Innovative multi-instrumentalist and electronic luminary Mathew Jonson returns to Crosstown Rebels with ‘Tako Tako’.
The Canadian synth wizard returns to Damian Lazarus' renowned imprint with two magical and absorbing new productions, with the most excellent two-tracker.
Mathew Jonson has developed one of the most distinctive voices in electronic dance music. His take on house and techno is rich in synth craft and high on captivating emotions, all shaped by his notoriously extensive collection of analogue and hardware gear that he can play, manipulate and use like few others. An electronic mastermind renowned for releasing countless seminal tracks and albums, both solo and as a member of Cobblestone Jazz, he returns to a label that has been a constant throughout his career. With his ‘Tako Tako’ EP, he offers two more superb journeys on Crosstown Rebels.
The fantastic ‘Tako Tako’ kicks off with Jonson’s signature mix of elegant and refined synth craft, with dancing melodies bringing futuristic energy and neon colour to crunchy beats. They are smeared and smudged in a painterly fashion and help make this production a pulsating dancefloor thrill. Equally standout is ‘Just a Little Bit’, powered by a jostling broken beat with a warm bassline and wordless vocals sampled throughout. It’s funky, kinetic, always on the move, and rounds out another one of Jonson’s fantastically inventive yet effective EPs.
quête:more music
The Dip is a 6-piece rhythm and blues band from Seattle who blend the best parts of funk and soul street music with the bounce of rock n' roll dance halls to create timeless songs of love and life. 'Love Direction', The Dip's fourth studio record and latest album on Dualtone Records (following 2022's 'Sticking With It' which landed at #1 on Billboard's Current R&B Albums chart), is the first time in the band's career they have relinquished complete control.
The group produced the record themselves and enlisted audio engineer Josh Block who contributed a lush addition to the 11-song collection along with a full spread of talented guest musicians across the tracks. Distant horns, funkier guitars and even a touch of pedal steel guitar from Will Van Horn on the introspective "Fill My Cup", The Dip sound as crisp as ever while exploring new sonic territories. The result makes for a fresh, loose mood that feels equally familiar to the band's earlier work and a confident, bold re-introduction that features some more nuanced and intimate moments highlighting the ways in which the band has matured.
MANOWAR is an American heavy metal band from Auburn, New York. Formed in 1980, the band is known for lyrics based on fantasy and mythology . The band is also known for a Loud and Bombastic sound. In 1984 the band was included in the Guinness Book of World Records for delivering the loudest performance, a record which they have since broken on two occasions. They also hold the world record for the longest heavy metal concert after playing for five hours and 1 minute in Bulgaria (at Kavarna Rock Fest) in 2008. MANOWAR have also been known for their slogan "Death to false metal » and have maintained a very strong following with dedicated fans worldwide as referred to by the band as "Metal Warriors", "Manowarriors", "Immortals" or "Brothers of Metal". The band signed with Atlantic Records in 1987. Via Atlantic, they released 'Fighting the World', which enjoyed more extensive distribution and increased the band's prominence in the international heavy metal scene. Album art was designed by Ken Kelly. In 1988, MANOWAR released the album 'Kings of Metal', which is the band's best known work. Songs like "Heart of Steel", "Kings of Metal" and "Hail and Kill" are performed regularly in concerts. 'Kings of Metal' is MANOWAR's highest-selling album worldwide. A new musical unit after the recent changes, MANOWAR released The Triumph of Steel in 1992. It gained some great success and was particularly famous for the presence of a suite lasting no less than 28 minutes entitled "Achilles, Agony and Ecstasy in Eight Parts", inspired by the events of the Iliad and the hero Achilles. After this release, the band went on a world tour for two years. Those MANOWAR’s album have become legendary and are still must have in any metal fan record collection . Vinyls formats Having been very rare and reaching high prices online, those three albums are now being made available again in quality coloured vinyls; Grab them now while you can !!
Sony Music Nashville/Columbia Records singer/songwriter’s new full-length album "Am I Okay?" will follow her blockbuster debut "Lucky" – a critically acclaimed LP that marked one of the biggest Country releases of 2023 and cemented Moroney’s status as Country’s latest “It” girl. In a formidable follow-up to 'Lucky', 'Am I Okay?' finds Moroney sharpening her phenomenal songcraft and sharing even more of her personal story. Produced by her longtime collaborator Kristian Bush — and firmly rooted in Moroney’s gorgeously raspy vocal work — the result is a major leap forward for one of Country’s most stunning and unstoppable new talents. Megan will tour the UK in September with dates in Cardiff, Manchester, Belfast, Glasgow, Birmingham and Cambridge before a headline show at London’s Kentish Town Forum on the 13th. Promo & marketing activity.
