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The Swallows were one of Singapore’s standout bands of the 1960s, rising from the explosive Pop Yeh-Yeh movement, the regional response to the global beat-band wave, with strong garage-rock roots. Fusing surf rock, early Beatles-inspired pop, and gritty, fuzz-laden guitars with a distinctly local sensibility, they became youth icons of the era. Defined by sharp suits, infectious melodies, and a rebellious spark, The Swallows captured the restless energy of post-independence Singapore, securing their place in the island’s golden age of bands and in the wider story of Southeast Asian rock.

Old Skool Hip Hop,Electro & Funk compilation.

Jeff Cascaro's previous albums have already highlighted the jazzy side of his sound. With his latest record, ‘Broadway and Beyond,’ the artist has now gone one step further. Wonderful, airy grooves allow the singer to shine with the finest vocal nuances. Everything is relaxed and tastefully arranged, the songs have swing and are soulful. Once again, it is his incredibly versatile voice that evokes the atmosphere of the old New York nightclubs. Jeff Cascaro takes us to Broadway and shows us what else there is to marvel at beyond it.

180g Vinyl

The album features the group playing Gary McFarland arrangements of Kuhn's compositions, accompanied by a string section on several tracks, with Kuhn delivering stream of consciousness lyrics in an unplanned and largely improvised fashion in the studio. However, that wasn't the only surprising aspect to the session. Airto Moreira's appearance was more by chance than design, he having just popped by the studio, again, unplanned. The 'Steve Kuhn' album is all the stronger for these extemporaneous and serendipitous elements and showcases a band at the top of their game; tight and funky yet relaxed and flowing like molten gold, with stabs and washes of keyboard from Kuhn. Splashes of free playing enter the session, but the band never stray too far from a melodic and harmonious centre of gravity. Kuhn's deft keyboard skills provide melodic embroidery to the impressive rhythmic textures and tonal colours of Carter, Cobham and Moreira. As if the music wasn't enough, the album is given extra significance by the fact that, within a few months of the recording, McFarland would die after being mysteriously poisoned by methadone in a New York bar. In a sense, it is a valedictory album from McFarland, channeled by Kuhn and the band. It's among the hardest of Kuhn's albums to find so this reissue is most welcome. Luxuriate in the glow of Kuhn's Fender Rhodes and the pliant funky bass of Ron Carter; immerse yourself in the percussive interplay of Moreira and Cobham, a pairing that has rarely sounded so good. This is such an exquisite album; you will lose yourself in its delicate power and find yourself coming back to it again and again. "It's a beautiful picture, and it helped me to comprehend things, life a bit, you know. And as I'm thinking about it, I hope it does that for whoever listens to it too." - Thundercat, Musician Details: Heavyweight Vinyl 45 RPM Cut / Original glued prints on Thick Cardboard 700 gram / 2 Separated parts hand-glued / Glossy lamination / PVC outer / 30x60 cm insert printed on 300 gram DNS paper with interview to Steve Kuhn by Tony Higgins.

Manilla Road's »The Courts Of Chaos« album was originally released in 1990. It was the band's last release for Black Dragon and also the last release before the band temporarily split up (if we do not take 1992's »Circus Maximus« into account, which was actually supposed to be a solo album). All in all it was a very tough time for Manilla Road. When he was still alive, Mark Shelton commented in an exclusive interview: "Yes, you are correct with all of that. Our releases were not selling as well as they had years before and it seemed like metal in general was having a hard time surviving the times that followed the conversion to CD technology. Right after Manilla Road broke up, I started putting together a solo project that accidentally turned into a band. So we named it Circus Maximus and signed a deal with Black Dragon but they decided to release it as a Manilla Road album because they thought it would sell better. »The Courts Of Chaos« was the last album that was a real Manilla Road project on Black Dragon." “»The Courts Of Chaos« was a tough album to get done because the atmosphere within the band was tense, to say the least”, continued The Shark. ”We all knew it was going to be the end of an era and that this line-up would most likely never do another album.” Although »The Courts Of Chaos« might not be the strongest Manilla Road effort, Mark did not consider it a “throwaway album” whatsoever: “It does not seem to get mentioned as much as many other albums of The Road. But when it does come up, it seems like that person is really sold on the project being one of our better ones. It does, in my opinion, have some really killer songs on it. 'Dig Me No Grave' is still in our show. It's always a challenge to play but I love doing that one live and it still seems to appeal to our audience. “ Another highlight on »The Courts Of Chaos« is "DOA", a cover of a Bloodrock number. Manilla Road were not known for playing too many covers. Mark Shelton explained: "I grew up in that era and yes, I love that old stuff and could be called a collector of sorts, I guess. This was the only cover song that Manilla Road has ever put on an album. We chose this song because it was the only one that all three of us could agree upon. I wanted to do some obscure hit from the old days and turn it into a Manilla Road style song. I'm still fairly fond of the version and still like to listen to it every once in a while."

Violator wurde 2002 in der brasilianischen Hauptstadt Brasília gegründet und hat sich zum Ziel gesetzt, eines der Aushängeschilder der postmillennialen neuen Welle des Old-School-Thrash-Metal zu werden. Die vierköpfige Band entstand aus der gemeinsamen Vorliebe der Mitglieder für genreprägende Acts aus der goldenen Ära der Szene in den 1980er Jahren. Sie mischten den unerbittlichen Stil der frühen Pioniere aus ihrem Land (Sepultura, Korzus) mit der amerikanischen Tradition (insbesondere den Genre-Titanen Exodus) und einer Prise Hardcore-Crossover. High Roller Records sind stolz darauf, vier Schlüsselveröffentlichungen der Gruppe auf Vinyl neu aufzulegen, wobei „Violent Mosh“ 2004 ihr erstes professionelles Werk auf dem brasilianischen Label Kill Again Records war. Nach einem Demo und einem Vierer-Split gab die Sechs-Track-EP den Ton an für das, was zwei Jahre später auf Violators Debütalbum „Chemical Assault“ folgen sollte. Beide Titel fangen die energiegeladenen Live-Shows ein, die sie sowohl alleine als auch als Support von internationalen Größen wie Destruction spielten. Apropos, auf der „Annihilation Process“-EP von 2010 konnte Sänger/Bassist Pedro Arcanjo nicht mehr nur den deutschen Frontmann Schmier oder Kreators Mille imitieren, während die Musik reifer wurde und Songs wie das ausgefeilte „Futurephobia“ haufenweise Potenzial erkennen ließen. Mit ihrem zweiten Album „Scenarios of Brutality“ (2013) löste die Band dieses Versprechen ein, indem sie ihren mittlerweile unverkennbaren Sound voll zur Geltung brachte, der das Flair eines neuzeitlichen Genre-Klassikers verströmt. Riff-lastig, mit intensivem Tempo und glaubwürdig Zorn und Wut durch etablierte Themen ausdrückend, die von gesellschaftspolitischem Bewusstsein und Doom-Mongering bis hin zu schlichter Thrash-Selbstreferenzialität reichen und mit rohen, aber kraftvollen Produktionen aufwarten, sind diese vier Platten äußerst wichtige Ergänzungen zum Genre-Kanon - Let the Violation Begin!

