Fishbeck poignantly puts it, “Imagination is nothing but the working over of what is remembered.”

Bristol label-turned-blog Innate launches a new sub-label, Innate Editions, which it says is dedicated to timeless UK techno, IDM, electro and ambient music, and it will all come on heavyweight vinyl. The first release revives Connective Zone's Palm Palm, a millennium-era cult classic and Ben UFO favourite that first came out on Mark Broom and Dave Hill's Unexplored Beats in 2001. Now, this long-out-of-print, expensive and hard to find gem has been remastered by Jamie Anderson and so sounds superb with many lavish electronic layers, richly emotive melodies and dynamic drums that lean on UK techno, IDM, and deep electro. Sounds as good now as it ever did.

DJ Feedback

Dan Curtin (Metamorphic):
"This sounds fantastic. I don't think I ever got it back when it came out but I'm glad I do now, it's really nice. Every track is the standout track!"

Dj Harri (Sub Club):
"Lovely stuff here, will be playing and supporting."

Laurent Garnier (COD3QR):
"Awesome 4 tracker, thanks a million times for this. Beautiful way to start a new label."

Midland:
"Thanks for sending this over. Really in to it, Function especially."

Mr Scruff (Ninja Tune):
"Thanks for this! Didn’t know this release. Function is great. Quite like Returned too."

RainboWarriors Vol 1 is the first compilation from the Warriorecords label, curated by Rebeka Warrior.

15 original tracks by 15 artists from all horizons and, for the most part, from the queer scene, grouped under the same Dark and New Wave banner.

Fourteen records in eight years. Side-projects records, experimental EPs, a double album of B-sides, splits and collections of demos: in just a few years, Bordeaux-born Thoineau Palis has built up a discography as fascinating as it is plethoric, in which he pays tribute in his own way to the heroes of a rock pantheon all his own, populated by lofi geeks and beautiful losers of all kinds.

Negative Freaks, TH da Freak's fifteenth album, sets the record straight in a way, since it's the first album by TH da Freak "the band", a collective incarnation hitherto reserved for the stage. This first album, composed entirely by the five of them, breaks a pattern established several years ago, with Thoineau contributing finished compositions that were then reworked collectively for live performance. The 5 Bordelais impose on themselves the use of what they call the "negative scale", dissonant and disturbing sonorities that they apply to compositions initially structured as pop tracks. This approach, combined with the casual, surreal lyrics written by Palis (influenced by intensive listening to the likes of Oingo Boingo, Devo and P-Model), lends an unprecedented coherence to the tracks on the album. Negative Freaks sounds like a massive grunge monolith, driven by a collective, radical vision that is assertive from start to finish. Impressive for a debut album

Don McLean's The Western Album is a 1973 release blends folk, rock, and country influences. The album features McLean's storytelling style, exploring themes like love, loss, and Americana, with a focus on Western imagery. It includes tracks like "The Good Old American Dream" and "The Legend of Andrew McCrew. The Western album remains notable for its introspective lyrics and rich sound.

2025 Repress

Veyl is proud to welcome back to the label one of the most essential and multidimensional producers today, Filmmaker. To date, the Colombian artist has delivered a plethora of revered releases from his breakout, The Love Market (2019), to his previous album on Veyl, Fictional Portrayals (2022). He consistently traverses genres from postpunk, EBM, synth wave and beyond to create a unique identity still firmly rooted in film culture. Now he returns with perhaps his most robust and powerful offering, Hollywood
Cult.

Comprised of 13 tracks, the album sees the producer elevate his sound to new levels, conjuring a world of haunting atmospheres and devious directions that take the listener through a journey of unparalleled proportions. Kicking off the album is the ritual-like
'Secrecy', which builds tension before exploding into a synth-driven race against time and introduces us to the world that lies ahead. 'Holy Wood' injects a heavy dose of body music for an infectious piece that bleeds perfectly in to the slow burning nostalgia of 'Generational Trauma'. Next, 'Western Malice' picks the pace back up with its evil energy that feels fit for the best horror scenes before 'Shocking Therapy' enters the picture with an exhilarating electro feel.


Now in the depths of the journey, 'Vessels Wine' continues the saga with a high intensity work that gives way to the stirring emotions of 'Peacekeeper Ripper' and the raw, blood lust of 'Criminal Rite'. Now entering the final phases, 'Spiritual Harvest' cleanses the palate before 'Elite Dungeons' comes crashing in with a lo-fi feel that puts you deep underground. 'Two Sets of Rules' charges back with twisted lines before 'No Fetish Without Evil' unveils post-punk strings that puts you in a trance before 'Hanging Finale' closes the release u ltimately fading out into the abyss. Repeat listens will be necessary and the whole album feels like a soundtrack to a dark new world that is perfectly fitting for any Hollywood Cult.

