Search:l own

UK electro wizard Plant43 marks his 20th year in the game in the only way he knows how: with another wonderful album, his 10th overall. It comes on his own now five year strong Plant43 Recordings and as he continues to lay it down with his regular performances at Tresor. Feeding The Machines is full of signature excellence, from the lithe rhythms of 'Information Decay' to the jittery drums and introspective chords of 'Anthropomorphic Algorithms' via the dark, hurried urgency of the paranoid 'Absolute Inertia'. This is another long player that is as adventurous as it is emotive and cinematic.

2025 marks 20 years of Tectonic, the pioneering dubstep and electronic label founded in 2005 by Bristol’s underground originator, DJ Pinch.
The Tectonic Sound compilation lays down the gauntlet for the future direction of the imprint. Split across 6 x 4-track 12”s, the compilation comprises many producers making their Tectonic debut, including Re:ni, Beatrice M., Yushh, Flora Yin-Wong, and Sicaria, alongside stalwarts like Om Unit, RSD, Peverelist and Kahn & Neek. It’s an exhilarating 24-track journey through experimental, bass-heavy electronic music, with almost all tracks created by the artists specifically with Tectonic's sound in mind - at the intersection where dubstep and techno meet.
“More so than just the sound, the music is in tune with the real ethos of the early dubstep scene,” - Label boss Pinch says: “People talk about 'heads in a scene - but it's led by hearts really. I've always tried to follow my heart when it comes to music and all the music here is from people I trust that do something worth communicating with the world. I love to watch and help artists grow just as much as I'm excited to release tracks from bigger names who are still passionate about what they do and have developed the powers and control to be able to output that effectively. It feels like Tectonic has been a part of so many communities over the years now, and that there is something that binds all the releases together, something that speaks for itself in a way that goes beyond words, something that's instinctive and immediate.”

Across Tectonic’s 150-strong catalogue there are seminal releases by 2562, Scientist, and Mumdance & Logos, side by side with appearances from Flying Lotus, Shed, Adrian Sherwood, Riko Dan and Photek. The label holds some of the earliest dubstep incantations of Skream, Digital Mystikz, and Joker as well as Pinch’s own productions. The evolution of the Tectonic sound branches into audio explorations encompassing sub-heavy techno and grimey soundscapes alongside leftfield electronica and future-facing beats. The common thread that binds is Pinch’s devotion to pushing underground music ahead of its time, always built to rattle a soundsystem

2025 marks 20 years of Tectonic, the pioneering dubstep and electronic label founded in 2005 by Bristol’s underground originator, DJ Pinch.
The Tectonic Sound compilation lays down the gauntlet for the future direction of the imprint. Split across 6 x 4-track 12”s, the compilation comprises many producers making their Tectonic debut, including Re:ni, Beatrice M., Yushh, Flora Yin-Wong, and Sicaria, alongside stalwarts like Om Unit, RSD, Peverelist and Kahn & Neek. It’s an exhilarating 24-track journey through experimental, bass-heavy electronic music, with almost all tracks created by the artists specifically with Tectonic's sound in mind - at the intersection where dubstep and techno meet.
“More so than just the sound, the music is in tune with the real ethos of the early dubstep scene,” - Label boss Pinch says: “People talk about 'heads in a scene - but it's led by hearts really. I've always tried to follow my heart when it comes to music and all the music here is from people I trust that do something worth communicating with the world. I love to watch and help artists grow just as much as I'm excited to release tracks from bigger names who are still passionate about what they do and have developed the powers and control to be able to output that effectively. It feels like Tectonic has been a part of so many communities over the years now, and that there is something that binds all the releases together, something that speaks for itself in a way that goes beyond words, something that's instinctive and immediate.”

Across Tectonic’s 150-strong catalogue there are seminal releases by 2562, Scientist, and Mumdance & Logos, side by side with appearances from Flying Lotus, Shed, Adrian Sherwood, Riko Dan and Photek. The label holds some of the earliest dubstep incantations of Skream, Digital Mystikz, and Joker as well as Pinch’s own productions. The evolution of the Tectonic sound branches into audio explorations encompassing sub-heavy techno and grimey soundscapes alongside leftfield electronica and future-facing beats. The common thread that binds is Pinch’s devotion to pushing underground music ahead of its time, always built to rattle a soundsystem

Grupo Yoyi's rare gem 'Paco La Calle' comes from 1977 and is now available on its own 45rpm for the first time ever, and is a fine window into the artist's pioneering blend of Afro-Cuban rhythms, jazz, funk and disco. Originally released on Cuba's iconic Egrem label, it's the only known solo project from producer Jorge Soler. It's brimming with lush horn arrangements and warm analogue synths, so both sides effervesce with genre-crossing spirit that feels timeless even now, almost half a century on. These are the sort of sounds that are perfect for both soundtracking a sunlit afternoon or heating up a dancefloor and will have Latin fusion freaks and crate-diggers alike in a spin.

LP comes with 24 page 8.5x11 full color booklet. In the blurred and memorial hallways of bygone time, to remember is to wander between the rooms of our own experiences, to appear and disappear, like a play of overlapping shadows. In music set drifting through the architecture of his own memories, Moses Brown weaves a story that oscillates between the past and the present, like a mason turning over stones to reconstruct his childhood home in this beautiful and disquieting soundtrack to growing up. On Stone Upon Stone, Moses' first solo LP attributed to his given name after several releases under the brilliant and despondent "Peace de Resistance" moniker, he moves sidelong into the realm of soundtracks with this score to the construction of his childhood home in a story spanning 1993-2023. Laid out in lush and provocative minimalist instrumentals, the album unfolds a story about the planning, partial construction, and dissolution of a home in constant state of becoming through the lens of its only child, coming of age under flux. Influenced by the approach of friends and collaborators Straw Man Army's OST to Charles Darwin's Voyage of the Beagle, Stone Upon Stone was originally intended as a soundtrack to a novel of the same name by Wieslaw Mysliwski, an epic set in Poland about a family's construction of a mausoleum. Struck by the story's parallels with his own family's project, he got the idea to complete the work as a personal narrative. Created from layers of different mellotron voices then separated, re-amplified, and recorded as if they were a sitting chamber orchestra, the music eerily blurs the line between human and synthetic, giving way to something akin to a memory with it's blurriness of fact and fiction. In the same spirit of association, this record is certainly influenced by other minimalists working within the confines of "soundtrack", like Philip Glass' North Star and the film work of Michael Nyman. But Brown's soundtrack works within its own peculiar depth of field, living in the listener's imagination, thriving in its own sense of loneliness, aspiration, and confusion that only childhood can evoke. Listeners will feel the entropy of aging in Stone Upon Stone, like a memoir in cascading tones, that sets it apart from so much else in DIY music, and rewards with repeated listens. For Fans of Philip Glass, Kali Malone, Julius Eastman, Mica Levi, Roedelius.

Habibi Funk is more than happy to announce our 31st release which happens to be our 3rd various artists compilation. The album is dedicated to the cassette tape scene in Libya from the late 80s to early 2000s, from disco to reggae to pop. All songs previously unreleased outside of Libya and not available on any DSP platforms.

This compilation isn’t a sweeping history of Libyan music — it’s a personal journey into the sounds we fell in love with while digging through tapes, conversations, and stories across Libya and beyond. Rather than spotlighting the country’s most famous musical exports, the compilation brings forward a mix of overlooked gems and local classics of the cassette era: artists whose work thrived despite political limitations, and scarce international exposure. The music featured here blends reggae rhythms, synthy disco grooves, gritty pop, house, and funk, a vibrant collision of genres that reflects Libya’s unique sonic landscape from the 1980s to the early 2000s. Many of these recordings were recovered from the TK7 cassette factory in Sousse, Tunisia, a now-demolished site that once played a quiet but vital role in distributing and manufacturing Libyan music. Other tracks were digitised in a Cairo hotel room in 2021, where we transferred nearly 100 tapes over the course of three days, on-site using a high-grade cassette deck brought into Egypt with us. From that trove emerged artists like Ahmed Ben Ali, Cheb Bakr, and Najib Alhoush & The Free Music, who have already featured on our earlier releases. Their sounds sit alongside contributions from this release from the likes of Khaled Al Melody, Fathi Aldiyqz & Sons of Africa Band, City Lights Band, Libya Music Band, and Group Hewaya. During this era, Independent artists relied on makeshift home studios or travelled abroad to record in Tunisia and Egypt, gradually building their own infrastructures for creativity. By the 90s and early 2000s, as access to digital equipment increased, a few of the artists began setting up their own studios — a shift that gave rise to a more self-sufficient recording culture across the country. The resulting sounds are anything but homogeneous. They reflect Libya’s geographic and cultural crossroads: North African rhythms meet Arab melodies and deep African roots. Reggae, in particular, took on a local Libyan flavour — not just musically, through the slowed-down cadence of traditional shaabi beats, but socially, as a vehicle for expressing identity and pride. What ties all the artists on this comp together is a boundary- pushing approach to genre and style: recorded in small studios, exchanged by hand, and shaped by a cross-pollination of influences, from Benghazi to Tripoli and beyond. All tracks are licensed from their creators and in the case of the artists being deceased from their estates. All profits are being split 50:50 between us in the licensors and ownership remains with the creators, we only licensed the music.