Mastered for vinyl by Christoph Brandes at Iguana Studios

Fifteen years after their first album "Time for a Change", and drawing on the experience of two others ("Elephanz" 2017, and "Rien de personnel" 2023), ELEPHANZ now returns with a fourth album that carries the scent of first loves, the kind you sing from the heart with your hands gripping a guitar.

"Love. Hurt. Repeat." tells, across ten songs, the story of a return to oneself, like coming home after years spent roaming the world, only to realize that everything you needed to understand yourself was already there at the starting line.

To help you understand what this new album makes me feel, I'd like to tell you about my first meeting with Jon and Max in 2009, when I became the band's bassist. Sixteen years ago, I discovered these two young men and set off in their family Kangoo van on my very first tour.

Through our early rehearsals around the piano of their childhood, I discovered their love for pop music in all its breadth, always in search of harmonies and melodies that touch the heart in the simplest way and gently ease your sorrows along the way. With them, I learned to appreciate the mainstream hits I had previously dismissed on principle, and I discovered the demanding art of melody as I listened to them sing about love and friendship through unforgettable catchphrases.

Listening today to some of the songs from their new album, I think back to those two young men with a big-city rock look, shut away in the living room of their family home, talking only about leaving that dull countryside behind to live the big life in the capital (Streets of Rage). What I once took for a kind of revenge against the hostile environment of their adolescence was in fact an almost vital need to find their place among others, to feel understood in order to feel at ease in their own skin.

Today, I find them again with the same guitar and the same inexpensive Juno as back then, but with the confidence shaped by years of concerts, writing, studio encounters, and all kinds of experimentation. The music of this fourth album has never been so close to that of their earliest days, but their voices have been set free. They no longer sing about who they dreamed of becoming, but about who they have always been, their most distant concerns, sometimes even their darkest ones, yet always in search of the light.

It is as if ELEPHANZ had to travel all the way around the world to come face to face with themselves again. There is no longer any shame in being who you are, and it is even the best way to understand yourself, to exist and to heal. To heal from grief and heartbreak, to understand the child you once were and the one who carried them (Mother), to forgive yourself and finally learn to love yourself.

That is what makes this record as sensitive as it is powerful and strikingly truthful. It was written and recorded like a cry, live, in just a few weeks, using the instruments of their beginnings: sharp bass and drums, powerful guitars, and synthesizers that are at times soaring, at times carriers of liberating melodies. The art of ballads remains, as does that of universal pop songs.

There is a beautiful urgency here, the urgency of finding oneself again in order to understand oneself through both pain and beauty, and "Love. Hurt. Repeat." is its most perfect expression.

Brisk is the debut album by Polish-Hungarian flutist Juli Deák (*2000), based in Budapest. Comprised of seven solo flute pieces, the album offers a concentrated snapshot of Deák’s musical world—one shaped by classical training, experimentation, improvisation, and folk influences.

The project began taking shape in 2021, as Deák moved away from the polished ideals of classical performance toward a more personal and exploratory approach. Early fragments only revealed their meaning in front of an audience, whose responses encouraged her to continue developing the material. With over 15 years of musical experience, Deák combines technical precision with a willingness to embrace vulnerability and chance.

Breathing lies at the heart of Brisk. More than a functional necessity, it becomes an expressive and structural force. Through close listening, breath feels tactile and intimate, placing the performer almost within reach. Techniques such as circular breathing, overblowing, harmonics, singing while playing, and wind tones allow the flute to unfold into multiple voices, while percussive key clicks provide a steady rhythmic pulse.

Deák foregrounds sounds often excluded from classical music—breathy tones, unstable pitches, squeaks, and audible inhalations—treating them as essential expressive tools. This focus reflects her long-term exploration of the flute’s physical and expressive limits and connects directly to her ongoing solo practice, The Breathing Project, of which Brisk is a distilled release.

Active across classical, contemporary, jazz, and experimental scenes, Deák has collaborated with ensembles including Konstmusik-systrar and the VENI ensemble, and performed at festivals such as Norbergfestival and Ung Nordisk Musik.

Across its seven pieces, Brisk balances immediacy and rigor, inviting focused listening while remaining open and bodily. It documents a musician in motion, attentive to sound as sensation, gesture, and breath, and committed to honesty

Before the 21:30min long odysseys, Grammy nominations, and the sold-out shows across the globe, there was this. Four tracks, recorded in Jönköping, released in November 2015 and immediately celebrated by fans and critics alike.The self-titled debut EP is where it all begins, we meet Sir Hällas - the knight living in a parallel medieval universe where tyrants reign, seers dictate the future, and the world lies on the edge of the apocalypse. Classic heavy rock with psychedelic influences collide with swirling keyboards and twin guitar harmonies, all wrapped around lyrics of tyrants, knights, demons and the end of the world.

This is where the Hällas trilogy takes its first steps. This is where adventure rock was born. Start here.

WRWTFWW Records releases THE GENTLE PEOPLE - The Peel Sessions, available on vinyl for the first time ever, in conjunction with the worldwide expanded reissue of the group's Soundtracks for Living. Lounge/Chill Out music reborn !

This is an exclusive 4-song EP recorded in 1997 on BBC's Peel Sessions, as The Gentle People were doing the rounds for the release of their legendary debut album. These live versions have never seen the light of day before - a must have for all the gentle fans !
When The Gentle People first glided into the mid-90s on clouds of strings, sugar and sine waves, they sounded like visitors from another, more glamorous planet. Signed to Richard D. James and Grant Wilson-Claridge's cult label Rephlex, this multinational "E-Z-Core" lounge unit took the aesthetics of 50s/60s easy listening and exotica and gently smuggled them into 1990s club culture.

Imagine KLF's Chill Out or Space growing up on French 60/70s pop, bossa nova, soundtracks, vocal harmony groups, library music and easy listening then slipping out for a late-night date with dub, ambient techno and bubble-bath pop. That's The Gentle People : music that can score cocktail hour, 4am taxi rides, and daydreams in headphones with the same effortless grace.

The Gentle People weren't just a curiosity on a weird label; they became unlikely icons of a whole loungecore moment, gracing TV, compilations and magazine spreads, and proving that tenderness could be as futuristic as any drum machine.

Bright morning. To noon and into afternoon. To dusk and the inky night.

A major new exhibition of Mammo’s music spread across a triple disc, twelve track album. Call it a compendium or summary, a network of sparking neurons and painted landscapes in techno.

