Search:op

Huge dancefloor acid original track from the legend that is Orlando Voorn plus killer peak-time remix action from Polymeric record's Maxx Rossi plus a bass-heavy, deeper funkier cut from label boss Pat Hurley.

“Dive / 4AM” is the latest outing from San Francisco Bay Area-based six-piece, The Seshen. The 7” outlines thesteps the group has made since their critically acclaimed sophomore album in 2016, both as a band and as individuals. “Since ‘Flames & Figures', a lot has been taking place both internally and externally. We were on tour for the last album when Trump was elected. There was an intense heaviness, a familiar one, one that extends generations and it just sunk in even further”, singer/lyricist Lalin St. Juste explains.

Side A opens with distorted four-to-the-floor chomper, “Dive”. Aggressive yet danceable, gritty but somehow unstoppable, “Dive” is inspired the profound need for change, catalysed through the somnambulant Larry Heard-esque bassline meshed to the warped tones of Lalin’s vocals. “The path towards my power, my strength, being okay with being unapologetic is just starting. I’m reclaiming what I have lost, reclaiming what has been passed down to me. The song is about the ground beginning to shake”, Lalin preaches.

While in contrast on side B, “4AM” untethers the listener by exploring a sense of spaciousness, flourishing the sparseness, distracting with moving snippets of delicate production. Lyrically tackling the insomniacs waking nightmare, “4AM” is about the witching hour, battling against oneself. "I was experiencing anxiety at night...where I would review all my actions and all the things I said throughout the day in search of something that I did wrong. At times it would keep me up, and I felt that I was at war with my mind.”

"We Can Do Anything We Want Because They Say We Can't Afford The Police"

Talking Heads lost in Ancoats. Prince in a Berghaus. The Compass Point All-Stars meet the Piccadilly Gardens Spiceheads.
Welcome to the world of SEE THRU HANDS.

Here to bring salvation to a Broken Brexit Britain, See Thru Hands is a fresh band from Manchester with hooks for days and a SERIOUS live vibe. Their debut EP on Manchester legend RUF DUG's label RUF KUTZ - "The Hot City EP" - brings you two new songs backed with remixes tested on the world's best dance floors.

Opener HOT CITY's energetic punk/funk conveys a dark story of British city life outside the London bubble.
Our councils are fucked, our public services neutered and all anyone cares about is when Deliveroo is gonna be available in their neighbourhood. Throw away your post-apocalyptic fantasies because it's already like that - the only option is to dance. It's grim up north.

After dancing ur arse off and simultaneously coming to the realisation that we're all fucked pls don't worry - See Thru Hands are here to pick up your pieces with NOTHING TO LOSE, a whimsical modern pop banger with shades of New British House that will instil in you a sense of freedom and ease all your worries.
Yes we are all going to hell in a handcart but with See Thru Hands as our companions, I think it's all gonna be just fine.

The package comes backed with a pair of deadly remixes - boss man RUF DUG strips back Hot City to the bare bones, rigs up a couple of jazzy neon lights and a DMX drum machine and brings you his 'Metrolink Vibes In The Area' version, while young upstart METRODOME completes the all-Mancunian lineup on this record with a twisted Marmite 2-step interpretation that is either gonna make you buzz or spew. It's not for everyone.

FPO (onesheet currently in development):

-

The digitally remastered release of JAK3's Moonlight Radiation is a menagerie of cyberpunk mutations arising out of the Memphis revival rap movement. The album's big, blown-out sound might have seemed an incidental result of an analog recording process in its original cassette release. Now, rendered in digital clarity, listeners can better perceive how JAK3 sculpts varying degrees of panic, aggression and resolve very intentionally through the hard mix of industrial noise, inventive beats, flush synths and recordings from a slew of rappers including Freddie Dredd (Toronto), Apoc Krysis (Memphis), and fellow Waistdeep Clique members Agnarkea and Calsutmoran.

The short format of Moonlight Radiation's 16 tracks allows JAK3 to cover a lot of ground, and even within a single track he keeps one guessing. Track 2, "2FAKE," goes from an atmospheric burn, to a slow drive with the snappy flow of Moistbread, and then abruptly crashes back into an oozing vortex of synths. The penultimate interlude "Return from Hyperspace" sounds like one is being forced through a hellish modem, only to land in a haunted and abandoned transmitter for the closing track, "This Night Will Never End."

