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UMC are proud to present two reissues of certified multi-platinum albums from DMX. Nominated for Best Rap Album at the 2001 Grammys, '...And Then There Was X' is the third studio album from DMX. Featuring the hits "What's My Name" and "Party Up (Up In Here)". Released in 2001, 'The Great Depression' was the fourth album by the American rapper. Featuring the singles "We Right Here", "Who We Be" and "I Miss You". Both packages presented as 2LPs on 180g vinyl.

Following on from the success of their last single ‘Always Happy’ Bristol punk trio Grandmas House return this October with the release of a debut self-titled EP. Leading with the single ‘Golden’ the band are back on furious form and excite us with the prospect of what they can deliver live. The band have an astounding 40 UK shows in 2020 including a tour supporting The Blinders, dates with Katy J Pearson and a headline tour in October to accompany the EP release. The band have also recently been announced to support IDLES at The Downs festival in September.

Grandmas House have had extensive radio play including Steve Lamacq and Jack Saunders both championing at BBC 6 Music and BBC Radio 1 respectively. The single also landed them in the Radio X Evening Playlist as well as Amazing Radio. Press accolades have come from DIY, Dork, Get In Her Ears, Punk News, BandCamp Daily, Hard of Hearing and many more.

LP pressed exclusively for National Album Day 2021 on gold vinyl in
single-pocket jacket with custom dust sleeve and digital download
coupon.
 Through ‘Titanic Rising’, Weyes Blood, aka Natalie Mering, has
designed her own universe to soulfully navigate life’s mysteries.
Manoeuvring through a space time continuum, she plays the role of
melodic, sometimes melancholic, anthropologist.
 Tellingly, Mering classifies ‘Titanic Rising’ - written and recorded during
the first half of 2018, after three albums and years of touring - as The
Kinks meeting WWII or Bob Seger meets Enya. The latter captures the
album’s wilful expansiveness (“You can tell there’s not a guy pulling the
strings in Enya’s studio,” she notes, admiringly). The former relays her
imperative to connect with listeners. “The clarity of Bob Seger is
unmistakable. I’m a big fan of conversational songwriting,” she adds. “I
just try to do that in a way that uses abstract imagery as well.”
 The Weyes Blood frontwoman grew up singing in gospel and madrigal
choirs. (Listen closely to ‘Titanic Rising’ and you’ll also hear the jazz of
Hoagy Carmichael mingle with the artful mysticism of Alejandro
Jodorowsky and the monomyth of scholar Joseph Campbell.)
‘Something To Believe’, a confessional that makes judicious use of the
slide guitar, touches on that cosmological upbringing. “Belief is
something all humans need. Shared myths are part of our psychology
and survival,” she says. “Now we have a weird mishmash of capitalism
and movies and science. There have been moments where I felt very
existential and lost.”
 As a kid, she filled that void with ‘Titanic’. (Yes, the movie.) “It was
engineered for little girls and had its own mythology,” she explains.
Mering also noticed that the blockbuster romance actually offered a story
about loss born of man’s hubris. “It’s so symbolic that The Titanic would
crash into an iceberg, and now that iceberg is melting, sinking
civilization.” Today, this hubris also extends to the relentless adoption of
technology, at the expense of both happiness and attention spans.
 But Weyes Blood isn’t one to stew. Her observations play out in an
ethereal saunter: far more meditative than cynical. To Mering, listening
and thinking are concurrent experiences. “There are complicated
influences mixed in with more relatable nostalgic melodies,” she says.
“In my mind my music feels so big, a true production. I’m not a huge,
popular artist, but I feel like one when I’m in the studio. But it’s never
taking away from the music. I’m just making a bigger space for myself.”

Reissue of this trance classic from 2000, remastered for 2021!

Due for release October 8th on Fuzz Club Records, 'Ungrateful Heart' is the fourth album from Milan-based group The Gluts. Whilst their previous releases traded in an explosive psychedelic noise-rock, 'Ungrateful Heart' sees the Italian four-piece hone in a more post-punk-indebted sound. Although no less abrasive and confrontational in its utlising of ear-piercing feedback and hard-hitting riffs, the band say that the songs here primarily take cues from the likes of Fugazi, Gang of Four, the PiL-Pistols canon and the Campana brothers' long adoration of Italian and American hardcore punk. The album arrives off the back of 2019's 'Dengue Fever Hypnotic Trip' LP and tours and festival dates around the UK, Europe and South Africa. Laid down over a tireless week living side by side and working in the studio around the clock, The Gluts - comprised of Claudia Cesana (bass/vocals), Dario Bassi (drums) and Nicolò and Marco Campana (vocals/synths and guitar, respectively) - recorded 'Ungrateful Heart' with Dutch producer and close collaborator Bob de Wit (A Place To Bury Strangers, Gnod, The Sonics). On the sessions, the intensity of which is mirrored in the fierce uncompromising attitude of the music itself, the band said: "Bob's contribution to this album was essential. He pushed us beyond our limits. It was difficult, we can't hide it, but it really was worth it." Although the album is still shot through with moments of lacerating noise-rock ('Mashilla' and 'Eat Acid See God'), songs like 'Love Me Do Again' and 'Bye Bye Boy' deal in a timeless hedonistic punk sound. Elsewhere, the politically charged 'Breath' and 'FYBBD' see The Gluts turn their sonic belligerence towards fascists and systemic racial violence to rallying effect. Standard LP is on Ultra-clear vinyl, standard sleeve

