Hip-Hop Vinyl New Releases - News

Before Aretha hit big with her stomping southern soul sound in the late 60s, she'd already had quite a career. Beginning as a gospel singer Franklin spent the early 60s recording in a variety of styles to varying success. While her other releases were overproduced and poppy, these very early recordings with the Ray Bryant group are beautiful jazz vocal stylings in the manner of Sarah Vaughan or Ella Fitzgerald. Beautifully recorded with no overdubs this is fantastic early 60s jazz and her voice is as perfect a fit for this material as it is for the soul she's famous for.

Names You Can Trust teams up with spacey synth wiz Donatinho and his father, the legendary João Donato, to release an exclusive 7-inch single from the duo's fantastic new album, Sintetizamor. While the full-length is only available in Brazil, this crisp single, mastered especially for vinyl, will be reaching stores in the US and around the world this summer.

Included are two cuts that set modern boogie funk fans alight when they leaked out online: "Lei Do Amor," with a sophisticated slinky groove that brings to mind a Brazilian Kashif, and the talkbox feature "Surreal," a knowing nod to Herbie Hancock's classic "I Thought It Was You" with all the hip touches the Rio de Janerio Donato duo do so effortlessly.

The single comes housed in a custom screened NYCT company sleeve with a full color postcard reproduction of the album cover art, a spectacular image crafted by Allan Jefferson of D.C. Comics.

It was the year 1977 when a bunch of musicians went into a small studio somewhere in North Carolina. They called themselves Mel-O-Madnezz and what they were about to record was nothing but a monstrous 2-sider. "What You Getting High On" is what the funk fans may prefer over the flip side. But let me tell you, "Beautiful Day" with its charming intro is no less exciting! Regardless where you listen to both songs, either on a loud sound system in a club or in your living room at home, as soon as the needle hits the grooves you will have a Beautiful Day!

A brand new collection of 13 dance classics & fans favourites. Includes "Thriller", "Blood on the Dancefloor", "Scream", "Dirty Diana", "Xscape", "Ghosts" & more plus a brand new bonus track which is a 5 song mix ('The White Panda Mash Up'). Fans can unlock an immersive augmented reality experience from their mobile device. Includes a collectable poster.

As with the previous volumes, the third edition is also released on this ultra limited, lavishly produced 1940s style 6 x 10" album set which boasts four exclusive extra tracks. Issued with extensive biographical notes and exclusive photographs.

New label which will showcase top funk producers on the scene under an alias umbrella of B Boy Funk Breaks personna. The label will focus on the important elements of any hip hop or funk dj ie the drums. Doing what it says on the tin taking rare funk tracks and re editing the fat back drums the imprint will aim to deliver limited edition small pressings of peak time jam hot dancefloor fodder for the breakers, B-Boys & B-Girls to give them the ammo to throw their best moves.... Hopefully some sound to follow.

Most of the musicians who gathered to record this fantastic spiritual jazz record for the Strata-East label on May 24th, 1974 had crossed each other's paths in various musical pairings over the preceding few years. Husband and wife team Dee Dee Bridgewater (vocals) and Cecil Bridgewater (trumpet) had been working together on albums like Frank Foster's "Loud Minority", and Roy Ayers' "Coffy" and "Virgo Red". Ten weeks before the "Freedom Of Speech" session, the couple had been joined in Tokyo by Cecil's brother Ronald Bridgewater (tenor saxaphone) to record Dee Dee's debut album, the beautiful "Afro Blue". Also in the studio on May 24th, 1974 was Donald Smith, (piano, vocals), fresh from recording on his older brother Lonnie Liston Smith's "Cosmic Funk" - on which Ronald Bridgewater had also played percussion. Cecil McBee (bass) was also there - just two weeks before, he'd completed his own Strata East date "Mutima", and in February he'd played on Mtume's "Rebirth Cycle" - with both albums also featuring Dee Dee Bridgewater on vocals. He'd also played on Lonnie Liston Smith's "Astral Travelling".

So 1974 was a huge year for all five of these people. Donald Smith and Cecil McBee were six months away from recording on Lonnie Liston Smith's massive "Expansions", with McBee fitting in a few Pharoah Sanders albums in between.