It folds in all the aspects of his other identities (self-)released over the last few years into an ultimate package ~ Heaven Smile, A∞x, CoA-A, E35, Puddlerunner; really any other project Fabiano has assumed an identity under. It all finds its way into the code and format of Lateral in some way or another.

Here the ground is given for the listener to hear just how much range and individual language there is in the music he’s been making. Fully immersive, inventive and detailed while also elegant and light of touch. It’s quite a package from one of the most talented techno producers right now, gesturing towards different genres and novel ideas in beautiful and intuitive fashion.

Break the pack down for your preferred disc of the day if you like. It’s designed with that modularity in mind. Disc one sparkles with vitality and a buoyancy. The middle disc has more drive and harder bites that you may want to amplify and split out to slot in a DJ bag. Sides five and six move into deeper, dreamier and more emotional techno in twilight. Each one is a little distinct and has its own orbit.

But give it your full attention on the turntable platter too. A listen from beginning to end. There’s lovely dynamics and interplays in the narrative, and its a remarkable new body of work to let your time dilate to.

Mastered and cut by Rashad Becker.

Art by Mammo.Works.

Promised Land is the long-awaited debut album from contemporary showstopper Vintage Culture. Enlisting the help of peers NomBe, Maverick Sabre, The Temper Trap, and Elderbrook, the album marks the producer and DJ's seguing from progressive house to electro, evincing a globetrotting, jetsetting sound that hardly ever fails to hold back on emotion. Including prior single 'Come Come' alongside newer, angelic progressive cuts like 'Weak' with Sabre, this is a stark debut from the Brazilian creative force.

After 90 releases on Future Retro London, I feel like I need to take a bit of a break from the constant workload that's come from running the label on my own. I feel like 50 (the cat number for the main label releases) is a good number to pause on for now.

I've been doing some remixes of the back catalogue & thought that putting them all together on one release at some point would be an interesting concept, so here we are.

Thanks so much to all the supporters, artists, designers & everyone else that's been involved in keeping Future Retro London going for so long, couldn't have done this without each & every one of you.

'Matsuli Music is proud to announce the first vinyl reissue of Philip Tabane’s Sangoma ("Spiritual Healer") since its 1978 release. Remastered from the original tapes with lacquers cut by Frank Merrit and pressed on 180g heavyweight vinyl at Pallas in Germany, this definitive edition re-asserts the power of one of South Africa’s landmark recordings. Featuring new liner notes by cultural critic Kwanele Sosibo and artwork restoration by Siemon Allen, Sangoma returns in full force through an extended Malombo line-up, fronted by Tabane's spellbinding guitar - ancestral, timeless, and unbound.
'Philip Tabane (1934–2018), the mercurial guitar genius of South African music, forged a sound that was as rooted in the spirit world as it was in daily life. With the Malombo Jazzmen of the 1960s, Tabane disrupted Western notions of “jazz,” bringing the resonant rhythm of cowhide malombo drums into the foreground. While outsiders and the uninitiated often reached for labels like “primitive yet sophisticated,” Tabane and his collaborators named it more truthfully: “music of the spirit.”
'By the time of Sangoma, Tabane stood at a crossroads. Fresh from a period of three years’ touring in the United States where he graced the Newport Jazz Festival, and played alongside Miles Davis, Herbie Hancock, Pharoah Sanders and others, he brushed off comparisons with characteristic self-assurance: “No, I don’t play like Miles. Miles plays like me.” Back home in South Africa, and with a newly signed international distribution deal with WEA Records, he harnessed this momentum into a larger band setting, capturing a rare intensity.
'The result was Sangoma—an album that bridges contradictions: expansive yet intimate, celebratory yet haunted by exile and return. Tracks such as “Sangoma,” “Hi Congo,” and “Keya Bereka” are not simply performances but living testaments, songs that would remain in his repertoire for decades. Unlike the moody, immersive character of much of his work, here Tabane is on the move—urgent, restless, uncontainable. As he announces on the second track, “Maskanta wa tsamaya” (“something that kicks ass”).
More than four decades on, Sangoma is both an historical document and a timeless invocation. From his home in Mamelodi to the world and back again, Tabane’s spiritual healing endures—raw, electric, and unbowed.'

Neues, viertes, Solo-Album vom dänischen Psych-Rock-Zauberer Uffe Lorenzen aka Lorenzo Woodrose aka... Seit zehn Jahren interpretiert Uffe Lorenzen (bekannt von u.a Baby Woodrose und Spids Nogenhat) auf allen seinen Alben ein altes dänisches Lied. Das gilt für seine drei Soloalben und die beiden Alben seiner aktuellen Rockband Lydsyn. Auf seinem neuen Soloalbum Glemte Spor ("Vergessene Spuren") hat er ein komplettes Album mit 10 Interpretationen von Liedern aus den Jahren 1967 bis 1999 aufgenommen. Einige davon sind dänische Klassiker, andere sind eher unbekannte Lieder, die er sich zu eigen gemacht hat. Viele davon können als Protestsongs betrachtet werden oder haben einen anti-war Charakter. ,Ich habe festgestellt, dass ich die Herausforderung, Songs anderer Leute zu interpretieren und sie zu meinen eigenen zu machen, wirklich mag. Sie zu verändern, zu interpretieren und vielleicht sogar zu verbessern. Viele der Songs werden den meisten Menschen unbekannt sein, während andere dänische Klassiker sind. Was sie gemeinsam haben, ist, dass sie mich irgendwie zu dem gemacht haben, der ich bin", sagt Uffe Lorenzen. Das Album wurde zusammen mit Morten Hart Grabowski in einem kleinen Studio in Kopenhagen aufgenommen. In mehr als 20 Sessions haben sie zusammen eine Liste von 50 Songs auf die zehn reduziert, die schließlich auf dem Album gelandet sind. Laut Lorenzen fanden die Aufnahmen in einer sehr entspannten Atmosphäre statt: ,Wir haben etwas Gras geraucht und Rotwein getrunken, was den Prozess sehr entspannt gemacht hat, und ich glaube, das hört man dem Endergebnis auch an." Später übernahm Flemming Rasmussen den Mix und das Mastering in seinem berühmten Sweet Silence Studio. Glemte Spor erscheint am 24. April bei Bad Afro Records und die erste Auflage ist auf 1000 Exemplare auf schwarzem Vinyl limitiert.

Kēpa is built whole, even if life has broken a few bones along the way.

Back when he was a pro skater, he gave everything to the board. Today, he gives that same intensity to the stage, delivering hypnotic cine-concerts where motion, sound, and image blur into one. The only falls left now are the ringing final chords of his guitar — not just an instrument, but an extension of his body.