Born out of the early 1980's Austin noise punk scene, Scratch Acid deliberately eschewed the loud, fast rules of hardcore as everything they didn't want to be and embraced a weirder, artier sound. Prior to the release of their 1984 debut S/T EP, someone gave Touch and Go Records owner Corey Rusk a cassette of the recording, and he was instantly a huge fan. Rusk was immediately interested in releasing the EP and contacted the band to express his admiration. At the time, Scratch Acid had already committed to working with Rabid Cat Records. The group quickly developed a riveting performance aesthetic, and, as the debut S/T EP made its way around the country via fanzines, college radio, and word-of-mouth, the band mounted short tours to the Midwest and the East Coast. While he was not able to work with Scratch Acid directly through Touch and Go, Rusk had begun booking shows with Scratch Acid in Detroit, so he could see them live and meet them. A friendship formed, and Touch and Go Records would eventually release the band's second EP, Berserker, in 1987.

Tech-Nology was launched in 2003 specifically to make records with the artist Bjorn Svin. Bjorn was the first Danish artist who made underground crossover into commercial hit territory via "Mer Strom" - but still keeping respect in the "real" music world for his enthusiasm, non-compromising style, persona, and sweaty live performance skills - his musical understanding and need to explore new directions took the crowd on a personal musical journey from jazz and classical musicians to early electronic pioneers - but always in a tone of his own. Bjorn always felt a need to escape norms, to grow and not to repeat, but investigate and create. The first record on Tech-Nology was born under the alias - El Far: Couples of lonely dancers. "Bjorn is maybe the most talented electronic producer ever in Denmark" and he was celebrated as a wonder kid by the media back in the 90's. An insider with new knowledge of Bjorn told us: "Yeah I think its good music.. It's not for everyone I must add, but it's definitely quality music for those who dig this sound.. sometimes a bit too deep.. which kind of works against it, cause you really need to listen to it.. you cannot just skip through it, cause then you don't really grasp the soul of it.. so this is what makes it more difficult to sell - but if a guy like this was a bigger name he would sell much better.."

We love Bjorn and we agree - We have tried to sell Bjorn and his music for over 2 decades now - But you can't capture Bjorn, you can't own him - he is only making music for himself - and you can get on the ride if you want to, but don't expect all the rides to be fun - sometimes it hurts! Bjorn is difficult to sell, but we don't think Bjorn really would like to sell much better if he had the option to do a more commercial approach to his music - because Bjorn is about not selling out, he's a purist at heart, making music documents for the few. Bjorn is bigger than superficial success and streaming numbers. He made jingles for Nokia, toured and played Roskilde's main stage, the biggest Festival in Denmark, but he still doesn't care... and that is important if you want to make interesting music that last for the future. When Bjorn met Mester Jakobsen, label boss of Tech-Nology, he has been releasing on numerous underground labels, made the jump to a major label, and everything more or less turned out as a big disappointment, so Bjorn presented a completely experimental album to the Tech-Nology label under the moniker Prinz Ezo - The Body Offset. We loved it then - we still love it now - and a truly collectors item and a secret DJ tool.

Today, Bjorn is still breaking all habits and rules, still doing the same thing - just in new ways, but he has gained insight on another level, adding even more nuances and textures to his post-genre compositions.

Welcome to the second album by Prinz Ezo on Tech-Nology: KURIER Why Kurier? Because Bjorn left to explore the Berlin Underground, shortly after the first two releases on Tech-Nology - he left his roots to search for a bigger meaning, a bigger understanding, to compose real mature sounds and understanding his skills, at the point where you understand why you have to cross borders, still incognito, doing smuggler-sounds, always in transit - between cities, between cultures, between worlds, time and space. Not Restless nor rootless, just forever on the move, always discovering new landscapes! But now Bjorn is settling down - accordingly with the music - to find - not inner peace, but to be completely in balance with the music inside of him. Prinz Ezo is raw, narrative, minimalistic electronic storytelling that refuses to freeze. Tension builds and releases - feel the energy and the drama for the last 2 decades if you dare to take the journey?

Almost twenty years after the first Prinz Ezo album, it has now been possible to make the music for those who never arrived.

Tech-Nology was launched in 2003 specifically to make records with the artist Bjorn Svin. Bjorn was the first Danish artist who made underground crossover into commercial hit territory via "Mer Strom" - but still keeping respect in the "real" music world for his enthusiasm, non-compromising style, persona, and sweaty live performance skills - his musical understanding and need to explore new directions took the crowd on a personal musical journey from jazz and classical musicians to early electronic pioneers - but always in a tone of his own. Bjorn always felt a need to escape norms, to grow and not to repeat, but investigate and create. The first record on Tech-Nology was born under the alias - El Far: Couples of lonely dancers. "Bjorn is maybe the most talented electronic producer ever in Denmark" and he was celebrated as a wonder kid by the media back in the 90's. An insider with new knowledge of Bjorn told us: "Yeah I think its good music.. It's not for everyone I must add, but it's definitely quality music for those who dig this sound.. sometimes a bit too deep.. which kind of works against it, cause you really need to listen to it.. you cannot just skip through it, cause then you don't really grasp the soul of it.. so this is what makes it more difficult to sell - but if a guy like this was a bigger name he would sell much better.."

We love Bjorn and we agree - We have tried to sell Bjorn and his music for over 2 decades now - But you can't capture Bjorn, you can't own him - he is only making music for himself - and you can get on the ride if you want to, but don't expect all the rides to be fun - sometimes it hurts! Bjorn is difficult to sell, but we don't think Bjorn really would like to sell much better if he had the option to do a more commercial approach to his music - because Bjorn is about not selling out, he's a purist at heart, making music documents for the few. Bjorn is bigger than superficial success and streaming numbers. He made jingles for Nokia, toured and played Roskilde's main stage, the biggest Festival in Denmark, but he still doesn't care... and that is important if you want to make interesting music that last for the future. When Bjorn met Mester Jakobsen, label boss of Tech-Nology, he has been releasing on numerous underground labels, made the jump to a major label, and everything more or less turned out as a big disappointment, so Bjorn presented a completely experimental album to the Tech-Nology label under the moniker Prinz Ezo - The Body Offset. We loved it then - we still love it now - and a truly collectors item and a secret DJ tool.

Today, Bjorn is still breaking all habits and rules, still doing the same thing - just in new ways, but he has gained insight on another level, adding even more nuances and textures to his post-genre compositions.

Welcome to the second album by Prinz Ezo on Tech-Nology: KURIER Why Kurier? Because Bjorn left to explore the Berlin Underground, shortly after the first two releases on Tech-Nology - he left his roots to search for a bigger meaning, a bigger understanding, to compose real mature sounds and understanding his skills, at the point where you understand why you have to cross borders, still incognito, doing smuggler-sounds, always in transit - between cities, between cultures, between worlds, time and space. Not Restless nor rootless, just forever on the move, always discovering new landscapes! But now Bjorn is settling down - accordingly with the music - to find - not inner peace, but to be completely in balance with the music inside of him. Prinz Ezo is raw, narrative, minimalistic electronic storytelling that refuses to freeze. Tension builds and releases - feel the energy and the drama for the last 2 decades if you dare to take the journey?

Almost twenty years after the first Prinz Ezo album, it has now been possible to make the music for those who never arrived.

A“This album is about what it means to be human, and its creation is my offering. I attempt to tell a tale of the human experience in the reflection of my own.”