After remaining unavailable for years, here's the long-awaited vinyl reissue of the debut album (originally released in 1972) by one of the epoch-making groups in the history of Peruvian rock: We All Together. Their original compositions -all sung in English- betray their passion for McCartney, taking Beatle centrism to new heights in South America. While the Uruguayan Los Shakers could remind us of the first phase of the Fab 4, We All Together is like their '70s version. Amazing compositions, with nods to prog rock and the twilight imprint of singer-songwriters living the end of the hippy dream, that show both diversity and a defined identity. A must for any '70s rock collector. DESCRIPTION Between 1967 and 1974 Saúl and Manuel Cornejo led a series of epoch-making groups on the MAG label (New Juggler Sound, Laghonia and We All Together) in the history of Peruvian rock. All these bands were directly influenced by the British invasion and used new sounds from Hammond, phase shifters, synthesizers and tapes played backwards, which stimulated rivalry with other groups. Another hallmark of the brothers was the technical quality of their records, thanks to Saul's supervision of all MAG recordings between 1972 and 1974. At the end of 1971, when Laghonia was working on the last tracks of "Etcétera", they met Manuel Antonio Guerrero's (MAG) son, Carlos, who had just got back from the USA, and gladly joined in the choruses of the last songs Laghonia was recording. They met up again soon after to rehearse some of Paul McCartney's songs. As soon as he heard them play, Guerrero Senior urged them to form a group focused on cover versions of foreign hits not yet known in Peru. Initially, the Cornejo brothers weren't enthused by a project so different from Laghonia, but ended up accepting as it gave them the opportunity to spend time in the studio. Carlos' melodic voice was another incentive, although they made it clear that the new group, We All Together (WAT), would stick to the mixing desk: "The group isn't into presentations or shows, we're about recording music and purifying it to the max," stated Saúl at that time. Their first album included four covers of Paul McCartney and Badfinger, several compositions by Carlos Guerrero -appealing Beatles-style melodies- and two songs from Saúl and Manuel's archives. 'Children', by keyboardist Carlos Salom, opens the LP: a nostalgic description of childhood, with the distinctive piano sound (achieved through mixing) that permeates the record. Although WAT sang and composed in English, they had no intention of undermining or alienating national culture. Their aim was much more innocent: they simply wanted to make it in the English-speaking world. 'It's a Sin to Go Away' was composed during Laghonía's lifetime as a band and it features guitars played backwards and a psychedelic-progressive style closely attuned to the era. After being included on several compilations, praise for the song has flowed from Europe and the United States in recent years. The album was released in July 1972 and became one of the best-selling Peruvian rock LPs.
Lovesick is an Italian based band formed of Paolo Roberto Pianezza and Francesca Alinovi. Two multi-instrumentalists, whose influences are deeply rooted in the American country, rock"n"roll and western swing music of the 40s and 50s. In addition to their vocal harmonies, Paolo plays electric and acoustic guitar, as well as lap steel, Resonator and Dobro guitar. Francesca plays double bass with the addition of a brush pad, a percussion built into the double bass to keep the rhythm with a drum brush. The duo is joined by Alessandro Cosentino on fiddle and drums. Lovesick have played as opening act for Ben Harper, JD McPherson, Zucchero, ToquinIo and Edoardo Bennato and they have played big festivals all around Europe, alongside the likes of The Offspring, Social Distortion, Walter Trout, Fu Manchu, Secondo Casadei Orchestra and Ten Years After.
