Cerca:hard

Soft Rock to Riches announces our first original songwriting winner: Jonathan Kirby from Winston-Salem, North Carolina! “This Is Your Song” is an evocative beat ballad dedicated to seemingly endless Southern summers, late night drives, and romantic realism. In the early morning hours of August 9th, 2018, Kirby layered the drum patterns, chords, and hushed harmonies through a Tascam four track while his dad slept in the next room. Written and recorded in just three hours, “This Is Your Song” fits comfortably alongside privately pressed electronic soul ballads from home recording’s heyday.

The Devin Dare Dusk Mix introduces Vivienne on Side B, adding a graceful harmony that champions Kirby’s pining refrain. The Dusk Mix flips Kirby’s ballad over a head nodding breakbeat with a hypnotic synthesizer line and light, airy brushes of strings and delay.

Jonathan Kirby is a musician and archivist known for his ambient jazz LPs Safe to Disconnect and Safe To Disconnect II, his writings for Wax Poetics, compilations for the Numero Group and his exhaustive archival research on the music of his native North Carolina.

The third volume in a survey of the modern jazz & hard-bop scenes that emerged in the new cultural melting pot of post war London, with recordings from the end of the 1940s through to the early 1960s.

Featuring representations from players whose roots lay in the East-End's jewish community alongside a wealth of talent of Caribbean and African descent playing and recording in post war London during this period.

Made in partnership with the Barbican to coincide with the exhibition Postwar Modern: New Art in Britain 1945-1965.credits

From the shores of Lake Erie to the heart of the dancefloor, DJ Romain opens a brand new chapter with The Cleveland EP, his latest release on legendary UK house imprint Hard Times.

Having relocated from his beloved New Jersey to Cleveland, Ohio, Romain dismantled and rebuilt his studio piece by piece, laying the foundations for a new wave of creativity. Following his acclaimed Lost D.A.T.S. series and The New Jersey EP, this marks the first body of music born entirely from his new northern base.

The EP kicks off with the haunting vocal and ghostly chords of 'Change Your Mind', before diving into the rattling hats, crisp snares, and plucked bassline of ‘Crysis’ - a pure Romain floor-tool. 'Cuz You Like' rolls deep with warm, shuffling UK vocal energy, while closer 'Deep Reaktor' lands with preaching tones and heavyweight bump, sealing the collection in signature style.

With The Cleveland EP, Romain bridges past and present - new city, same uncompromising house spirit.

""Ein verträumtes, verschwommenes Album, das sich langsam und träge über den Hörer legt und sein Zeit- und Raumgefühl verdrängt. Gesangsfetzen schweben geisterhaft aus dem Äther, nur um wieder in den Nebel einzutauchen und sich um einen langsamen, schwülen, dampfenden Rhythmus zu winden – ein verführerischer Mix, der McDonalds beeindruckendes und dezentes Gitarrenspiel umspielt. Es stammt aus der sumpfigen Unterwelt der Delta-Blues-Bibel, und Adrian Sherwoods rauchige, dubbed-out Effekte, Loops und Echokammern sind allgegenwärtig, mit Sounds, die aus der Zeit gefallen sind und doch genau dorthin zu gehören scheinen, wo sie sind."" - Thom Jurek, allmusic

Mit ihrem fünften Album kehrt das slowenische Trio Sirom zurück - und präsentiert ein klanglich wie thematisch weitreichendes Werk. In the Wind of Night... knüpft an das gefeierte The Liquified Throne of Simplicity (2022) an, geht aber neue Wege: melodischer, zugänglicher, ohne die hypnotische Tiefe und rhythmische Komplexität zu verlieren, die Sirom auszeichnen. Ana Kravanja, Iztok Koren und Samo Kutin verweben auf überlangen Tracks folkloristische Motive, dissonante Texturen und rituelle Klanglandschaften. Sie nutzen fast zwei Dutzend akustische Instrumente - viele davon selbst gebaut - und erschaffen so eine Musik, die sich jeder Kategorisierung entzieht. Die Stücke wirken wie Klangwanderungen durch imaginäre Landschaften, mal dicht und tranceartig, mal luftig und klar strukturiert. Das Album wurde live aufgenommen und spiegelt die kollektive Arbeitsweise der Band wider. Sirom bleiben dabei kompromisslos eigenständig - und sind heute eine der spannendsten Stimmen der europäischen Avant-Folk-Szene.

Dillinger one of the most consistently successful DJ’s to come out of the Jamaica, fondly remembered for his massive ‘Cocaine In My Brain’ hit from the great CB200 album and the later reworked ‘Marijuana In My Brain’ which gave Dillinger crossover hits in both England and Europe. But the versatile DJ has many more strings to his bow.

Dillinger (born. Lester Bullocks,1953 Kingston, Jamaica) began his musical venture around 1971, working asa DJ to Sound Systems run by Prince Jackie and El Brasso.1974 saw his first vinyl release in the form of ‘Freshly’ for Producer Yabby U and in 1975 he came with the great ‘Brace A Boy’ for the young Mr Augustus Pablo.But his first album release was through Coxsone Dodd’s Studio One setup, where he let Dillinger fire some vocals over classic Rocksteady rhythms. It took the form of ‘Ready Natty Dreadie’. It was his time at Joseph ‘Jo Jo’ Hookim’s Channel One Studio that produced his second album set(a crossover release and fore mentioned) the timeless 1976 classic ‘CB 200’. It contained three big singles in ‘Plantation Heights’, ‘Cocaine In My Brain’ and ‘Crank Face’. The reworked ‘ Marijuana In My Brain’ even became a No 1 hit in Holland in 1979.

We have taken our set of tunes from his classic 70’s period when Mr Dillinger could do no wrong.Alongside the big ‘Cocaine’ and ‘Marijuana’ hits the great opening track ‘Love Is All I Bring’ sees him working over Alton Ellis ‘Still In Love With You’ which Itself turned into ‘3 Piece Suite’. ‘Money Alone Is Not All’ where he works over Barry Brown’s ‘Mr Money Man’, ‘Hear and Deaf’ working over Johnny Clarke’s ‘Nobodies Business’. ‘King Pharaoh Was A Baldhead’ has him working Frankie Jone’s ‘ Jesse Black’ cut. ‘Concubine’ reworks the Mighty Diamond’s ‘Mother Winney’ and ‘Time So Hard’ sees Dillinger telling it like it is over Ronnie Davis’ original ‘ Time So Hard’ cut, empathizing the points in fine style.

A classic set of tunes all ‘Killer No Filler’ from the master of rhyme himself we hope you agree…..

Billie Eilish’s third studio album, "HIT ME HARD AND SOFT", released via Darkroom/Interscope Records is her most daring body of work to date, a diverse yet cohesive collection of songs— ideally listened to in its entirety from beginning to end—does exactly as the album title suggests; hits you hard and soft both lyrically and sonically, while bending genres and defying trends along the way. With the help of her brother and sole collaborator, FINNEAS, the pair wrote, recorded, and produced the album together in their hometown of Los Angeles. This album comes on the heels of her two massively successful albums “WHEN WE ALL FALL ASLEEP, WHERE DO WE GO?" and "Happier Than Ever" and works to further develop the world of Billie Eilish. This special anniversary edition is pressed on bio-vinyl dark blue & orange splatter with the original cover printed on silver mirror foil board.