Fingerpicking is his native tongue. So much so that Kēpa no longer sings — he lets the strings speak. Percussive, alive, essential. This music isn’t about performance, it’s about living: a personal quest, a way to reach others by first going inward. Moving against the current without fighting the wind. Finding breath, essence, and remembering we’re all drifting on a spinning planet, surrounded by forces bigger than us.

It’s easier to look away. Easier to follow noise, fear, or false prophets. Harder — and braver — to truly connect.

Released in late 2025, Hotline Service opened the door, offering a wide-open, spiritual escape. With SOUL WASH SERVICES— produced by Timber Timbre — Kēpa goes further. Warmer, deeper, more focused. The album feels like sunlight on asphalt, a long drive with the windows down, time slowing just enough to let something real surface.

A kindred spirit to Hermanos Gutiérrez, Kēpa plays the role of a modern, pagan preacher — guiding us through a dusty, golden road movie that unfolds entirely inside the listener. His music doesn’t shout; it cleans.

Kēpa does it all: writes, plays, films, edits, mixes. Music becomes image, image becomes music. Nothing is separate, on record or on stage. There’s no excess, no showboating — just an open invitation to slow down, go deeper, aim higher.

Tracks like Solarium and Paradisiac reach the peaks with minimal gear: five strings, a few picks, and total control of touch and space. Listening to Kēpa feels like checking in with yourself — a quiet inner trip shaped by sounds from every corner of the world. Blues, not to feel them, but to leave them behind.

After years devoted to picking, his playing has become something sacred.

And if you let it, it carries you with it.

e A5 Harbour (At Hotel2tango) [feat. Elizabeth Glenn-Copeland]





[e] A5 | Harbour (At Hotel2tango) [feat Elizabeth Glenn-Copeland]

A delve into the murky avenues of sonic territories, exploring off-grid zones & askew worlds – Daisy Moon leans harder into her 4/4 vision in this dancefloor-ready EP – the first release for Off-Kilter.

Each track pulses along to its own singular logic, with Daisy’s distinctive voice and vocal manipulations playfully drizzled throughout, marking an elegant collision of her sonic worlds.

Spirit Princess is a breakneck peak-time explosion – club-ready and bouncy with a pulsing bassline fit to burst from the subs of any system underpinning waves of textured ambience, nagging synths and granular gusts of found sound.

Fuelled with late night techno energy, Grain Pip offers a heads down counterpoint to the title track, while the B side serves up different energies again. Perhaps the most playful track on the record – The Stuff – demonstrates Daisy’s cheekier side as a producer and person, as inspired by a summer of fun with friends on festival dancefloors: a house banger stuffed with melodic stabs, pitched vocals and swung hats, made for the joys and follies of the 3am dancefloor. Drop Cycle rounds things off with a trippy, rolling excursion of delays and warped synths.

Dizzying sonics and relentless dancefloor energy with razor-sharp precision and uncompromising force.

The year that NOW’s story began, and where we started our ‘Yearbook’ series back in 2021. An incredible year in Pop music, and a fabulous selection of the years’ hits have featured on that first ‘Yearbook’, and on the ‘80-84 Final’ as part of our appreciation of 1983. Those tracks were generally the bigger hits of the year, with their Chart achievement a factor in their inclusion. However, that’s not the whole story, and our celebration of 1983 wouldn’t be complete without shining a light on some of the year’s singles that have been compiled much less frequently over the past 40 years. Welcome to the THE VAULT for 1983…Some of the tracks were Top 40 hits, some missed the Chart completely, and some were huge in the U.S. and not in the U.K. – but all are part of the wonderful Pop story of 1983. Released as 80 tracks across 4-CDs, available as a standard 4CD and as a a special edition 4CD in ‘hardback book’ packaging featuring a 28-page track by track guide, original singles artwork and a quiz and 45 tracks across 3-LPs, pressed on stunning translucent red vinyl -

Naya Beat is excited to announce 'PAWA!', a soaring disco-funk anthem celebrating feminism and the power (pawa) of togetherness. It is a mouthwatering collaboration between legendary jazz vocalist and disco pioneer Asha Puthli and NYC’s punk-chic, discodelic stars Say She She.

A fortuitous and fleeting window between touring schedules allowed Puthli and Say She She’s Nya Gazelle Brown, Sabrina Cunningham, and Piya Malik to write and record Pawa! with members of the cult funk band Orgone in the English countryside at Mike Oldfield’s (Tubular Bells) studio. Pawa! is a tribute to female fortitude and an anthemic call to action for unity and collective action. PAWA TO THE PEOPLE! Asha’s spoken word bursts into a soaring falsetto while Say She She’s celestial three-part harmonies make for a sublime call and response between the fabled mentor and her gifted disciples. Throw in a stellar bassline and one of tightest rhythm sections around, and you have an instant classic. And if that wasn’t enough, four remixes bring Pawa to the dancefloor! The UK’s legendary Crazy P deliver not one, but three future classics – an epic house take with a stomping bassline, a stripped-down vocal dub, and a sunshine-ready disco dub. Not to be outdone, Greece’s favourite dance duo Boys’ Shorts add magical disco touches and reimagine the original as an eight-minute balearic opus.

Featuring beautiful artwork and a premium poly-lined inner sleeve, the 12" has been cut to vinyl for the discerning DJ and listener by Grammy-nominated Frank Merritt from The Carvery, London.

Swirl-Vinyl. Diese 10-Jahre-Jubiläumsausgabe erscheint in einer neuen Gatefold-Hülle mit aktualisierten Fotos, Texten und Liner Notes. Disc eins enthält das Originalalbum in voller Länge, und die brandneue zweite Disc bietet die seltene B-Seite ,Nail In Your Hand", eine überarbeitete Version von ,Heaviside" mit der Künstlerin Wisp am Gesang sowie sieben bisher unveröffentlichte Demo-Versionen von Songs aus dem zweiten Album von Citizen. Vor zehn Jahren veröffentlichten Citizen ,Everybody Is Going to Heaven" - ein Album, das einen mutigen Wendepunkt in ihrer Karriere markierte. Nach dem Durchbruchserfolg von ,Youth" hätte die Band einfach ihren bisherigen Kurs beibehalten können. Stattdessen setzten sie noch stärker auf dunklere Texturen, schwerere Stimmungen und einen furchtlosen Sinn für Experimente. Das 2015 veröffentlichte ,Everybody Is Going to Heaven" erweiterte den Sound von Citizen über ihre Emo- und Post-Hardcore-Wurzeln hinaus und verwebte Elemente aus Grunge und Alternative Rock. Tracks wie ,Cement" und ,Stain" fingen eine rohe, unruhige Energie ein, die sich mit Sterblichkeit, Depression und Identität mit einer Ehrlichkeit auseinandersetzte, die bis heute nachhallt. Es war kein Album, das zum einfachen Hören gemacht war - es war auf Dauer angelegt. Jetzt, ein Jahrzehnt später, steht ,Everybody Is Going to Heaven" als entscheidender Moment in der Entwicklung von Citizen - ein Album, das sowohl die Band als auch ihr Publikum herausforderte und dazu beitrug, die furchtlosen, Genre-übergreifenden Künstler zu formen, zu denen sie geworden sind. Auch beim 10-jährigen Jubiläum bleibt Citizen eine Band, die sich ganz dem Wachstum verschrieben hat und sich weigert, sich auf einen einzigen Sound oder eine bestimmte Ära festlegen zu lassen. ,Everybody Is Going to Heaven" hat nicht nur markiert, wo sie standen; es hat den Weg für alles geebnet, was danach kam.