Midan’s new album pays homage to the beautiful music of Brasil. The young producer, DJ and digger from Cologne channels his deep love for Bossa Nova, Samba and MPB (Música Popular Brasileira) into a 17 track strong album entitled “Letter To Brasil”. Accompanied by his good friends FloFilz, Saib, Mr.Käfer and Lesky. Artwork by Sao Palo-based illustrator André Cast.
Born and raised in Paris, the half German-half Algerian producer is one the most exciting new jacks on the German beatmaker scene. At the age of 23 Midan has already released a bunch of albums for renowned labels like Casual Low Grind, Mutombo Recods and Beat Jazz International.

Feiern Sie das 25-jährige Jubiläum des Debütalbums von Disturbed, „The Sickness“, mit dieser limitierten Auflage des 1 LP / 3 CDs Box-Sets. Enthalten sind das Originalalbum, B-Seiten, unveröffentlichte Demos und ein unveröffentlichtes Konzert mit 14 Titeln aus dem Palladium in LA vom April 2001. Außerdem enthält sie ein Buch mit seltenen Erinnerungsstücken, einen Essay mit neuen Interviews mit den Mitgliedern von Disturbed und dem Produzenten Johnny K. Die Box enthält außerdem ein Poster, einen Stoffaufnäher, einen Backstage-Pass und ein Set Gitarrenplektren.

Vier Stücke des estnischen Komponisten Arvo Pärt, eines Pioniers des ,heiligen Minimalismus". Im Mittelpunkt des Albums steht eine bisher unveröffentlichte Interpretation von ,Silentium", dem zweiten Satz von Pärts berühmtestem Concerto "Tabula Rasa", gespielt vom Kammerorchester A Far Cry aus Boston. Die Gruppe spielt ,Silentium" in fast der Hälfte der Geschwindigkeit der bekanntesten Version, die 1984 bei ECM veröffentlicht wurde. Das Stück, das für seine heilende Wirkung auf Sterbende bekannt ist und oft in Palliativeinrichtungen verwendet wird (ein Patient bezeichnete es als ,Engelsmusik"), ist bei halber Geschwindigkeit atemberaubend und scheint die Zeit selbst zum Stillstand zu bringen. Das Album enthält einige der beeindruckendsten Interpretationen von Pärts Musik, die je aufgenommen wurden. ,Vater Unser (Arr. für Posaune & Streicherensemble)" ist irgendwie warm und streng zugleich. Ein Miniatur-Epos. Pianist Marcel Worm's Soloversion von ,Variationen zur Gesundung von Arinuschka" ist so schön, das man kaum Worte dafür findet. ,Fratres for Strings and Percussion" ist eines der berühmtesten Werke von Arvo Pärt. Diese Version des Orchesters der Ungarischen Staatsoper ist ikonisch, voller Emotionen, an der Grenze zum Romantischen, aber nie kippend. Pärts Herangehensweise an die Musik und das Leben ist so spärlich wie die Kompositionen, die er schafft. Er sagte einmal: ,Ich habe nichts zu sagen... Die Musik sagt, was ich zu sagen habe. Und es ist gefährlich, irgendetwas zu sagen, denn wenn ich es bereits mit Worten gesagt habe, bleibt vielleicht nichts mehr für meine Musik übrig." Silentium setzt die Faszination von Mississippi Records für diesen großen zeitgenössischen Komponisten fort. Hochwertiges, schweres Vinyl, gepresst bei Smashed Plastic in Chicago, präsentiert in einem luxuriösen Reverse-Board-Jacket mit einem Artwork von Pärts heilig-minimalem Zeitgenossen Eduard Steinberg.