Between, those tracks, one gets a tour of the wild possibilities that could come next from this producer and the sounds emerging from the Memphis chopped-and-screwed scene. In a milieu that is retreading the past, the mutants of Moonlight Radiation may seem to be arriving a little prematurely. But you can't stop evolution when the field is so wide, and young producers like JAK3 are moving fast.

Over the years Kid Loco has become a reference in the French electronic music landscape. Firstly, known for being an activist in the French underground music scene, he cofounded Bondage Records in 1982. With Bondage Records, he introduced several bands to the French alternative music scene like Bérurier Noir, Ludwig Von 88 or Washington Dead Cats. Alongside his activity of label manager, he composed and released under the name of Kid Bravo, an experimental music at the crossroads of rock and electronic. Astonished by the beginnings of the instrumental hip-hop of DJ Shadows, Jean-Yves Prieur aka Kid Loco experimented new ways of composing music with the sample technic in his own studio near Orly. This new musical adventure led to the birth of a mini album Blues Project released in 1996 on Yellow Productions.

Exploring further his own psychedelic universe, he released his first album A Grand Love Story in 1997 under the name of Kid Loco. Acclaimed both by the French and international music review, “A Grand Love Story” established itself as an iconic album of the trip-hop and electronic music scene. During the two years following its release, Kid Loco continued to invent his own musical universe nurtured by multiples influences. In 1999, he released Jesus Life For Children Under 12 Inches, an album featuring thirty remixes he composed for French and international artists (Pulp, Talvin Singh etc.) as well as his mixed compilation for the famous DJ KICKS collection released on the German electronic music label, !K7.

After a first European tour, Kid Loco returned to his studio, nicknamed “The Lafayette Velvet Basement” and composed his second album Kill Your Darlings released in 2001. Compared to his previous compositions, Kill Your Darlings features more tracks without sampled vocals. Eager to explore new musical horizons, Kid Loco produced in 2004 the original soundtrack of the American movie The Graffiti Artist directed by James Bolton (Narrative Feature Sound Award – Austin Film Festival 2003). Cruising to new musical galaxies, Kid Loco continued to compose and released the album Party Animals & Disco Biscuits in 2009 followed in 2011 by the album Confessions Of A Belladonna Eater. In addition of his albums, Kid Loco continued to experiment with the production of compilations celebrating the trip-hop music with “Trip-Hop Classics” released in 2010 followed by a second opus released in 2013 on Wagram Music.

2019 marks the return of Kid Loco with his track Here Comes The Munchies selected in the original soundtrack of the show Vernon Subutex (Canal +), the vinyl reedition of his cult album A Grand Love Story and for the first time the digital release of the album Confessions Of A Belladonna Eater with exclusive remixes.

Warehouse Find!

Flight Mode makes a welcome return to Delusions, this time joining forces with Joel Brittain to come up with another killer release in the form of Burn This. Those who caught his last one It’s So Nice last year will know the drill…. epic, rolling, dubbed-out loopy uptempo house based around a classic disco bassline which patiently builds, increasing in intensity Wild Pitch style. Burn This treads similar waters with subtle arpeggios floating around an incessant groove whilst layers of vocal pads build to a crescendo over a beautiful ten minute ride. Completely flipping the script we’ve got the man like Medlar stepping up for remix duties and delivering just the kind of bonkers reworking we were hoping for. Keeping the trippy vibe of the original in place but opting for a more drum machine-programmed groove Medlar’s remix turns the shuffle factor up to ten and adds a rude bassline and intense synths which make it a real ear worm. Finally, Flight Mode gives us his own Tricky Dub of Burn This which adds a straighter 4/4 vibe and goes heavier on the FX creating a perfectly bubbling track which seems to simmer without ever boiling over.

TROY TOWN are back with their 3rd release and itʼs another dance floor focussed EP from a South East London mainstay. El Prevost has been a fixture of the underground London dance music scene for nearly 20 years - his first label, Linx Recordings, was at the forefront of the garage and grime crossover at the turn of the millennium signing early tracks by Kano, Wiley and Pay As U Go Cartel. However, over the past decade his productions in the world of house, garage and techno have brought him widespread respect amongst discerning A&Rʼs and DJs such as Third Ear Recordings, Patrice Scott and Ricardo Villalobos whilst building his own label and party series ‘No Speakersʼ. This EP is unmistakably indebted to the sounds of London but equally doesnʼt sound like anyone else out there at the moment. ‘A Little Politicalʼ, dripping in dub effects and toughened up with the immense delivery of poet Kyla Jenee Lacey, is full throttle and combines consciousness with a determination to fill dance floors. The broken beat influence of Ladbroke Grove and the Co-Op collective is given a hefty rejuvenation on ‘Nu Jazzʼ. ‘Wheelʼ and ‘Acid Tonerʼ are heads-down, deep and dubby. Both tracks that would ramp up the temperature in dark basements like Plastic People circa 2011.