Compare the best of British jazz circa 1963 with American sounds from labels such as Prestige, Tangerine and World Pacific. This album captures the period when rhythm and blues is emerging as the dominant club sound, forcing Soho jazz clubs to change their music policy in order to survive. On the British side, you’ve got Ronnie Scott’s arrangement of Last Minute Bossa Nova; Bang!, taken from Dick Morrissey Quartet’s first session for the BBC’s World Service, recorded around the time of the release of their first album Have You Heard? The version here is take two. You can hear take one along with the rest of the eleven-track session on R&B18 Jazz For Moderns.
Early In The Morning is a Ginger Baker/Jack Bruce arrangement of the traditional work song realized as a repeated blues riff, and is the first ever recording that is recognizably British Blues. Graham Bond features on alto sax along with Bruce and Baker together as members of the Johnny Burch Octet heard playing live at a BBC staff party from March 1963. Side Two features Jazz Stateside, such as West Coast guitarist Johnny Hartsman, Gene Ammons veering into proto jazz-funk on Jungle Soul, aka Ca' Purange plus a couple of top notch Hammond workouts from Terrell Prude and Charles Kynard.

Soul meets Funk 1967-style. Club Sounds, Funk Guitar Groovers, Soul Cha-Cha, Hammond Magic, Freak-Out Party Sounds, Slinky Organ Smoochers. Cornbread And Buttermilk, Chittlin' Salad, Sweet Potato Gravy, and a Bucket Of Grease. Just Instrumentals Soul and Funk-Style. Mmm Mmm Mmm.

These two very different sessions involving John Surman and Mike Osborne have much in common. They both share a wonderful sense of liberation, of the joy of making music together and of finding collectively new ways of making jazz happen. And even more importantly, they speak volumes about the eclecticism and openness of British jazz in those years of the mid- to late-sixties and about the creative ambitions of John Surman. In the current absence in the market of his first LP, this is an essential purchase for Surman fans. Notes by Duncan Heining with suggestions from John Surman. These sessions have never previously appeared officially in any form.
Side One 26.2.67 - Mike Osborne (as), John Surman (ss, bs), Harry Miller (b), Alan Jackson (d) - Side Two 17.7.68 - Sterling Betancourt for Alan Jackson and add Russ Henderson (p)

Petter Eldh's explosive ensemble Koma Saxo continues their adventures with a new album "Koma West", out on We Jazz Records, 18 March 2022. The album sees Koma Saxo expand on their previous sound with the addition of vocalist Sofia Jernberg and a strong cast of featured artists, including cellist Lucy Railton, violinist Maria Reich, pianist Kit Downes and accordionist Kiki Eldh (Petter's mom!). The hard-hitting key quintet remains, including Eldh on bass and assorted instruments, Christian Lillinger on drums, plus saxophonists Otis Sandsjö (of Y-OTIS), Jonas Kullhammar and Mikko Innanen bringing the SAXO to the KOMA operation.

At 14 tracks, "Koma West" is a full menu of monumental compositional ideas that could spawn entire albums. True to his chop & go production style, Eldh relies on continuous movement while presenting another all killer no filler program taking Koma Saxo on a sonic outing not quite like anything that had previously appeared under the band's name. That being said, there's very much the Petter Eldh touch here, one which might be hard to pinpoint and verbalise, but nevertheless a recognisable style of composing, producing and arranging.

Thematically, the album is rooted in the West Coast of Sweden, where Eldh grew up – he's from a tiny town called Lysekil. There's a thread of Swedish folk song tradition that has been part of the Koma Saxo DNA from the get-go and you can hear that here as well, especially on cuts such as "Närhet", beautifully sung by Sofia Jernberg.

Petter Eldh says:

"In a way, it's a concept album and a celebration of the Swedish West Coast. The first single is called 'Koma Kaprifol', and kaprifol is the landscape flower of Bohuslän on the West coast, where I grew up. I'm not too wild about attaching strong narratives to my music but there's no way around it this time. The oysters, a common snack around the coast, are a strong conceptual presence here. Anyway, they seem to pop up here and there quite often already thus far in the Koma Saxo narrative, even though it's not always so obvious. Koma Vocals! Koma Strings! I love the presence of Sofia Jernberg here and I love writing string arrangements, too, although I never thought I would do it for Koma, but of course, Koma should have some strings, why not?. Koma Saxo should and can become anything."

To commemorate the 40th Anniversary of the passing of James Darroch, singer/songwriter/guitarist for Sydney's incredible The Eastern Dark, Grown Up Wrong! is thrilled to announce a long-awaited reissue of the band's classic single "Julie Is A Junkie/Johnny and Dee Dee".

Heavily influenced by the Ramones - the band opened their first live show with 'Blitzkrieg Bop' and from then on opened with a new Ramones song every time they played, working through the band's complete catalogue in chronological order - as all manner of hyper-melodic and high energy rock. The Eastern Dark were a classic trio powered by former Celibate Rifles bassplayer James Darroch's blazing guitar and anchored by former Lime Spiders backing vocalist Bill Gibson's hard driving and melodic bass playing (and supreme backing vocals) and Geoff Milne's untouchable beat keeping. They set Sydney's Radio Birdman influenced scene alight in 1984 and quickly built an international following on the back of their classic single. Sadly, just hours after completing what would become their next release - the mini-LP "Long Live the New Flesh" - the band's life, and that of 26-year old James Darroch, was brutally ended in a road accident whilst the band was on its way to Melbourne.

On the back of the tragedy, the band's music lived on and it's global impact was reflected in the influence it bore on numerous bands, from Boston's the Lemoneads to Tokyo's Teengenenete, and obviously a succession of Australian bands from the Hard-Ons through to God and the Meanies and beyond.

After years of searching, surviving members Bill Gibson and Geoff Milne recently found the single's original multi-track tapes, and for the new release, the original recordings have been both remixed and remastered for maximum impact under their supervision.

The new HARDLINE album ‘Shout’ sees the band helmed by American vocalist Johnny Gioeli (Axel Rudi Pell, Crush 40) and his Italian team mates, keyboardist Alessandro Del Vecchio, guitarist Luca Princiotta, bassist Anna Portalupi and drummer Marco Di Salvia, take up where their 1992 Melodic Rock masterpiece "Total Eclipse" left off.