Veiga lands straight on the dancefloor, no ambiguity about it. Spurred by the guys from RS Produções, he's been honing his DJ skills since he was 17 (currently 23), initially with partner Nunocoox, who gave him even more motivation. Production came naturally sometime in 2020. We venture: maybe one of the good things coming out of the lockdown? Summer of '22, his debut at Musicbox (at the Príncipe monthly residency) is recorded as a festive, lively set, punctuated by the kind of crowd shouts only heard when things go really happy and sweaty. Since then, Veiga's name has been spotted regularly in the afro club scene, growing in reputation
This side of kuduro, "Leandro" is as expressive as it gets, with percussive forces pulling in deceitfully different directions, much in the same style as the slower form of tarraxo. But we can call this house, yeah? No niceties, however: little over 3 minutes and the track abruptly cuts into silence, exuding the raw power of something made for the mix, not in the least "for the people". In a similar pragmatic mode, the stabs in "Sem Nome" get the party started unannounced. Full mode, for the duration. Minimal groove, broken beats and emotive highlights. "Boiler Room" may be wishful thinking, an interpretation of what is required to rock the place or, ultimately, just a title to wrap up the project. In any case, here's a feisty vocal-and-whistle driven stormer, building up to perfection over three and a half minutes. All elements exactly where they belong. Relentless pace in "X de Destroi", a dark side operation, unreal ambiance, breakneck beats, a purgation?
The title "Tudo É No Guetto" contains all the necessary theory. Everything happens in the ghetto. This uplifting house slab celebrates life as it is, freezing hardships for a moment, the ghetto seen as welcoming, a natural place to be. Vocals stashed away in his cell phone come from the animação crew Os Twinni (he joined them for a while). Clipped, repeated and manipulated to convey the very simple feeling of good times. Veiga himself talks about growing up with minimum resources but still happy. That is the memory he retains from being a kid in the ghettos of Amadora, just outside of Lisbon, born to a Cape Verdean father and Portuguese mother. Though the music sounds carefree and the message is chilled, let us not be tempted to rebrand Reality.
BACK IN PRINT ON VINYL!!! Originally seeing the light of day in April of 1992, Harsh 70s Reality was not just a high water mark for that year, but for the ages. Technically this was the band’s fourth long-play outing, and as a double-album, it followed (and was ever so slightly informed by) two formidable juggernauts that preceeded it: Twin Infinitives and Lake. But it was Harsh 70s Reality that left the decade stronger and more resonant than it came in. People say that rock music died with the passing of Kurt Cobain. But The Dead C slaughtered it in its sleep with this tremendous set of grinding thud. It is in every sense the ultimate post-rock album. To hear it is to understand why one scribe back in the day referred to their sound as “a garbage truck backing over the abyss.” A legendary release from a legendary band on a legendary label.
We can"t really say that Japanese jazzmen benefit (not justify in fact) from a great international fame. However, trumpet player Terumasa Hino is an exception, undoubtedly because since the 70s he has collaborated with numerous Americanmusicians : Gary Burton, Roy Haynes, Herbie Hancock ... On Into the Heaven, which was released in 1970, Terumasa Hino is surrounded by the same musicians as on Hi- Nology, released a year earlier : his brother Motohiko Hino on drums, Hiromasa Suzuki on electric piano, Kunimitsu Inaba on electric bass and Takeru Muraoka on tenor sax. The eponymous piece, which lasts more than 20 minutes, is a jazz fusion giving room to choruses and which is reminiscent of the music that Miles Davis then offered, in what we will call his "electric period". B side opens with "Love More Train", a brilliant and long hard bop song, while the album closes melancholy with the peaceful"Feeling Blues As YouAre Feeling".
A seminal set from Jorge Ben one that mixes samba soul with more baroque arrangements from the legendary Arthur Verocai! The record's got a different feel than some of Jorge's other work almost a wider vision of music that ties his usual funky style to some of the more ambitious modes being explored by Marcos Valle and Edu Lobo at the time expressed here in some larger instrumental passages that shade the tunes lightly, while still letting Jorge step out strongly on vocals and the usual mix of tight percussion and raspy guitar. Titles include "Que Maravilha", "Rita Jeep", "Comanche", "Porque E Proibido Pisa Na Grama", "Cassius Marcelo Clay", "Palomaris", "Maria Domingas", and "Negro E Lindo".
Repress!
Formed in 1968, Jazz Sabbath was considered by many to be at the forefront of the new jazz movement coming out of England at the time. The eagerly awaited debut album, scheduled for release on Friday 13th February 1970, was cancelled when news broke that founding member and pianist Milton Keanes was hospitalised with a massive heart attack which left him fighting for his life.
The record company shelved the album and cancelled the scheduled release out of financial uncertainty of releasing a debut album from a band without its musical leader. When Milton was released from hospital in September 1970, he found out that a band from Birmingham, conveniently called ‘Black Sabbath’, had since released two albums containing metal versions of what he claims were his songs.