AND THEN, THE MYSTERY ... So with all this fervent activity, the question has to be asked ...Who was Billy Earl Parker Jr (drums), the leader of this session

Billy Parker remains unlisted as a musician on all major jazz sites. His only other recording appears to be as a percussionist on Charles Tolliver's "Impact" in 1975. Then there's nothing.

Finally, by backtracking one of those Zoom info pages, I found a summary of a "SUNY Rockland Community College" 2002 press release that no longer exists :

"Billy Parker's Fourth World Legacy Concert ...The concert, Billy Parker's Fourth World Legacy, is the eighth annual tribute honouring the late percussionist and RCC educator, Billy Parker. A long-time Rockland County resident, Parker began his affiliation with RCC in 1987, building its jazz program and maintaining his life-long tradition of teaching and inspiring others. A lifelong student himself, Parker was near completion of his doctorate in music education at New York University when he died in 1996.

But then people began to read this blog post, and in the comments, Aaron Fuller said :

"Billy Parker was my uncle. He was an incredibly talented, smart, and kind man. I'm very happy to see that folks are still enjoying his masterpiece. Just to give you a bit more information about him... He was born and raised in Buffalo, NY and then attended college at Michigan State University. He met my aunt in Lansing. They lived in NY and toured in Europe for quite a while. Sometime later they relocated to Nyack, NY and he ended up on the faculty of the community college while he pursued advanced degrees from NYU. He was an Ellington scholar. Although his name isn't well-known even among the most avid jazz fans, I think that if you were to talk to some of the great NY musicians that were around in the late 60s and 70s you would find that most knew him. He also had a huge impact as a music educator and I have no doubt that his former students are all over the place, continuing to put his love of the art into practice."

Invisible Starlight is a ripping tune by an unknown midwestern funk outfit with a driving backbeat and soaring horns. It sounds like Ohio to us, but we can't be certain.
However, we are sure that this band must have rocked local bowling alleys and lounges wherever they went. Universal Cave is proud to present our edit to
our fellow 45 loving movers and groovers.
On the flip, The Beat Broker rounds out the original with his signature style and an impeccable ear. The Kind Dub's sun drenched delay and reinforced drums ensure that Invisible Starlight will shine on any dancefloor.

ASTRO TAPES & STAR CREATURE team up with the GREAT LAKES ACCELERATED TRANSIT ALLIANCE to create a soundtrack of original music produced by DJ MOPPY (BOOGIE MUNSTERS CREW) representing the underground electronic dance sounds of both Chicago and Detroit.

TIM ZAWADA takes listeners on another healthy aquatic adventure for 90 minutes of relaxing, contemporary electronic RnB music bringing the gap between modern Funk, Deep house & New school electronic soul & RnB. "CONTEMPORARY JACUZZI AEROBICS VOLUME 2" comes with a full color insert.

Far Out Recordings are honoured to be working with master composer, arranger and pianist, Antonio Adolfo for the first time since releasing his Destiny album in 2007. This time we present the first ever vinyl reissue of his era-defining Viralata LP: An essential album from Brazil's majorly progressive heyday of late seventies jazz-funk. Viralata is a sacred artefact of Brazilian music, which Antonio himself describes as 'a product of my hybrid musical influences that joins together flavours of marchinhas de carnaval, frevo, toada, classical, baia o, mpb and jazz, etc'.

The album's first track 'Cascavel' is the emotionally charged, celebratory dance anthem, which became a London jazz-dance classic in the early '90s after Far Out label boss Joe Davis discovered a handful of copies in a second hand shop in Sao Paulo and brought them back to London to sell to DJs like Gilles Peterson and Patrick Forge. In recent years the track has been played out by the likes of Floating Points, Mr Scruff and Andrew Ashong, it was also the last song ever to play on the hallowed soundsystem of London's beloved club Plastic People...

Saturday nights at Plastic People wouldn't have been the same without this album. Cascavel was such an important track for the club, it was the last tune we played there before the doors were closed forever.'

(Sean McAuliffe, Plastic People & NTS Radio)

Viralata sits comfortably on the same pedestal as Azymuth's Light As A Feather and Joao Donato's Quem É Quem, which is no co-incidence. All three keystone LPs were recorded and engineered by Toniniho, considered by many to be "the Brazilian Rudy Van Gelder" whose magic touches in the studio also helped to produce Marcos Valle's Previsão Do Tempo and Joyce's Água E Luz among many other holy grails and unassailable classics of soulful Brazilian music.