Joan Baez – a singer, activist and pacificist committed to the struggle against all segregation – recorded her first album in 1959 at the age of eighteen. The titles on these four sides are taken from the first four records she made, and they all reflected the position she took in the folk movement that was then emerging, together with her militant support of minority groups.

It would be sixty years before she said farewell to the stage, in July 2019 at the Montreux jazz Festival, after a sixty-year career of unrivalled quality that actively showed her sincere commitment to social and political causes. The grace in her exceptional voice, her kindness and admirable personality – and her determination – earned her an exceptional place in the history of popular music, as well as in the hearts of an ever-increasing audience.

After 10 years from its origial release RADIO DAYS' 1st EP "Midnight Cemetery Rendezvous" is finally available again for the 1st time on vinyl! The records includes also all the tracks from their previous 7"s and an exclusive track!

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

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

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

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

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

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



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

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

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

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

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

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

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

The second volume of music from the hit Fox TV show ‘Bob’s Burgers’. The Emmywinning, top-rated show was named one of the 60 Greatest TV Cartoons of All Time
by TV Guide.
In addition to the show’s cast, the album features high-profile guests including Adam
Driver, Tiffany Haddish, Jenny Slate, Daveed Diggs, Max Greenfield, Toddrick Hall,
Aparna Nancherla and Matt Berninger (of the National).
The ‘Bob’s Burgers’ audience is wide-ranging: strong performance with 15-25 year
olds, median viewing age of 37, 35 share among males 35-54 and a 16 share of
females in the same group.
Campaign will include promotion from the cast and show production team.
‘The Bob’s Burgers Music Album Vol. 2’ includes nearly every single musical morsel
from Seasons 7 through 9.
This 90-song smorgasbord will feature the Belcher family - Bob (H. Jon Benjamin),
Linda (John Roberts), Tina (Dan Mintz), Gene (Eugene Mirman) and Louise (Kristen
Schaal) - as well as the show’s numerous recurring and special guests.
For fans of the show, enjoying the music of Bob’s Burgers on its own is both an
irresistible to-go bag and ultimately a world unto itself. Lose yourself in the strangely
epic disco celebration ‘Hot Pants Rain Dance’, sing along with the musical theatre
gem ‘The Wedding Is My Warzone’, or do whatever you’re gonna do to ‘Sexy Little
Tiger’ but don’t miss ‘The Bob’s Burgers Music Album Vol. 2’.

Fans have been waiting eight long years for this new album from Ishi that
is expected to drop under Swedish Indie Label Icons Creating Evil Art, the
home of Flora Cash, Summer Heart, and Glamour Hammer.
It will be titled ‘Sweet Gold’ and feature the hit singles ‘Not My Girl’ and ‘LoFi Love Affair’ and the new single ‘Fly Away’. Ishi’s ability to successfully walk
the line between an ambitious studio act and a multi-sensory live experience
allows him to engage the audience in an uplifting celebration of life. His subtle
undertones of inner exploration combine to create a concert experience that is
unequivocally one-of-a-kind.
Each night, Ishi intends to create an entirely unique environment of mysticism,
awareness, love and acceptance. Adored by fans and critics alike, there is no
denying that Ishi is an immersive experience that everyone should discover.
Following the successful release of the Yuksek remix of ‘Not My Girl’ (supported by the likes of A-Trak, Kiss FM, Ministry of Sound, Amazing Radio etc.) and
a remix collaboration with the internationally acclaimed EDM-producer Oliver
Nelson, and his Goody Goody collab with fellow Texans CAPYAC; Ishi now line
up some new original music and the new album dropping early fall.

1st October sees the release of the Neil Young ‘Carnegie Hall 1970’. Young has selected this concert he played at New York’s Carnegie Hall on December 4th, 1970 as the inaugural release from his Official Bootleg series.

The show rounded off a seminal year for Young who had released the ‘After The Gold Rush’ record just 3 months earlier in September which followed on from the ‘Déjà Vu’ album he recorded as part of Crosby, Still, Nash & Young in March of the same year.