‘In the Andean mythology, condors are believed to be immortal. It is said that once they feel old, without energy, and useless, they climb to the highest peak and let themselves fall to death.’

The Allegorist is a visionary, enigmatic, transmedia, and boundary-pushing artist known for crafting deep, immersive dark sonic tales. Embracing a wide array of influences, weaving together the mysteries, art and spirituality, the art project defies categorisation, resonating with those who seek the unconventional.

From Birth Until Death is an introspective and immersive concept album that reflects on the essence of the human experience. Crafted over six years by The Allegorist (aka Anna Jordan), the album traces the arc of life—from its fragile beginnings to its inevitable end—using sound art to explore existential and philosophical terrain. Inspired by the Andean mythology of the condor – a symbol of immortality – the album blends electronic soundscapes with raw field recordings, evoking a deep sense of connection between the natural world and human existence.

The album’s progression mirrors the stages of life, starting with the birth of new beginnings and culminating in death, with each track offering a unique reflection on the moments in between. From the dynamic energy of Momentum, to the ethereal, illusionary world of Fata Morgana, the tracks guide the listener through emotions, perceptions, and experiences that shape the human condition.

A distinctive feature of From Birth Until Death is its intricate production. The album incorporates field recordings from Grunewald Forest, a distant roar of a jet, barking dogs, blending the sounds of nature – footsteps in the snow, birdsong, ocean waves – with layered synthesisers and electronic beats. The bass and ambient textures are crafted using an array of analog hardware, while all vocals, both lead and backing, are performed and recorded by Jordan. Some of the vocal takes were intentionally left raw, capturing the spontaneous energy of early recordings, while others were re-recorded to balance the album’s organic yet polished feel. Each element is meticulously crafted, revealing its deeper meaning as the album unfolds like a multidimensional, living sculpture.

At its core, From Birth Until Death is a meditation on the full spectrum of life. The album’s title track, From Birth Until Death, encapsulates this journey, reflecting on the passage of time and the unique experience of being human. The final track, Death, offers a melancholic yet beautiful exploration of endings, not as finalities, but as moments in the grand cycle of life. With its combination of evocative sound design and deeply personal themes, From Birth Until Death invites listeners to contemplate their own lives, offering a moving experience of reflection, growth, and transformation.

About From Birth Until Death
Words By Robin Rimbaud (Scanner)

From Birth Until Death is a deeply personal and reflective album and beautifully crafted. A detailed listen reveals that Jordan was in search of a profoundly human and authentic expression. In an era when so much around us seems defined by speed, Anna Jordan, aka The Allegorist, stands apart – aware that skimming the surface of life is neither sufficient nor rewarding. She reminds us of the value of deep, authentic listening.

The track Andean Condor seductively draws us into a smoky, blurred rhythmic soundscape, capturing the essence of the darkest Berlin nightclub, while Birth pulses with an almost shamanic transformation of sound, moving from the organic to the musical. It features a recording of Jordan’s footsteps in the snow in Grunewald Forest, Germany.

At times, the music feels almost sculptural in shape and tone – lifting, pushing, lilting, opening, and closing – where each piece is given room to fully develop. Many of the works blend synthetic sound with the natural, incorporating the human voice alongside environmental recordings: the wild waves of the ocean, a jet flying overhead, and barking dogs.

With From Birth Until Death, Jordan, like an alchemical architect revealing in the process of getting lost and relinquishing control, leaves us with a taut, immersive soundtrack in which to lose ourselves.

About the album ‘From Birth Until Death’
words by The Allegorist

“The album From Birth Until Death did not come easily to me. I started working on it in 2019, and it underwent many alterations over the years. I produced multiple versions of the tracks each year, but the album name, the track titles, and the album cover art stayed the same for 6 years. Not everything I did fit into the album’s final form, but I hope the heavy selection just made it better. I played this piece live in my techno live set between 2019 and 2020, and in the years after, I performed different art, ambient, and vocal versions of it, most notably the one at the church St. Marienkirche in Berlin in 2022. It just wanted to live and didn’t want to be finished. As I aged, this album aged with me. And now I’m ready to let it go.”

Repress!

Bristol music Godfather Rob Smith (Smith & Mighty) was a major force in the 1st wave Bristol Dubstep scene, not only as a huge musical influence on the likes of Pinch and Peverelist but also as a producer in his own right. This typically dubwise 12' is one of his best from that era, repressed for 2016.

2025 Repress


Ash Ra Tempel is the eponymous debut studio album by the Krautrock band Ash Ra Tempel. It features guitarist Manuel Göttsching with drummer Klaus Schulze and bassist Hartmut Enke.
Engineered by Conny Plank it was recorded in March 1971 and released in June 1971 on Ohr Records.

This 50Th Anniversary Album will be Released in Memoriam of all the Musical Contributors to this Release and on Manuel Göttsching´s MG.ART label. It´s the fourth and headlining edition in this series and was finalised, carefully overseen by Manuel Göttsching himself in the late Autumn of 2022.

Much has been written about the record and band.

Having finished a first musical chapter with their Steeple Chase Bluesband and still at very young age of only 17 and 18 years old Manuel Göttsching and Hartmut Enke met Klaus Schulze. Together they started to write and and compose what, to many, became one the holy grails of Psychedelic Rock and early Electronic Music -
the German variant which was later also named "Krautrock":

Ash Ra Tempel´s self-titled first album "Ash Ra Tempel".

"The trio of Klaus Schulze, Manuel Göttsching and Hartmut Enke decided to abandon conventional composition and song writing, in favour of free-form improvising and developing a new musical language. As such, they became notorious for jams that could exceed 30 minutes." Says Discogs. "Some of these recordings can be found on Manuel Göttsching´s "The Private Tapes" releases", which will be re-released on MG.ART as well, following this edition.

"Krautrocksampler" author Julian Cope mentioned it to be "… one of the greatest rock 'n' roll LPs ever made." (Julian Cope Presents Head Heritage | Unsung | Reviews | Ash Ra Tempel - Ash Ra Tempel". 15 March 2000.)

AllMusic called the album "both astonishingly prescient and just flat out good, a logical extension of the space-jam-freakout ethos into rarified realms."

Here we would like the Band to be heard, for what can easily be said as the first time in 50+ years, with the exception of some early Journalists for whom the young Manuel Göttsching wrote a statement of intent (the original text can be found inside this edition) as following:

"Our musical concept is based on a combination of blues rock and delicate collages of electronic sound. These two elements should remain inseparable. And in their complex unity, the different musical philosophies of each musician find a common sweet spot. Our music is a permanently impulsive experience left to develop as it will, starting from a common fixed point of departure. This is where the difficulty of the music begins: No standardized formulation of our music can and should be possible. Only the constant reaction within the band can determine the musical result. And this requires constant listening with full concentration on the part of the creators. The idea of a particular musician will be - if flexible enough - absorbed by the others, transposed to their own instrument, and reflected back into the music as an individual contribution. This reciprocity within the band is then transferred over to the audience. And this process means that their reaction is not only a contribution to the end result; it actually makes them jointly responsible for the creation of the final musical product.
…
On our album, the track "Amboss" represents the first layer. Conventional instruments communicate familiar music which is in part expanded through electronic means. In the second track of the album - "Traummaschine" - the actual basic sound approach is dissolved into an electronic Nirvana which no longer allows the concrete identification of actual instruments. Innocent, virgin listening, free from any and every association, can finally begin - and the music can be absorbed and processed free from the limitations of categorization. That is the purpose of our music: To convey freedom without any predetermined criteria or traditions.

Thank you for your attention."
(Taken from the original A-R-T Bio 1970)


Hartmut Enke, Manuel Göttsching and Klaus Schulze aka. Ash Ra Tempel travelled to Hamburg in March 1971 to record their debut, with assistance of another Icon, legendary engineer Conny Plank.
The rest is history.

2025 Repress

Ash Ra Tempel is the eponymous debut studio album by the Krautrock band Ash Ra Tempel. It features guitarist Manuel Göttsching with drummer Klaus Schulze and bassist Hartmut Enke.
Engineered by Conny Plank it was recorded in March 1971 and released in June 1971 on Ohr Records.

This 50Th Anniversary Album will be Released in Memoriam of all the Musical Contributors to this Release and on Manuel Göttsching´s MG.ART label. It´s the fourth and headlining edition in this series and was finalised, carefully overseen by Manuel Göttsching himself in the late Autumn of 2022.

Much has been written about the record and band.

