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One of the most unique, ambitious and experimental game soundtracks ever made. Now on vinyl for the very first time.

Similar to the task of condensing Yuzo Koshiro and Motohiro Kawashima's abundance of ideas into a Mega Drive cartridge in 1994, it feels impossible to convey the influences, technical achievements and sheer ambition of their masterpiece into a single paragraph today. By combining automatic composition methods, custom programming languages and a complete sense of artistic freedom, Koshiro and Kawashima transcended their medium and created something so incomparable that it's hard to believe it came from any games console, let alone a 16bit one. Streets of Rage 3 is urgent, demanding and a complete rejection of the notion that video game music is either pedestrian or predictable. We are honoured to be releasing it.

Streets of Rage 3 is presented as a double LP in a heavyweight single pocket sleeve, with accompanying lithographic print featuring artwork from the SEGA archives in Japan. The audio was sourced from original hardware and carefully remastered in collaboration with Yuzo Koshiro, who also supplied exclusive liner notes for this release. On 180g translucent orange vinyl.

Capra Black remains one of the seminal recordings of jazz's black consciousness movement. A profoundly spiritual effort that channels both the intellectual complexity of the avant-garde as well as the emotional potency of gospel, its focus and assurance belie Billy Harper's inexperience as a leader. Backed by an all-star supporting unit including trombonist Julian Priester and drummer Billy Cobham, Harper's tenor summons the brute force and mystical resolve of John Coltrane but transcends its influences to communicate thoughts and feelings both idiosyncratic and universal. This is music of remarkable corporeal substance that somehow expresses the pure language of the soul.

After 20 years in the lab Conny Frischauf releases her debut EP for International Major Label. - Effekt und Emotion is on point when it comes to songwriting, sound aesthetic and craftsmanship. Made with a deep understanding of soundscapes and pop culture, the musical language of Conny Frischauf breathes a magical and melancholic vibe that transfers itself into the subconscious of the listener without any comment. Full of unexpected moves and elegant references which disappear right before getting aware. Music for advanced dreamers. Discrete, unique, peerless and therefore a perfect match for the IML collection.

Bubblewrap Collective and The Gentle Good are proud to present 'Y Gwyfyn', a new EP entirely in the Welsh language to celebrate Welsh Language Music Day 2018. The EP contains brand new tracks and previously unreleased material as well as outtakes and an album track from the recent Welsh Music Prize winning 'Ruins/Adfeilion'.

In keeping with the'Ruins/Adfeilion'album, themes of the naturalworld,cultural identityandsocial justice feature prominently in 'Y Gwyfyn' EP. The title  track describes a hot summer evening as perceived through the senses of a moth,  whilst 'Briwsion' (Crumbs) is a critique of social inequality in today's modern  world. Fan favourite track 'The Fisherman' (Y Pysgotwr) is reworked into the Welsh  language, followed by a brand new recording of traditional Welsh folk song 'Cariad  Cyntaf' (First Love). The EP ends with an epic 8 minute instrumental, 'Golwg y  Gwdihw' (An Owl's Eye View), a musical representation of a nocturnal woodland  scene originally recorded as part of a project for National Museum Wales. The EP features some of the finest musicians in Wales, including Jack  Egglestone on drums, Callum Duggan on bass and Georgia Ruth on vocals. The  EP also gives a platform to the stunning string arrangements of Cardiff­ based  composer Seb Goldfinch, performed beautifully by the Mavron Quartet.