This show is a never before heard recording with Young playing solo on vocals, acoustic guitar, piano and harmonica. Young played two solo acoustic shows at Carnegie Hall that week. “Listening to existing bootlegs, it seems that all the bootleggers got the second Carnegie Hall show,” Young writes on the Neil Young Archives. “There was one at 8:00 pm and one at midnight about 27 hours later. No one got that first one — the first time I walked onstage at Carnegie Hall, blowing my own 25-year-old mind.”

Change happens fast. At Carnegie Hall, I hear myself doing a new song, one about my ranch I had just moved to – ‘Old Man.’ Time flies.

Split Single from the garage combo of The Panturas and Sundancer sung entirely on their
regional language. An exclusive 7” split from Indonesian surf-garage-rock behemoth The
Panturas and Sundancer, hailing from Jatinangor and Lombok Respectively. It was the
first series from their upcoming “"Singel Klub" series.
"Lasut Nyanggut" by The Panturas their first song sung entirely in Sundanese language.
The band appointed Ricky Virgana from White Shoes and The Couples Company fame to
be their producer, and successfully produced a garage psych-surf-calypso with a mixture of
traditional oriental sundanese pop aesthetics. The lyrics of the song itself paints a picture of
someone fishing.The title itself is a popular term among fishing enthusiast on the western
parts of Java.
“Dedare Tanjung” or “Gadis Tanjung” roughly translates to “the girl on the cape”, was
inspired from “Dark Eyes” a russian folk song and Ismail Marzuki’s very own “Panon
Hideung” which is a song sung in Sundanese language. The band translates the song to
their own mother tongue language which is the Sasak, a language that the band originated
from.

ayne/Wayne County's most audacious album is also possibly among the most important albums of its age. Released in 1979 just as the new wave was teetering on the brink of some kind of bold step forward, Things Your Mother Never Told You was one of the sudden shoves which sent it sprawling into its destiny. Electro-punk starts here. Producer David Cunningham takes only a portion of the credit; in years to come he would lead the Flying Lizards into the realm of heavily stylized electronica. But County's songs match his ambitions all the way, from the harsh, grating soundscapes behind "C3"'s muttered imprecations to the soft-spoken paranoia of "Waiting for the Marines," and onto "Berlin," the song that put into words everything David Bowie (among others) tried to convey about that city via image and insinuation. It's not all electro-art smarts, of course. "Boy With the Stolen Face" and the pouting, punishing "Wonder Woman" are archetypal Electric Chairs - a reminder of how, at the band's very best, they could run the Rolling Stones close in the swaggering rock & roller stakes - and the murder mystery "Wall City Girl" could have fallen off a forgotten volume of Nuggets or Pebbles. The title track, meanwhile, doesn't simply seethe with all the promise -- sexual, social, and societal -- which made County the superstar (s)he so very nearly was, it also lets listeners know why no one has ever truly snatched that crown away.

Beautiful Garbage is the third studio album from Garbage, initially released on October 1, 2001. Marking a departure from the sound the band had established on their first two releases, Garbage & Version 2.0, the album was written and recorded over the course of a year, when lead singer Shirley Manson chronicled their efforts weekly online, becoming one of the first high-profile musicians to keep an Internet blog. The album expanded on the band's musical variety, with stronger melodies, more direct lyrics, and sounds mixing rock with electronica, new wave, hip hop, and girl groups. This brand new edition featuring newly remastered audio by Billy Bush & Butch Vig across Deluxe, LP, CD and Digital formats. The Deluxe edition includes Beautiful Garbage on 2 x 180g Black Vinyl, as well as a 12” 180g of B-Sides and memorabilia. The two Double LP formats have been pressed on 180g Black and 180g white vinyl respectively. This reissue campaign also features a triple CD featuring, original album, b-sides, demos and remixes housed in a deluxe clamshell.

Nachpressung der beliebten Compilation! Auf "Singles Round Up" kommen die ersten zwölf 7"-Singles, A&B-Seiten von Holly Golightly zusammen. Mit dabei ist das bluesige ,No Big Thing" mit seinem Barklavier und der Mundharmonika, das schmutzige gitarrenlastige ,Til I Get", die mit dem Jazzbesen bearbeiteten Drums und der Kontrabass von ,Come The Day", das eindrückliche ,Stain" und die brillante Coverversion ,Box Elder" von Pavement. Holly Golightly (ihr echter Name!) begann ihre musikalische Karriere 1991 bei Thee Headcoatees, einer Splittergruppe von Billy Childishs Thee Headcoats. Nach vier Jahren als Headcoatee trennte sie sich von der Band, um 1995 ihr Solodebüt ,The Good Things" zu veröffentlichen. Während bei den Headcoatees ein 60's Girl Group Sound auf dreiakkordigen Garagerock traf und viele Songs sowieso aus der Feder von Billy Childish stammten, vermischten sich auf Hollys Soloplatten Blues aus der Zeit vor dem Rock'n'Roll mit Folkrock und einer entspannteren Rock'n'Roll Gangart. Neben Coverversionen von Künstlern wie Willie Dixon, Ike Turner oder Lee Hazelwood schreibt Holly den Großteil ihres Materials selbst. Holly Golightly ist ohne Frage die interessanteste und vielseitigste Künstlerin aus der Schule von Billy Childish und ist mit Sicherheit eine der besten Songwriterinnen der Post-Grunge Ära, die mit jedem Album besser und besser wird. Seit ihrem Debüt 1995 war sie stetig aktiv, hat eine ganze Stange von Alben und eine noch größere Stange Singles für die verschiedensten Labels veröffentlicht und in den USA, Australien und Europa getourt.

