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Orions Belte: «Villa Amorini» Jansen Records 2021 Do you remember the time the doorman ran after some drunken kids around the lake outside the club? As he dives into the lake, he scrapes his stomach on a sharp object in the water, but catches up and returns with one youth under each arm. At the same time the singer from the band playing inside, jumps from the loft hoping that the chandelier he grabs will hold him. It doesn’t. Endless afterparties and constantly trying to avoid visits from the police or the liquor control. Still nothing? This was the 90’s club scene in Bergen, and Villa Amorini was the place where everything happened. Starting as an 80’s fine dining spot, it evolved into an extravagant club with tons of artists and DJ’s in screaming shirts and oversized sunglasses. This sets the scene for Orions Belte’s second album. Still a mix of all the sounds they like, reminiscing eras they haven’t experienced, trying to navigate in their own musical atmosphere. Chaotic and calm at the same time. Villa Amorini is recorded at Norsk Riksstudio by engineer Njål Paulsberg, making sure the sounds were on point while leaving the band alone to play together for hours upon hours, chiseling out the base for the album. Where the debut was summery and a bit brighter, this album tends to lean a bit more towards the big city, night life and leftover food from the fridge. Mixed as always by the magnificent Matias Tellez.

With his new album Rhapsodic, Nicolas Repac gives life to the archives of the hunter-gatherer of sounds: Charles Duvelle Nicolas Repac is pursuing the dreamlike magic of his art of sampling with his new album "Rhapsodic". The musician plunged into musicologist Charles Duvelle's pioneering field recordings, in order to deconstruct and revisit rare music archives gleaned from all over the world. Repac ventures into the craziest sonic and stylistic pileups - adding voices, rhythms and traditional music from "every world". He offers some "Rhapsodies" of multicoloured sounds and instrumentals, revisited through the prism of electronic music. He liberates himself from all ethnomusicological coherence to speak directly to the soul and imagination of his listeners - beyond the frontiers of time and space. Grafting heady grooves of traditional percussion from Benin onto sub-Saharan violin refrains, interweaving them with Mongolian morin khuur on a bed of pygmy mouth-bow, Nicolas Repac leads us on the most captivating of immobile journeys, to the heart of the most intimate impulses, the most human pulse.

When Linda Smith purchased a 4 track cassette recorder in the mid-1980s she was playing guitar in a band called the Woods, and thought it would be useful for sharing demos with her bandmates. In the end, the new hobby followed her from New York back to her native Baltimore, and over the next decade she’d release several albums worth of delicate, bewitching solo music on cassette. Till An- other Time: 1988-1996 is the first retrospective collection of Smith’s charmingly lo-fi music.

Sparse and gentle, Linda’s music is tinged with lovelorn melancholy despite the sweetness of her voice. Over ‘60s pop-indebted melo- dies on tracks like “A Crumb Of Your Affection”, she delivers ob- servations with an earnest softness. Elsewhere, her voice takes on a post punk deadpan, as on “I See Your Face.” The effect of both modes is a haunting charm, equally reminiscent of early Cherry Red Records and ‘60s yé-yé.

With a no-nonsense approach to recording, Linda recorded almost all of her songs at home. There was a creative freedom that came with recording on tape, and unbeknownst to her, this was a conclu- sion that many musicians were reaching at the time.

Unfortunately, the independence that made at-home recording ap- pealing to Linda also made it difficult for her to reach a wider au- dience. Relying on niche publications, cassette trading, and word of mouth to share music, Linda released a few 7”s on labels like Slumberland and Harriet but remained relatively local in terms of reach. Nevertheless, one can trace a direct line from Linda Smith to the ubiquity of bedroom recording today.

Back in October 2009, Strut’s Inspiration Information series was in full swing. Following an acclaimed collaboration between Mulatu Astatke and The Heliocentrics, Finnish maverick Jimi Tenor hit the studio for a mouth-watering head to head with Afrobeat drumming legend, Tony Allen.

Tenor had already built a reputation as a fascinating enigma in modern day music. Consistently one of the most inspired and unpredictable live artists around, his work since his breakthrough album ‘Intervision’ (Warp, 1997) had involved open-minded projects ranging from live film soundtracks and orchestral pieces to a series of Afro-based albums with his band Kabu Kabu. Enjoying a burgeoning revival, Tony Allen had continued to attract new fans. Celebrated as the creator of the Afrobeat rhythm and a lynchpin of Fela Kuti’s Africa 70 band, his work at the time of this recording had included the first album as The Good, The Bad & The Queen with Damon Albarn and his debut recording for World Circuit Records, ‘Secret Agent’.

Recorded at Lovelite Studios in Berlin during November 2008 ith further sessions in Finland and Paris, the Tenor / Allen collaboration whipped up a raw, heavy analogue sound mixing the full range of Allen’s Afrobeat repertoire with Tenor’s off-kilter brew of dark humour, tongue-in-cheek lyrics and tight, firing musicianship. The sessions involved key members of Tenor’s Kabu Kabu band and Berlin-based guest MC Allonymous with tracks evolving naturally from jamming ideas together over five intense days of recording, fuelled by plenty of African food and whisky. Tenor’s trademark range of home-made instruments rubbed shoulders with vintage keyboards and traditional African percussion.

The resulting set became one of the best recordings that both artists produced during this period. Tracks range from Jimi’s S&M tableau, ‘Darker Side of Night’ to the apocalyptic commentary on our times, ‘Path To Wisdom’ and the hilarious lampooning of the UK immigration system, ‘Mama England’, composed on the Tenor tour bus. The album also featured fusions based around more traditional low-slung Afrobeat structures (‘Sinuhe’, ‘Got My Egusi’) and ended with the epic freestyle juggernaut, ‘Three Continents’, a life affirming, mesmeric groove built around another rough-as-nails Allenko rhythm base. 'Inspiration Information: Jimi Tenor / Tony Allen' is re-released on 22nd February 2021 and is dedicated to the memory of the great, incomparable Tony Allen.

First reissue of long out-of-print and sought after release from 2009
Unique fusion of Afrobeat drumming and psychedelic Jazz
Vinyl cut from original sessions

Mats Gustafsson - Flute, baritone sax, live electronics, Johan Berthling - Electric bass, Andreas Werliin - Drums with Goran Kajfes - Quartertone trumpet, Mats Aleklint - Trombone, sousaphone, horn arrangements. Fire! tracking new paths and reaching new levels of excellence, still honoring their 12 year old vow of presenting a fresh approach to improvised music. Their debut album, You Liked Me Five Minutes Ago, was released in 2009 to wide international acclaim. "The basic strategy of pairing the expressive energy of free jazz with a sturdy sense of groove has yielded something potent and self-contained" (New York Times). Between this and Defeat there's been five albums, including collaborations with Jim O'Rourke (Unreleased?, 2011) and Oren Ambarchi (In The Mouth A Hand, 2012). No two Fire! records sound the same, but with Defeat they have taken their biggest leap so far, with Gustafsson giving the flute a prominent place in the sound image, a surprising and most successful move, his both expressive and ornamental approach given ample room to breathe, especially on the two long tracks bookending the album. In places more subdued than on previous efforts, but with the distinctive bass figures and hypnotic mood fully intact. There are some lively stretches with guests Goran Kajfes and Mats Aleklint, bringing to mind their big band offshoot Fire! Orchestra, albeit on a smaller scale. For over 20 years we have made a habit of releasing music that is beyond easy classification, in later years typified by Hedvig Mollestad, Elephant9 and Krokofant, but cemented by Fire! and their exploratory curiosity and deep love of music in general. We, and many others, have tried to compare the trio to other groups, but listening to Defeat we realize how futile this is. Given the above there's no doubt there are many influences at play, but the resulting brew is in a class by itself.