Antonio's work has been widely performed by his legendary Brazilian contemporaries including Sergio Mendes, Emilio Santiago and Erasmo Carlos, but also by platinum-selling American icons including Stevie Wonder, Herb Alpert and Dionne Warwick. Following an early 70s spell of studying jazz in the USA, Viralata's release in 1979 arrived at the height of a flourishing period of Antonio's career. With his late 60s and 70s output following through on his influences of tropicalia, funk, MPB and easy listening, the almost entirely instrumental Viralata marked an apex for Brazilian jazz.

The Dubplate series continues with Scrimshire bringing us a frighteningly funky pair of edits, released for the first time on vinyl, well in time for Halloween.

Lalomie's Strangeness finds the master of the chop shop slicing and dicing a particularly freaky serving of soul with some rather devilish vocals to boot.

Ray's Superstitions takes one of the finest, and more obscure, versions of this fright night favourite and gives it a petrifying percussive workout complete with monstrous Moogs a-go-go!

An essential slab of wax for All Hallows' Eve courtesy of your favourite Dubplate provider!

Louie Vega's latest album, Louie Vega Starring... is a dualdisc conceptual record featuring over twenty-five artists on twenty-eight different songs. The record is Louie Vega's first solo album ever and a contender for his magnum opus. Vega is in esteemed company, with a seasoned group of collaborators imparting their magic for this special project including; Funkadelic & George Clinton; The 3 Winans Brothers and The Clark Sisters; Jocelyn Brown; Nick Monaco & Soul Clap; N'Dea Davenport; Lisa Fischer; Cindy Mizelle; Anane Vega; Monique Bingham; Caron Wheeler (Soul II Soul); Josh Milan; Bucie; Tony Momrelle; Kaylow; Vikter Duplaix; Cassio Ware; Adeva, Covertion & Leroy Burgess; Kenny Bobienl; Zara McFarlane; Luis Salinas; Roberto Roena; Diviniti; and Byron Stingily.

By bringing together the diverse genres of house, funk, latin soul and gospel, Louie Vega has created a record filled with positive vibes. Like a fine bottle of wine, the album's ingredients and their interactions with each other come to the light upon pressing play. Listeners can expect notes of Afro & Latin and pure house infused with funk, gospel, Caribbean, jazz, r&b, soul. All the ingredients for a truly global party.

Each song is uniquely crafted to represent a different emotion, energy or experience. Their melange with Louie Vega's timeless music production is the album's true treat, 'Today's listener wants to feel good and that's exactly what our songs and tracks do. We celebrate the gift of love, art and music,' adds Vega. Followers of his illustrious career will find the album unveils a completely new side of the legendary artist; that of a sound chemist. Louie explains, 'My inspirations came from various visits around the world and experiences in life. As far as the album's sounds, I revisited lots of R&B, soul, gospel, nu jazz, even some disco, all within the backdrop of house music, took it back to the artist and song tailoring' .

Describing his artistic process, 'The album came together naturally, it was a growing process. It was like planting a tree, each branch represented an artist, a sound, a groove. The entire process happened within a few years. It started with a few songs and then this past year, I was in a creative state and the music happened back to back. As I travelled and toured, I met artists on the road and would record with them a few weeks later. The experience with the artists on the album was magical; they are all so talented and very unique and have their own special quality.'

The delivered sampling of featured artists on Louie Vega Starring... is one for the record books and a must for any music aficionado as Louie explains, 'This body of work is a masterpiece that will be party of my legacy. I see it up there on the same high shelf with albums like Nuyorican Soul, Elements of Life, and Masters at Work.'