Having finished a first musical chapter with their Steeple Chase Bluesband and still at very young age of only 17 and 18 years old Manuel Göttsching and Hartmut Enke met Klaus Schulze. Together they started to write and and compose what, to many, became one the holy grails of Psychedelic Rock and early Electronic Music -
the German variant which was later also named "Krautrock":

Ash Ra Tempel´s self-titled first album "Ash Ra Tempel".

"The trio of Klaus Schulze, Manuel Göttsching and Hartmut Enke decided to abandon conventional composition and song writing, in favour of free-form improvising and developing a new musical language. As such, they became notorious for jams that could exceed 30 minutes." Says Discogs. "Some of these recordings can be found on Manuel Göttsching´s "The Private Tapes" releases", which will be re-released on MG.ART as well, following this edition.

"Krautrocksampler" author Julian Cope mentioned it to be "… one of the greatest rock 'n' roll LPs ever made." (Julian Cope Presents Head Heritage | Unsung | Reviews | Ash Ra Tempel - Ash Ra Tempel". 15 March 2000.)

AllMusic called the album "both astonishingly prescient and just flat out good, a logical extension of the space-jam-freakout ethos into rarified realms."

Here we would like the Band to be heard, for what can easily be said as the first time in 50+ years, with the exception of some early Journalists for whom the young Manuel Göttsching wrote a statement of intent (the original text can be found inside this edition) as following:

"Our musical concept is based on a combination of blues rock and delicate collages of electronic sound. These two elements should remain inseparable. And in their complex unity, the different musical philosophies of each musician find a common sweet spot. Our music is a permanently impulsive experience left to develop as it will, starting from a common fixed point of departure. This is where the difficulty of the music begins: No standardized formulation of our music can and should be possible. Only the constant reaction within the band can determine the musical result. And this requires constant listening with full concentration on the part of the creators. The idea of a particular musician will be - if flexible enough - absorbed by the others, transposed to their own instrument, and reflected back into the music as an individual contribution. This reciprocity within the band is then transferred over to the audience. And this process means that their reaction is not only a contribution to the end result; it actually makes them jointly responsible for the creation of the final musical product.
…
On our album, the track "Amboss" represents the first layer. Conventional instruments communicate familiar music which is in part expanded through electronic means. In the second track of the album - "Traummaschine" - the actual basic sound approach is dissolved into an electronic Nirvana which no longer allows the concrete identification of actual instruments. Innocent, virgin listening, free from any and every association, can finally begin - and the music can be absorbed and processed free from the limitations of categorization. That is the purpose of our music: To convey freedom without any predetermined criteria or traditions.

Thank you for your attention."
(Taken from the original A-R-T Bio 1970)


Hartmut Enke, Manuel Göttsching and Klaus Schulze aka. Ash Ra Tempel travelled to Hamburg in March 1971 to record their debut, with assistance of another Icon, legendary engineer Conny Plank.
The rest is history.

Itara is the debut solo album by Paul Pèrrim—guitarist, composer, and anthropologist—featuring a set of guitar-driven compositions that blend hallucinatory acid folk, abstract blues, mutant Eastern jazz, surreal ambient, and free improvi-sation into a vivid and distinctive sonic tapestry.
With a background in ethnomusicology and a degree in Music Education, Pèrrim’s work bridges popular and experi-mental music. He contrasts the acoustic guitar’s austerity with the expansive possibilities of the electric guitar, drawing from late ’60s folk traditions, contemporary fingerstyle, sound collage, drone, psychedelia, and improvisation.
A key figure in the Canary Islands’ experimental scene, he released two albums in the 2010s under The Transistor Arkestra, a Catalan collective merging free jazz and psychedelia. As Transistor Eye, his solo project, he merges ana-log electronics with guitar, using vintage synths and effects.
In 2022, Pèrrim gained wider recognition through his appearance on Manos Ocultas (Philatelia Records) and the in-ternational tribute Solstice: A Tribute to Steffen Basho-Junghans (Obsolete Recordings). That same year, he founded GUITARRACO, a contemporary guitar festival in Tarragona, where he has shared the stage with Joseba Irazoki, Buck Curran, and Raphael Roginski.
Itara will be released in July 2025 via Keroxen. Recorded and produced by Pèrrim, the album features liner notes by critic Bill Meyer, who writes:
“While it’s common to call music cinematic these days, Pèrrim goes split-screen. One might say he composes econo, jamming scenes and sounds to psychedelic effect. But economy does not equate with poverty. Pèrrim draws upon a rich bank of musical notions, all of which he makes his own through the alchemy of recombination and transmutation.”

"Astral Americana hymns hovering somewhere between the dirt and the stars" Pitchfork

"Mood music for moments of solitude, best experienced without distraction" The Times

"Overwhelmingly effective and ravishingly beautiful" The Wire

American Dust is an ode to the beauty of the American Southwest, where vast desert landscapes hold stories both stark and tender. Eve Adams’ characteristic folk noir weaves a vivid tapestry of love, sacrifice and quiet revelation, conjuring images of dust storms, stray dogs and far off trains.

The high desert of California is a vast and confounding place. Equally inspiring as it is punishing, it’s a landscape that carries magic in its deep dark nights, holding stories both tender and stark in the coarse layer of dust that settles upon everything. It’s long been a source of inspiration for musicians, writers, and painters, each of them adding to the same current, carried forward over time, through hope and hardship and the passing years.

Somewhere out there in that broad and boundless landscape, Eve Adams has been living her own desert life, quietly writing the follow-up to 2021’s Metal Bird LP. Where that album sang of liminal space, the dream-like turbulence of Hollywood’s golden age, American Dust is far more rooted in traditional storytelling; a eulogy for the American Dream channeled through that sweeping part of the country that holds such power and mystery. Slipping into different and varied costumes throughout its ten songs, it finds Eve not just observing the people around her but stepping into their shoes and peeling back the layers of their quiet lives.

Adams writes from within. A few years ago she moved out there, to “the middle of nowhere”, finding a slowness that didn’t exist in the city, and she knows only too well about the mystical nature of the land and those who live within it. Weaving together themes of grit and romance, American Dust holds its focus on the bittersweet poetry of lives lived in solitude, most notably the women who sustain life at the center of it all. “There’s something very radical about domestic life,” Adams says of this thread. “So many women live their entire lives behind closed doors, completely in the shadows. Within those lives is such sacrifice, devotion, and love. I wanted to honor that: the poetry in the mundane, the longing in the repetition. The way love survives boredom and dust and time.”

Eve is joined on American Dust by Canadian musician Bryce Cloghesy, aka Military Genius of Crack Cloud, who plays throughout and also helped produce the album. Musically bold and vivid, it’s an ambitious and detailed stride forward from what’s come before, the scope of the LP’s narrative reflected in the radiant sweep of the playing. On top of gentle piano and guitar, gorgeous strings drift through the album, lending the songs a woozy sense of romanticism; a collaboration with Gamaliel Traynor (Cello) and Caroline’s Oliver Hamilton (Violin).

For all the drama that’s coiled around these songs, it’s the recurring notion of love and hope fighting against everything that holds true throughout American Dust. Musically it’s lush and vibrant, intimate and cinematic side by side, and always bursting with warmth. But it’s what it holds in its weary bones that elevates it to something truly special, something more than just a collection of songs penned in the heart of the desert. The characters it speaks of, and from, feel shadowed but wholly real, like they’re bursting to share their stories that have remained hidden for years and years and they allow Eve Adams to grow as a songwriter right in front of our eyes.

“The same swirling dust that clung to the covered wagons of my ancestors as they crossed the Great American Desert is the same dust my great-great-grandmother swept off her porch during the Dust Bowl of 1936 in Oklahoma, is the same dust that blows in through the cracks in my windows here in the desert, carrying stories from a time long gone,” Eve says, reflecting on the personal narrative that runs through her new album.

“It’s not just dust—it’s American Dust, the kind that settles into the bones of a family and never leaves. I think about that dust as a symbol of the passage of time. I hope this album will be part of that same current, carrying forward for the next generations of my family to find. I’ve been lucky enough to have journals and poetry from my ancestors that documents their lives during times of pure hope and pure hardship. I’d like to think of this album as a contribution to that family history.”