Mit seinem gefühlvollen, swingenden Hard-Bop-Stil verkörperte der Trompeter Blue Mitchell in der zweiten
Hälfte der 1960er Jahre das Blue-Note-Ethos wie nur wenige andere Musiker. “The Thing To Do” war
1965 das erste Album, das Mitchell bei dem Label veröffentlichte (sein eigentliches Debütalbum “Step
Lightly”, das 1963 aufgenommen wurde, erschien trotz Spitzenbesetzung erst 1980). “The Thing To Do”
ist historisch allein schon deshalb bedeutend, weil auf dem Album zwei junge Musiker zu hören sind, die ein
paar Jahre später mit der Jazz-Rock-Band von Miles Davis Weltruhm erlangten: der Pianist Chick Corea
und der Schlagzeuger Al Foster. Das Repertoire des Albums, das bei AllMusic die Höchstwertung von fünf
Sternen erzielte, reicht von Hard Bop über Balladen bis hin zu einem von Calypso beeinflussten Stück.

Allison and Katie Crutchfield have formed a new band called Snocaps. Their 13-track debut album, released digitally as a surprise, will be made available on April 17, 2026 in vinyl & CD formats. An indie-rock record that recalls Allison"s band Swearin" and Katie"s early records as Waxahatchee, Snocaps was born out of the twin sisters" desire to work on music together as they had in their teens and twenties. Allison and Katie are backed by friends and close collaborators Brad Cook and MJ Lenderman. The album was produced and almost entirely engineered by Cook, and all four musicians play multiple instruments across the record. After a handful of shows at the end of 2025, Snocaps will be put on ice for the foreseeable future, although, as Katie says, "Allison and I have been, in some way, shape or form, doing this together for over 20 years," so it is practically a given that they will work together on music at some point again in the future.

Allison and Katie Crutchfield have formed a new band called Snocaps. Their 13-track debut album, released digitally as a surprise, will be made available on April 17, 2026 in vinyl & CD formats. An indie-rock record that recalls Allison"s band Swearin" and Katie"s early records as Waxahatchee, Snocaps was born out of the twin sisters" desire to work on music together as they had in their teens and twenties. Allison and Katie are backed by friends and close collaborators Brad Cook and MJ Lenderman. The album was produced and almost entirely engineered by Cook, and all four musicians play multiple instruments across the record. After a handful of shows at the end of 2025, Snocaps will be put on ice for the foreseeable future, although, as Katie says, "Allison and I have been, in some way, shape or form, doing this together for over 20 years," so it is practically a given that they will work together on music at some point again in the future.

Niagara return to Discrepant with Buxtehude, a new work bending the legacy of Dietrich Buxtehude into their own fractured, electro-organic language.

Rather than a tribute, Buxtehude feels like an abstract dialogue with the Baroque composer’s sense of structure and flow—reimagined through Niagara’s raw synth work, off-grid rhythms and subtly warped melodic cycles. The trio let the music grow from the inside out: patterns expand and contract, harmonies tilt slightly off their axis, and small details accumulate until each piece reveals its own internal gravity.

There’s a clarity to Buxtehude that feels carved rather than composed. Tracks move with a quiet insistence, like mechanical organisms finding coherence through repetition and drift. Melodic fragments surface briefly, disappear, then return transformed, lending the album a strange balance between austerity and warmth.

With Buxtehude, Niagara continue to refine their unmistakable approach—playful yet rigorous, minimal yet full of life— remaining entirely their own.

Faitiche welcomes a new artist: Christina Kubisch belongs to the first generation of sound artists. Her practice ranges from performances, concerts, to works with video and visual art, but she is best known for her sound installations and electro-acoustic compositions.

TUNING brings together three pieces by Christina Kubisch from different periods of her oeuvre. What they have in common is the way they transform sound phenomena originally considered “non-music” into compositions.

Jan Jelinek: Gaming in Silence (2024) is the most recent work on this compilation. It’s a collage of electromagnetic waves, voice, and abstract sound textures. How did this combination come about?

Christina Kubisch: Gaming was commissioned as a fixed-media composition for the Sound Dome at ZKM Karlsruhe. Since Resonances: The Electromagnetic Bodies Project (2005), I’ve been making recordings in the old and new server rooms at the ZKM and in their permanent collection of historical computer games. Computer games like Asteroids (Atari, 1979) and Poly-Play (VEB Polytechnik, 1986) have specially generated analogue electromagnetic waves that interest me in particular on account of their density, rhythms and textures. I originally studied painting and to me the work of composition often feels like painting an abstract picture. I alter my source material as little as possible, layering and overlapping until a distinctive sound space emerges. In recent pieces, I sometimes combine magnetic waves with field recordings or live instruments. In Gaming it’s my recording of a Chinese song about silence.

JJ: Two persons walking through a street in Madrid (2004) is a recording from your Electrical Walks series. Here we should give a brief explanation of one of your best known works: participants in an Electrical Walk move through public spaces wearing prepared headphones that allow them to receive electromagnetic waves from their surroundings – for example from security gates, ATMs or neon signs. They discover a situation that normally is inaudible to the human ear and they can actively shape it by choreographing their movements. I really admire this piece, not least because there’s no clear dividing line between participants and artist. What exactly do we hear in Two persons walking through a street in Madrid (2004)?

CK: With this early work, I wanted to understand what is heard by people participating in an Electrical Walk in the same place but moving in different ways. The Spanish composer Miguel Alvarez-Fernàndez and I set off from opposite ends of a major shopping street in Madrid, met briefly in the middle, and then continued to the end. We both recorded our walks and I then layered them over one another. You might call it a work of electromagnetic conceptualism.

JJ: Diapason (2009 version) is an installation that plays a composition based on sounds from fifteen tuning forks. This setting is audible in the recording: there’s no dramatic arc, no beginning or end – instead, it recalls a piece of aleatoric music focussing on the decay phase. How did you come to make this work and could you tell us something about your compositional method?

CK: Diapason is part of a series of three pieces that deal with “non-instruments” or instruments that no longer exist: electrical mine bells used to send signals to the workers underground; a historical glass harmonica originally used for medicinal purposes; and tuning forks that were used by doctors to test people’s hearing. All of these methods are no longer in use. The sound of the tuning forks, audible only if held close to the ear, was recorded at the electronic studio at Berlin’s Technical University in such a way that even their decay remained audible. The frequencies range between 64 and 2048 Hertz and they can be adjusted at micro-intervals using small movable weights. The sequence and the duration of the pauses are dictated by chance and were not defined in advance. The 2009 version was created for an installation in the historic Holy Cross Church (Korskirken) in Bergen. Visitors could enter and leave the space at any time, deciding for themselves where and for how long they wished to listen to the sounds played back over an array of small loudspeakers placed on the floor of the apse.