REPRESSED !
1970's "Osmium" was Parliament's debut album and possibly the first real indicator of where George Clinton and his notorious band of psychedelic funksters might be headed. The ground zero of P-Funk if you will. Existing since the late 50's as a doo-wop group it was the bands later offerings that sculpted their unique, mildly warped idea of what the FUNK should sound like. Initially they cut a couple of 45's for Detroit Soul label Invictus in 1970 (both of which appear on the LP) then embarked on recording more music for the project, their first full length offering on the label. The group also released the debut Funkadelic LP in the same year with both albums feature the same personnel. The conditions under which "Osmium" was realised have since passed off into mythical status with colourful anecdotes involving marathon LSD consuming sessions in isolation in their Toronto studio and a general air of hallucinatory, intense mental psychosis prevailing throughout. It's under this druggy haze that Parliament honed their own sound, a raucous, blown out, tripping stew of R&B, Blues, Soul and Funk replete with early P-Funk trappings.
"Osmium" is a fascinating ride, wild, rampaging heaviness of the most soulful kind. A glimpse into what was to come from one of the most enduring and colourful groups of the last 5 decades. Often a very difficult LP to track down it has always been sought after and extremely expensive to buy. Appealing to fans of Black music, Rock and psychedelia equally it's contents have shocked, entertained and grooved open minded music lovers since it's release over 40 years ago.
This is the first time the record has been reissued in over a decade, complete with original artwork. Remastered, reissued and fully licensed with the full permission and involvement of Invictus Records, Detroit.

Beat Electric are ready to press up another batch of Disco-funk classic Carmen - Time to Move. The record will be repressed in a limited batch and will be exclusively distributed by Rush Hour. Pre-orders as always recommended.

Right after LA POLIZIA INCRIMINA, LA LEGGE ASSOLVE (HIGH CRIME), the magic duo of Italian poliziotteshi conceive yet another highlight of the genre - the groovy, melancholic score of MILANO TREMA: LA POLIZIA VULE GIUSTIZIA (THE VIOLENT PROFESSIONALS, 1973), which perfectly sets the tone of metropolitan violence presented on the screen. A dramatic sound, which preludes the acidprog and gloomy music created for IL GRANDE RACKET (THE BIG RACKET) just three years later, with lots of flutes, clavinet, frenzied percussions, deep basslines and experimental effects.

The result is a disturbing atmosphere of suspence, always on the verge of exploding in deep piano notes that highlight the most violent moments of the film. With the main theme Blue Song', repeated several times with endless instrumental variations, the De Angelis brothers set a dark-romantic atmosphere which becomes a manifesto of disenchantment and the perfect accompaniment for the detective story.

Four Flies Records, in collaboration with Bloodbuster Edizioni, is proud to present the complete soundtrack for the first time on vinyl (only the two songs of the movie were published before on a 7''-inch by RCA), featuring exclusive liner notes by the film's director,

Sergio Martino.

Sacred Summits returns after a two-year hiatus with an album of interpretations of the music of Eric Satie by acclaimed composer Morgan Fisher.

Active for over 50 years Morgan's career has moved from 60's number one hit wonders Love Affair, to 70's rock'n'roll keyboardist in Mott The Hoople, before finally on to 80's ambient, improvisation and soundtracks, working with the likes of Yoko Ono, Haroumi Hosono and Dip In The Pool.

Based in Japan since the mid-80s, Fisher's long-standing admiration for Erik Satie (1866-1925) led to these Inside Satie recordings. Satie's unique work as a precursor to artistic movements such as minimalism, surrealism and repetitive music are acknowledged but for long periods he not given the accolades his music warranted.

A strange, eccentric, surreal man, he was never as acclaimed as the established masters, but influenced not only the likes of Debussy but also many of the Dada artists. On this album Morgan played his music freely after just a brief look at the scores. Recorded in just three days, it features piano, melodica, synthesisers, and Morgan's favoured tape delay system.

'INSIDE SATIE is one of the first albums I recorded in Japan shortly after moving here in 1985. In three days I improvised on several of my favourite Satie themes. Mostly I played piano as well as the rich, analog-sounding Yamaha GS-1 (precursor of the DX-7), and sometimes used long tape delays to build layers of sound. All the pieces were recorded in single takes - no overdubs (no time!)'.