All recalled Jazz Sabbath albums had been destroyed when the warehouse burned down in June 1970; which turned out to be a case of insurance fraud by the label owner, leaving only a few bootleg tapes of Jazz Sabbath’s live performances as proof of existence.
The album masters were said to be lost in the fire, but were actually misplaced and gathered dust in the basement vaults of the recording studio. These tapes have now been remixed and, half a decade later, will finally be heard; proving that the heavy metal band worshipped by millions around the world are in fact nothing more than musical charlatans, thieving the music from a bedridden, hospitalised genius.
The legendary DJ Muro is behind this superb new P-Vine compilation, Diggin Groove Diggers: Best Of Tribe. Muro is a truly a-grade digger and one of his homeland of Japan's most famous. Here he collates together some of his favourite songs from Tribe, a rather legendary spiritual jazz collective from the Motor City. This music has been revered for more than 50 years and now for the first time gets put together on one album that is both a perfect primer for newbies and a great collection for those long-time fans.
Repress!
Formed in 1968, Jazz Sabbath was considered by many to be at the forefront of the new jazz movement coming out of England at the time. The eagerly awaited debut album, scheduled for release on Friday 13th February 1970, was cancelled when news broke that founding member and pianist Milton Keanes was hospitalised with a massive heart attack which left him fighting for his life.
The record company shelved the album and cancelled the scheduled release out of financial uncertainty of releasing a debut album from a band without its musical leader. When Milton was released from hospital in September 1970, he found out that a band from Birmingham, conveniently called ‘Black Sabbath’, had since released two albums containing metal versions of what he claims were his songs.
All recalled Jazz Sabbath albums had been destroyed when the warehouse burned down in June 1970; which turned out to be a case of insurance fraud by the label owner, leaving only a few bootleg tapes of Jazz Sabbath’s live performances as proof of existence.
The album masters were said to be lost in the fire, but were actually misplaced and gathered dust in the basement vaults of the recording studio. These tapes have now been remixed and, half a decade later, will finally be heard; proving that the heavy metal band worshipped by millions around the world are in fact nothing more than musical charlatans, thieving the music from a bedridden, hospitalised genius.
- A1: Love Is Ft. Kameelah Waheed
- A2: Love Is A State Of Mind Ft. Ramona Renea
- A3: It's Quiet Now Ft. Dope Earth Alien
- B1: Downtown Ft. Anette Bowen & Nikki-O
- B2: Drama Ft. Rimarkable & Dope Earth Alien
- C1: Stand Ft. Cor.ece
- C2: In The Club Ft. Eve
- D1: Not About You Ft. Hadiya George
- D2: Everybody Ft. Pablo Vittar & Urias
- E1: Show Me Some Love Ft. Channel Tres
- E2: Don't Be Afraid Ft. Latashá
- E3: Work Ft. Dave Giles Ii, Cor.ece & Mike Dunn
- F1: C's Up Ft. Mike Dunn
- F2: La Femme Fantastique Ft. Josh Caffe
- F3: Love Me Like You Care Ft. Hadiya George
repressed !
Classic Music Company are proud to present Black Girl Magic, the highly anticipated sophomore album from the inimitable Honey Dijon. An artist in every sense of the word, across 15 tracks of attitude, energy, heart and community, Honey demonstrates a broad range of disciplines and influences, enlisting A-List collaborators such as Channel Tres, Eve, Pablo Vittar, Josh Caffe, Mike Dunn and more for an unmissable, boundary-pushing LP.
Redefining what it is to be a DJ in 2022, this year Honey’s production capabilities have been enlisted by the upper echelon of musicians. Producing two records for Beyonce’s chart-topping album Renaissance and remixing lead single ‘Break My Soul’, as well as working in the studio with Madonna on new material. Now unapologetically expressing her own sound on Black Girl Magic, she unveils the next chapter of her development as a producer and songwriter.
Since the first teaser of the album, the BBC Radio 1 playlisted collaboration with Atlanta singer-songwriter Hadiya George ‘Not About You’, to the most recent single ‘Show Me Some Love’ featuring Compton royalty Channel Tres, the Black Girl Magic project has consistently illustrated Honey’s dedication to profiling diverse vocal talent. Shining a spotlight on a new generation of queer people and people of colour, Honey’s intentions to “keep this culture in the conversation,” are demonstrated with the featured artists on the LP.