The always on-point and culturally significant Tuskegee Music is back with more essential music, this time from venerated American producer D’Marc Cantu. Over the course of a distinguished career, Cantu has contributed to everything from jackbeat to acid, house to techno on labels like Creme Organisation and Les Disques De La Mort. Always serving up raw-edged, uncompromising sounds, he does so again here on another standout EP. Opener ‘Beat The Move’ is an urgent, high tech piece of slick and supple acid house with 303 undulations, dark vocal loops and the sort of hammering drums that get the club locked right in.
The sublime ‘In The Forest’ is a tripped out bit of restless electro with skittish hits and rueful pads that gets right to your heart. Last of all is the militant, marching ‘A Narrow Connection’ which closes things out with crisp kicks and scintillating sheet metal drums that straighten your back and get you stomping.
These are utilitarian yet wonderfully unique club tracks from a real master of the form.

50 years ago, a young Panamanian singer by the name of Ralph Weeks, who a few years prior had cut his teeth in the US music landscape with the group Johnny & The Expressions, self-produced and independently released a record with an absolute monster of a soul ballad called "Something Deep Inside." It was a song that Weeks had come up with on the spot during one of many gigs in the heart of Brooklyn's Prospect Heights, at the time a cultural hub and community for many Panamanians living in the borough. Along with his group, The Telecasters, Weeks often played at a Panamanian-owned club in the neighborhood called 4 Star's (STA4R's) which would independently sponsor the release of the tune on a 7-inch single.

Fast forward to 2019, where a serendipitous meeting between Ralph Weeks and Names You Can Trust turned into a solid formation of musical synchronicity, bonded over a shared belief in musical fusion, a weaving of musical threads that was similarly the foundation of that earlier era in Panama. It's a fusion that has become a constant theme throughout the Names You Can Trust catalog in the last 10 years, connecting the dots from NY, the Caribbean and Latin America. An immediate plan was put into motion: return Weeks to a studio atmosphere that had eluded him in the preceding decades, a vibe and live musical presence that would be reminiscent of his time recording with The Telecasters and The Exciters in Panama.

In the ultimate tribute to Weeks and that foundation, NYCT label mates Combo Lulo unpacked the 50-year old original tune and refashioned it into a timeless rocksteady ballad. It was an opportunity for Weeks to acquaint himself with a new band and a new generation of musical talent. Ultimately, it was an unexpected chance for Weeks to reconnect to the music he wrote one fateful evening in a Brooklyn club. For Combo Lulo, Names You Can Trust, and now the rest of his musical admirers, it's a chance to hear how gracefully Weeks' voice has aged, still silky smooth with those beloved falsetto runs, sweet and rounded like a barrel-aged añejo rum. It's a testament to the timelessness of Weeks' original music, and certainly another reminder of how far and wide even the smallest of musical blips can spread.

Presented as a double-sided bilingual 45 single, both versions of Weeks' classic tune, "Algo Muy Profundo" and "Something Deep Inside," have been formatted in the traditional Jamaican style, skillfully cut live and mixed under the guidance of NYCT and Combo Lulo's talented musicians. It's a tribute to a brilliant record and an unsung architect of Latin American sweet soul, but also a love letter to a very particular NY-Caribbean fusion that theoretically could have happened 50 years ago, depending on the borough you resided in. After all, there was always something deep inside. Comes with NYCT / STA4R'S Company Sleeve & Liner Notes.

Halav Av is a Tel Avivian super-group consisting of members of the Israeli alternative music scene. Alonzo and Amitkes of The Crotches, Niv of Red Axes, Yovav of Shame on Us and Adiel of Hila Ruach & Future Shock.

This summer the band will release their first album, the first singles to meet the public’s ears will be To Live, Talk to Me and Mt. Beitar. These singles and the rest of the album were recorded by Uri Mixmonster of The Apples straight onto two-inch tape like the good ol’ days.
In addition to Mixmonster’s recording expertise, the album features Cello virtuoso Noa Ayali of The White Screen and Keyboardist Shay Landa of The RPS Surfers.