You Make It Feel Like Christmas is the fourth studio album by American singer-songwriter Gwen Stefani. The album, which is Stefani's first full-length Christmas-themed album, was originally released in October 2017, now a Xmas staple and we re issue it every October for a limited run

Originally out on CD only on the legendary 1+2 label from Tokyo, this is the first ever vinyl issue for the Australian-adopted Japanese punk band Mach Pelican. Ripped jeans, leather jackets, 14 short and sharp 3 chords tunes. PunkRock to the bone! Featuring the single "Dance in Chicago" and a cover of The Queers’ classic "Ursula Finally Has Tits". Cover art by Ray Ahn from the Hard Ons. Double-sided lyrics insert included. Limited to 300 only, on yellow vinyl!

THE PALE FOUNTAINS - LONGSHOT FOR YOUR LOVE (Marina Records) New enhanced, remastered vinyl edition of the long-deleted, much sought-after Pale Fountains compilation "Longshot For Your Love" - originally released in 1998 - covering the band's early years from 1982 to 1984. "Longshot For Your Love" is a collection of rarities, radio sessions and previously unreleased tracks by Liverpool's second best band ever - fronted by Michael Head ("Our greatest living songwriter" - NME). Seven cuts are released here for the first time ever - incl. the superb John Peel and Old Grey Whistle Test BBC Sessions ('82/'83). The album comes with enhanced artwork - in a beautiful gatefold cover plus inner sleeve feat. lots of unseen band photos and extensive linernotes by former Pale Fountains manager Patrick Moore. On Marina Records.

Stuart Evans, aka Sordid Sound System is one of the founders of The Green Door Studio, a not for profit, analogue recording studio in Glasgow which emerged from an increasing disillusionment with the modern ways of music production. His sound holds outsider qualities, being everything but generic and predictable, mixing dub with movie soundtracks in the tradition of Carpenter and Italian likes.

On this 7” released on Höga Nord Rekords, SSS deconstructs and rebuilds music in an imaginative style, pairing tribe-ritual “back to ape”-beats with synthesized cosmic harmonies. In a way, we are enjoying straight up dub here but this record is also a display of the vivid and creative Glasgow scene centred round “The Green door studio” and record labels like “Invisible Ink” where krautrock and 80’s/90’s electronic music is part of the foundation. Boundless joy for every girl and boy!

Events currently taking place throughout the world only serve to stoke a fire under the likes of Pillow Queens, who find themselves continually inspired by a Dublin that is no stranger to fighting social injustice. Street artists, fashion designers, musicians, film makers and more comprise a scene which routinely champions queerness and marginalized groups, and engages with and activates young people in response to the likes of the city’s ongoing housing and mental health crises. Pillow Queens’ songs of togetherness and unity ring out louder than ever before.

In their short lifespan as a band they've released two demo EPs, performed on a successful string of UK & Irish dates & festival appearances, had playlisting from BBC 6 Music, and found themselves opening for the likes of American Football and Pussy Riot, as well as stadium performances opening for IDLES and Future Islands.

With all this under their belt, the band began working with Mercury Prize nominated producer Tommy McLaughlin for their single 'Gay Girls' – which received a nomination for the RTE Choice Music Prize song of the year, as well as International pickup from NPR’s World Cafe and KEXP. The song also found its way into the heart of actor Cillian Murphy and his BBC6 mixtape show.

2019 saw Pillow Queens venture into mainland Europe, as they lit up the Eurosonic festival and completed a string of tour dates opening for Soak. The tour was a messy and joyous affair captured beautifully in the DIY video for the bands summer single 'HowDoILook'.

In Waiting is Pillow Queens’ debut album, the result of four years of brotherly love in a sisterly unit from Ireland’s most urgent, yearning, rock band. Crafted from our lives, and honed in a studio in rural Donegal in the northwest of Ireland, this is a record by queens in waiting and kings in the making. It’s an album about love; self-love, queer love, the anxiety-inducing fault lines of romantic love, and the love for a city and a country that simultaneously has your back and is on your back.