Behind the scenes Honey has worked closely with Classic Music Company founder and close friend Luke Solomon, as well as regular collaborator Chris Penny on the production of the album. Her most adventurous and explorative output yet with a diverse range of influences, Honey’s Chicago musical upbringing is a driving force behind the LP, with her sights set on demonstrating how she first experienced the music of her hometown felt deeply across the record.
Working with British sculptor Jam Sutton, an artist who explores the relationship between technology and antiquity, 3D sculptural digital renderings of Honey have formed the artwork for all preceding singles leading into Black Girl Magic. Exploring identity, form, technology and classical portraiture, the artwork for the album comes as the final piece in the series of bespoke displays of Honey.
From her stratospheric DJ career, to her fashion line with COMME des GARÇONS: Honey Fucking Dijon, to soundtracking some of the most iconic fashion shows of the 21st century, Honey’s influence is felt far and wide across the worlds of music, fashion and art, with Black Girl Magic a powerful physical statement of her interdisciplinary artistic impact.
Russian born, Spanish resident, Artur Nikolaev is next on BAR Musica. Delivering two track with his unique elegant style, combining complex grooves with spanish vocals, Artur makes his debut on the label, and we are even more happy to have a great remix by Shaun Reeves to add that club touch to the ep.
- A1: Hey Mami
- A2: Dreamy Bruises
- A3: Could I Be
- A4: Wolf
- A5: Dress
- B1: H S.k.t
- B2: Coffee
- B3: Uncatena
- B4: Play It Right
- B5: Come Down
- C1: Hey Mami (Rick Wade Remix)
- C2: H S.k.t. (Dntel Remix)
- C3: Coffee (Helado Negro Remix)
- D1: Hey Mami (Charles Spearin Remix)
- D2: H S.k.t. (Hercules And Love Affair Remix)
- D3: Coffee (J Rocc Remix)
Black/White Split Colour Vinyl. Recorded in a little bedroom studio out in Durham, North Carolina, Amelia Meath and Nick Sanborn's debut LP as Sylvan Esso arrived in 2014 at the juncture of pop and experimental. Even now, years later, the LP remains an urgent and fitting introduction to a push-and-pull that would go on to inform the duo's sound - a thoughtful headiness that also wants you to get out on the dance floor. A blend of analog and digital, Meath and Sanborn were two unexpected puzzle pieces fitting together with singular ease, producing a ten-track LP that was both minimalist and shimmering, with dark undulations rippling beneath the synthy-surface and crystalline quality of Meath's voice. Before all of the international touring and festival headlining and critical acclaim and Grammy nominations, Sylvan Esso was just a shot-in-the dark of musical chemistry gone right. The original album bio for the self-titled presciently sets the stage for the thesis that has gone on to guide Meath and Sanborn's writing since then: "a collection of vivid addictions concerning suffering and love, darkness and deliverance" arriving as "a necessary pop balm, an album stuffed with songs that don't suffer the longstanding complications of that term." And so, even as the band continues to evolve and becomes amorphous, there's still that argument about what pop can be at its core. This is just the beginning of that conversation captured on tape. In honor of the record's ten year anniversary, North Carolina-based indie label Psychic Hotline will release a deluxe reissue, complete with previously unreleased material. Featuring essential singles "Coffee", "Hey Mami," and "H.S.K.T.", the expanded edition also includes remixes from J Rocc, Rick Wade, Helado Negro, Dntel, and more. The deluxe 2LP package sports an all-over foil inversion of the original album's iconic foil "SE" logo.