Wrapped up in a cover by the praised Israeli artist David Tartakover, the songs in this album are meant to be short and ticklish just like a father’s bristles. Because Father’s Milk is the essence of male gentleness. It is romantic, optimistic, nostalgic and naive. It’s childhood. It’s longing. It’s longing for childhood. Father’s Milk is the feeling of fatherhood, even if without offsprings. Father’s Milk is love, it’s music, it’s nourishing music.

Taking inspiration from a vast musical sphere, the Munich-Vienna pair Jorkes are widely recognised for their open-minded and passionate approach to electronic music which is translated through their Freeride Millenium imprint and own unique productions. ‘Cross The Line’ will be the duo’s first outing since 2016 seeing them join up with the Italian pair Hard Ton who are known for releases on Wonder Stories, Luv Shack Records, Toy Tonics and many more. Jorkes invite Live At Robert Johnson artist Massimiliano Pagliara and Philpot founder SoulPhiction aka Jackmate for remix duties which tops off this distinctive release highlighting the openness and sensibility of their musical philosophy.
‘Cross The Line’ begins the EP with alleviating pads balanced harmoniously with alluring, heart-warming vocals and gentle keys drifting throughout before Massimiliano Pagliara delivers an infectious remix focusing on hypnotic bass grooves, effervescent drums and undulating pads fluttering naturally with the stirring modulations.
‘Jackmate’s Dub Mix’ deploys low-riding resonations fused with muffled tones and thrilling, shuffling rhythms within whereas ‘Jackmate’s 90s Mix’ focuses heavily on organic percussion rolling throughout with robust musical elements and looping vocals. SoulPhiction’s ’Dub Mix’ completes the pack with a tranquil take on the original laying focus on funk-infused instrumentals and subdued jazz drums.

With its fourth catalogue number, Steinlach returns to the vinyl format with a remix EP. On board are international friends of the label, who layed hands on Wice's originals with outstanding re- interpretations. While the A-side contains two groovy and club-oriented remixes of "Just kiddin", the trippy flipside focuses on the second outcome of the label and refers to the two pieces "Absent" and "Hertz".

The record opens with a fast-paced and jacking "Just Kiddin" version by Deep'a and Biri. The two guys from Tel Aviv re-interprate the clubby aspect of the piece, furnish it with a portion of percussions and accompany it with a volatile beat. Discharging the track with a big bang, they're leaving the listener with no chance but to move energetically to the groove patterns while cherishing the original lead melody.

Just like Deep'a and Biri, Jon Hester bets on the energy and the recognition value of the original synth line. As typical for Jon, he gives a more Chicago-style housey and bouncy touch to the composition. The lead is getting chopped, re-interpreted and re-arranged into a new groove and melody pattern, sure to inspire the floor to shake and to catapult everyone around into a frisky dancing mood. Suddenly, the well-known arpeggio of the original comes in and makes for the climax of this brilliant remix.

With side B, the club aspect of the record might not be left behind, but moved into more stripped and trippy terrains. The B1 track is fashioned as a ruthless "Absent" version, unmistakably having Refracted's writing all over it. The smallest variations of the synth line, drones, and pads, without resorting to typical drum rack aspects, find their way deep inside the listener's head, and draw them into their subtle rhythm. The unapologetic roughness of the interpretation is striking and makes it a brilliant peaktime weapon.

Rounding up the whole EP, the last remix of the record is a wonderful re-interpretation by the talented Australian that is Mosam Howieson. He ministered to Wice's personal favourite piece and crafted a loving and deep version of "Hertz", which translates the magic of the original into own words and emotions, adds a subtle groove to it, then invites to listen more carefully. One quickly dives into a hopeful world in which a certain magic seems to be present, and where everything seems to be alright. Be it as a perfect last piece after a long fulfilling evening, or as the outstanding means to make the sun rise in the morning-Mosam's interpretation sure hits the spot.

Special thanks go out to our close friends Simon Sandleitner who is always in charge of the great artworks and Roger Reuter (Roger23) for having always an open ear, his helpful advises and his thought-out criticism.