Mouse on Mars is recognised as one of Germany's most defning and versatile electronic music projects. With their
anarchic mixture of sound that oscillates between uncontrollable chaos and meticulously arranged structures,
Jan St. Werner and Andi Toma have forged a unique musical language, which is readily decomposed by the
unpredictability of its myriad mutations. Free from schools of thought, genre conventions, and from the constraints
of the music establishment, they have worked under the Mouse on Mars alias for 24 years, mapping their own
idiosyncratic trajectory through a no man's land between pop, art, club music, and the avant-garde. - Jan Rohlf
Idiology takes the acoustic experiments of Niun Niggung even further, and it's this combination of electronic
and 'traditional' music -- melding keyboards and synthesizers with french horns and guitars and trumpets into a
seamless whole -- that points the way through the dead-ends of most electronica.'
- PopMatters
Andi Toma and Jan St. Werner continue to create soundscapes that blur the line between programming and live
musicianship, and sometimes between Earth and outer space.' - The A.V. Club
On April 13th Mouse on Mars will release Dimensional People,
their brand new studio album on Thrill Jockey.
The album features Werner and Toma joined by a number of
prolifc guests: Justin Vernon (Bon Iver), Zach Condon (Beirut),
Spank Rock, Aaron and Bryce Dessner (The National), Swamp
Dogg, Eric D. Clarke, Lisa Hannigan, Amanda Blank, Sam
Amidon, Ensemble Musikfabrik, and about 20 more musical
collaborators.
After a series of notorious dance oor releases, Dimensional
People reveals them working deep within their own vernacular,
digging into fertile terrain of their inexhaustible vault of digital
and acoustic experimentation, and charismatically making
elemental components new again. This album makes clear how
their craft is of discovery, of fnding new contexts for places,
sounds, memories, sensations, ambiences, technologies,
relationships, and of course, people.

For her first single, the sublime title 'Loverboy' comes out as a big urban spleen, released in a space made of asphalt and artificial paradises. Groups like Hooverphonic or even Portishead play around this throbbing softness that is Loverboy, splashing about in the electronic lounge of the 90s.

The opener, 'Alien Lady' features a flute-driven solo backed up by a funky guitar riff that then transitions into a tropical beat and Tanja narrating the story of feeling a stranger in a big city, not understanding the social codes and clues 'I don't speak the language in the way that you know' while Worth to you is a dreamy, glitched-out hypnotic track which maintains an edge of mysterious sexuality and her signature sense of intimate detachment.

If the atmosphere coming out of Lomboy's work can be sometimes felt as prude and even shy, it certainly does not intend to hide with embarrassment the aphrodisiac scent that permeates it. On the contrary, this modesty perceived in the interpretation and in the production sensually envelops the different compositions, and imparts to this guilty pleasure the feeling of a stolen kiss. Warped Caress brings us to vertiginous heights and takes us into abyssal depths throughout the five tracks. This suggests at times a diegetic representation of this erotic world seen through the insolent prose and at other times a mimetic representation where each instrument plays an important part in every story told.

'Intraverso is a journey in that momentary 'inbetween land' that many of us experience sometimes. It explores the turmoil of feelings of when one gets stuck in the middle, floating in between ambition and complete stillness'.

Fabrizio Lapiana is a well-known name on the contemporary Italian techno scene. He has been involved in music since the 90's when he started DJ'ing in his hometown Rome. To date he has over two handfuls of releases on labels such as Figure Jams, Arts and M_Rec Ltd - as well as his own imprint, the well renowned Attic Music, founded in 2008.
Intraverso is Fabrizio's debut album, set for release on his label. The record is a very personal journey, according to the artist himself. You here find him examining different territory than where he usually heads within his productions. The album, which consists of nine songs in total, was composed between April 2016 and February 2017 in his studio in Rome. Written in a state of 'introspect', we here see an artist in motion. Changing. Evolving. The perfect moment to explore something new and unveil a different side of yourself to the world.