A muffled cry into the technological darkness, Contemporary Movement slid into the world right as the MP3 was seeping out of college dorms. A 39-minute drift into the void, drenched in Cold War-era reverb and then submerged in four track hiss for good measure. Duster constructed a Brutalist masterpiece on the outskirts of a suburban mall, as if to say, "We were here." This numbered 25th anniversary edition is pressed on 180G vinyl and comes with a lyric sheet and poster.

A muffled cry into the technological darkness, Contemporary Movement slid into the world right as the MP3 was seeping out of college dorms. A 39-minute drift into the void, drenched in Cold War-era reverb and then submerged in four track hiss for good measure. Duster constructed a Brutalist masterpiece on the outskirts of a suburban mall, as if to say, "We were here." This numbered 25th anniversary edition is pressed on 180G vinyl and comes with a lyric sheet and poster.

In an interview released to Billboard in 2017, east coast veteran AZ explains how this collaboration with legendary DITC producer Buckwild came along:

"The sound was shifting. A lot of brothers in the street were telling me "You got to save us." And I'm like, "Save y'all from what?" So I took that title to save the people, then Buckwild played a joint in the studio called "Save Them," and I was like, "This is it."

The two don't really need no introduction: with the Brooklyn lyricist gracing the mic since the mid 90's beginning with one of his first appearances alongside Nas on "Life's A Bitch" and dropping legendary classics such as "Doe Or Die", and the Bronx producer providing beats to artists that range from old school acts such as The Notorious B.I.G., Jay Z, Kool G Rap, Big Pun, modern day legends such as Vinnie Paz, Meyhem Lauren, Termanology and, last but not least, legendary DITC members Big L, Fat Joe, Diamond D and the list goes on and on.

AZ had to recruit "some brothers who I know respect the craft" and found them in Wu-Tang Clan's own Raekwon alongside the late great Prodigy of Mobb Deep. The song was released in April 2017 and brought a breath of fresh air with its classic vibe, together with a video being released just days before Prodigy's untimely passing in June 2017. The rest, you already know, is straight up hip-hop history.

White LP. Born out of the early 1980's Austin noise punk scene, Scratch Acid deliberately eschewed the loud, fast rules of hardcore as everything they didn't want to be and embraced a weirder, artier sound. Prior to the release of their 1984 debut S/T EP, someone gave Touch and Go Records owner Corey Rusk a cassette of the recording, and he was instantly a huge fan. Rusk was immediately interested in releasing the EP and contacted the band to express his admiration. At the time, Scratch Acid had already committed to working with Rabid Cat Records, who released the band's debut release S/T EP (1984) and their only full-length album, Just Keep Eating (1986). The group quickly developed a riveting performance aesthetic, and, as the debut S/T EP made its way around the country via fanzines, college radio, and word-of-mouth, the band mounted short tours to the Midwest and the East Coast. After playing a total of 146 shows, Scratch Acid broke up after the long tour that followed the release of the Berserker EP (Touch and Go Records, 1987). Since that time, the band have had many imitators, and many alternative bands have cited Scratch Acid as one of their influences.

Hot on the heels of 12bit Jungle Out There's 'Right Mind' EP, Foundations Records brings you the hotly anticipated follow-up from rising star Arkyn on 'The Spirit EP' Drawing influence from classic '93 era jungle techno on the likes of Basement Records, it's perhaps his most accomplished work to date in his first foray into all hardware production. Arkyn is a UK based DJ and Producer. His production is influenced from a wide range of music he grew up listening to including Reggae, Dub, Soul, Techno and Funk to name a few. After discovering rave music through the underground party scene in Northampton, he began to cut his teeth DJing and has since gone on to play at some of the most established Jungle/Hardcore events in the country including Distant Planet, The Rave Story and Calling The Hardcore among others. He also recently debuted at Fabric for Motive Hunter Audio's takeover. Arkyn has released on FFF's 3am Eternal, Billy Daniel Bunter's Music Mondays and Motive Hunter Audio to name a few. He also runs his own label TufStuf Records. FOUNDATIONS002 - Arkyn - The Spirit EP Four tracks of Hardcore Jungle Techno and 4x4 made with Akai S3000 XL sampler, Roland 909, Roland JV 1080, Korg 01/W FD and Roland D50.

Planet Trip Records is pleased to present Aqua Terra, the latest EP release from Friedrich Trede and Stephan Braun, the respected Munich-based DJ and production duo better known as Rhode & Brown. Since 2010, they’ve racked up a slew of quality releases through Permanent Vacation, Public Possession, Shall Not Fade, and their own Slam City Jams imprint, while playing well-received DJ sets across Europe. Along the way, the two longtime friends have spent the last fifteen years incorporating influences from electro, italo, synth-pop, breakbeat trance, rave music, and ambient into their blend of uptempo house and techno productions.

Shifting gearspeed, Aqua Terra sees Rhode & Brown trying something completely new and unexpected from them: a record inspired by UK street soul, digi-dub, and transatlantic R&B and boogie from the 1980s and 1990s. Beginning with the Loose Ends slanted synthesiser chords and shuffling machine beat of ‘Heart Attack’ and the glossy new jack swing bounce of ‘Passion Sauce’ (both featuring sultry Berlin-based New York singer Marlena Dae), Aqua Terra quickly reveals itself as a treasure chest of heavy tunes. Steeped in love and lust, ‘Heart Attack’ and ‘Passion Sauce’ are essential sing-along numbers for the warm-up and the warm-down.

The exemplar of a groove that keeps on giving, ‘Aqua Terra (Acid Frog Mix)’ is a note-perfect example of digi-dub redone for the 2020s. Keeping us guessing, Rhode & Brown flip the script on ‘Longo Doggo’ by borrowing elements from sampledelic ‘90s turntablism and blending them with a post-disco/electro beat and a slinky bassline for the ages. From there, ‘Multiflora’ sees our protagonists back in a bassy digi-dub mode, before closing things out with an acid breakbeat slanted demo mix of the title track.

Emerging from the Sydney punk scene alongside bands such as Gee Tee, R.M.F.C., and Tee Vee Repairmann, and with large side of Egg punk accompanying their NWOBHM bacon (also maybe the beans in this messy breakfast are AOR?… I think we might be overreaching with this metaphor). Steröid are ready to rock the main stage with more thunderous aplomb than an atom bomb, hard-boiled and clad in chainmail ripping blisteringly hot rockin’ riffs all night long. Brought to you by rock and roll savant Lord Gordith also known as (at least some of the brains) behind Gloomy Reflections and Quest Master proving once again that he might very well be the most exciting act to follow in heavy underground music these days.
This is a record about rocking, and never stopping, and then rocking some more. You can rock with friends at a gig or a show. Sometimes you have to rock alone, but thats okay. Just give it your best, and never miss your chance to rock.

Men in Love is a collaborative concept album by Irvine Welsh and The Sci-Fi Soul Orchestra, exploring the complexities of love, relationships, and the human condition. The album blends classic Motown and disco influences with contemporary electronic dance production, creating a unique and powerful sound that is both nostalgic and fresh.

From soaring anthems to intimate ballads, Men in Love takes the listener on a journey through the highs and lows of romance, celebrating the power of connection, vulnerability, and the enduring search for love in a chaotic world.

The album will be released concurrently with Welsh's new novel, also titled Men in Love. The book is a sequel to Welsh's seminal work, Trainspotting, and continues the story of Renton, Sick Boy, Spud, Begbie, and other beloved characters. The album serves as a sonic companion to the novel, with its themes, lyrics, and musical atmosphere reflecting the experience and inner turmoil of its characters. The album also introduces The Sci-Fi Soul Orchestra, a unique musical entity with their own unique music releases in the pipeline

fka boursin is a DJ and producer out of Bristol, UK.
Previously known as DJ Boursin, he is recognized for his deep, ambient-infused house music that explores political dimensions of clubs and identity politics.
Welcomed into the Scissor & Thread fold, fka boursin shares two cuts of deep and introspective
electronic music.
The original Listless Intertext is a hazy trip through ambient soundscapes, shuffling rhythms and half-caught conversations, drifting across a 12 minute run time that slowly evolves and shifts with time.
"Listless Intertext is a track centred around the "failed" employment of cheap vocoder software that attempted to process explicit words and phrases across 11 minutes." says fka boursin. "Instead, the vocoder output made any words indecipherable and I was left with thematic vagueness. The final text of the track is simply a submission to its own limitations with some french thrown in."
When label bosses Frank & Tony step up for their Housebeat Dub, they keep the essential mood but introduce a thick, fat groove that works just as well in conveying the mood.
"Our remix is a strictly dancefloor approach," says Frank, "an extended psychedelic beat rework perfect for late night, early morning vibes".