lack Truffle present In Real Life, the latest in a flurry of releases from Berlin-based guitarist and composer Julia Reidy. Having drawn acclaim for solo performances on 12-string acoustic guitar that bridge microtonality, ‘American primitive’ stylings and classic minimalism, Reidy’s recent releases have utilised an increasingly broad sonic palette, fleshing out guitar-based composition with electronics, field recordings, and – most strikingly – heavily auto-tuned vocals. On In Real Life, Reidy pushes one step further, crafting an epic LP-length suite that moves from abstracted song to lush electronics and explorations in contemporary musique concrète. Beginning with a passage of eerie electronics and creaking percussive interjections, Reidy’s heavily auto-tuned voice quickly takes centre stage. Surrounded by explosions of electric guitar and synthesised arpeggios, the auto-tuned voice delivers a melancholic ode, bringing together poetic images to reflect on the instability of experience and mutability of identity in a contemporary world saturated by digital technology. This concern with the unsettled relationship between the physical and digital is reflected musically by the constantly shifts in emphasis between Reidy’s physically demanding guitar-picking and the various forms of synthesis deployed. Similarly, the dynamic imagery of cutting, shattering, and ‘racing streams’ present in Reidy’s lyrics also serves to characterise the structure of In Real Life, which ceaselessly shifts between distinct episodes. The song-based opening, long sequences of frenetic 12-string guitar shadowed and eventually overtaken by synth tones, passages of delicate chiming harmonics, electro-acoustic cut-ups – each flows seamlessly into the next, often recurring throughout the record’s duration, which lingers over interstitial moments between these episodes.

Mixed and mastered by Joe Talia at Good Mixture, Tokyo. Vinyl cut at 45rpm for maximum fidelity by Rashad Becker at D&M, Berlin. Artwork by Suze Whaites. LP desgn by Lasse Marhaug.

Time is Local is a project by Danish collective We like We and sound artist Jacob Kirkegaard built around a 12-hour live sound installation and performance at Thorvaldsen Museum in Copenhagen.

The piece was initiated and performed by the artists during the G((o))ng Tomorrow Festival in 2017. As they slowly wandered the halls and rooms of the museum for a whole day, they performed extended sound compositions for a visiting audience at each of the 12 chambers for a longer session - a haunting experience as the outside world disappeared and the focus was on quiet sonic moments unfolding in midst of the grand, reverberous space. For this album they have collected 12 fragments revolving around the chambers in the museum. Each chamber is being represented by its own handful of tones, instruments and voice. The statues within, depicted by neo-classicist sculptor Bertel Thorvaldsen get their own soundtrack of quiet emanating gusts. Barely heard frequencies reflect through the walls. The marble carved busts of Greek gods that line the museum hallways gaze eternally with a blank stare as decades pass and new audience arrives.

Although We like We should need no introduction to followers of the Sonic Pieces label, the Danish all female sound quartet consists of Katrine Grarup Elbo (violin), Josefine Opsahl (cello), Sara Nigard Rosendal (percussion) and Katinka Fogh Vindelev (voice). Together they have forged a dynamic and intuitional sound beyond genres through the last decade. Only two years ago they released the nordic neo-classical opus Next to the entire All. This time they emerge in collaboration with sound artist Jacob Kirkegaard. Jacob’s works are sonic reflections on complex aspects of the human civilisation, treating themes such as radioactivity, melting ice, border walls and tones emitted by the ears. Through the last decades he has released records and sound documents through labels such as Touch, Important Records and more. As a document of their 12h performance, Time is Local is a beautiful sonic evocation that shines as a bright line of sun through the cracks of a tomb.

UK duo Wayward continue to turn heads after a big 2018 and return with a fresh new EP that features a remix from cult minimal man, Voigtmann. 

 For their latest offering, they turn once more to Silver Bear Recordings as newly announced co managers of the label and in the process remind us of the depth and talent that remains a hallmark of their output.  Opener 'The Energy' is a driving cut with lush drum layers carrying you along as distant pads flesh out the groove. Soft female whispers add layers of soul and the whole thing will make close-knit floors go off. 'Space Marines' then gets more edgy, with techno-leaning drums and freaky samples that make for a pumping but classy groove, finished in style by some heavenly sounding, uplifting pads. Voigtmann is a long time underground figure, releasing on a range of vital labels and has a superbly reduced sound, showcased here on his druggy, infectious remix. Notable for its swirling pads and zoned out vibes, it rounds off another expert Wayward release.

MUSAR continues to explore the healthy landscape of underground and alternative electronic music with the debut release on the label from Nightwave. 'The Journey' is a fitting title for the Glaswegian producer, DJ and promoter, who has been a lynchpin for the city's vibrant music scene since her first release in 2010. In the time since, Nightwave has a developed a punchy and highly original sound that blends potent influences of acid, techno and forward-thinking bass music, with releases on DABJ, UTTU, Fool's Gold, DEXT and her own imprint Heka Trax.