The National’s second album, Sad Songs For Dirty Lovers (2003) proved a leap forward from 2001’s eponymous debut, showing a band adept at delivering warm embraces and gut punches in equal measure. With word of mouth now spreading on the band, critics proved equally enthusiastic... Pitchfork in their glowing review called it a “Gorgeous train wreck” that “Lives up to its blunt title (with) Matt Berninger’s self-eff acing barbs matched by the band’s equally potent hooks,” while Uncut also became early champions saying the album was “A genuine treasure... Livid as a bruise, this is brave, desperate, beautiful music.” No longer a secret among those that know, Sad Songs For Dirty Lovers is an important record in The National’s discography with this new remaster showing that it’s more than standing the test of time.

Only four days after Donovan’s nineteenth birthday his successful debut album What’s Bin Did and What’s Bin Hid was released. It contains his popular hit single “Catch the Wind”. The music primarily consists of Donovan singing and playing mouth harp and acoustic guitar. Although Donovan was hailed as the British answer to Bob Dylan when he first emerged, his debut album actually established him as a distinctive talent in his own right.

Hunter And The Dog Star is the band’s fifth studio album and their first since 2018’s Rocket—a record that marked a major return for the group following a twelve-year hiatus and was released to widespread critical acclaim. Of the album, Associated Press declared, “a triumphant return…their joy in recording together again is clear on Rocket, a record that touches on a variety of musical styles with ease,” while NPR’s World Café proclaimed, “explosively joyful” and the Austin American Statesman praised, “a beautiful, inspiring, sensational album.” Since forming in Dallas in the mid-1980s, the band has toured extensively across the country and had their music featured in several hit shows including Miami Vice, Girls, Cold Case, Ugly Betty, Wet Hot American Summer: Ten Years Later, American Dad! and more. Since the release of their 1988 debut, the 2x platinum-certified, Shooting Rubberbands at the Stars, the band has continued to earn their reputation as an unclassifiable, genre-blending force. Returning to Arlyn Studios in Austin, TX to record with producer Kyle Crusham, Brickell and the New Bohemians—Brandon Aly (drums), John Bush (drums, percussion), Brad Houser (bass, synthesizer) and Kenny Withrow (bass, guitars, synthesizer)—once again put forth a collection of diverse musical ideas and styles on Hunter And The Dog Star, as they have continuously done for the past three decades. Reflecting on the album, Brickell shares, “Hunter And The Dog Star is a collection of songs reflecting the mystery of self-expression, loyalty, companionship and love in the darkest sky just before dawn.” In addition to Brickell (vocals, guitars), Crusham (background vocals, mellotron, piano, Rhodes, synthesizer) and the New Bohemians, the album also features Matt Hubbard (background vocals, organ, piano, synthesizer, wurlitzer), Burton Lee (pedal steel) and background vocals from Kelly Micwee and Alice Spencer.

African-born, Baltimore-based experimental hip-hop producer Infinity Knives joins PhantomLimb for the release of his unique debut album Dear, Sudan, a vibrant and polymathic labyrinth of moods and colours.

Infinity Knives - aka producer and musician Tariq Ravelomanana - moved from Tanzania (via Kenya, South Africa and Madagascar) to Baltimore with his family as a teenager, soaking up the raw,vociferous hip hop culture around him, devouring Western classical music, and embedding himself with the city’s verdant music scene. This unique combination of life experiences and contrasting strands of musical education empowered and enabled him to create his Infinity Knives guise, allowing us a window into his singular energy with Dear, Sudan.

​Tariq writes “Music has always been my medium. Since I was a child living in Tanzania, music has been my babysitter. The one central idea I kept dwelling on was that all humans experience sorrow, but despite the fact that it's universal, we still experience it as if we were alone.”

Appropriately, Infinity Knives casts a wide and thrilling net. Dear, Sudan runs like a masterful showreel of deftly balanced disparate elements, a late night channel-hopping between multiple, vital, powerful musics. Tariq himself offers “experimental, drone, hip hop, leftfield minimalism, neo-classical and Baltimore” as his key styles. “I wanted Dear, Sudan to be a record of the things that I enjoy, the things that keep me coming back to this life and I wanted it to be in the language I understand the most. I hope that this album can be a companion to those in need.”

Dehumanization is the only full length album from the band Crucifix. Recorded in 1983, it is considered a classic American hardcore album and a landmark of anarcho-punk.Dehumanization delivers a raging critique of war, violence, displacement, and the decimation of human rights and human dignity—themes at once global in scope and also completely endemic to Reagan-era America. The intensity of this message is matched only by the intensity of the sound: a heavy minimalist construction built on brutal guitar riffs, low-end distortion, hardcore fury and teenage speed. It is an album of pure raw power, a hot blast of personal and political outrage and musical adrenaline.Fusing California hardcore with metal and second wave British anarcho-punk, Crucifix carved out their own highly distinctive wall of sound on this release. Ignoring the rules of punk purism in favor of a well produced huge guitar sound, the album preceded much of the hardcore metal crossover of the mid-80s and played an influential but often unacknowledged role in the punk and metal subgenres that followed. “Annihilation,” the album’s opening track, has become iconic . Quoted often, it’s been sampled by Orbital and covered by A Perfect Circle and Sepultura. The original vinyl version of Dehumanization was released on the Crass Records offshoot label Corpus Christi in the UK, and has been out of print since the 1980s. This new Kustomized rerelease has been carefully remastered from an original vinyl source and adheres closely to the audio quality of the original. In addition, the six-panel foldout poster sleeve has been reproduced in its entirety. Taken together, the words, music and graphics of Dehumanization form a complete work and a resonant and enduring document of the period

It's tempting to think that you have all the answers, screaming your gospel every day with certainty and anger. Life isn't quite like that though, and the debut album from London four-piece TV Priest instead embraces the beautiful and terrifying unknowns that exist personally, politically, and culturally. Posing as many questions as it answers, Uppers is a thunderous opening statement that continues the UK's recent resurgence of grubby, furious post-punk music. It says something very different though - something completely its own. Four childhood friends who made music together as teenagers before drifting apart and then, somewhat inevitably, back together late in 2019, TV Priest was borne out of a need to create together once again, and brings with it a wealth of experience and exhaustion picked up in the band's years of pursuing 'real life' and 'real jobs', something those teenagers never had. Last November, the band - vocalist Charlie Drinkwater, guitarist Alex Sprogis, bass and keys player Nic Smith and drummer Ed Kelland - played their first show, to a smattering of friends in what they describe as an "industrial freezer" in the warehouse district of Hackney Wick. "It was like the pub in Peep Show with a washing machine just in the middle_" Charlie laughs, remembering how they dodged Star Wars memorabilia and deep fat fryers while making their first statement as a band. Unsurprisingly, there isn't a precedent for launching a band during a global pandemic, but among the general sense of anxiety and unease pervading everything at the moment, TV Priest's entrance in April with the release of debut single "House Of York" - a searing examination of the Monarchy set over wiry post-punk and fronted by a Mark E. Smith-like mouthpiece - served as a breath of fresh air among the chaos, its anger and confusion making some kind of twisted sense to the nation's fried brains. It's the same continued global sense of anxiety that will greet the release of Uppers, and it's an album that has a lot to say right now. Taking musical cues from post-punk stalwarts The Fall and Protomartyr as well as the mechanical, pulsating grooves of krautrock, it's a record that moves with an untamed energy. Over the top of this rumbling musical machine is vocalist Charlie, a cuttingly funny, angry, confused, real frontman. Uppers sees TV Priest explicitly and outwardly trying to avoid narrowmindedness. Uppers sees TV Priest taking musical and personal risks, reaching outside of themselves and trying to make sense of this increasingly messy world. It's a band and a record that couldn't arrive at a more perfect time.