Credits:

Gaming in Silence: commission of the ZKM/Hertzlab, Karlsruhe 2023
elektronic sound processing: Tom Thiel
sound engineering and mixing: Eckehard Güther

Diapason: produced at Elektronisches Studio of TU Berlin
rearrangement: Eckehard Güther

Christina Kubisch, published by Edition Christina Kubisch / Random Musick Publishing

image front: Transitionen 2021 by C. Kubisch, sonagrams of electronic waves (courtesy: Galerie Mazzoli Berlin)
image back: Diapason Tuning Fork, property of Folkmar Hein, Photo: Archiv Christina Kubisch

design by Tim Tetzner
mastered by Giuseppe Ielasi
Thanks to Miguel Álvarez-Fernández, Folkmar Hein, Dominik Kautz and Mario Mazzoli

Im April 2026 bringt Eaves Wilder ihr heiß erwartetes Debütalbum ,Little Miss Sunshine" raus. Die Platte ist ein krasser Entwicklungssprung für die Singer-Songwriterin aus Nord-London, die 2020 mit 16 Jahren mit ihrem selbst aufgenommenen Lockdown-Release ,Won't You Be Happy" zum ersten Mal auf sich aufmerksam gemacht hat. Eaves begann mit der Arbeit an ,Little Miss Sunshine" nach einer Phase des Nachdenkens, in der sie sich fragte, ob sie der Musik in ihrem Kopf letztlich gerecht werden könnte. Wer sich mit dem Album beschäftigt, entdeckt zehn Songs, die sich an den Zyklen der Natur orientieren, um die emotionalen Stimmungen zu erklären und zu feiern, die uns zu Menschen machen. ,Als ich am Boden war", erinnert sich Eaves, die an einer Stelle sogar lacht, als sie sich daran erinnert, wie sie beschloss, die Musik ganz aufzugeben, um in ein Kloster einzutreten: ,Ich wollte einfach nur unmenschlich, gefühllos und unbewegt sein. Wie ein Berg oder ein Baum. Oder der Himmel. Das sind alles Dinge, die einen Zweck haben, aber ich wusste nicht, was mein Zweck war. Und so musste ich es herausfinden, Song für Song." Auf Little Miss Sunshine wird diese Geschichte in spannenden Episoden erzählt, angefangen mit den ersten Sekunden des Albums und der Lead-Single Hurricane Girl, einer sensationellen Synergie aus durchscheinenden Shoegaze-Harmonien und elementaren Rockgitarren, inspiriert durch Dokumentarfilme über Sturmjäger, wobei die Metapher verwendet wird, um ein Licht auf Freunde zu werfen, die gezwungen waren, stürmische Beziehungen zu suchen. ,Ich habe das Gefühl, dass dies mein Pearl-Jam-Song ist", erklärt sie. ,Das erste Mal, als ich Pearl Jam hörte, war ich auf einem riesigen Berg in Wales. In derselben Woche hörte ich auch zum ersten Mal Jagged Little Pill von Alanis Morissette." Von hier aus, bis hin zu seinem schmerzlich bewegenden Requiem an die Kindheit Summer Rolls fungiert jeder Song auf Little Miss Sunshine als leuchtender Koordinatenpunkt in einem Bogen der Selbstfindung. Da ist der hochfliegende Klangrausch Everybody Talks, mit seinem ansteigenden Crescendo aus aufdringlichen Stimmen, der auf beiden Seiten des Atlantiks große Unterstützung im Radio fand. Für Mountain Sized bezog sie sich auf Lily Allens Single The Fear aus dem Jahr 2009 - ,weil da diese eine Frau ist, die ganz beiläufig all die schlimmsten Dinge über sich selbst aufzählt, Dinge, die man sich eigentlich nicht trauen würde zuzugeben". In Eaves' Song wird diese aufkommende Angst jedoch durch einen panoramischen Refrain ausgelöscht, in dem sie die Grenzen ihrer realen Welt durchbricht, um zu verkünden: ,But in my mind/But in my mind/I am taller than the highest mountain sides." In dem schmerzlich melodiösen ,The Great Plains" hinterfragt Eaves ihre frühesten Erinnerungen, in denen sie ihre ältere Schwester Dora vergötterte. ,Sie war so zurückhaltend und wie eine Meerjungfrau", erinnert sich Eaves, ,und ich wurde von meinen Emotionen beherrscht - und je mehr ich versuchte, das nicht zu sein, desto mehr wurde mir klar, dass ich niemals wie sie sein könnte." In dem Song findet Eaves eine Art Selbstakzeptanz, indem sie auf die Natur schaut, um zu erfahren, dass es okay ist, so zu sein, wie sie ist: "As I erupt into a blaze / It's ok the sky will do the same/Let no-one bat an eye when / Every year I'll hibernate till May / Because no-one blames the clouds for rain / So take me as I am, tears down my face." Als die Sessions an Fahrt gewannen, fand Eaves Inspiration in zeitgenössischen Veröffentlichungen. Beispiele dafür waren Wolf Alice (,die einzige Band, die die Balance gefunden hat, die ich immer suche - die Kombination aus schweren Gitarren und hohen, ätherischen Vocals"), Mannequin Pussy (,sie gaben mir etwas von dem, was ich in der Ära von Riot Grrrl vermisst habe, als L7 und Babes In Toyland auf Tour waren") und CMATs ,geradlinig brillantes Songwriting". Weitere Highlights auf einem Album, das von ihnen geprägt ist, sind Daisy Chain Reaction, dessen glitzernder Power-Pop-Glanz einen Text über die Kultur des Wettbewerbs rund um Essstörungen verbirgt, und der unangenehme, mechanisierte Angriff von Just Say No, ein Song, der auf den brutalen Wahrheiten basiert, die Eaves und ihre Freundinnen in ihren Auseinandersetzungen mit missbräuchlichen Männern gesammelt haben. Zwei Jahre lang hat Eaves unermüdlich daran gearbeitet, jeden einzelnen Vers, Refrain, Pre-Chorus und Middle Eight auf Little Miss Sunshine zu verfeinern, bevor sie mit dem Co-Produzenten des Albums, Andy Savours (My Bloody Valentine, The Killers, The Horrors), ins Studio ging. Dies ist ein Album, auf dem jedes einzelne Detail seinen Platz verdient hat und das Zeugnis ablegt von der einzigartigen musikalischen Vision seiner Schöpferin.

Repress of the 1 st album of the fresh Afro funk sensation ! Recorded on analog equipment in Lyon in 2014 !