Color Vinyl[24,58 €]
Valley of Rain was Tucson’s Giant Sand’s debut album recorded in 1983, and eventually released by 1985. It included Howe Gelb on vocals, guitar and Winston Watson on drums for most of it, Tommy Larkins on drums for some of it and Scott Garber on fretless bass for all of it. At the time of the recording, Howe was unacquainted with the possibilities of tube (valve) amps and had recorded most of the album with a Roland JC120 at the miraculous 8 track facilities of The Control Center in Korea Town, Los Angeles by Ricky “Mix” Novak. This impromptu recording had occurred because the band refused to cancel their first Los Angeles live gig, at Madame Wong’s, when the band (Giant Sandworms) had broken up days before in Tucson. Instead, Howe headed out anyway with Scott, the newest member who’d only been in the band for about a year, after band mainstays Billy Sed and Dave Seger reasonably decided ‘enough was enough’ following a rough and tenuous year spent in the lower east side of NYC attempting to further the band circa 1981/82. Tucsonan Winston Watson, (who would go on to tour with Bob Dylan in the 90s, as well as Alice Cooper, Warren Zevon etc ) was already living in Los Angeles and was brave/kind enough to jump in for the live date with no rehearsal. The result was so sparked with adrenalin, that the trio set up an impromptu studio session the next day to attempt to capture the sonic thrust on tape. The total cost of the day and a half recording was $400 including one 1” reel of 30 minute tape. When Enigma Records offered to release the album they requested another 15 minutes of music to make it a full LP. Ron Goudie was then called in to oversee the extra recordings at a Venice, CA studio called Mad Dog with Eric Westfall engineering. Tommy Larkins, who had been on the previous country punk album of Howe’s “The Band of ... Blacky Ranchette” came in to drum for those last 3 songs. It was there when Howe borrowed an amp that had been stored at the studio did he discover the bolster of a tube amp and his world changed. The amp was a slightly modified Fender Twin Reverb owned by Robbie Krieger of The Doors. 30 some years later, now that the band had been put to sleep indefinitely, those very first songs had begun creeping into the last Giant Sand tours. It somehow seemed appropriate to give them another shot with the proper amp just to see what they could’ve been. What made the idea more approachable was the availability of both original drummers living back in Tucson. The first attempt came last summer with both Winston & Tommy and Thøger Lund on bass, as well as the 2 newest members, 29 year old Gabriel Sullivan and 23 year old Annie Dolan on double neck guitars. The sound was insane. The funny part was Gabriel, who engineered and mixed the session, gave it an intentional 80s production sound. Howe later explained to Gabe he had been at war with that production trend since those first original recordings. So they all tried it again at Christmas time, this time with a newly discovered Fender 30 amp that had only been in production from 1980 – 1983. This new re-recording of that first album now sounds like it should’ve sounded. It was re-done for $400 and the same day and a half session time as the original. Scott Garber even drove up from Austin TX with his fretless to play so that the album is literally the originally line up for at least half of the songs. And yes, no pedal boards were used too. The band intends to tour this summer playing only those Valley of Rain songs. Giant Sand Returns To Valley Of Rain.
From the cacophonous surrounds of London to the sea stacks of Orkney, via the abandoned military facilities of the Suffolk coast and the watery expanses of the Blackwater Estuary in Essex, from the quarries and neolithic sites of Snowdonia and the wide open skies of Norfolk to the hubbub of Nairobi and Berlin, the streets of Kyiv and the windblown wilds of Antarctica – music is everywhere. You just need to know or learn how to listen.
Ears To The Ground: Adventures in Field Recording and Electronic Music explores how electronic music producers and sound artists use field recordings and samples to document their environments. Author Ben Murphy takes you on a journey to discover how field recordings can create context, emotion, atmosphere, humour and meaning – and examine the most pressing topics of our times.
Composed of extensive interviews with music producers, the book will show how field recordings have become a vital way of understanding, celebrating and interrogating the landscape and the places we live. The book features interviews with Leafcutter John, KMRU, Ultramarine, Kate Carr, Erland Cooper, Proc Fiskal, Flora Yin-Wong, Langham Research Centre, Claire Guerin, Toshiya Tsunoda, Lawrence English, Heinali, Oliver Ho, Matthew Herbert, Matmos, Scanner, Felicia Atkinson and many more.
On its journey, the book takes in abandoned military test sites, remote bird colonies, estuaries, cities, coastlines, old quarries, neolithic burial grounds, scientific research centres and docklands, and ventures between Orkney, Edinburgh and Cork to Norfolk, Kent and Snowdonia, before heading to Kenya, Ukraine, Japan and Antarctica
Circling guitar lines; the rise of fall of delicate bass; deep, breathy horns: sonic elements that exist in a state of slow, perpetual motion, like ideas sprouting from some kind of cognitive compost. With wonder and charm, G. S. Schray's new solo album, Whispered Something Good, evokes a realm of new growth while offering a fitting soundtrack for its exploration, as if tailor made for both the daydreamer and silly adventurer.