-LTD. LOSER EDITION-

This LIMITED LOSER INDIES edition is on GREY MARBLED Vinyl! It's tempting to think that you have all the answers, screaming your gospel every day with certainty and anger. Life isn't quite like that though, and the debut album from London four-piece TV Priest instead embraces the beautiful and terrifying unknowns that exist personally, politically, and culturally. Posing as many questions as it answers, Uppers is a thunderous opening statement that continues the UK's recent resurgence of grubby, furious post-punk music. It says something very different though - something completely its own. Four childhood friends who made music together as teenagers before drifting apart and then, somewhat inevitably, back together late in 2019, TV Priest was borne out of a need to create together once again, and brings with it a wealth of experience and exhaustion picked up in the band's years of pursuing 'real life' and 'real jobs', something those teenagers never had. Last November, the band - vocalist Charlie Drinkwater, guitarist Alex Sprogis, bass and keys player Nic Smith and drummer Ed Kelland - played their first show, to a smattering of friends in what they describe as an "industrial freezer" in the warehouse district of Hackney Wick. "It was like the pub in Peep Show with a washing machine just in the middle_" Charlie laughs, remembering how they dodged Star Wars memorabilia and deep fat fryers while making their first statement as a band. Unsurprisingly, there isn't a precedent for launching a band during a global pandemic, but among the general sense of anxiety and unease pervading everything at the moment, TV Priest's entrance in April with the release of debut single "House Of York" - a searing examination of the Monarchy set over wiry post-punk and fronted by a Mark E. Smith-like mouthpiece - served as a breath of fresh air among the chaos, its anger and confusion making some kind of twisted sense to the nation's fried brains. It's the same continued global sense of anxiety that will greet the release of Uppers, and it's an album that has a lot to say right now. Taking musical cues from post-punk stalwarts The Fall and Protomartyr as well as the mechanical, pulsating grooves of krautrock, it's a record that moves with an untamed energy. Over the top of this rumbling musical machine is vocalist Charlie, a cuttingly funny, angry, confused, real frontman. Uppers sees TV Priest explicitly and outwardly trying to avoid narrowmindedness. Uppers sees TV Priest taking musical and personal risks, reaching outside of themselves and trying to make sense of this increasingly messy world. It's a band and a record that couldn't arrive at a more perfect time.

Lucrecia Dalt is a Colombian recording artist, songwriter, and producer. After studying civil engineering in Colombia, Dalt worked at a geo-technical company for two years and has since lived in Barcelona and Berlin, where she currently resides. She has released six solo albums and has collaborated with musicians Aaron Dilloway, Jan Jelinek, and Gudrun Gut, to name a few. No era sólida is Dalt's seventh solo record, and her second on RVNG Intl., following the release of 2018's Anticlines. No era sólida is an introspective venture into visceral sonic terrain, as Dalt sets out to capture the moment when one becomes pure sound. The album observes a transition in Dalt herself through the emergence of an alternate ego / state of self named Lia. Each song identifies a different state experienced by Lia, opening with Disuelta (`dissolved') and transforming through pieces such as Seca (`to be dry'), Ser boca (`to be mouth'), Espesa (`thick'). Lia's poetic reflections on the panspermia echo her origins, having come from some other ether. As a lifeform seeded through sound, the very essence of Lia is embodied in the exploratory instincts of her creator Lucrecia Dalt, an artist whose innate sonar system traces the far reaches of musical experimentation.

3 x LP - Live in Sharjah Box Set + Booklet. designed by Lorenzo Mason Studio.

If you’ve ever travelled to Egypt and wandered through its crowded streets, you probably ended up buying a cassette or a CDR of popular synth based music heard in most cabs, cabarets, or alleys around town: the almighty Shaabi.Raed Yassin and Paed Conca based their project PRAED on research between Shaabi and Mouled (traditional trance music from Egypt) and the hypnotic structures of both these genres. Repetitive beats, loud Mizmar and loads of energy, with a strong influence from psychedelic rock, free jazz and electronica.

During the years in which the duo produced 4 albums and performed on an endless number of stages around the globe, PRAED started working on anambitious expansive project: an orchestra that could transpose this study of rural and popular culture into an immense, iconic work. In autumn 2018, supported by the Sharjah Art Foundation, PRAED Orchestra! premiered “Live in Sharjah”, interpreting new material merged with some of the band’s iconic pieces. The composition process started with the choice of musicians: the line-up consisted of some of the most innovative artists coming from a wide spectrum of musical practices. Each musician was chosen for a defined role, and the common denominator was their capacity to interpret written material, and their ability to improvise effortlessly. Each role was clearly set to work in unison with the rest of the group, while simultaneously sustaining a centrality in the choir. Solo parts masterfully drawn over the structure as a fil rouge connecting every piece of the entire concert; massive and powerful orchestral sections leading to a breathtaking trance-like state of mind; all of this material ultimately coalescing into an Egyptian Operette that narrates the sorrow, love, and deeply rooted culture of this urban music called Shaabi.

Paed Conca: Clarinet, Electric Bass, Electronics
Raed Yassin: Synthesizers, Vocals, Electronics
Alan Bishop: Alto Saxophone, Vocals
Nadah El Shazly: Vocals, keyboard, Electronics
Christine Kazarian: Electric Harp
Hans Koch: Bass Clarinet, Soprano Sax
Martin Kuchen: Tenor Saxophone, Baritone Sax
Maurice Louca: Keyboard, Organ
Radwan Ghazi Moumneh: Buzuk, Vocals, Modular Synthesizer
Sam Shalabi: Electric Guitar, Oud
Ute Wassermann: Vocals, Mouth Harp, Whistles
Khaled Yassine: Drums, Percussion, Darbuka
Michael Zerang: Drums, Percussion

Recorded live at Calligraphy Square on November 3rd, 2018 in Sharjah, UAE by: Sudish Suman & Shuaib Ahmad Poonthala
Edited by: Rabih Beaini at Morphine Studio, Berlin, Germany
Mixed by: Radwan Ghazi Moumneh at Hotel2Tango Studio, Montreal, Canada. Mastered by: Harris Newman at Grey Market Studio, Montreal, Canada.
Artwork by Lorenzo Mason Studio.
Project manager : Simsara Music

Aber mich macht’s traurig ("But It Makes Me Sad") is Kai Althoff’s first regular release after several records as Fanal and before with his band Workshop. The music for the double album was recorded by Kai Althoff between 2016 and 2019 with numerous instruments - including synthesizers and various flutes, guitars and African drums, rattles, cymbals, ratchets and Japanese string instruments.

"Nobody had to bear this music, neither was it thought out by anyone, played by none, nor dedicated to someone. Also, one no longer is, and therefore this utterance generates itself and is music to nobody’s ears.