The intro 'Early Morning Waves' opens the album with its own quiet dramatic tone, waves hitting the shore as we move into 'Bret'. A cloud-walking kind of melody welcomes you, accompanied by a curious beat driving the journey forward. A deep heavy bassline and almost ancient sounding melody rises in 'Onironauta' (reflecting 'Early Morning Waves' mystical mood) until more playful elements blends in. The contemplative bass elements continue in the title track of the album; 'Intraverso' is a track of mind traveling discovery, yet before drifting too far you are grabbed by a snare, a clap of white noise and a pulsating beat to keep you on track. Further on, 'Lost In Negative Thoughts (reshaped)' reveals itself with its heavy ominous drumbeats and a dark spun web of strings is joined by sounds of distant life and machinery. Then there is 'Distance' which is the album's first flirt with more dancefloor friendly territory. Still under a veil of ill-lit melodies, expertly programmed percussion and claps creates something for a more personal body move experience. Moving into 'Again' sees the expedition continuing journeying through the dancefloor, albeit in a deeper landscape where flickering extraterrestrial sounds watches you go along. In 'Backlit' you find the albums most organic moment, an ambient slow thoughtful walk through the consciousness of the producer - only to end up with the album's final moment; 'Freckles (beatless)'. Here we drift deeper off into slow ambient melodies with a comforting thoughtful bassline taking us to the end of our voyage.

Lapiana has composed an album where you get to travel with him on a sonic journey into the deepest corners of his mind, baring vulnerabilities as well as strengths. Intraverso carries a feeling of ancient atmosphere via its melodic language through its whole running time, perhaps since the foundation of the album is based on emotions and the mind. Thoughts, feelings and mental states that always have been with us, no matter the time and place. It is a mature debut album for an artist that proves he is willing to risk going into different areas than the tried and tested ground. One might say Intraverso is a record created for an introvert introspective dancer, willing to see what lies beyond that of which is visible at first glance.

For this release Metrist delves into a set of carefully constructed and deeply rhythmic but ear-grabbingly idiosyncratic, mixed fidelity dancefloor-geared oddities.

The first three tracks are united, in a fashion, by the artist's skill at programming a series of drum tracks that set a definite tone for the productions. Within a quite partisan field of often microscopic generic variety, largely pinned down to the tempo and timbre of electronic drums, here Metrist has pursued a tricky-to-define path. The bounce of new jack swing is twisted amongst stripped back polyrhythms, equal parts groove and glitch seasoned by some futuristic acid filters that create a constantly shifting aura of space and textural nuance around the individual drum hits. Quite often arrhythmic interjections punctuate these 'grooves', be it the sawing bursts of noise and snarled, incoherent vocals on 'An Soaep', the non-language and playful, bubbling bass surrounding the half time feel of 'On Golden Seize' that builds to something approximating an industrial take on UK Funky or the brash sub-wobbles that intrude 'Pantomimer Tongue's juddering knife-scraping-on-a-balloon stutters.

'Caaacel the Horze' closes the record in a less weighty style, with crunchy arpeggios running on a synth that sounds like it's picking up interference from a radio channel, as snatches of moaned vocals allude to a deeply ambiguous yet chilling narrative behind the music. Thudding kicks intrude on the skittish melody but in a non-rhythmic way reminiscent of someone trying desperately to snatch your attention by banging on the adjacent wall. Gauzy melodic textures in the background provide a calming counterpoint to the uneasy qualities of the composition.

An ethereal, unresolved presence fading into the stereo field, Hilja breathes into life with a haunted synth line and self-sampling vocal hook that instantly creates an enchanted space. Hilja is the debut album by Glasgow-based musician Maria Rossi aka Cucina Povera. Named after a style of southern Italian traditional cooking associated with precarity and making-do, a philosophy of simplicity and stoicism that applies perfectly to the spare but beautiful music Rossi experiments with. Hilja's marriage of minimal synth, field recordings and the hymnal dexterity of Rossi's vocal performances creates a new language, sometimes literally, to be spoken in some mythological Fourth World we've yet to create.
Originally from Finland, Rossi brings an acute sense of space, surroundings, and practicality to her working practice, with each composition often relying on a limited sound palette to create deeply affecting messages which transcend language. Cucina Povera's power is to communicate purely, often down to the solo-choir nature of Rossi's multi-layered voice, an achingly beautiful instrument which has seems to have an innate spirituality in its grain. The tension between the means and the end is at the heart of Cucina Povera, the invocation of a kind of secular spirituality at times using nothing but Rossi's voice. Indeed there's almost a Dogme-like purity to the arrangements: Elektra is a soothing song based around the lapping waves of Rossi's wordless backing vocals and a simple field recording of stones knocked together. Kehoitus is completely a cappella, a haunted fairytale told in glossolalia, evoking a quasi-religious experience with very little.
For music often minimal and simple there's a boldness that belies Hilja's status as a debut. Rossi allows each word, each sound and rhythm to exist in its own space, finding its own relationship with its surroundings. Mesikämmenen Veisu is perhaps the most ecclesiastical sounding composition here, burbling water trickles below a virtuoso vocal, with incredible arrangements in several registers undulating above. A meditation to relieve hunger and restriction, it's a perfect summing up of Hilja, a music ambient but completely earthed, finding enchantment in what you have to hand, the realism of magic, the magic of realism.
First Press limited to 300 with hand-screened sleeves.