It’s been ten years since Drew Lustman aka FaltyDL last released on Planet Mu. In the meantime he's been running his own label Blueberry Records, been in-house producer for Mykki Blanco and has become a dad. The best things come out of play and it was Drew’s relationship with his young daughter that switched on this playful side of his music. The album in question, ‘Neurotica,’ expresses Drew’s fun in creating such energetic pieces people will want to move to. It's a dizzying sugar-rush at a high-speed bounce; the music is fresh and inviting and most important of all, joyful."Summer of ’24, we were in Catalonia. My girl, our young daughter, the old folks. Days by the village pool, afternoons on the dirtbike. At night, I made salads. Simple things. Good things. One afternoon, lying back, phone in hand, I saw a friend post a GRWM. The music behind it stopped me. A song grabbed hold. The track was ‘Secret’ by Mietze Conte, which is fast-paced euro-pop dance music, like soft fluffy gabber with childlike vocals. I hunted down the full version. Played it again. And again. Twenty times over the next few days. It unlocked something. The best music does that. Like the first time I heard Burial. Had to know what was happening under the surface. That time, it led to ‘Love Is A Liability’ in 2009. This time, it led to ‘Neurotica.’“ “I started to record, getting down fast, bright, sugar-rush sounds. 185 to 200 BPM. I wrote them quick—half a day per track. In between, I slowed things down. Gave space for breath. Mike Paradinas helped shape the album, his ear guiding the flow. I tested the tracks. Played them for kids barely out of diapers and grown folks who still move like they are. It worked, on all ages. I kept it simple. Only two rules: keep it moving and don’t look at my phone. Cut the vocals like I used to.” ‘Neurotica’ is FaltyDL with his mojo refreshed, a new life squared, do yourself a favour, crack a smile and feel the joy.

Another record, another appearance from Kid Lib (& his many aliases) on Future Retro London... ????

As I said before on FR015, the Dub & Wheel stuff he makes is almost always making it into my selection for DJ sets, I honestly can't get enough of it. He had done this tune (originally titled Shaka Sound) in 2017 (I think?) but it was never fully finished on its own & I don't think there were any plans to finish it or release it. That didn't stop me from playing it in my sets of course haha

Eventually, I reached a point where I felt like I'd played it so much that I couldn't allow it to not come out, so I offered to finish the tune and then it could come out on Future Retro London & thankfully he allowed me to work on it and get it done.

In dub, they'll record many different versions/mixes of a tune with various differences in arrangement and sounds used & I felt it'd be cool to do that with this tune, with Mix One sounding more true to his original idea & Mix Two having a bit more variation in the bassline & drum patterns.

Anyway, big up to Kid Lib for letting me work on The Firmament & for letting me release it, hopefully there'll be more Dub & Wheel material from him in the future, I'm patiently waiting...

Kevin Fingier returns with a brand new 7” single on his own Acid Jazz imprint Fingier Records. Known for his explosive Latin sound and classic-style production, Kevin has released a string of sell-out soul 45s, a world music vinyl series, and an album and LP respectively.

Here Kevin returns to his Jamaican-influenced roots. He formerly led Acid Jazz-signed reggae band Los Aggrotones and has produced tracks for reggae legends Derick Harriott, Pat Kelly and The Cimarons. Now for the first time this distinct flavour hits wax on the Fingier label.

This release presents a unique, driving Ska-tinged take on Mod/R&B classic ‘Comin’ Home Baby’, paired with a Fingier original, the deeply authentic Trojan-styled ‘Leaving Samsara’ on a limited edition 7” vinyl single.

Presented in the Fingier Records graphic housebag, the perfect addition to the summer DJ box.

Brazilian Psychedelic Rock Artist Firefriend via Cardinal Fuzz and Little Cloud Records announce a first time vinyl pressing for the classic - “999 to 666 ts Street” Prepare to take the long way through the void — Brazilian sonic architects Firefriend present the searing “999 to 666 TS Street”, a full-length LP that bends time, bleeds color, and dives deeper into the cracked corridors of psychedelic rock. With roots tangled deep in the underground of São Paulo and their eyes forever fixed on the cosmic unknown, Firefriend has carved out a space uniquely their own — a distorted dreamscape where shoegaze meets fuzz, noise folds into melody, and every track is a doorway. “999 to 666 TS Street” is a concept record that navigates a haunted psychogeography: an address etched between realities, where spiritual unrest collides with dystopian daydreams.

A Journey Through Sound and Shadow Drenched in fuzzed-out guitars, whispered vocals, analog synths, and pulsing rhythms, this LP sees the trio — Yury Hermuche (guitar/vocals), Julia Grassetti (bass/vocals), and Cacau Bandeira (drums) — begin to forge the fearless vision they seek. From the opening surge to the final fractured lullaby, “999 to 666 TS Street” is both a destination and a transmission: a call to the wanderers, the outsiders, and the seekers. But Firefriend's mission isn’t just sonic — it’s political.

As proudly left-wing artists with an internationalist vision, the band channels the disillusionment and resistance of a generation watching the world teeter. Their music radiates both critique and hope, connecting the dystopia of late capitalism with a dream of liberation. Whether playing São Paulo basements or European festivals, Firefriend brings an urgent message beneath the haze: solidarity is louder than silence. "This album is a street you can't find on any map — it's the place your mind goes when you turn the lights off," says frontman Yury Hermuche. "It's noise, beauty, and a little bit of danger." "We wanted to build a record that feels like a fever dream on vinyl," adds bassist Julia Grassetti. "Something physical, something that glows in the dark." About Firefriend Known for their hypnotic live shows and cult international following, Firefriend has shared stages with underground legends and graced the grooves of multiple celebrated independent releases.

They’ve become essential listening for fans of Spacemen 3, The Brian Jonestown Massacre, and The Velvet Underground — yet remain wholly, defiantly themselves. “999 to 666 TS Street” marks the start and is another milestone in their prolific catalog, pushing the limits of psychedelic rock while remaining anchored in the beautifully bleak emotionalism that defines their sound. Beneath the distortion lies a worldview — anti-authoritarian, borderless, and defiantly alive.

Mrs. Piss is a new collaboration between Chelsea Wolfe and Jess Gowrie . Drawing on their collective rock, metal, and industrial influences, the project began while the two were touring around together during Wolfe's Hiss Spun album in 2017. The result is their debut album Self-Surgery, which was recorded at The Dock Studio in Sacramento, CA and in Wolfe's home studio, The Canyon. These songs feel more urgent and visceral than anything either of them has created before: heaviness spurred on by punk spirit. Chelsea Wolfe (vocals, guitar): "Working on this project brought Jess and I so much closer as songwriters and production partners, after reuniting as friends and bandmates. It was freeing and fun to channel some wild energies that I don't typically put into my own music. We tried not to overthink the songs as we were writing them, but at the same time we did consciously put a lot into crafting them into our own weird sonic vision. This project was a chance for us to do things our own way, on our own terms, and we plan to invite more womxn musicians along for future Mrs. Piss recordings." CW Jess Gowrie (drums, guitar, bass, programming): "To me, Mrs. Piss represents a musical chemistry cut short long ago that now gets a second chance. Creating with Chelsea has always been very liberating for me, and we both push each other to try new things: anything and everything. Both of us have grown so much as writers and musicians since our first band together (Red Host), and with the journeys we had to take separately to get there, we both have so much more to say; so much more pain and anger to express. That said, we also had a lot of fun doing it, not to mention how freeing it is to not give a f-k and to just create." JG "Doomy chugs, ethereal vocals and massive distortion sounds are the order of the day, summoning the menacing timbres that fueled Wolfe's Abyss and Hiss Spun records" GUITAR WORLD "a grungy, sludgy new project that defies expectations" REVOLVER "Together, they make a grandly grungy noise - something bigger and more anthemic than what we're used to hearing from Wolfe" STEREOGUM "urgent and abrasive" CONSEQUENCE OF SOUND " thundering tracks that sound as if they had diliberately set about to destroy a roomful of amplifiers" BLACKBOOK

The quietest voices can be the most durable.

American Football’s original triumph, on their 1999 self-titled debut, was to reunite two shy siblings: emo and post-rock. It was a pioneering album where lyrical clarity was obscured and complicated by the stealth musical textures surrounding it.