Organizing the entombed power structures, paving alongside the most beautiful nettle-seamed trickle of remembered civilization on one’s own authority, which eventually gives in to its assumption; its mouth pasted (over) with the dried-up vomit of its intentions, never to open again. It carries this desparate melancholy, always ready to ridicule all of its (own) forms, to get to the bottom of all matter. Poking in the flesh of doggedly pursued gnosis with fingers, with weary despisement, deflating to crinkly tissue after life’s bloating :Oh, seriously! How could I be sad, the way they carry themselves and sing as they do that Alas, those whose fingers these are, just take those flutes and instruments! —- in liberation without the Idol, to no longer play something."
A.M.

It's been three years since the last vinyl by Ntogn was unveiled and now we're glad to share with you the result of his venture through the recent winter.

'Smedjan' is inspired by the dwarven craftsmanship of Norse mythology. It is made completely with organic sounds gathered from, and recorded in, the forests of Bålsta which is rich with northern heritage. Everything you hear is either processed textures of birch wood blocks, layers of a custom made Ukrainian artisan mouth harp or the artist's own voice.

There is no synthesis in this record. The kick drums are made by hitting these pieces of wood against each other with contact microphones. Bass layers are extracted from bark scraping against bark. Hi hats are crafted by recorded fire of the same wood logs burning and ambiance is built from the forests where the trees grew and from the woodshed where the artist chopped the wood during winter to keep his cabin warm. The rhythms and sounds in this shed is what inspired the making of this record.

By shaping these sounds of wood and metal Ntogn strives to create a sonic experience that connects the listener to the old Norse stories of the dwarven craftsmanship of Svartalfheim. It is they who made the famous trinkets and weapons that empower the gods of Asgård through stories of trickery and despair which has later inspired tales and literature for over a thousand years.

The record has been distilled from material that was meant to become a two-hour live set specifically made for Mo:dem festival which was unfortunately cancelled due to the corona pandemic. It was also the foundation of the artist's thesis at the university of sound design where he made a study of the effects of organic sound on an electronic expression such as techno music.

It will be released digitally and as a 200 copy limited edition black vinyl adorned with an artwork drawn by the artist's partner Gabriella Holmström using the ashes of the same birch wood blocks that was used to make the sonic content.

The record has received early support from Francois X, Takaaki Itoh, Abstract Division, BLNDR and Rambadu to name a few.

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

Ntogn en'togg-n is a conceptual electro-acoustic project developed by Hypnus Records' founder and sound design graduate Michel Iseneld (b. 1988, Sweden). It aims to breath life into a fascination for magic with the use of contemporary and classic sound design techniques. This has resulted in what Resident Advisor's William Lynch describes as 'fierce, artistic techno that sounds like little else out there' and a discography ranging from earth-shattering techno to dark, throbbing ambient excursions.

After spending nearly three years in isolation, deeply lost in literature on history, philosophy, occultism and epic fairy-tales; Michel developed an inner world which eventually found an outlet through the means of music in 2013. By the use of field recordings and various samplings of his voice and surroundings, something peculiar sprouted as his inner images started to manifest and mature into an organic sound inspired by the emerging hypnotic deep techno scene.

Today, all music is released on his own imprint Tome in order to preserve the projects' artistic freedom and originality. After two years of sound design studies at the university and a new-found passion for modular synthesis; there's plenty of music in store aimed to satiate the curious minds.

After the success of the 2 Late 4 Love EP, Roy Of The Ravers returns to Emotional Response with a double LP with a deeper perspective, experimenting in ambient and drone textures, lucid techno travails and acid interludes.

Recorded between 1997 and 2017, the album was pieced together over the last six months after Roy's archives were first feared lost and then found. Approached by the label to release a follow up with something more introspective and personal, it was discovered that a recent move to a new studio had led to over 20 years of music being misplaced after it was believed they were mistakenly dropped at a local charity store. However, deep in a box of what were thought to be patch cables were in fact the decades worth of hard drives and here presented, is a sample of those lost recordings.

The nature of the music is introspection, eschewing the acid beats and white noise for a personal encounter between man and machine. The orchestral opening of the title track gives way to the submarine beats, pulsing TB303 and gliding hats of Robinson College 10 to set the outlook to come. Even with the scattering A Dim And Distant Past waking lulled senses, the melodies and feel all lead to a pause and reflect rather than jump and shout.

This is continued with the haunting drives of Bounce Erec and Oriental X0X-Press; the twisted, warped jams of The Weber Traum Boat Pt.3, Ichi and Roland Corp Labs 05; and the beautiful, heartfelt odes in Sade Lost Theme, The Clock House Pt.2 and closer, Nemesis '01. The album's melodic nature hums and shines as CS (6x8) appears as much a centre piece as a alternative consideration to the acid tinged, club bangs of Roy's releases to date.
A surprise package maybe, but in the rolling, word of mouth phenomena that was Emotinium II, all this and more was sensed and so White Sunrise Music II, spreading across 12 songs of contrasting moods, is a further affirmation that there is something good and worthy of exploration.

Hey Existeers!
The new Pudel Produkte release has arrived!

This time, it’s more like a record for yellow press readers – due to the high celebrity density on the two tracks! First, there’s Richard Fearless. The guy has been on the “Mission Impossible” soundtrack and he was famous in New York and London as DEATH IN VEGAS. He composed the music on this record and recorded it together with the slackers of Circuit Diagram, which is why the project was aptly named DEATH CIRCUIT. That’s logical, that’s correct, excellent!

One track of theirs is called “Strom Dub”, and the full length of it has been pressed onto the A-Side of the record. It sounds like Synthesizer music usually sounds: Sexy and warm and cold. The tears of technology dripping onto your head for eight and a half minutes while the spirit of the 80s sneaks in through the back door.

Like the B-Side, this track is a grower, a slow creeper you’ll want to hear again and again. Ac-cording to science, this is just what the people need in these days of unhealthy acceleration. And yes, the B-Side: There’s the track “Teeparty am Waldbrand” which translates to “Tea Party at the Forest Fire”, and it features the fat-mouthed DAS BO and RALF KÖSTER. Trust us, it’s just as hard for native speakers to decipher what they’re saying, but we were assured there’s even a “political dimension” to the track, so I guess we’ll have to listen again. Soundwise it’s a beautifully clut-tered mess, a cold wave sprinkled with bizarre brittle that lures you out into nature.

Ah yes, Pudel Produkte – it’s still minority music from the planet of the apes for people that know where to go, and that is elsewhere than the others.

Like the Grass documents and reimagines a warm summer's evening in Basel, Switzerland, in June 2018. Four musicians convened: Johannesburg composer and bow expert Cara Stacey, South African violinist and composer Galina Juritz, German harp player Antonia Ravens and Swiss guitarist and sonic explorer Beat Keller.

Together they improvised using a graphic score titled "Luhlata njengetjani" ("Green like the grass" in the southern African Siswati language), inspired by the rivers of eSwatini, blackbirds in the parks of Basel and the evocative, red-flowered umcinci or erythrina tree. The South African umrhubhe mouthbow's dense harmonics folded around skittering, fractal violin loops; temperate swells of guitar were punctuated by agitated harp pings and the hearty thuds of Ugandan and Mozambican lamellophones.

This joyous, unfettered outpouring criss-crossed between southern Africa and Europe, forwards and backwards, for the following two years. The fruits were unpicked and rewoven into new mosaics by Cara, Galina, and two of our favourite recording artists, Object Agency and Hello Skinny.

Recorded as part of Cara Stacey's studio residency in Basel, Switzerland, supported by ProHelvetia Johannesburg.

Dark-Side Electro Conjurations- and Gnashing EBM from Medellin, Colombia, Seething with Raw-Punk Energy & Foamy Blood around the Mouth. No nonsense Body Music!