First release of five in the Kavalanic Languages series by label founder Gunnar Haslam. Four cuts of vibrant, psychedelic techno.

Blue fabric-covered deluxe replica gatefold with circle cut on the front and white hot stamp, printed paper inner-sleeve and black vinyl. includes CD (inserted in a clear pvc wallet) the new album! vinyl tracklisting : Side A: Sous le sable, Lasso, Fontaine de lait, Seeds, Les loups, Je ne mâche pas mes mots Side B : Twix, Nuit debout, Piscine, Fille à papa, Langue The internationally celebrated artist, award winning singer and composer Camille releases 'OUÏ' her fifth studio album and first for Because Music on June 2nd. Recorded over a year in La Chartreuse, a 14th century monastery-turned-artist's residence in Avignon, France 'OUÏ' is a cornucopia thrumming with folk, hymns, ballads, pop, lullabies and breathtaking a cappella. 'The story of the album is like this, moving from the arcane drums' - percussion is used throughout as the bedrock - 'to the treble and harmonics and light in my voice.' An instrument of exhilarating range and phenomenal power, Camille's voice provides all the vocal parts on 'OUÏ'. 'All the voices are telling a story,' she says, 'and I am all the voices. Co-produced by Camille with two of her longtime collaborators, composer and multi-instrumentalist Clement Ducol and sound and mixing engineer Maxime Leguil, and featuring the versatile Moog analogue synthesiser, 'OUÏ' is a work with a pulse. 'It really resonates,' says Camille, 'On some songs there are no drums, just this sub-bass like a kick drum, which leads the way and gives it a beat.' While she sets out to write politically charged songs inspired by drum-driven French traditional dances, that reflect upon the country's recent, tragic events, she was equally led to something peaceful, vowel-oriented and vibrational in her exploration of sound. The latter explains the album's title, 'Oui' - ooo...eee - a playfulness with sounds and language, a breaking free from its oft imposed restrictions.

Hailing from Mali, Amadou Bagayoko and Mariam Doumbia first met as children at Mali's Institute for the Young Blind—both lost their vision at an early age. It was here that they started performing in the institute's Eclipse Orchestra, eventually marrying and began recording together in the '80s.

Over the span of three decades Amadou (guitar and vocals) and Mariam (vocals) developed an international following having recorded eight full-length albums and toured around the world. Their album Welcome To Mali (2008) was nominated for the Best Contemporary World Music Album' at the 52nd Grammy Awards. Tour highlights for the duo include supporting U2 on their U2 360 Tour, performing at the 2010 World Cup for FIFA's Kick-Off Celebration and performing alongside major acts across multiple genres such including Blur, Coldplay and Pink Floyd's David Gilmour.

The album also includes the hit single Bofou Safou,' which Stereogum calls the funk, the whole funk, and nothing but the funk.' The band discussed La Confusion and performed new music on a recent stop at KCRW's Morning Becomes Eclectic' during their recent sold out North American seventeen city headline tour — watch HERE. The band played major markets including New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Chicago, Washington D.C., Philadelphia, Montreal.