Natalie Imbruglia returns with her brand new album Firebird later this year, kicking off with the first single 'Build It Better' in June. The single marks the first new music from Natalie in almost a decade after choosing to remain out of the limelight following her monumental success in the nineties and early noughties, accumulating 5 x UK Top 10 singles, 10 x UK Top 40 singles, 1 x UK #1 album, 3 UK Top 10 albums, 2 BRIT Awards, 8 ARIA Awards, 3 Grammy Award nominations and much more. The forthcoming new album was written and recorded between the UK, the US and her homeland of Australia, co-written with the likes of Albert Hammond Jr of The Strokes, Romeo Stodart of The Magic Numbers, KT Tunstall, Eg White (Adele, Dua Lipa, Sam Smith), Luke Fitton (Little Mix, Girls Aloud), Fiona Bevan (One Direction, Ed Sheeran), Rachel Furner (Little Mix, Jason Derulo, Craig David) and more, and produced by Natalie and My Riot with additional production from Albert Hammond Jr, Gus Oberg and Romeo Stodart.

Beggars Arkive announce the LP reissue of Gary Numan’s
fifth album, ‘Warriors’, on orange vinyl. Originally released
in 1983 and co-produced with Bill Nelson, the album
continues Numan’s ambient-funk experimentations.
 “I still like a lot of the ‘Warriors’ stuff and Bill Nelson did a
lot of very inventive things on it which, because of our
differences, I failed to appreciate at the time. I think the
Mad Max image convinced a lot of people, the press
especially, that it was a sci-fi album. Much of it though was
actually quite autobiographical. Even songs like ‘The
Iceman Comes’ and ‘This Prison Moon’ were more to do
with what I was going through than anything sci-fi. Lyrically
I was already becoming overly focused on the career
struggle. ‘Warriors’ was written, in the main, in a hotel
room in Jersey. My girlfriend had just left me, I’d been
evicted from the house I was living in and I felt pretty much
alone in more ways than one. Despite its surface gloss of
futurism it was really very inward looking. To me the image
was meant to represent someone fighting for survival as
much as anything” - Gary Numan
 The achievements over his four-decade career (and
counting) are remarkable for someone who never made
any concessions to mainstream success. Seven Top 10
singles, including ‘Are ‘Friends’ Electric?’ and the debut
solo hit ‘Cars’; seven Top 10 albums, three of which
topped the charts; and huge critical acclaim, most notably
with the Inspiration Award at the prestigious Ivor Novellos.
 In a career that spans over forty years, the music evolves
and the themes change. But fans remain fascinated by
Numan for the v

Midway through his long, earnest and often very, very
funny essay on the role playing game ‘Dungeons &
Dragons’ in the September 2006 issue of The Believer,
writer Paul La Farge proposes that ‘Dungeons & Dragons’
is not a game at all but rather a ritual. La Farge notes the
marked difference between game and ritual. Whereas a
game seeks to demonstrate how unequal or distinct
players / teams are from one another, rituals seek to do
the very opposite.
 And so, across the 25-year history of Jagjaguwar - an
independent record label curiously named using a
‘Dungeons & Dragons’ name generator - we find this idea
of ritual as a conjoining practice. We see it early on when
Jagjaguwar join forces with a midwestern label called
Secretly Canadian for a powerful fusion. We see it in
familial relationships and collaboration among Jagjaguwar
artists and the ways those artists’ most treasured
collaborators make their ways to the Jagjaguwar game
board.
 ‘Join The Ritual’, a piece of Jagjaguwar’s 25th Anniversary
celebrations, looks to pay homage to the labels and artists
that, whether they know it or not, invited Jagjaguwar to the
table, to this wild, dark magic ritual of music. We’re talking
about independent titans like Drag City, Too Pure, K
Records and Touch & Go. We’re talking about heroes like
R.E.M., Slint, Stereolab and Tracy Chapman. These songs
captured the imaginations of founders Darius Van Arman
and Chris Swanson - and ultimately, opened up worlds to
them.

Blind, Chicago soul singer Willie Williams was first discovered performing in clubs in and around the Windy City. He was signed to ABC records by their A&R Director for the Midwest Johnny Pate a former Jazz bassist, independent producer, arranger and songwriter in his own right. Pate was a friend and colleague of fellow musician, songwriter and founding member of one of ABC’s prolific vocal groups The Trends, Tom Dorsey. Pate and Dorsey would contribute heavily as writers and producer throughout Willie’s recording career, beginning with his first ABC 45 release in 1966 “Have You Ever Been Played For A Fool/With All My Soul”. The release’s b-side became a popular radio play at the time with Willie becoming known as Willie “Soul” Williams for a while. Two further ABC releases were to follow “It Doesn’t Pay/Just Because” (1967) and “I’m Through With You/Strung Out” (1968).

Willie’s next 45 release although recorded in Chicago under Johnny Pate’s supervision found it’s way to another major label, RCA, although credited as a GWP Production (Gerrard W. Purcell). The 45 in question being the excellent Tom Dorsey penned songs “Just To Be Loved By You/Name It” released during 1969.