GLOK is the electronic solo project from Andy Bell of shoegaze legends RIDE (formerly of Oasis/Beady Eye/Hurricane #1). His debut album under the moniker, Dissident, was originally released last year on a limited edition cassette by Bytes, an offshoot of Ransom Note Records. That sold out in 24 hours, and was followed by a vinyl pressing of 500 copies, on transparent green vinyl, sold via Bandcamp and two online shops. However, with that edition now sold out pretty much on word of mouth, due to popular demand, Dissident is being repressed and is this time being made available to a wider audience via a partnership between Bytes and Republic of Music/K7. The name GLOK is a misspelling of the German word for Bell. The German connection fits well as there is a strong Krautrock influence in the music, especially on the title track, 'Dissident', an epic clocking in just shy of the 20-minute mark, which blends synthwave, minimalism, trance, Detroit techno and John Carpenter soundtracks, with Andy even dropping in some killer John Squire-esque guitar licks.

It is a cliché to describe music as a trip or an ocean or whatever, so this album, Tecwaa’s album “Beyond the Altai” released on Höga Nord Rekords, will in part be described as a snowman: the snowman has its characteristic familiar shape. He is cold yet there is something warm and cuddly about him, something that makes you feel happy and safe.

The A side on the album goes from that warm/cold cosy feeling but elements of destruction like melodies in minor keys slowly transforms the album to become only cold and not so cosy - the snow turns grey and the snowman’s smiling mouth becomes a twisted grin. Its contours disappears and the shape dissolves as the snow melts and floats out on the ground beneath its body. As the album develops, the sound gets harder and darker and the York based DJ moves closer to his roots in electro and Roland-machine knob-turning.

In some ways, “Beyond the Altai” is a call from the eighties and nineties dancefloors like in the tracks “Back To The Atomic Ether” and “10 Swords” on the B-side but all melts together in Tecwaa’s music to create his own obstinate and loose sound!

Tucked away in their cover, but never for long, Guts' musical eyebrow wands have once again panicked, this time aggressively marking Africa.

Letting his instrument guide him towards the one he felt was the next signature of his label Pura Vida Sounds, the beatmaker-producer found himself face to face with an old acquaintance: Pat Kalla aka the voice of the Voilaaa Sound System, aka the one with which he crossed the funk on his album Philantropiques and the title "Daddy Sweet".

Convinced to follow him in studio, Pat, accompanied by his Super Mojo celebrates this collaboration by decapsulating La "Canette". Long groove in the mouth, acidic notes of synths and attacks of precise guitars, despite the bitterness of his words, a drink that suits every hour of the day and that strengthens the legs most numb. Heckled by her journey to the bottom of Pat’s musical bag, shaken by the syncopes of the beat, she spreads her funk foam from the very beginning into the A-side furrow.

Bartering the beige trench coat of Commissioner Joss against a colorful toghu, Kalla and his Mojo revisit on the B side the "Requiem Pour Un Con" de Gainsbourg. The martial groove, dark and hypnotic leaves its place to a polyrhythmic afrodisco production, surrounded by a low velocity.
More than a recovery, they are making a real diversion.
A hijacking driven by Pat Kalla and his Super Mojo, with Serge Gainsbourg and Jean Gabin sitting in the back seat like two "Pachas".

David Gray’s multi-platinum-selling album, White Ladder is presented in newly remastered audio in celebration of its 20th anniversary.
White Ladder spawned the timeless hits “This Year’s Love,” “Babylon,” and “Sail Away” and is one of the greatest and most heart-warming word-of-mouth successes in music. “What happened with White Ladder involved more than music. It was a sort of heart and soul moment of total surrender for everybody involved, for me and the
audience. That was it. It doesn’t get any better than that.” - David Gray

The expanded, deluxe edition features a remastered version of the iconic album plus a second disc; LP of previously unreleased and rare White Ladder-era B-sides and demos. LP 2x12" regular pressed & designed on 140g White Coloured Vinyl, Includes Printed Inner Sleeve, Gatefold & DL Card.

Black Truffle invite you to an evening of drunken revelry in the Batcave! After a chance meeting at a local supermarket in Poughkeepsie, New York, Joe McPhee and Graham Lambkin have performed together as a duo extensively in recent years, in addition to their joint work excavating some of the wildest tapes from McPhee’s archive for Lambkin’s now defunct Kye label. Live in the Batcave documents an evening the two friends spent together in the company of Joe’s brother Charlie and Lambkin’s son Oliver in November 2017 at Charlie’s house in Poughkeepsie. The LP captures seven increasingly drunken snapshots of the four shooting the breeze, playing flutes and whistles, drumming on anything at hand, and playing records.

Edited together in Lambkin’s distinctive style of lo-fi domestic tape collage, the multiple simultaneous cassette recordings of the shenanigans abruptly cut in and out and fall out of sync, creating disorientating, woozy echoes. Mics are bumped, stories are told, drinks are poured, text messages arrive, and AACM-esque flute jams are interrupted by violent bursts of laughter and wet-mouthed sound poetry. All the while, classic soul records play, initially in the background, but coming increasingly to the fore until the record culminates in a strangely moving free-associative singalong. Presented in a gatefold sleeve with extensive photographic documentation and liner notes from Joe McPhee, Live in the Batcave is a truly unique document that exists somewhere between free jazz, audio verité, performance art, and everyday life. File next to your copy of Das Kümmerling Trio. ‘Our music was born from the sounds of jazz, funk, soul, noise … sounds with no other reason so exist, except because they did, sounds which occurred like putting one step in front of the other to see if the way was clear to take the next step. The plan was, there is no plan, just start at the beginning, end at the end and party like it’s 1999’ – Joe McPhee

“Following on from Homenagem, Lugar Alto’s first critically acclaimed project, the São Paulo label's new endeavour is the reissue of another neglected masterpiece. This time, it’s “Poema da Gota Serena” turn by Zé Eduardo Nazário from 1982. This unique work gathers elements of free jazz, Brazilian Northeastern rhythms, Asian percussive instruments and electronics.

Zé Eduardo is a virtuoso drummer and percussionist with a prolific career as a musician and teacher. He was introduced to music in his youth and started playing professionally at the age of thirteen. In the late 60’s he was a regular at the famous Totem night club in São Paulo, where he performed alongside the pianist Tenório Jr. and other exceptional instrumentalists. It was there that he met Guilherme Franco, and together they formed the Grupo Experimental de Percussão. This period defined Nazário’s interest in different sonorities involving percussion, and he broke away from the more traditional genres, such as bossa nova and jazz. Over time, this distinctiveness in sound and playing allowed him to create his own path which culminated in an extensive number of remarkable works, including the colorful and psychedelic “M andala”, which examines Indian and hippie themes. He also played with Hermeto Pascoal’s group and joined him and Jaques Morelenbaum for the recording of the cult classic “Imyra, Tayra, Ypy” by Taiguara. For Egberto Gismonti’s “Nó Caipira”, Nazário performed with the khene, a mouth organ from Laos, a present from Gismonti himself.

But it is Nazário’s work with the 1976 collective Grupo Um which is his most well-known, who, during their 6-year legacy recorded, amongst movie and ballet soundtracks, 3 albums: “Marcha Sobre a Cidade”, “Reflexões Sobre a Crise do Desejo” and “Flor de Plástico Incinerada”. The combo is considered one of the most innovative formations of its time, unusually combining electro-acoustic elements, jazz and Brazilian traditional music.