Amadou & Mariam recently released the Bofou Safou EP via Because Music. The EP includes the first two La Confusion singles, Bofou Safou' and Filaou Bessame,' alongside remixes of the EP's title track by Fatima Yamaha, Africaine 808, Henrik Schwarz and more. The term bofou safou' is a Bambara (the Malian national language) nickname given to nonchalant young men who would rather dance than work. Of the new EP, the group notes, We really like the remixes that were made for the EP. You get to hear our music in a different form, which is great. All five remixes manage to catch the essence of our song while really pushing those enticing afro pop and electronic vibes further.'

That we live in a world changed is beyond question. Since 2015's Zenith, Berlin-based songwriter Molly Nilsson has surrendered to the world, traveling from Mexico to Glasgow, observing the changing socio-political landscape and imagining a better world. For an artist who has so successfully created her own environment and gradually let others in, her 8th studio album Imaginations sees Nilsson directly engaging with her surroundings, engendering change and allowing love in. Imaginations dreams big, recasting storming, stadium-sized pop into the internal language of the solo auteur. Imaginations is not escapism, it's a kaleidoscope and an alternative view, an agent of change.Opener Tender Surrender encapsulates Imaginations, a tango on the ruins of the past, like many of Nilsson's best songs a collision between the political and personal. Though potentially a love song, there's a glowing anger in the lines I want your ruin, I want destruction, I won't be through until we mend this...' this is rapturous transformation, order and chaos. Molly has built an almost 10 year career on perfectly summing up how we feel and this is no different... Who else could write a song about privilege (Let's Talk About Privileges) and make a heart-rending chorus of It's never being afraid of the police, it's expecting every thank you, every please.' The artist's vision on this album is perhaps more forceful than the emotionally fragile moments of previous album Zenith, at times exemplified on songs like Memory Foam, a bright, driving pop song that belies themes of nostalgia and the past, reminding us that Molly alone can make us feel so welcome in loneliness. If there's overt anger in songs like Money Never Sleeps, an anthem for a post-capitalist utopia if ever there was one, there's also seams of optimism sewn into the album's genetic code. Any revolutionary will tell you that anger alone achieves nothing - Nilsson's mission on Imaginations is to offer some alternatives we can hold close. Not Today Satan is a song about accepting love as the agent of change, Don't be sad, but do get mad at all the small men who act so tall, in the end they always fall, there ain't no sin in giving in to love, that's just how we're winning the fight.' Love can be visceral, a weapon with which to fight the power.On Imaginations Molly is recasting her interior monologue as a prism through which to see the world, a means to live differently and to reject the status quo. We can Think Pink, change our destiny together. This is an optimism about the future when we need it the most. New boys, new girls.. give me your smile and I'll give you mine' Clearly, we are living through a transformation but with alchemists like Molly Nilsson, we're never alone in the process.

Visible Cloaks' Lex proposes a utopian dream language and its accompanying sound, a limitless, delicate space developed by fluid musical techniques and subconscious voices. The six pieces comprising Lex simulate a more peaceful future, their mysteries telling a new tale in an unknown but imaginable melodic language. Visible Cloaks are the Portland-based musicians Spencer Doran and Ryan Carlile. Utilizing software-based composition rooted in randomization, MIDI-translation and chance operations, the duo has established an improbable humanist mode of music from esoteric processes. Following their self-titled debut album, Visible Cloaks offered Reassemblage, an album simultaneously honoring the post-Yellow Magic Orchestra school of avant musical adventure and diverging from it. Veering from the paths cleared by Japanese and Italian electronic pop and ambient artists of the mid-80s / early-90s, Reassemblage established Visible Cloaks' own camp in a forest of deep sound canopied by trees grown from synthetic seeds.The sound represented on Lex is webbed with sculptural arrangements and interpolated by the sounds of alien speech. These strange and serene utterances were created by Doran feeding a chain of multiple dialects and accents through a language translation software to create an auditory poetry of an evolved place and time.

Lex features both the final version of this process and earlier, simplified experiments with it ( Keys'). The idea - building on 'fourth world' or 'global village' type concepts - was to create a projected language that was a fusion of many,' Doran explains. The result was a very disorienting form of non-language that amplifies the lapses in meaning that occur with the inaccuracy of auto-translation software.'