- Four Flies Records explores

Piero Umiliani's Sound Work Shop archives to select rare and unreleased tracks - First archive compilation of Piero Umiliani's work for the Rome-based record label and the first one focussing on Piero Umiliani in recent years - Exotica, psychedelic jazz-funk, proto-trip hop: this selection is a cross-cutting portrait of Umiliani's activity during the golden years of his Sound Work Shop, the

studio-laboratory where he has been playing, creating and experimenting with total freedom from 1969 to 1983

- The compilation will be released as a limited edition 2LP, accompanied by Four Flies' Pierpaolo De Sanctis liner notes and archive images. Four Flies Records strikes again, releasing their first archive compilation of Piero Umiliani's work and the first compilation focussing on the Maestro's legacy in years. Studio Umiliani' is a collection of sunken treasures and hidden beauties yet to be

re-released, and of stunning unpublished works surprisingly unknown for quite some time. The project, born from the initial effort of Andrea Fabrizii, who has far and wide been exploring Umiliani's soundtracks before anyone else, led Four Flies research to seek for new unreleased recordings at the Maestro's archive. A challenge that Pierpaolo De Sanctis from Four Flies Records accepted without hesitation - with the help of the Umiliani family. His two daughters Alessandra and Elisabetta Umiliani, true keepers of their father's memory, together with their husbands Francesco Argento and John Linkowski, and of course, Piero's wife Stefania Baffa, have been pivotal in compiling this exciting project.

The result is a cross-cutting portrait of Umiliani's activity during the golden years of his Sound Work Shop, the studio- laboratory where he has been playing, creating and experimenting with total freedom from 1969 to 1983.

If you read the name Shankar you may right away think of Ravi Shankar, the grand master of contemporary Indian folk music who was very popular in the 60s due to his connection with the music industry in the United States despite staying away from the pure pop music by maintaining his classic sitar and tabla style ragas to express himself musically. Ananda Shankar used to be his nephew who also made a journey to the USA to gather inspirations from rock artists like Jimi Hendrix among others. His first album from 1970, a conglomerate of classic Indian folk tunes and instrumental versions of the hottest rock songs of the day clothed in a veil of sitar melodies and backed up with tabla drum grooves, was an attempt to combine the spiritual approach of his cultural origins with the light minded blissful attitude of western psychedelic pop music. It worked well in the sense that it is still, nearly fifty years later on, a groovy little album that leaves nobody sitting around at any random hippie party. He took a five year break from recording to create what should become his second album and this is what I am about to present to you now. The cover-tunes were replaced by all original compositions with a lush instrumentation that features the typical sitar, tabla and bowed string instruments such as sarong and sera arrangements mixed with sounds that have a definite western origin such as rock guitars, Hammond organ and moog synthesizers plus full drum kits that take care to enhance the actual groove. Psychedelic rock, raga, fusion-jazz and funk flow into each other quite naturally giving birth to something fresh and exciting I would label as Bengali pop'. The borders between eastern and western music get abrogated here. If it was not for a few deeply mythical chants on a bed of drones here and there you could not even tell this was a record by an Indian artist. This album is quite accessible most of the time and comes with a certain slickness that makes it easy for the listener to understand and appreciate what is going on. Still there is the other side of the coin, the depth pop music often lacks. So in the end this might have been too far out for the average western mainstream fanatic back in 1975 when disco began to rule but it is an awesome sound trip for fans of psychedelic dance music like INCREDIBLE BONGO BAND and all eastern influenced popular rock.

A solar flare of cosmic sounds heralded the rising star Sun Ra when the pianist, composer and band leader first shone over the musical landscape in the 1950s and 1960s. He caused quite a stir with innovative albums that introduced electronics, special effects and unusual arrangements into a jazz world that sometimes slid into comfortable conservatism, despite its radical roots. This comprehensive collection of the best recordings from the formative stages of his career, enables the listener to hear with fresh ears the legendary Mr. Ra's unique contribution.

the third and final part of the jacob f. desvarieux anthology on endless flight brings two more hot productions of the fabled french zouk veteran with roots in guadeloupe.
the tune 'rifyx' is taken from desvarieux's 1985 album 'oh madiana' and delivers arresting jazz-funk and zouk-suspense enlarged with touching horns, synth-enthusiasm and longing female vocals.
the second song comes from the paris based, west cameroon born singer tala, produced by desvarieux for tala's album 'mother africa' in 1982. also here desvarieux tuned the synthesizers odd and edgy to let them dance with an afro styled rhythm.
above all tala sings sexy with a chorus of girls while percussions go crazy and the sounds of horns are longing for the sky.
on top of everything endless flight asked again the japanese producer kuniyuik to edit a desvarieux track. he chose 'rifyx' and tuned it into an epic soulful eight minutes long dream house
anthem that funks all dancers crazy. hotter than hot stuff here!