Poema da Gota Serena was Zé Eduardo's first solo project and it was financed by the legendary Lira Instrumental, a collaboration between the ground-breaking venue, label and publisher for the São Paulo avant-garde, Lira Paulistana, along with the always interesting Continental Records, home to such luminaries as Tom Zé. The album was offered as a package deal simultaneously with the production of “Flor de Plástico Incinerada”, ensuring 2 studio sessions at JV studios in October 1982.

Each side of the album explores different duets which, with its suite formated tracks, give the album the feel of a cohesive whole. The first half of the A side, “Energia dos Três Mundos”, is shared with the improvised saxophone of Cacau. Nazário delves into free jazz rhythms and plays his drums with a rolling and tumbling swing, using the kit in full, demonstrating the power of Brazilian jazz fusion. The second half of the suite takes us into a more tranquil mode. “Só Prá Ouvir”, demonstrates Zé’s mastery on the glockenspiel, and Indian percussion instruments, such as the tabla and mridangam. Cacau, on his side, switches his saxophone for more delicate dancing flute driven passages, equal parts northeastern rhythms and deep Amazonian indigenous influences. The B side, with “Prá Pensar / Prá Sentir e Prá Contar”, contrasts heavily with the A side’s more organic and natural feel. In Prá Pensar Lelo Nazários’s synth clusters and electronic blasts strangely interact with the exploring, wandering percussion. This track leads into the sublime “Prá Sentir e Prá Contar” where South Indian inspired vocals, performed by Zé Eduardo, accompany the graceful synth chords and fluttering percussion. The result is a hypnotic, otherworldly feel to the music that is infectious and takes the listener on an extraordinary journey.
With Poema da Gota Serena, it is possible to hear music that extrapolates the lines of the avant-garde and popular music. It is an album the demonstrates that Brazilian jazz fusion can be both spiritual and challenging at the same time.

All the tracks were expertly remastered by Lelo Nazário, directly from the original tapes, maintaining the high quality of production that Lugar Alto are becoming renowned for. All the artwork was reinterpreted by the São Paulo design studio Sometimes Always, including an exclusive insert and unpublished images.

It seems that Lugar Alto have managed to excavate yet another gem from the seemingly bottomless Brazilian mines. Long may they continue to do what they do so well.”

Known as the Queen of Morna, Cesária Évora brought the traditional music of Cape Verde to international recognition and became recognised as one of world music's great female voices. Raised in an orphanage, Évora started singing as 16-year-old in the bars and sailor taverns of the West African island and sang on cruise ships before performing in Portugal at the invitation of Cape Verdean singer Bana. After being discovered by Portuguese producer Jose Da Silva she went to Paris becoming a serious global star. . Madonna asked her to perform at her wedding and again for her birthday, but Evora turned her down both times
Influenced by Brazilian rhythms, creole flamboyance and the heartworn sadness of the blues, the "barefoot diva" was compared to Billie Holiday and found great acclaim in). A heavy drinker and smoker, Évora's romantic, humble visions of Africa led to a Grammy Award for Voz d'Amor (2003), but ill-health forced her retirement in 2010 and she died - aged 70
The Barefoot Diva, and she continued to always perform without shoes on, proudly proclaiming her humble roots. She is also remembered for her stage appearance, always modestly dressed, with a bottle of Cognac on stage and a cigarette in her mouth.
Cesaria Evora is the world's foremost singer of the morna, the indigenous style of Africa's Cape Verde Islands. The morna evolved as a hybrid of Portuguese fados, British sea shanties, and African rhythm, reflecting the island's history as a Portuguese colony and spot for British coal mining. Some say it was also influenced by the modinha, a Brazilian song form. Full of mournful melodies and slow tempos, Evora's music encapsulates the essence of the morna in its sadness, longing, and nostalgia.

Ambient/Traditional Flute Music from Japanese Shakuhachi Master Teruhisa Fukuda

The shakuhachi is an end-blown bamboo flute with one dorsal and four frontal holes and a bevelled notch as mouthpiece. There are two elements in the name of the instrument: shaku refers to an ancient measurement which is the equivalent of 30,3 cm; hachi means eight. Originally shakuhachi thus refers to a flute that measures 1,8 shaku, that is, 54,5 cm.

For this CD, 2LP Master Fukuda chose a series of seven pieces from a repertoire dating back to the seventeenth century. These were originally performed by monks belonging to the Fuke sect of zenBuddhism, who viewed their instrument as means for meditation. The seven pieces are destined to be played solo, in the spirit of zen.

Teruhisa Fukuda
Born in 1949, Teruhisa Fukuda is an eminent artist who has explored a vast range of musical techniques from, both, traditional and contemporary music.

The fifth issue of Blacksilk sees the return of label head Marc Ash. Following the debut of his one-project moniker Plovdiv in 2016, a tape EP on Clan Destine and appearances on labels such Helena Hauff's 'Return to Disorder', he now comes forth with a work that reveals a deeper side of his obscure and multifaceted vision of electronic music.

Rejecting any fixed musical categorization, the listener is left free to decide how to deal with these compositions, each one exploring different areas of Marc's approach to existence through seductively articulated synth lines.

A work of self-reflection and a stark celebration of controversial times of uncertainty and doubt.

Deadpan vocals extracted from Godard films, eerie Teutonic fairytales and Marc's own deconstructed voice take the listener by the hand on a rollercoaster of anxiety and active resignation to the absurd post-everything age in which we live.

Silent Servant's reinterpretation of 'Take your Judgments' crowns the EP with a shadowy march built on repetitive sequences, abruptly waking us up from the sinister dream and leaving a sweet yet sour taste in our mouths.

North East duo Forriner are back with their third and final instalment in the samurai trilogy on their eponymous 'Forriner Music' imprint. Following a couple of impressive showings with previous EP's 'Condor' and 'In the B' they return for their hattrick with '17:17 Neon'. A four tracker of experimental club music for powerful dance floor experiences that offers two originals as well as a banger from Bird Of Paradise and a mouthful of mathematics from Legget and Suade for the remixes.

First up, 'The Jungle Is Deep' which immediately sets off at a rate of knots! Its sharp pace is tempered by the sound of the drums: dull kick, wooly clap, rattling hi-hats while its bassline bleeds in slowly as a dark repeating tone and subtle chord swell and a haunting, cautious vocal reminds you that 'The jungle is dark and deep'. The second half of the track balances its steamrolling kick with an intricate, hypnotic lead as a growling synth line shuffles and recombines over its rumpled techno groove. It's feeling is transportive, the kind of music that makes you close your eyes on the dance floor.

Fellow Northeast alumni take up the remix for 'The Jungle Is Deep'. Steve 'Four Hands' Legget and Suade Adapted hammer a hefty slice of future dub techno from the skeletal remains of the original! Its chunking, discordant drums and manic echo chamber combine with a lilting bassline making sure you know that this is tough music but that it also has a tender heart. Clipped vocals squelch and flutter throughout but these are more textural than melodic, adding extra depth to the track. This trip is all about striking, psychoactive grooves, pushing the swing settings to extremes. Equal parts sinister as it is are playful. Fitting the typical tradition of winsome, weird dance music.

Over on the flip is the title track '17:17 Neon' featuring vocalist Louis Adams and violinist Late Girl (Laura Stutter Garcia) Breathy melancholic vocals and pitched down, endorphin flooded electronica. This is techno in a state of dewey eyed delirium. The neon of the title is very much instructive here, with the vocal being the scattered, shining light that the track playfully hangs itself from.