Permutate Lex, a companion short film to Lex made by Visible Cloaks in collaboration with artist Brenna Murphy (who also created the artwork for Reassemblage and several virtualist videos for the album), is an integral counterpart, both visualizing an aesthetic alive with human form and guiding the sonic experience of the first five pieces: Wheel,' Frame,' Transient,' Keys,' and title track Lex.' World,' the longest piece presented on Lex, is redrawn from a generative composition originally produced for an installation Doran made with Murphy.

The original work incorporates LFOs and randomized MIDI-information, and was intended to variate indefinitely. In this 'fixed' version, World' provides a more conclusive view into the impossible musical environments Visible Cloaks make real. Longer than any track on
Reassemblage, World' expresses the deepening, patient intimations suggested by Lex.

Doran says the Lex attempts to communicate the essence of a world distant enough that it can't be captured or comprehended from the present, appearing only surreal and inscrutable.' The statement reveals a broader musical philosophy fueling this new moment, an awakened voice woven through complex melodic shapes and phrases establishes communication between listeners and the unknown, here presented by Visible Cloaks as sounds coloring the very edge of the envisionable.

With their second album Kin Sonic, Jupiter and Okwess transcend the Congo's unexplored musical heritage and dive into a pool of modernity. We're invited to savour his latest recipe, the Okwess ('food' in the Kibunda language) which is the fruit of all the encounters and influences he has absorbed during his many journeys around the world. It's a recipe based on perfect alchemy.

Aketi Ray are an all-acoustic dub-jazz group, playing original compositions grounded in the instrumental music of post-independence Jamaica -ska, rocksteady, reggae, rockers, dub -but drawing inspiration and influence from Ethiopian and US jazz, west African percussion traditions, all with the mind set of UK steppas. An outernational sound: Kingston to Chicago to Addis Ababa to Dakar to London.The sound of "From Ever Since" draws on the vibes and heritage of pre-electr(on)ic music, but gives that traditional sound new power through the use of dub techniques of reverb, delay and EQ manipulation.The Aketi Ray sound Band leader 'Mikus' Gorecki explains: At the time I was listening to a lot of tuff digital dub tunes, and much as I love that sound still, I thought there was a lack of dubwise music getting made that had that live feel of the 60s and 70s. At the same time I didn't want to just rehash the past - the best you can do is come close to replicating that sound, you definitely won't beat it. So I decided to try something different, and bring in other connected jazz and African influences to the mix. 'Sometimes when people fuse different music traditions it can sound a bit of a collage, the elements are all there but they don't actually fuse together. I think we have our own sound, and it's greater than the sum of its parts.The compositions are forward-looking, form-pushing, and although there are no vocals, they are message-driven, concerned with conditions of modern life, spirituality and politics. Mikus says The music definitely has a message. Each track has a very clear subject in mind when writing it, but it's down to the listener to tune in to that and take from that what they will. I find you can say more with the abstract language of music than you can in words.'

Throughout its nearly 20­year heroic label's journey, Turbo Recordings has fulfilled its pledge to 'keep on lookin' for the music' no matter where it takes them, working with artists from cultures as diverse as Sweden, Finland, England, Spain, Scotland, Mexico, Australia, France, Argentina, Switzerland, Germany, Belgium, Italy, the United States, Israel, Denmark and Toronto. We realize that certain parts of the world are still underrepresented, and are working hard to correct this. Our Antarctic A&R guy has been asleep at the wheel for far too long, and can expect a sternly­worded e­mail any day now.All of which brings us to our newest core artist, Russia's Dimitri Veimar. We'd like to tell you we discovered him when he and his friends shot down our Eurasian Outreach Ableton Tutorial Helicopter for being 'too condescending,' but the truth is actually much simpler. Veimar is merely fluent in the universal language of floor­filling, one that transcends borders and skin­crawling descriptions alike. It is a primal tongue describing a future where all communication is elevated to an endless loop of sweat­drenched club­goers pressed tightly against the front of the stage, smiling at everything you do.