Two Willie Williams 45 releases did appear on the Gamma label but I’m unsure if one or both of these are by the same Willie Williams in question.

Throughout his recording career Willie continued to work the clubs with his own band which was led by his bass guitarist and confidant Bradley (Brad) Bobo a man who featured as a session musician on many recording sessions including the creation of The Notation’s album of the same name for Curtis Mayfield’s Curtom subsidiary label Gemigo.

On the 22nd of December 1970 a recording session was held in RCA’s Studio B, on North Wacker Drive, Chicago with sound engineer Russ Vestuto. The session was financed by Tom Dorsey who amongst other song writing gratuities had been paid handsomely for the 3 songs “Love Machine”, “My Baby’s Love” and “How Are You Fixed For Love” which he had wrote and contributed to the blue-eyed hit group, The O’Kaysion’s “Girl Watcher” ABC album. The result of this session yielded four Willie Williams tracks. Brad Bobo played bass guitar on the session, the composer of the four songs Tom Dorsey supplied the arrangements and Tom’s wife Carolyn (also a former group members of The Trends) joined both he and Brad on backing vocals.

The four songs were then offered to Eddie Thomas who chose two of them to release on a 45 single. The two songs being “Must Mean Love” which was later renamed “The Baa Baa Song “and “Psyched Out” which Eddie then released on his own Lakeside label, thus leaving the two other songs to remain unissued in the can.

Willie has now sadly passed away but in his later life once the opportunity’s for performing artists began to dwindle he chose a different path in his life, gaining a Doctors degree, he went on to become a College Lecturer. Tom Dorsey too turned his back on the music industry apart from his publishing company to concentrate on his family life as well as founding a very successful business involving one of his other great life passions, photography. Luckily for us he never lost the master tape of Willie’s sessions and after several years of tentative enquiries he graciously relented to my request to put them out. So now before you we have the two excellent previously unissued Willie Williams songs that Eddie Thomas passed on, the delightfully soulful “Give It All I Got” backed with the funky, social conscience themed “Do You Understand”, lost early 1970’s Chicago Soul at its finest.

Effortlessly hopscotching between vintage acid and 80s Rn’B, insouciant Francophone pop and twinkling electro house, Lou Hayter has delivered something at once utterly unique and defiantly timeless with her much anticipated debut solo LP, released on Skint Records. It has been a long time coming for London native Hayter, who first made her mark professionally as keyboardist for New Young Pony Club, one of THE bands at the epicentre of the white hot day-glo nu rave scene alongside the likes of the Klaxons and Test Icicles in 2006. But, to fully place her debut album in context, it is necessary to rewind a little bit – to the very beginning in fact, with Hayter growing up on a diet of Bowie, Prince, Human League and Jellybean-era Madonna while concomitantly learning classical piano from the age of five. The flames of this deliciously varied musical palette were further stoked by trips to record shops in Soho with her brother (Soul Jazz was a particular obsession), but it was while studying in Cambridge that the match was well and truly struck – she used her student grant to buy a set of Technics and started putting on club nights, before moving to London and working at Trevor Jackson’s seminal Output Recordings, placing Hayter smack bang in the middle of all the action, with disco punk fever hitting full force and bands like the Rapture and LCD Soundsystem first breaking out.

The hugely successful, Mercury-nominated New Young Pony Club followed shortly after, but it’s through her subsequent output that she started to distil and refine her idiosyncratic tastes. And certainly, you can hear hints of both the New Sins, the 80’s New Wave duo she formed with Nick Phillips, and Tomorrow’s World, the swooning Gallic pop act she fronts alongside Air’s JB Dunckel, in her remarkable debut. Full to bursting with evocative electro-soul love letters to her home town of London alongside addictive disco torch ballads, it’s like Kylie meeting Mr Fingers or, Jam & Lewis producing Jane Birkin – something beautiful and melancholic yet sharply modern and new. From the warm, woozy, lysergic harmonies of opener “Cherry on Top”, which sound like a beloved old cassette unravelling, to the fizzy, infectious “Cold Feet”, which calls to mind Lisa Lisa & Cult Jam at their most heartworn, taken in toto the album perfectly nails the essence of gorgeously nostalgic synth-pop with a twist; crisp, stylish and sophisticated music which heralds the next chapter of Lou Hayter quite nicely, actually. Her retro-futuristic results will give 2021 the pop fix it so desperately needs.

The Toolroom Family is happy to announce the release of KC Lights' brand new single 'Cold Light' that lands as the highly anticipated follow up to his global hit 'Girl’ which, in spite of the global shutdowns of clubs and festivals last year went on to be the ‘stay at home’ summer anthem for 2020.

‘Girl’ dominated the airwaves with BBC Radio 1 daytime playlist inclusions, KISS FM, Capital Dance, Sirius XM in the US and specialist playlists all over the world. It has now amassed over 5m streams on Spotify alone and still going strong.