Jo Howard aka Bird of Paradise takes the reins for the final remix delivering a charging peak-time club tool with relentless batteries of percussion setting the stage for a trippy soundscape. Other than their Northern roots, what these producers have in common is a distinctive approach to rhythm. The restlessness of the sharp stabs of static perfectly guiding the darkly pulsing mood.

Odd Beholder, the project of Zurich-based musician Daniela Weinmann, releases the full-length debut album "All Reality Is Virtual" this fall.

"All Reality Is Virtual" is an intelligent, tenderly flowing and weird pop album, colourful, assertive. It deals with the strange temptations of our time: from tinder to AI, from offline loneliness to obsessive self-marketing. "I noticed that the main temptation of a digitalized life is the idea that everything can be measured, recorded and therefore known." says Weinmann. "But I yearn for surprise, for wonder. The unknown, the uncontrollable is appealing to me."

Odd Beholder have released two highly acclaimed EPs already, "Lighting" and "Atlas". Followed by the "Remixes" EP. Those remixes have been contributed by friends made along the way and artists Odd Beholder became fans of: The/Das, Fejká, Hundreds, Alessandro Giannelli, Kalipo, Thomas Atzmann. After having played tours in China, Germany, Switzerland and Italy, Daniela Weinmann teamed up with swiss musician and producer Martin Schenker to finish producing Odd Beholder's debut album. "All Reality Is Virtual" will be out Oct. 19th, 2018 on Sinnbus and Mouthwatering Records.

In July 2014, Jungle released their self-titled debut album. Featuring the singles 'Platoon', 'Busy Earnin'', 'Time', 'The Heat' and 'Julia', neo-soul classics all, it was the aspirational sound of young London, a soundtrack of escapism, an unmistakable Jungle sound and a unique, vivid, visual Jungle world. The whole thing was dreamed up by Josh 'J' Lloyd-Watson and Tom 'T' McFarland, a production and multi-instrumentalist duo who never expected to leave their bedroom studios, far less become the core of a talent-filled seven-strong collective that morphed into a killer live outfit. Cue online word-of-mouth and IRL buzz, rave reviews, a Mercury Music Prize nomination, songs of the summer (two summers, even), viral videos, Noel Gallagher declaring the album 'fucking amazing', half a million sales, burgeoning DJ careers, a global tour that lasted two solid years. It all just happened.

Today, Jungle announce news of the follow-up to that defining debut record. The album is titled For Ever and will be released on 14th September via XL Recordings. If Jungle's first album was their imaginary soundtrack to the places they had never been, For Ever is inspired by real life experiences of the places they'd dreamed of for so long. Swapping Shepherds Bush for the Hollywood Hills, J and T set up camp in Los Angeles to write and record the album. Over time however, their romanticization of The Californian Dream clashed with the reality of actually living it, the feeling of being adrift on the West Coast compounded by the collapse of long-term relationships. Returning home to London, they teamed up with highly regarded young producer Inflo where they sought to create a "post-apocalyptic radio station playing break up songs', whittling down loads of ideas this concept spawned into the core 13 tracks you have before you. That station and those songs and that journey are the sound of Jungle's second album For Ever. They had to go away to come home. And what J and T lost in love, they gained in music. For Ever is for real, deeper and higher, more intimate and more expansive, feelgood and, just occasionally, feelbad. It is, then, a proper second album.

From the inheritor of John Coltrane's mouthpiece a re-integration of deep South African jazz roots with the Black Atlantic spiritual jazz continuum.

Celebration's release trumpeted the emerging dawn of South Africa's epochal changes. Sainted and blessed, Bheki Mseleku appeared as the herald of a new era, a prophet of rebirth and reconnection. This is a work signalling transition and change, and a sign of a South African music that was properly reconnected with global currents - a music that could journey far beyond the stifling combination of exile and oppression in which it had been bound.

Recognising Bheki as a kindred spirit to her late husband, Alice gave him the saxophone mouthpiece that John Coltrane had used during the recording of A Love Supreme. Coltrane was a permanent touchstone for the pianist, one of the few who Bheki felt had the same esoteric and spiritual focus as himself: 'the only musicians I know of who were deeply into this were Coltrane, and Pharoah and Sun Ra', he told an interviewer in 1992.

While the idioms of post-Coltrane spirit jazz are certainly to the fore on Celebration, they are energised by a swift and original musical vision, quite specific to Bheki's music, in which whole musical systems - the marabi and mbhaqanga jazz of the townships, American jazz, European classical, and more - are seamlessly mended together by the pianist's quicksilver musical sensibility and legendary technical ability.

Celebration was originally released on compact disc and cassette in the middle of 1992 by World Circuit. It was Bheki's first statement under his own name, and the first recorded presentation of his personal musical vision. This vision had been tempered across two decades which had combined intense professional playing with profound personal trials in both the spiritual and earthly domains, all set against the greater backdrop of South African political turmoil and exile in Europe.

The band brought together musicians hailing from three signally important points within the interconnected, communicating spaces of the Black Atlantic continuum - North America, post-colonial Britain, and southern Africa. With them, Mseleku created the first major South African-led musical statement to be produced after the sufferance of exile was ended. The ultimate and most egregious remnant of the centuries-long colonial era, apartheid, was finally being dismantled as they played. At this critical point, Mseleku's musical spirit work, channelled from a higher source, spoke of a time to come where all divisions might be transcended by a greater unity.

"At the crux of American-born, Shanghai-based producer Eli Osheyack's debut album, Sadomodernism, is a question of agency. Borrowed from film theory, the album title was originally coined by writer Moira Weigel to describe a waning European art house tradition that vehemently rejects 'naïve pleasure'—the tranquilizing comfort of conventional cinematic narrative, like mainstream Hollywood—and opts for violence and pain, with the aim of shaking audiences out of cinematic manipulation and into their own position vis-à-vis the malaise of contemporary life. Echoing the work of sadomodernist auteurs, Osheyacks's Sadomodernism is a deeply political project with critical ambitions. The smashing and blending of genres, from techno, industrial, noise and gabber to ballroom and metal, even opera, and spontaneous percussion arrangements, sometimes mixed with distorted spoken word, do not mean to please, but provoke through disorder and chaos. Laden with Brechtian alienation affects, Sadomodernism interrogates the notion of autonomy in contemporary music, club culture, and social-political life."

New album from Anthony Ferraro aka Astronauts, etc, who for most of his music career, served as Toro y Moi's keyboardist, with this album 'Living In Symbol' being his debut solo record.

Sonically, the album weaves its influences into an alien drapery. 'The Border' introduces Latin psychedelia to a groove à la David Axelrod, setting the stage for a vocal performance that manages to be equal parts Lee Hazlewood and HAL 9000. On 'The Room', a Borgesian story gets dressed up in an eerily graceful string arrangement reminiscent of Les Baxter. And 'Who I Talk To' nods to George Harrison in a soft rocking arrangement that supports Ferraro's ghostly croon.
Living In Symbol Is An Ode To Ambiguity, The Future, And Saying 'so Long' To The Known. A Member Of The Last Generation To Experience Life Before Total Interconnectedness, Anthony Ferraro (digitally Known As Tony Peppers) Aims To Be A Bridge Between Two Very Different Realities.