Like Slint’s Spiderland, or Codeine’s The White Birch, even Talk Talk’s Laughing Stock, American Football asked far more questions than it cared to answer. But there wasn’t a band around anymore to explain it, anyway. The three young men who made the album – Mike Kinsella, Steve Holmes, and Steve Lamos – split up pretty much on its release.

Fifteen years later, American Football reunited (now as a four-piece, with the addition of Nate Kinsella). They played far larger shows than in their original incarnation and recorded their long-anticipated second album, 2016’s American Football (LP2). The release was widely praised, but the band members still felt like their best work was yet to come.

‘I feel like the second album was us figuring it out,’ says Nate. ‘For me, it wasn’t quite done. I knew there was still more.’

Enter American Football (LP3). ‘We put a lot of time and a lot of energy into it,’ says Mike. ‘We were all thoughtful about what we wanted to put out there. Last time, it was figuring out how to use all of our different arms. This time, we were like – Ok we have these arms, let’s use them.’ The band used the same producer, Jason Cupp, and recorded the album at the same studio (Arc Studios in Omaha, Nebraska) as its predecessor – yet they approached it in a markedly different way. There was a determination to let the songs breathe, to trust in ideas finding their own pace. The final result is a definite, and deliberate, stretching of the band.

As a result, LP3 is less obviously tethered to the band’s past than the second album. An immediate contrast between LP3 and its two predecessors is its cover. The two previous albums featured the exterior and interior of a residence in the band’s original hometown of Urbana, Illinois (now attracting fans for pilgrimages and photo opportunities), by the photographer Chris Strong. But American Football knew that LP3 was an outside record. Instead of the familiar house, this time the cover photo (again by Strong) features open, rolling fields on Urbana’s borders. It is a sign of the album’s magnitude in sound, and of the band’s boldness in breaking away from home comforts.

American Football also joked that LP3’s genre was ‘post-house’, because of this very conscious visual break. But, in a strange way, there are links in LP3 with an actual post-house genre: shoegaze. The more exploratory members of the original British shoegaze scene were inspired by the dreamtime and circularity of house music (ambient house in particular), cherishing its sonic possibilities. That spirit drips into LP3, most obviously on ‘I Can’t Feel You’, a collaboration with Rachel Goswell of Slowdive.

The album also features Hayley Williams from Paramore on the album’s catchiest moment, ‘Uncomfortably Numb’, and Elizabeth Powell, of the Québécoise act Land Of Talk. Mike wrote lyrics in French especially for her.

LP3 is contemplative, rich, expressive, yet with a queasy undercurrent. It is heavy with expectancy, revealing its ideas slowly, eliciting the hidden stories people carry around with them. ‘I feel like my lyric writing has changed a lot over the years,’ says Mike. ‘The goal is to be conversational, maybe to state something giant and heavy, but in a very plain way. But, definitely in this record, I keep things a little more vague.’ As on the first album, the lyrics on LP3 may seem confessional and concentrated, but the more you scrutinize them, the further their meaning slinks away. Or, as Mike tellingly sings on ‘I Can’t Feel You”: I’m fluent in subtlety.

‘Somewhere along the way we moved from being a reunion band to just being a band,’ says Steve Holmes. American Football is now a bona fide ongoing focus, and they are making some of the best music of their lives. American Football (LP3) stands with two other rare reunion successes – Slowdive and My Bloody Valentine’s mbv – as a fine example of how a band refinding one another can augment, rather than taint, their legacy.

‘I think that there are those albums, or the music that you heard when you were younger, and they imprint on you,’ says Nate. ‘And no matter where you go, or what you do they’re always there.’ He is talking of Steve Reich – an early and ongoing influence on American Football – but he might as well be reflecting what is said of his own band, and the ardent following they inspire. American Football stands as an enduring symbol of elusive emotional landscapes, where introspection can be as dramatic as confrontation

Old-time and traditional music stay exciting for their contrasts. Exacting instrumentation honed through mentorships and late-night jams at fiddler's conventions tangles with a community-sourced inventiveness that influences variants and new sounds. Joseph Decosimo is a master of this genre for this very reason, blending deep technique with an openness and curiosity that keep his music crackling with life. A "marvelous fiddler" (No Depression) and banjo player who braids "exultation and veneration" (INDY Week) into his music, on his third solo album Fiery Gizzard Decosimo gathers a close-knit ensemble of friends from his musical career to infuse his interpretations of fiddle and banjo pieces with a contagious communal joy. As an artist working with traditional music from the South and Appalachia, Decosimo chooses songs based not only on historical significance and lineage but also his own sensory approach. For Fiery Gizzard, his ear was tuned to otherworldly tones and mystery, sourcing from field recordings such as Virginia fiddler Luther Davis' hypnotic version of "Shady Grove" while amping up the music's psychedelic potential. On the middle Tennessee banjo composition "Flowery Girls," a VHS of bluesman Abner Jay inspired Decosimo to rig up a pickup inside a fretless banjo and play it thr ough a tube amp to capture some of Jay's edge and funkiness. But to round out the sound and keep it kinetic meant galvanizing a genre-eschewing crew to jam out - and not in a "spaced-out drooly" kind of way, he laughs, but as a sort of "responsive conversation." Decosimo has always been a community-minded artist. He began playing as a seventh graderin Tennessee, fostering relationships with older players at jams and in homes, a learning mode natural to his inquisitive nature and desire for musical connection. A folklorist by intuition, he later became one by profession, studying with old-time legend Clyde Davenport, teaching in East Tennessee State University's renowned bluegrass program, and receiving his PhD at the University of North Carolina with a dissertation titled "Catching the `Wild Note': Listening, Learning, and Connoisseurship in Old-Time Music." In North Carolina, Decosimo kicked about in the verdant environment of Durham and Chapel Hill's folk and indie scenes, collaborating with artists including Alice Gerrard, Hiss Golden Messenger, and Jake Xerxes Fussell. This community has influenced his own music, including his "sublime and strangely heartening" (Bandcamp Daily) 2022 release While You Were Slumbering and Beehive Cathedral, Decosimo's 2024 "Appalachian mountain music treasury" (New Commute) trio album with Luke Richardson and Cleek Schrey for Dear Life Records. Continuing on this path, Fiery Gizzard is home base for a loose outfit of mostly Tarheel-based musicians from within and beyond traditional music. Inspired by a tour with fiddler Stephanie Coleman (Nora Brown), guitarist Jay Hammond, and synth builder and multi-instrumentalist Matthew O'Connell, Decosimo assembled studiomates based on close friendships and comfort. Coleman, O'Connell, and Hammond contribute to Fiery Gizzard, along with bassist and producer Andy Stack (Helado Negro, Wye Oak), horn player Kelly Pratt (Beirut, David Byrne), Mipso and Fust's Libby Rodenbough, Joseph O'Connell (Elephant Micah), andtrad/experimental artist Cleek Schrey. Decosimo's fiddle and banjo work is virtuosic, intricate and simple simultaneously, a testament to his many years of study. On some tracks, his playing or lovely, plain-hearted singing is the centerpiece, such as on his interpretations of Texan street preacher Washington Phillips' 1929 recording "I Had a Good Father and Mother" or the Eastern Kentucky fiddle barn-burner "Glory in the Meetinghouse," famously played by Luther Strong for Alan Lomax. But there's also a trusting open-door policy, like where Southern Appalachian tune "Ida Red" relaxes into Coleman's sweet, confident fiddling and Hammond's loping guitar. As a bandleader, Decosimo's confidence and enthusiasm for the music reveal the heart of traditional music and how it can come to life through community. Fiery Gizzard is Joseph Decosimo as a powerful champion of traditional music - a sponge who soaks up as much as he squeezes out, a responsive artist who makes his genre accessible, and a magnet who can bring musicians of all sorts into his orbit with his same passion.

Clear Vinyl. While Jamie Saft has been a significant presence on previous RareNoise recordings by Slobber Pup, Plymouth and Metallic Taste of Blood, the renegade keyboardist and essential Downtown improviser steps into a dramatically different role on The New Standard. A collaborative trio outing featuring the dream rhythm tandem of drummer Bobby Previte and bassist Steve Swallow, both prolific composers and venerable bandleaders in their own right, it showcases Saft alternating between piano and organ and making thoughtful, melodic contributions throughout. The album is the result of a magical recording and direct mixing session in Saft's own Pottervilles Studios, masterfully setup and captured by 5 - Time Grammy winning engineer Joe Ferla, who is regarded as the fourth member of the band for this remarkably empathetic endeavour. Ferla recorded everything analog direct to two-track 1/2" tape through a Neve console. On ten original tracks, seven of which the keyboardist composed, Saft blends brilliantly with his esteemed elders on this remarkable RareNoise release.