As we move further into 2021, timed right on the back of some of his most recent stellar remixes for James Hype, Topic, Blinkie, Lost Kings and Nightlapse, KC Lights returns to lift our bleak spirits with the aptly named ‘Cold Light’.

He has collaborated with UK singer, songwriter Leo Stannard, who is being hailed as one of the most talented and exciting songwriter / vocalists to emerge in recent years, which is quite impressive during these times of quarantines and lockdowns. Most recently, Leo featured on CamelPhat’s track ‘Blackbirds’ which is featured on the Camels album, ‘Dark Matter.” He may also be recognized for his work with Maverick Sabre, Tom Odell, Rae Morris, Lewis Mokler and many more.

‘Cold Light’ is signature KC Lights with a stripped back groove and tribal drums complimented by Leo’s sublime vocal which takes the track to a whole new level! It’s feels like another anthem in making from this emerging star and with a club mix and a 6am remix, it really is the perfect tune to take us into the promise of lighter and warmer months ahead.

The scottish musician, born in 1953 in Port Glasgow, is one of the most eclectic artist of the so-called minimal wave scene. Alongside german singer Claudia Brücken (vocalist of the hit-makers Propaganda) he formed Act a short-lived synthpop group signed to ZTT Records in the late eighties. Licensed by Cherry Red in 1982, the double album ‘Contradictions’ is the third effort in Leer high and rising career. After the seminal debut on Industrial Records with Robert Rental – The Bridge (1979) – Leer ventured on a solo career with the brave synth wave of ‘Letter From America’ and his personal masterpiece ‘Contradictions’. The latter is such an enigmatic piece of work, with alien melodies as in the case of the ‘Soul Gypsy’ infectious white funk. The whole album was recorded in his living room at home onto 4-track using borrowed equipment ( Korg synth, Ult-sound drum computer & guitars ) from his friend Morgan Fisher. Featuring Leer’s haunting, uncertain vocal – recorded quietly, so as not to wake his girlfriend in their bedsit! – crooning over a minimal bass pulse and discreet whines and washes of primitive Wasp synthesiser, it retains its peculiar lo-fi magic four decades on.

The anticipation is there in Elizabeth Stokes’ solo guitar riff under the opening lines of “I’m Not Getting Excited”: a frenetic, driving force daring a packed Auckland Town Hall to do exactly the opposite of what the track title suggests.

As the opener of The Beths’ Auckland, New Zealand, 2020 expands to include the full band, the crowd screeches and bellows. It’s a collective exhalation, in one of the few countries where live music is still possible.

The album title, and film of the same name, deliberately include the date and location, lead guitarist Jonathan Pearce says. “That’s the sensational part of what we actually did.” In a mid-pandemic world, playing to a heaving, enraptured home crowd feels miraculous.

In March 2020, everything seemed on track for another huge year for The Beths. Home after an 18-month northern hemisphere tour, they had just finished recording sophomore album Jump Rope Gazers and were primed for more extensive touring. But within days, New Zealand’s lockdown split the band between three separate houses. All touring was cancelled.

“It was existentially bad,” Stokes says. As well as worrying about economic survival, they lost something crucial to the band’s identity: live performance. “It's a huge part of how we see ourselves... What does it mean, if we can't play live?”

The band found an outlet through live-streaming, returning to the do-it-yourself mentality of their early days to connect with a global audience. The album and film have their genesis in that urge to share the now-rare experience of a live show, as widely as possible.

The fuzzy-round-the-edges live-streams pointed the way aesthetically. Native birds, wonkily crafted by the band from tissue paper and wire, festoon the venue’s cavernous ceiling while house plants soften and disguise the imposing pipes of an organ. The presence of the film crew isn’t disguised: much of the camerawork is handheld; full of fast zooms and pans.

With much of the material still fresh, the band was less focused on re-invention than playing “a good, fast rock show”, Pearce says. The tempo is up on crowd favourites “Whatever” and “Future Me Hates Me” (released as a live single on its third anniversary) as both band and audience feed off the mutual energy in the room.

Certain songs have taken on special resonance post-Covid. Pearce has found “Out Of Sight”, a tender rumination on long-distance relationships, hits particularly hard with live audiences.

Album closer “River Run” visibly brings Stokes to tears as a mix of achievement and relief kicks in. “You can finally relax at that point … You play the last note, breathe out a sigh and look up - and you’re in a giant room full of people happy and smiling.”

The latest chapter in Columbia/Legacy's highly acclaimed Bootleg Series revisits an often forgotten, rich vein in Dylan’s vast and complex catalogue, shining fresh light on the provocative new musical directions Dylan was taking as a songwriter and a recording artist from 1980 through 1985. This set celebrates the rich creative period surrounding Dylan's albums 'Shot Of Love', 'Infidels' and 'Empire Burlesque', with previously unreleased outtakes, alternate takes, rehearsal recordings, live performances and more.