We start in the darkness of "Unlit Center" with elliptical phrases of jazz guitar. A conversation between double bass, synthesiser, and piano plays out on "In Tears Twice A Page" before we're ushered into the reflective zone of "Another Haunted Mirror." There is synth mist which trumpet cuts through decisively like a shaft of light from the sun: warm and clear. As the album proceeds, firmer rhythms coalesce. On "Prelude for Probably," clattering drums lock into a triumphant groove with horns. And then, to close, the instrumental art-pop of "Gone in Amber," probing not necessarily towards a final destination but another stop-off, one of distant birdsong and the faintest flicker of synth. Intimate and inviting, the act of listening to Whispered Something Good is akin to digging through an imagination. It's a place of subliminal melodies blooming into rhizomatic musical shapes, stray musings coalescing as bolts of inspiration — change fostering yet more change.
- A1: Hello 00 27
- A2: A Love From Outer Space 05 08
- A3: Crack Up 04 12
- A4: Timewind 00 15
- A5: What's All This Then? 04 03
- A6: Snow Joke 04 46
- A7: Off Into Space 00 04
- B1: And I Say 02 42
- B2: Yeti 00 11
- B3: Conundrum 02 32
- B4: Honeysuckleswallow 03 20
- B5: Long Body 01 21
- B6: In A Circle 04 37
- C1: Fast Ka 00 27
- C2: Miles Apart 03 01
- C3: Pop 03 40
- C4: Mars 00 20
- C5: Spook 03 10
- C6: Sugarwings 03 37
- D1: Back Home 00 07
- D2: Down 05 14
- D3: Supervixens 05 40
- D4: Insect Love 02 52
- D5: Sorry 00 05
- D6: Catch My Drift 05 40
- D7: Challenge 00 06
*REMASTERED ROUGH TRADE DEBUT LP LIMITED TO JUST 500 COPIES WITH EMBOSSED OUTER SLEEVE AND ORIGINAL INNER SLEEVE ON BLACK VINYL*
Dream POP, they called it. Given AR Kane’s Alex Ayuli once worked for advertising agency Saatchi & Saatchi, it’s no surprise that he and collaborator Rudy Tambala invented their own genre before critics could stick their oar in. It was a canny move, but more importantly, it was accurate: the music of AR Kane was made for dreamers, by dreamers, and its languor and longing made it particularly bewitching listening; their music is often smeared and blurry, happily lost in its own indefinable pleasures. “We wanted dream pop,” Tambala says, “that feeling of a dream where the rules are different. Dream logic.”
-UNCUT REISSUE OF THE MONTH
"A.R. Kane carved out a unique musical path, welding elements of pop, psych, dub, electronica, funk, noise, jazz, ambient and more in a way that had never been done before. Or since. Their debut in particular is a work of unbridled brilliance."
*Electronic Sound*
‘Sixty Nine’ the group’s debut LP that emerged in 1988 had critics and listeners struggling to fit language around A.R. Kane’s sound. As a title it was telling - the year of ‘Bitches Brew’, the year of ‘In A Silent Way’, the erotic möbius between two lovers - and as originally coined by the band themselves,
‘dream pop’ (before it became a free-floating signifier of vague import) was entirely apposite for the music A.R. Kane were making. Crafted in a dark small basement studio in which Tambala recalls the duo had “complete freedom - We wanted to go as far out as we could, and in doing so we discovered the point where it stops being music”. There was an irresistibly dreamy, somnambulant, sensual and almost surreal flow to ‘sixty nine’s sound, but also real darkness/dankness, the ruptures of the primordial and the reverberations of the subconscious, within the grooves of remarkable songs like ‘Dizzy’ and ‘Crazy Blue’. Alex’s plangent vocals floated and surged amidst exquisite peals of refracted feedback but crucially there was BASS here, lugubrious and funky and full of dread, sonic pleasure and sonic disturbance crushed together to make music with a center so deep it felt subcutaneous, music constructed from both the accidental and the deliberate, generous enough to dance with both serendipity and chaos. ‘sixty nine’ remains - especially in this remastered iteration - ravishing, revolutionary – Neil Kulkarni
"A.R. Kane made some of the most exciting, forward-thinking, and science fictional music of their era".
*Reissue Of The Week In The Quietus*



