The Year of the Rooster is upon us... It was a hot winters day in Miami, Scone along guitarist Jason Joshua and drummer, Eddie Garcia built a studio by hand with a mirror on the ceiling. Together they put the current issues in their lives and focused on making the grooving-est, Funkiest & most tragic Hammond Organ music ever. This time around they recruited sax master Ian Hendrickson-Smith from the legendary The Roots &
Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings, Also joining them is the elusive master percussionist Jose El Gavilan' Pena. Take an organ driven soulful ride with The Scone Cash Players.

Scone Cash Players are currently on their US tour return with
Ian Hendrickson-Smith from The Roots for this organ soul
heater Catch Adam Scone on tour in Europe with The Sugarman 3 (Daptone Records)

Jerome Derradji's Past Due Records is proud to announce the first part in a reissue series of Lee Moore's rarest and meanest boogie funk tracks, originally produced for his labels Score Records and LM Records, circa 1981-85.
Alien "Changing Times" was produced by Lee Moore and Paul Zaleski for Score records out of Memphis. Double sided 12", it is one of these future funk instrumentals that will light a fire on any dance floor. Never reissued before today - remastered. Rarer than rare and so good!

After Mukatsuku Records summer Hammond Organ screamer from Billy Hawks (MUKAT 052) the label goes deep on an international funk tip. Few years ago label manager Nik played in France and the promoter pulled out a Biosis now 45 that he never knew existed up till then and was generally thought to be a long album track only. An extensive search revealed nothing online including popsike/discogs/ebay except a tropical seller who'd just bought a huge caribbean collection with the record included saying he'd never seen it before either and he was keeping it...Failing to secure a copy themselves the label licensed it instead and created their own 45 edit which retains all the funk & soul of the elongated album version into a 7 inch friendly format. On the flipside and 1973 Tumba Safari from Afro Train get's a funky afrobeat re touch for peak time club play that would save you several hundred pounds on an original if you could actually find a copy !

Jerome Derradji's Past Due Records is proud to announce the first part in a reissue series of Lee Moore's rarest and meanest boogie funk tracks, originally produced for his labels Score Records and LM Records, circa 1981-85.
"Get Off" was Lee Moore's (and his wife Patricia) first release for Memphis based Score records.
Originally released in 1982.

Jerome Derradji's Past Due Records is proud to announce the first part in a reissue series of Lee Moore's rarest and meanest boogie funk tracks, originally produced for his labels Score Records and LM Records, circa 1981-85.
Magnificient limited 7" reissue from the ultra rare boogie funk label Score Records with Lee Moore under the First Family alias. Rare as can be and simply amazing!

The funk runs deep and rich on "World Wide Funk," Bootsy Collins' first studio album since 2011's "Tha Funk Capital of the World". Populated with musical friends old and new, and recorded in his Cincinnati home's Bootzilla Re-hab studio, "World Wide Funk" marks both a reckoning and significant reboot, if you will, for the Rhinestone Rock Star Monster of a doll baby baba! Blue-chip rappers like Doug E. Fresh, Big Daddy Kane, DJ Quik, Dru Down, and Chuck D, along with guitar shedder Buckethead join a Bootsy-curated posse of fresh new artists on a record that embraces everything from the classic P-Funk sound Bootsy pioneered to the closest Collins has ever come to radio-active, boots on the ground friendly fire in a musical-P-rated-adventure. World Wide Funk will be released worldwide on Mascot Records on October 27, 2017 on CD, vinyl, digital download and streaming.

Hailing from Florida, the Brookside imprint have dug deep into the master tapes and let NYC master-mixer Mike Maurro loose on a couple of stone cold classics! Maurro, a Queens based DJ and mixer since 1986 has become one of the top remixers out there today with his own, faithful takes on numerous dance classics from the last 30+ years. Here he lends his magic touch to a pair of well loved club classics while adding his own original flavour. Dan Hartman's "Vertigo/Relight My Fire" is up first on side-A, featuring the unmistakable vocals of NYC diva Loleatta Holloway. Maurro's mix brings the vocals in earlier, dubbing them out creating a super trippy atmosphere with a slightly different musical arrangement over the course of almost 14 minutes! On side-B, we have the legendary Evelyn "Champagne" King's "Shame", with a slightly longer, beat led intro for the DJ's. A true extended mix with a slightly different arrangement Maurro's mix of this classic is a killer. Beautifully faithful and mixed with love and an understanding of the dancefloor and the classics! These mixes are ESSENTIAL for any Disco/soul/Funk fans out there, unmissable for the DJ's, legitimately remastered and pressed onto high quality 12" singles in conjunction with all rights holders.