[e] b2 Don’t Fall Apart on Me Tonight [version 1] – Infidels alternate take

[g] c1 Too Late [band version] – Infidels outtake

Funky Dark Electro Pop... Superb Album opening on a real maturity and aesthetic choice : New Wave background ina Dies Puppe style maybe ??

American indie rock band The Virgins released their self-titled debut full-length album in 2008 through Atlantic Records. A couple of songs were taken from their previously released EP, The Virgins ‘07, including breakthrough hit “Rich Girls”. A lot of songs from this album were used in prominent tv shows, films and commercials. “Rich Girls” was featured in 17 Again, Castle, and Gossip Girl, with the latter also featuring the songs “One Week of Danger”, “Fernando Pando”, “Radio Christiane” and “Love Is Colder Than Death”. “Hey Hey Girl” was also heard in The Vampire Diaries. It’s no surprise that the songs were so popular in the media, as their catchy dance punk yielded positive reviews from music critics.

Spanish Model tells the story of what happens to a seminal album (This Year’s Model) recorded 42 years ago when it is reinterpreted with new voices in another language. This is a story of transformation, adaptation, reflection; a mash-up of language, geography, culture, and passion. How past/present and time/ space can partner with music/talent to reimagine a completely new work – Spanish Model.

Elvis Costello’s “This Year’s Model” will be reinterpreted all in Spanish with 19 of today’s top Latin artists (Luis Fonsi, Sebastian Yatra, Juanes, and many more) representing a total of 9 countries. The lyrics have been precisely translated to have the featured Latin artists sing to the original multis. We are working closely with our Universal Latin label partners for artist participation and overall support on this release.

In the wake of Bitch Magnet and current of Superchunk, Sooyoung Park and Mac McCaughan formed a raw version of Seam in the summer of ’91. With bassist Lexi Mitchell, the trio banged out an album and two singles worth of shambolic dream pop in the sweltering Chapel Hill heat. Ten songs of talk-whispered vocals, sloshing guitar solos, scattered snare rolls, Velocity Girl’s Sarah Shannon, and the original version of Codeine’s slowcore classic “New Year’s,” on LP for the first time in 30 years.

The Alice Comedies are a series of Animated/live-action shorts created by Walt Disney in the 1920s, in which a live action little girl named Alice (originally played by Virginia Davis) and an animated cat named Julius have adventures in an animated landscape.

The Magic Clock is a whirlwind mishmash of motifs that 1 draws on an unusually wide range of sources: Hoffman’s The Nutcracker and medieval romances working cheek by jowl with Arabian Nights, Ovid, Midsummer Night’s Dream, Peter Pan, Mallarme’s “Afternoon of a Faun,” and Novalis’ blue flower.

Paul Dessau was a German composer and conductor. He composed operas, scenic plays, incidental music, ballets, symphonies and other works for orchestra, and pieces for solo instruments as well as vocal music.

The music is conducted and produced by Hans E. Zimmer, who conducted an extensive repertoire including Die Zauberflöte, Le Nozze di Figaro, Euryanthe, Jenufa, Ariadne auf Naxos, Salome, Der Rosenkavalier, Der Friedenstag, Die Meister-singer von Nürnberg, Lohengrin.

The UK’s love affair with American soul music blossomed in the
mid 1960s, with the launch of the Tamla-Motown record label in
Britain. But by the end of the decade this passion took on a
distinctly homegrown twist with a new movement that grew out
of the North of England and Midlands’ underground soul and
R&B scene. It was here at dancehalls and clubs such as
Manchester’s Twisted Wheel and the Wigan Casino that
devotees danced the night away to uptempo, joyous US soul
records that always came with a heavy beat. Pretty soon the
movement had a name: Northern Soul. This collection is the
next best thing and it is all on vinyl, exactly how the movement’s
fans originally heard them

BARBARA JEAN ACKLIN was working as a receptionist at Brunswick Records in 1966 when she co-wrote “Whispers (Getting Louder)” which became one of Jackie Wilson’s biggest hits and secured her a recording contract with the label. In 1968 she hit with “Love Makes A Woman” peaking at #15 on the Billboard pop chart. “Am I The Same Girl” followed in ’69 barely breaking the Hot 100. Dusty Springfield covered the song later that year giving the singer her final chart hit, peaking at #43 in the UK. Salena Jones cut a credible jazzy interpretation in 1970 and the British pop group Swing Out Sister scored a #21 UK hit in 1992 after first hearing the song in a Manchester Northern Soul club.
Brunswick producer Carl Davis was inspired to remove Acklin’s vocal and replace it with a piano solo shortly after the original release. He called the instrumental “Soulf Strut” and attributed it to Young-Holt Unlimited providing them with a #3 hit in the USA.