Peter Solo is a singer and composer born in Aného-Glidji, Togo, the birthplace of the Guin tribe and a major site of the Voodoo culture. He was raised with this tradition’s values of respect for all forms of life and the environment. With his new band, Vaudou Game, Peter Solo claims, and spreads this spiritual and musical heritage. Chants are at the heart of the Voodoo practice, but for times immemorial, harmonic instruments have never accompanied them. No balafon, no kora - only the “skins” support the singers. However, in 2012, Peter, along with his band based in Lyon, France, decided to explore and codify the musical scales that are found in sacred or profane songs of Beninese and Togolese Voodoo so they can be played easily on modern instruments. Peter composed the album Apiafo, using the two main musical scales of this tradition. The first musical scale on Apiafo leans towards raw Funk with a sound similar to the famous 70’s bands, L’Orchestre Poly Rythmo De Cotonou and El Rego. Funk, is the skeletal structure of this record, and provided the opportunity for Peter to invite his uncle, Roger Damawuzan - the famous pioneer of the 70s Soul scene - on two tracks. Their collaboration on “Pas Contente” is a highlight on this 100% analog album. Apiafo was entirely recorded, mixed and mastered with old tapes and vintage instruments. The second scale, which had never before been transposed for instruments, evokes deeper feelings and a sacred ambiance. The moving song Ata, an invocation to a supreme divinity is another highlight of this record. Even if some can recognize similarities between this scale and Ethiopian scales, they are in fact different. Peter, the only African band member, introduced the other musicians to the universal values of Voodoo and he taught them his native language. On the recording of Apiafo and during their live performances, the musicians all sing and answer Peter in the Mina language. The strive for authenticity, the analog sound and vintage looks don’t mean that Vaudou Game is looking backwards. This is Togolese funk, born in the post-colonial era but that never before explored its ancient roots so deeply and proudly.



Antoine RAJON

SIMPLETON, the third album from multi-platinum indie-rock singer/songwriter YOT CLUB, dismantles the utopian view of the American suburbs, treating finely manicured life as a mirage. Across its 13 tracks, the LP wrestles with how curated feeds and predictable routines can blur, and even erase, empathy and responsibility, creating a world where difficult questions and harsh realities are easy to ignore. In 2019, Ryan Kaiser started Y ot Club in his college dorm, crafting a lo-fi, classically cool indie rock sound grounded under a dreamlike haze. Two years later, his breakthrough single “YKWIM?” quickly reached viral status on TikTok (today, it’s been streamed more than 1 billion times) and has since taken him around the world at festivals like T reefort, Kilby Block Party and Pitchfork Paris

“III” is an intimate, cinematic and dream-like body of work — written, produced and mixed by Morita Vargas, and recorded in Buenos Aires between 2014 and 2025. The album was mastered by Rafael Anton Irisarri at Black Knoll Studio (NY), adding depth and clarity to its carefully built sonic landscape.

The visual world of the record is an essential part of the release. The cover artwork was crafted by Juliana Guglielmi, Ariadna Aylen Barrios, and Noelia Garreffa, whose combined vision creates a unified visual narrative that reflects the album’s emotional depth and atmospheric essence. The LP layout and full manufacturing realization were carefully executed by Ilja Tulit, translating the complex design ideas into their final tangible form of a vinyl release.

“III” marks a special release for Hidden Harmony Recordings. Morita Vargas was among the first artists released when the label began in 2020–2021, and her work played an important role in shaping the spirit and direction of Hidden Harmony.

IRON CLAW 7" - BISHER UNVERÖFFENTLICHTE TITEL DER SCHOTTISCHEN PROTO-METAL-LEGENDEN VON 1970. In den Annalen der Heavy-Metal-Geschichte steht Iron Claw als unbesungener Titan - eine Band, deren schwere Riffs und donnernde Klanglandschaften die Grenzen der Rockmusik jener Zeit sprengten. Wir freuen uns riesig, der Öffentlichkeit ,Saga" und ,Bright Future" zu präsentieren - zwei verborgene Relikte aus dem Iron-Claw-Kanon, die endlich aus den Archiven befreit wurden und bereit sind, die Hörer in ihrem klanglichen Feuerwerk zu versinken. Diese beiden Songs verkörpern die Essenz von Iron Claw, fangen ihre rohe und entschlossene Härte ein und sind ein Beweis für ihren rechtmäßigen Platz unter den Pionieren der Heavy-Rock-Musik. Aufgenommen am 5. Dezember 1970 - Iron Claw stammten aus Dumfries, Schottland.

Eines der besten Metal-Alben des Jahres 2025 wird 2026 als exklusive Metal Hammer Picture Disc geehrt. Klasse Artwork, einmal "The Rat Queen" aka Band-Chefin Riley Pinkerton, einmal die gesamte Band plus Logos und Tracklist. Das Fantasy-Mittelalter-Metal-Phänomen CASTLE RAT präsentiert sein zweites Album! Castle Rat ist die NY Fantasy-Heavy-Metal-Band, die von der Rat Queen angeführt wird, welche die Mission verfolgt, ihr Refugium gegen diejenigen zu verteidigen, die es zerstören wollen. Ihr zur Seite stehen The Count, The Plague Doctor und The All-Seeing Druid. Gemeinsam stellen sie sich mit Heavy Magie dem unerbittlichen Zorn ihrer Erzfeindin - dem Tod in Form von The Rat Reaperess. The Bestiary ist ein riffgeladenes Kompendium mystischer Kreaturen und vorwarnender Erzählungen aus einer vergessenen Welt. Es erzählt 13 allegorische Geschichten von mythischen Bestien und dem Zauberer, der sie beschwört, und verwebt kraftvolle Heavy-Hymnen und dunkle Verzückungen zu einer betörenden und unvergesslichen Heavy-Metal-Odyssee. Als ob Grace Slick mit Black Sabbath ca. 1200 A.D. auf einem Kiss-Konzert Liebe macht. Aufgenommen von Randall Dunn (Sunn O))), Wolves in the Throne Room, Björk) und gemischt von Jonathan Nuñez (Torche, Restless Spirit), bietet das Album episches Heavy-Gemetzel und doomy Hard Rock. Hervorgegangen aus New Yorks abscheulichem, kreaturenverseuchtem Untergrund, schlugen die Fantasy-Heavy-Metaller zunächst mit ihren Live-Auftritten und später mit ihrem Debütalbum "Into The Realm" im Jahr 2024 große Wellen. Seit ihrer Gründung im Jahr 2019 haben CASTLE RAT ein lebendiges Labyrinth aus Erzählungen und Mythen geschaffen, welches sie nun rund um die Welt führt. Die MH Picture Disc kommt in durchsichtiger, halbfester PVC-Hülle mit Lasche (semi-rigid transparent PVC sleeve with flap), ansonsten auch noch auf CD (aufklappbares Digipak), MC (mit gefaltetem Inlay) und auf LP (farbiges Vinyl, inklusive ausklappbarem Lyrics-Insert)!