Re-issue with a new lower price !! For starters, this platter begins with one of the great intros of all time: Ladies and gentlemen, there are seven acknowledged wonders of the world. You are about to witness the eighth...' Lodged in a deep groove between the JB's' debut LP Food For Thought (1972) and the more complex and at-times political Damn Right, I Am Somebody (from 1974) sits the ridiculously vampy and infectious classic, Doing It To Death. First moving hips and making heads nod in 1973, the James Brown-produced, 5-song album is one big funk lick, broken up into many delicious moving parts. As with pretty much everything produced by the JB's - led by Fred Wesley with heavy help from a supporting cast that included saxophonist Maceo Parker, guitarists Jimmy Nolen and Hearlon Cheese' Martin and drummer John Jabo' Starks - all songs began and revolved around a devastating riff. The title track is most certainly guilty-as-charged, as it starts strutting right out of the gate and continues for just over 10 minutes, driven by a guitar lick and MCed by the inimitable James Brown, with soloists stepping up and out while the song chugs on. The other centerpiece of the album is the 8-minute You Can Have Watergate Just Gimme Some Bucks And I'll Be Straight,' whose groove is interestingly teased two times before it arrives in full form. The song title itself is provocative, and the music keeps a stone-cold groove despite the less than cheery undertones. Again driven by an infectious guitar morsel, the breakdowns in this song gave sampling producers and DJs sweet dreams in the '80s, and Fred Wesley's trombone solo rides beautifully over the group's cries of We need some money.' Beyond the aforementioned sure-shots, the twitchy More Peas,' La Di Da La Di Day' and the much jazzier, solo-heavy Sucker' round out this incredible album. It's just another perfect example of how James Brown's funk machine could stop the world when they hit a groove.

Songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, producer, orchestra leader, digital mixologist, and filmmaker: Kutiman's job description changes by the day. He's been dubbed the prestigious title of being a 'psychedelic funk architect' -- A title Kutiman truly lives up to. But while he may be too modest to agree, everything the talented musician does comes under one general description: pioneer.
Kutiman's upcoming 7' White Monkey comes as the third official release on Siyal Music. The A-Side features the crisp drums and cosmic synths of 'White Monkey', promising a heavy funk psychedelic experience. Flip it over to the B-Side and you'll find 'Sefi Ramirez', the name of the epic trumpeter collaborating on the track. The record exceeds expectations, launching listeners into a tripped up, funked up groove.
Many know Kutiman for his tremendous and innovative YouTube mash-up project, ThruYOU, while others may recognize him for his 2007 acclaimed jazz/funk self-titled debut album, or from his honorable mention in TIME Magazine's 50 best inventions of 2009. This recognition has led to Kutiman performing at YouTube's launch exhibition at The Guggenheim museum in New York City, and to a second ThruYOU series in 2014. Over the past few years, Kutiman has travelled to Krakow, Jerusalem, Tokyo, Riga, Istanbul, Tel Aviv and New York, to create original audio/visual montages of each city's atmosphere.
In July 2015, Kutiman released Space Cassava, Jazz/ Funk mini album that hailed reviews and received airplay from some of the world's most prominent radio stations such as KCRW (Jeremy Sole), Mi-Soul (Dr. Bob Jones), BBC6 (Gilles Peterson), and Mind Fluid (Kev Beadle). 
Above all, Kutiman is a unique, soulful and organic musician who enjoys creating music under a wide range of styles.
The second release off Kutiman's own label was kicked off in 2016 with his much anticipated sophomore album 6AM. 6AM proved how Kutiman has no musical boundaries; it is an album filled with psychedelic Rock n' Roll roots, which dips into deep funk/soul grooves and even adds underlying influences from Africa and the Middle East. The album was featured in the Guardian with a single premiere on Consequence of Sound. The album received widespread support from Gilles Peterson, Huey Morgan, Don Letts, and more!
Google described Kutiman's work with the paraphrase 'the future is a glorious mess.' And boy, were they right.