Vier Stücke des estnischen Komponisten Arvo Pärt, eines Pioniers des ,heiligen Minimalismus". Im Mittelpunkt des Albums steht eine bisher unveröffentlichte Interpretation von ,Silentium", dem zweiten Satz von Pärts berühmtestem Concerto "Tabula Rasa", gespielt vom Kammerorchester A Far Cry aus Boston. Die Gruppe spielt ,Silentium" in fast der Hälfte der Geschwindigkeit der bekanntesten Version, die 1984 bei ECM veröffentlicht wurde. Das Stück, das für seine heilende Wirkung auf Sterbende bekannt ist und oft in Palliativeinrichtungen verwendet wird (ein Patient bezeichnete es als ,Engelsmusik"), ist bei halber Geschwindigkeit atemberaubend und scheint die Zeit selbst zum Stillstand zu bringen. Das Album enthält einige der beeindruckendsten Interpretationen von Pärts Musik, die je aufgenommen wurden. ,Vater Unser (Arr. für Posaune & Streicherensemble)" ist irgendwie warm und streng zugleich. Ein Miniatur-Epos. Pianist Marcel Worm's Soloversion von ,Variationen zur Gesundung von Arinuschka" ist so schön, das man kaum Worte dafür findet. ,Fratres for Strings and Percussion" ist eines der berühmtesten Werke von Arvo Pärt. Diese Version des Orchesters der Ungarischen Staatsoper ist ikonisch, voller Emotionen, an der Grenze zum Romantischen, aber nie kippend. Pärts Herangehensweise an die Musik und das Leben ist so spärlich wie die Kompositionen, die er schafft. Er sagte einmal: ,Ich habe nichts zu sagen... Die Musik sagt, was ich zu sagen habe. Und es ist gefährlich, irgendetwas zu sagen, denn wenn ich es bereits mit Worten gesagt habe, bleibt vielleicht nichts mehr für meine Musik übrig." Silentium setzt die Faszination von Mississippi Records für diesen großen zeitgenössischen Komponisten fort. Hochwertiges, schweres Vinyl, gepresst bei Smashed Plastic in Chicago, präsentiert in einem luxuriösen Reverse-Board-Jacket mit einem Artwork von Pärts heilig-minimalem Zeitgenossen Eduard Steinberg.

Luponero aus Finnland ist ein alternatives Hardrock-Kraftpaket, angeführt von Marco Luponero, dem Gründer von Terrorwheel und späterem Altaria-Bassisten. Die explosive Energie und die mitreissenden Melodien des Trios haben ihnen eine treue Anhängerschaft eingebracht und ihre rohen, ehrlichen Texte spiegeln das Chaos und die Schönheit des modernen Lebens wider. Auf ihrem selbstbetitelten Debütalbum erforschen Luponero einen positiven Nihilismus, inspiriert von einer breiten Palette an Einflüssen, von Grunge, Punkrock und Classic Rock bis zu 80er-Synthwave, Ambient-Pop und Post-Punk.

Four years since her last dancefloor 12", upsammy returns with a four-track exploration of gleaming, sprightly drum and bass with a restorative centre. Thessa Torsing's moves in upper tempo zones have been defined by her light touch, finding power and presence in finely chiseled sounds and sculpting space between intricate, interwoven rhythms.

The dynamic movement of her pristinely moulded percussion is absolutely geared up for the club, but it's also matched with an uplifting, meditative sound palette which tempers the busy energy of the drums. Pushing and pulling on her arrangements with ever-increasing expressiveness and revelling in the subtlest of modulations to her kinetic beat systems, upsammy proves once again that moving in time to fast music can be an incredibly restorative experience.

Divergence and Declaration is the second album by San Francisco Bay Area Darkwave duo Vague Lanes. The album features their signature two-bass configuration, with Mike Cadoo (Gridlock) handling the melodic six-string duties. At the same time, Badger McInnes (Here We Burn) propels the music forward with his low-end four-string.
The album opener, "Heptahedron", also features drums by Martin Atkins (P.I.L., Ministry, Killing Joke). The album's title eludes to the refinement and solidification of Vague Lane's manifesto, and by utilizing a more expanded pallet than their debut album Foundation and Divergence, the duo displays confidence in their creative trajectory and the overall substance of their musical voice.

Sixth album by Christoph Heemann and Timo van Luijk. Four years after we got Lost in Spice we reached the point of Arrival. An altar on the surface of the water is burning with flames. Behind it you can see a half of the Earth's globe, and on it there’s a bright throne. A pale, translucent ruler wearing a crown sits in the throne. The globe is surrounded by a ball of shadows on which sits a larger dark ruler on a dark throne. Behind the globe are mountain peaks, and all of it is reflected in the water. Above the mountains are clouds which merge into rivers and end in a curved horizon on which forests stand, and the sun rises between them. Above this horizon is another sky with lunar crescents and comets. Above this sky are rows of angels bent over, above which the stars shine. The sun shines in the top left corner and the crescent moon in the right.