Swampmeat is the project of Dan Finnemore, former co-frontman of cult US rock & roll act Low Cut Connie (as recommended by the likes of Rolling Stone, KEXP, and - yes - Barack Obama), not to mention his role as behind the drums of PNKSLM's own The Castillians, as well as being a former member of the notorious Black Mekon. A long-time homeown secret in his native Birmingham, Swampmeat is now ready to step out of the shadows - over ten years after the project took its first steps. "Gin & Tonic" is a collection of country-fied rock and roll, straddling the edge between country, punk and rock and roll, with great songs and melodies.

Fishing for Gravel is the debut solo mini-LP from Dublin-born, Amsterdam-based producer Paraflow (aka Niall Rogers), via Superconscious Records. Known for his work as a music supervisor and dream pop collaborator (Officer John), Paraflow dives deep into a world of EBM and dub-infused electronics-granular textures, mid-tempo chug, and flashes of blissful uplift driving seven tracks of earthy, drum-heavy synthesis. Includes a rugged remix from Superconscious' own FIO. For fans of Jonquera, Parchman, BPM AM.

CATCHY, MESMERIZINGLY BEAUTIFUL, DREAMY CHAMBER POP WITH A FOLKY TWIST

Music can have a multitude of emotional impacts and can create inner worlds out of voices, sounds, and moods.
If you open heart and ear to the mesmerizing, hauntingly beautiful soundscapes of AURI, you might find a beacon of light inside a sonic realm untouched by today’s often scary, grim realities; a dreamscape that can be profoundly uplifting.
On their third studio album, III - Candles & Beginnings’ the stars have aligned yet again. Propelled by the unique and celestial voice of Johanna Kurkela, the magical textures of Nightwish mastermind Tuomas Holopainen and the almost unlimited musical palette of Nigtwish multi-instrumentalist Troy Donockley, Auri have presented a world to be unlocked with the senses, blending folk, progressive and symphonic elements, world music, pop and avantgarde.
Right after completing Nightwish’s 2024 monument Yesterwynde, the songwriting for the third chapter in Auri’s musical adventures started in 2023, with Troy writing in Yorkshire and Tuomas and Johanna working their creative magic in Kitee, Finland. By Autumn 2024, a 10-song demo was complete, setting the stage for what would become another breathtaking Auri journey. The band and their trusted engineer Tero “Teecee” Kinnunen took the mixing process to sunny Spain, letting the Andalucian vibes infuse the music whereas in March 2025 mastering was wrapped up by Tim Oliver at the legendary Real World Studios - a ground-breaking recording complex started by Peter Gabriel in 1989.
The album is a tapestry of emotions - each song a world of its own, touching on childhood memories, vivid life experiences, and even a nod to one of the group’s most beloved places on Earth - The Lion Inn at Blakey Ridge, a historic spot nestled in the North York Moors and one of the most remote pubs you will ever find.
Visually, the cover artwork by Pete Voutilainen, layout and watercolors by Mikko Pankasalo plus calligraphy by Johanna Kurkela provide wonderful illustrations perfectly capturing Auri’s unique musical visions.
With guest musicians like Frank Van Essen (strings), Jonas Pap (cello), Juho Kanervo (basses), and the incredible drumming and percussion courtesy of Nightwish’s Kai Hahto, Auri III - Candles & Beginnings is as lush as it is atmospheric and provides astonishing dynamics.
Having been a studio endeavor in the past, Auri is finally going on tour with their first-ever live European trek kicking off in August 2025, followed by summer festivals in 2026, allowing you to hear, see and feel songs from their previous two albums, as well as brand new pieces from III - Candles & Beginnings.

Purple Vinyl 7" Single! limited edition! Chastity Belt's version of "Loaded Painted Red" doesn't just cover 764-Hero's original. It dissolves into it, rebuilding it with a gauzy, wide-open clarity. It's a song that's always carried a certain weight: bruised and echoing with late '90s Pacific Northwest melancholy. In their first-ever recorded cover, Chastity Belt traces that ache into new territory, drawing it out like bated breath. Lydia Lund threads a new guitar line through the song, tugging it towards their distinct style like a slow orbit around the song's core feeling. "I've been a fan of 764-Hero for a while now, and 'Loaded Painted Red' is one of my faves!" says Julia Shapiro. "It was hard to do the song justice because the original is so perfect, but we also had fun reimagining it and making it our own." Initially released in 1998 on 764-Hero's Get Here and Stay (Up Records), "Loaded Painted Red" has long been a fan-favorite, a softly jagged and charged meditation. The new split 7" pairs the cover with the original, a full-circle release that marks 764-Hero's catalog joining the Suicide Squeeze family. Together, the two versions collapse decades into a single foggy breath riding out the dusky golden-hour light of the Pacific Northwest.

TRSN hits release number 36 with a statement from one of the Netherlands' most promising new names. Groef steps up for his full solo debut on the label, delivering four meticulously crafted originals that twist and stretch the parameters of hypnotic, high-impact techno. Fresh off the back of appearances on Delirium Vol. II and a breakout debut EP on Bipolar Disorder, Groef showcases his signature blend of raw textures, tightly-wound percussion, and heads-down momentum. Rounding out the EP are two heavyweight remixes from French powerhouses Bours? and Ferdinger, adding their own flavour while keeping the energy locked firmly to the floor. A bold and confident six-tracker that marks Groef as one to watch.

Still Forms in Air is the debut album by Italian composer Francesca Marongiu under her own name. It draws inspiration from mid-1980s Japanese ambient music — Hiroshi Yoshimura, Satoshi Ashikawa, Takashi Kokubo — and, more subtly, from Italian experimental echoes rooted in both personal and cultural memory.

The album unfolds like suspended time, like architecture that quietly bears witness to the shifts that have shaped our cities and the ways we live in them. These tracks reflect an emotional and urban landscape, shaped by a gaze cast upon the mid-1980s and early ’90s — a time of subtle yet lasting changes in the form and meaning of shared space. That period marked a delicate turning point, later described as les années d’hiver: the slow onset of fragmentation beneath a surface of creative openness.

Still Forms in Air doesn’t dwell in nostalgia (though it draws from it), but reimagines that duality through a contemporary lens. Its sound blends memory and presence, layering ambient textures with a refined spatial sensitivity. It is a dialogue across decades — clear-eyed, affectionate, and quietly luminous.

Written, arranged and recorded by Francesca Marongiu in Rome and Pistoia between May 2024 and March 2025.
Francesca Marongiu: electronics, synthesizers, vocals, sound objects.
Antonio Gallucci: wind arrangements on track 1 and 4, bass and sound objects on track 3, drums on track 3 and 4.
Mixed by Francesca Marongiu and Antonio Gallucci. Mastered by Antonio Gallucci at Mercurial Mastering in Pistoia. Artist photo by Elisabetta Scarpini. Artwork by Daniel Castrejón.

2xLP+Book. Black & White Splatter vinyl. Between 1975-77, Chicago's southside nightclubs were experiencing dark times. The after-hours routine may have been on the up, but the sound of urban blues was on its way down, getting funkier, heavier, picking up a Zeppelin echo from the British rock scene that had raided its larder. Thankfully, lightening came by way of a lanky white guy skulking from club to club with a camera and strobe light. Chicago photographer Michael Abramson hit Perv's House, Pepper's Hideout, The High Chaparral, The Patio Lounge, and The Showcase Lounge nightly, not to capture the artists on stage but instead popping off a half-dozen rolls every night exclusively on the seldom photographed crowd. Light: On The South Side gathers more than 100 beautiful black and white Abramson images, as Numero shines its own light on yet another dark corner of the musical past. The 132-page hardback book features not just these photos, but an extended and wildly colorful ephemera section, plus an essay by British novelist and Numero fan Nick Hornby. Housed in a gorgeous slipcase with the 12X12 monograph is the 2LP set Pepper's Jukebox, a 17-track compilation of Chicago blues in transition, as heard from both the stage and the Wurlitzer.