What attracts us to Chilean-born artist Ricardo Tobar is the notion of intersection, and although fusion is nothing new, as a concept it will always pull our heartstrings. Applying influence is amateur, we see this over and over again as we endure trend-driven appropriation of cultures the world over, but the epiphany when an artist finds true synergy between heritage and influence is a pivotal moment that the inspired will seek, even though it may take the length of one's career to behold. As pretentious as that may sound, it is precisely the hybrid born from that place of intersection that
excites us at the ESP Institute, the 'A plus B that equals 3'. We hear this in Ricardo's music — the Latin American instinct in his drums and percussion, sometimes tightly aligned with body movements and other times hauntingly mis-aligned and chaotic, intersects with his rock influence of ethereal (micro) melodies that slowly layer and layer until we're climbing a glorious (macro) wall of sound — but most importantly we hear where these different parts of his life come together to further create one unique voice. On both sides of his ESP Institute debut Liturgia, Tobar couples one pulsing dance-driven track with another atmospheric and immersive track, requiring we educate ourselves in the polarity of this language he's building, one that will expand to tell a broader story later this year with his debut album. We welcome Ricardo Tobar, another forward-thinking artist, to the ESP Institute, and are proud to support any direction his compass points from here, as we believe he'll never follow but will always lead.

Re-issued again, with new liner notes. A wonderful, rare record wrapped in a mysterious yet playful ambiance. Or maybe it's just the impression that the Japanese language often gives me. ''Suiren'' is an odd jazz-fusion-wave tune that sounds like its boiling, waiting to burst but somehow manages to stay in control. Like the nervous tick of a leg fidgeting under the table of a restaurant on a first date. Yasuaki Shimizu is a Japanese composer, producer and saxophone player born in 1954. He worked with Ryuchi Sakimoto on certain arrangements, with the South Korean artist Nam June Paik on art+sound installation pieces and even DJ Towa Tei (of Deee-Lite fame). ''Suiren'' was released in 1981 and is the opening title on the sought-after ''Kakashi'' album and is my personal favorite on this overall brilliant record. It weaves behind new wave, jazz, fusion, ambient and experimental music.Repetitive and hypnotizing, punctuated by exclamation marks on most first mesures, the muted triangle percussion hits me straight in the heart. About 90 seconds into the song, the saxophone makes its appearance and the song goes from ''this is cute'' to ''oh, this is some serious shit!''. Shimizu's saxophone frees the song from the rest of the elements which are more calculated and repetitive.A joyful, mysterious slow-moving train ride led by the artist's mellow voice that rocks us with this calming but funky lullaby. Every phrase is punctuated by the xylophone there to energize the piece, albeit very subtely.

(180gr) An incredible album from Lo Borges - one of the best singer/songwriters on the Brazilian scene of the 70s!

An incredible album from Lo Borges - one of the best singer/songwriters on the Brazilian scene of the 70s! Borges first burst into the spotlight for his work on the Club Da Esquina album by Milton Nascimento - and his work as part of Milton's "corner club" really helped shape the style of the more famous singer. Yet Borges is almost an equally great talent on his own - with a soaring, soulful approach that's every bit as great as the best Nascimento material from the period - and recorded in a wonderfully similar spirit! The sound here is completely sublime right from the start - music that moves us, even if we can't understand the language of the lyrics - like some of the best work by Caetano Veloso and Gilberto Gil. There's maybe a bit more guitar than on some of the Milton Nascimento work of the period - but used in a fuzzy way that slides in nicely with some of the jazzy phrasing of the instrumentation - which is delivered with help from key contemporaries who include Beto Guedes, Nelson Angelo, Toninho Horta, and Tenorio Jr. The songwriting is amazing - and titles include "Cancao Postal", "Voce Fica Melhor Assim", "Nao Foi Nada", "Calibre", "Faca Seu Jogo", "Toda Essa Agua", "Pensa Voce", "Como O Machando", and "Aos Baroes".