Mesmeric, confessional alt-folk with hints of americana - weaving beautiful stories with deep and poignant lyricism and relatable storytelling, creating a sense of familiarity even in the ambiguous, leaving no choice but to feel everything with her. Mann’s debut album,

- Clara Mann’s evocative debut album Rift navigates the fractured environment of the in-between—those liminal spaces exposed between light and dark, growth and remorse, loss and reclamation. It is a record that makes a strong case for hope, those luminescent silver linings in the dark. With Rift, Clara Mann acknowledges the cracks through which both despair and hope can seep. It is a deeply personal record, yet it is universally resonant, holding the mirror up to herself and to the world around her. It is a record that reflects on embracing our fault lines, navigating the ruptures that can erupt from them and moving forwards, in motion, with a renewed sense of self and aliveness. Mann’s debut album, Rift is all of her—her past, her present, her emotions, her experiences—and now, it is for you.

- Influenced by artists like Jacques Brel, Edith Piaf, Judee Sill, and Tom Waits, Mann has a deep love and care for songwriting

- The album was primarily recorded at the 4AD Studios in London, produced and mixed by Fabian Prynn (Martha Skye Murphy, Ex:Re, Fabiana Palladino) who carefully facilitated an imaginative space for Mann to express the playful, strange and real parts of herself

- She has previously toured and collaborated with the likes of Daniel Rossen (Grizzly Bear), Billie Marten, Skullcrusher, Bill Ryder-Jones, Youth Lagoon and Willie J Healey

Roger Waters is set to release a Super Deluxe Boxset of The Dark Side Of The Moon Redux on Friday, March 14, 2025, with special live versions of the iconic songs from Roger’s appearances at The London Palladium on October 8 & 9, 2023.

The Super Deluxe Boxset includes: • The Dark Side Of The Moon Redux on Gold Vinyl (2LP), CD, Blu-ray: Dolby Atmos Mix, 96/24 Audio. • The Dark Side Of The Moon Redux Live on Gold Vinyl, CD, Blu-ray: 96/24 Audio. • Roger Waters Track by Track video interview. • A 4 x 10-inch Vinyl from the original Redux album cut at 45 RPM for: Money, Time, Speak To Me / Breathe and Us & Them, each with an artwork etched B-side. • A 40-page Commemorative Book of Photographs from The Making of the Album, Rehearsals, and Roger Waters Redux Live at The London Palladium. • Hand numbered Certificate of Authenticity. Limited Edition of 3000 copies

Waters Quote: “All that is gone, all that’s to come? Looking back or looking forward, Dark Side of the Moon offers you choice. The choice is yours. Darkness or the Light”.

15 years after it's original release, Freestyle Records serve up reissue for The Apples' Kings LP - fully remastered with a fresh new cut, it's sounding better than ever!

In a musical first for the band, they wrote, arranged and recorded Kings with specific collaborators in mind. They held sessions with two of their heroes; a congregation with two musical and spiritual father figures from opposite ends of The Apples rich spectrum: Fred Wesley (pioneer of funk trombone in particular and funk horn arranging in general with James Brown, The JBs) Shlomo Bar (vocalist, percussionist, godfather of Israeli world music).

The exciting process of these recordings exposed the band's many roots and influences; elements of The JB's funky foundations, cut 'n paste, soul, middle eastern and dub are all clearly displayed - strained through the band's unique decks-horns-sfx-bass-drums lineup. This release signified the next step in The Apples ever thickening groove stew, primed for festival and club stages with a relentless live set filled with runaway grooves, countless twists and turns, dizzying transitions, spontaneous arrangements, the occasional reworking of early 90's alt-rock fist shakers - plus the basic jump-up-and-down crazyness for which The Apples are known across dancefloors, soundsystems, playlists, films, televisions, cars and ears worldwide.



e B1 | Batash (Alwoojdi) feat Shlomo Bar

LP with printed inner sleeve

Mitte der 80er Jahre konnten The Loft eine beeindruckende Liste von Premieren für Künstler von Creation Records vorweisen. Die erste Creation-Band im Fernsehen, die erste, die die Spitze der Indie-Singles-Charts erreichte, die erste, die zu einer großen UK-Tournee eingeladen wurde und die erste Creation-Band, die eine begehrte BBC-Radiosession aufnahm - für Janice Longs Radio One-Show im Jahr 1984. Dann lösten sie sich auf. Seit dem berüchtigten Bühnendrama, bei der sie sich mitten im Song im Hammersmith Palais vor 3.000 Zuschauern trennten, als sie auf dem Sprung zur Big-Time-Indie-Größe waren, hat sich die Band wieder zusammengefunden. Während ihr Status als eine der einflussreichsten britischen Gitarrenbands der 80er Jahre weiter wächst und eine Vielzahl jüngerer Künstler:innen beeinflusst, schien es 39 Jahre nach der bitteren Trennung an der Zeit zu sein, ihr Debütalbum aufzunehmen.