The Spirit Of Change Is Especially Pronounced In California's Bay Area, Where Technologies Dawn And Disruption Is The Noblest Goal. Critics And Advocates Of All Stripes Write Columns And Fill Talk Radio Hours With Their Analyses Of The Times. Ferraro Is A Funny Case: A Sometimes Luddite With A Romantic Streak, He Would Probably Be A Doomsayer If It Weren't For His Being Situated In The Middle Of It All. As It Happens, He Ended Up Writing A Generative Music Algorithm That Sold On Auction At The Smithsonian For $5,000.

His Take On Tomorrow Is Nonjudgmental, Meditative, Imaginative. It Keeps Away From Unqualified Hope Or Outright Alarmism, Choosing Instead To Embrace The Indeterminacy As Food For Dreaming.

Ferraro's Friendship With Chaz Bear, Who Co-produced The Album, Began Modestly Enough: Bear Walked Into The Coffee Shop Where Ferraro Worked While Attending Uc Berkeley. The Two Became Friends, And When Ferraro Graduated The Following Summer, He Signed On As Touring Keyboardist For Toro Y Moi. Musical Bonds Were Forged Over The Next Few Years, And The Pair Began Collaborating On What Would Become Living In Symbol.

Living In Symbol Is A Series Of Rooms, A Choose-your-own-tomorrow Story. Step In And Peer Through Its Open Doors.

On their very first shot, Count Five, one of America's most exciting mid-60s garage rock groups, hit the bulls-eye. And, fittingly, on Double Shot Records, a hot new label that was also making its debut. For both, it was a giant hit, "Psychotic Reaction," a driving, pulsating sound that zoomed to the top of the charts. To the five youngsters from San Jose, CA, "over-night" success came after 18 months of rehearsals, experimentations and unique innovations. Thanks to a tip from popular disk jockey Brian Lord, Double-Shot Records signed Count Five to a long-term contract in the summer of '66. The instant success of "Psychotic Reaction" prompted the release of this album of the same name, their one and only full-length studio record, which also includes covers of The Who's "My Generation" and "Out In The Street." 180g vinyl reissue with Stoughton jacket packaging.

Teste returns with The Box Man, a five-track EP that marks their first release of original material in 25 years. Formed during the early nineties in Hamilton, Ontario, they put out only three official records between 1992-1993 on Probe Records, most notably 'The Wipe,' which is regarded as a genre defining classic, while the follow-up 'Regions' also served as a template for the ensuing sonics of contemporary techno. With only a handful of live actions, the final chaotic show (public disturbance) occurred for Pure in Glasgow 1994. Afterwards, the original Teste lineup of juvenile delinquents disbanded but unwittingly ended up defining the hypnotic and drugged out strains of today's afterhours techno parties. The project vanished for decades until reactivating the chaos in 2014, promoting a slew of remixes 'The Rewipes,' by artists such as Rrose and Terence Fixmer, on the Edit Select imprint.

Since then, original member David Foster, still at large as //HUREN//, has been slugging it out in the fringes with influential output on the seminal Zhark Recordings Berlin and has collaborated as O/H with Rich Oddie of Orphx. First meeting on Mayday 2017 in Berlin, a new alliance with Martin Maischein aka Goner formed. Goner is likewise a veteran with essential output under various monikers on imprints such as Force Inc., Editions Mego, and Hospital Productions. From that pairing, The Box Man came into being for the second release on BITE, the Berlin techno label run by Hayden Payne and Florian Engerling.

The Box Man picks up where Teste last left us with their revolutionary vision of techno and continues to further their interdimensional manifestation of insanity and formation. Pure techno serving as a method of psychic expulsion and self-reckoning. From the opening, the eponymous track approaches full panoramic throttle as metallic synths creep 360 degrees around the listener, setting the tone for panic and loss of cognitive control. Teste then moves into the stealthier outpatient techno rhythms of 'The Long Term Care Facility' and 'Thieves Are Operating In This Area'. The EP contrasts its propulsion with different interpretations of its blueprint. 'Foaming At The Mouth' delves into Cabaret Voltaire-alike rhythm box violence until all is closed with the comedown melodies of 'Lyubov'. Through highly adept methods of sound design and neural interpretation, Teste once again cuts apart reality with their music, expressing nightmares and visions via new rituals and mind control techno.

Haiku's Raw Waxes label is delighted to welcome the famously unconventional Stanislav Tolkachev with a new track EP of experimental techno and IDM sounds. Entitled Champions' Breakfast and with brilliant artwork from German Benedikt Rugar, the releases features six cuts, one of which is a previously digital-only track landing here on vinyl for the very first time.

Haiku has long been a fan of Ukrainian Tolkachev having previously collaborated on a remix for the label, while Tolkachev has also released on Haiku's other label Inkblots. This new EP is one that not only shows off the label's willingness to take risks and put out diverse and interesting electronic music, but also one that proves Tolkachev is a truly unique artist with his own musical voice. He has been that way for more than a decade now, and has put out three long players as well as countless EPs that get heavy support from the tastemakers of the day. This latest offering contains his take on the essentialness of groove, enriched by his use of atonality, dissonance and acid-not-acid textures, all in a minimal style.

The deep 'Shady' kicks things off with spangled synth lines and eerie pads off in the distance. It's a lonely and insular piece with kinked rhythms that keep you locked. The excellent 'The Main Thing Is To Survive' is then less constrained, with kicks that rock back and forth as off kilter synth lines warp and wrap around each other in mind melting and tripped out fashion. Switching up the mood with ease, 'Fuck This Guy' is a dark and musty passage of humid ambient techno with static electricity buzzing about over smeared pads that are filled with menace, then the curious 'Hair In My Mouth' is about blurting, busted frequencies, loose and scattered drums and glassy melodies. It's a mangled and mashed up track that sounds like little else. 'Negative Space' is horror soundtrack techno with urgent, driving drums and nervy sound design that keeps you on edge, and closer 'Self Destruction' is built on broken, bristling beats. A rhythm slowly emerges from the haze and it is one that is physical and restless and sure to make a big impact in the club.

This is a varied and vital EP that oozes essential electronic invention.

Mouse on Mars' Andi Toma and Jan St. Werner return with their most
inventive album to date, Dimensional People. The electronic music pioneers
have been critically acclaimed for their playful and inventive sound and
production techniques on releases spanning from the early '90s to now. In
demand from a surprising array of artists their most recent contributions are
featured on the Grammy award winning album Sleep Well Beast by The
National.
The duo are joined on Dimensional People by an impressive list of guests
: Justin Vernon (Bon Iver), Aaron and Bryce Dessner (The National), Zach
Condon (Beirut), Spank Rock, Swamp Dogg, Eric D. Clarke, Lisa Hannigan,
Amanda Blank, Sam Amidon, Ensemble Musikfabrik, and about 20 more
musical collaborators. The cast of characters are as unique as they are vast,
clearly a rich quarry for the prodigious duo.
Dimensional People is by it's nature a collaborative album. Originally
premiering as a spatial composition using object-based mixing technology
playing with the possibilities of sonic design (4D Sound) and collective
musicianship, the recording expands upon these ideas. Dimensional People
expresses itself as a dynamic 50-piece orchestra, telling a story in sound.
Mouse on Mars offer sound as a means to encourage open-minded societies,
aided by cutting-edge technology including their own MoMinstruments
music software or a spatial mixing technique called object based mixing,
with which a spatial version of the work was created. It is a conceptual
puzzle composed around one harmonic spectrum within one rhythmic
scheme, mostly in the tempo of 145bpm (inspired by Chicago footwork,
so the dance oor is not entirely absent). Looking ahead, Dimensional
People will also be realized through installation, presenting the work as an
immersive listening experience, as well as performance.