For her MUSAR debut, Nightwave celebrates, in her own words, "joy, dance, exploring inner worlds, the celebration of nature and life and how it all interconnects". On a delicate tip, opening and title track 'The Journey' establishes the EP's "rainforest rave" aesthetic, spiralling upwards with weightless energy. It's underlying percussion steps forward on 'Jiboia Groove', which blossoms thrillingly into wave upon wave of ethereal, breakbeat-led rave.

'Monkey Puzzle' pulls a similar, if more uncompromising trick, only with its rhythmic timber instead succumbing to layers of rough-hewn, squealing acid synthesis and pounding snare drums. 'Forest Guru' meanwhile restores much of the record's spiritual equilibrium in one fell swoop, finding a clearing in the landscape to sculpt a rolling, detailed jam that's as playful as it is creative.

Naive founder and Lisbon's rave goddess, Violet generously remixes 'The Journey' in intriguing fashion, unravelling a trippy and tense riddle at the heart of the rainforest.

Having spent the past few years quietly building up a dedicated crowd of followers and dancers as a club night, Scenic Route step out for their first offering as a label with three expertly crafted club cuts from Desert Sound Colony, an artist whose pumping productions have provided some of the parties’ most memorable moments. Since his debut release in 2014 on New York’s Scissor & Thread, Desert Sound Colony (real name Liam Wachs) has been refining a deeply personal club sound with releases for the likes of Futureboogie, Me Me Me, his own Holding Hands imprint and most notably of late, Nick Höppner’s Touch From A Distance. In addition to his productions garnering support from the likes of Midland, Raresh, Andrew Weatherall and Lena Willikens, Wachs himself is also a highly sought after DJ whose skills have seen him land bookings at some of the world’s most well respected clubs and festivals, including two stints at Berlin’s Panorama Bar already this year.

His prowess as a DJ has undoubtedly informed the music featured on the Cartographer EP. All three tracks are primarily designed for club use yet their intricate arrangements and undulating instrumentation ensure they remain captivating, despite the effectiveness of their functionality. The EP’s opener, “The Cartographer”, is a sleazy machine-driven odyssey, continuously building and evolving until snapping back into its original groove with a vengeance. “Gypsy Moth” sees Wachs team up with fellow Holding Hands affiliate Guava (real name Bradley Hutchings) for a dangerously syncopated drum workout doused in warped agogo bells, spliced vocals and a two-note bassline with a distinctly London flavor. Rounding the release off is “Budapest”. The combined power of the track’s interlocking kick and bass provide a solid stage for Desert Sound Colony to unleash an eerie arp and pads combo alongside a flurry of stuttering percussion and twisted samples while intermittently sprinkled with an unintelligible and downright ominous pitched down voice.

Glenn Astro conquers new territories with Naturals, fusing elements of Balearic and leftfield house with tribal and acid sounds on Tartelet Records.

In an impressively short amount of time, Glenn Astro has created a musical universe that’s entirely his. With full-length releases making waves on Ninja Tune and Apollo Rec, the sister label of R&SRecordings, the Berlin-based musician assembles a perfect pastiche of influences on his forthcoming EP Naturals, coming out on Copenhagen’s Tartelet Records this September.

Exploring the outer fringes of the Balearic sonic spectrum, Naturals delves into unexpected sound territories without losing touch with planet home. Sub-heavy drums mix with private oceanic field recordings, futuristic synth, and effect pedal workouts, delivering a four-track EP that is novel but honest to the bone.

“I tried not to take any direct influence from any particular music I was listening to,” Glenn Astro says. “Instead, I tried concentrating on where the instruments and effects were taking me, experimenting with different ways of using the gear that I know so well.”

Inspired by Sicily’s natural beauty, the juxtaposition of its rough landscapes and clear blue waters, Naturals takes listeners on a journey into unfamiliar sound; a conscious diversion from his usual style and yet an instant dance floor cracker infused with the artist’s signature panache.

“I made most of the record while being in Sicily,” he says. “In retrospect, it is easy to hear that the volcanic landscapes contrasting the idyllic beaches were a major influence.”

The EP opener “Naturals (Unsweetened Mix)” is a beautiful freak – a peak-time cut – starting out with tranquil ambient melodies and water drop percussion followed by a beasty acid line and slick drum programming. Next, “Naturals (Dance Mix)” slows it down to 116 BPM, taking a completely different route with a hypnotic dance between tribal and dub – a wonderfully weird closer.

On the flip side, “Slarutan (Pristine Mix)” emerges au natural with Sicilian field recordings, layered pads, playful melodies, and crisp drum programming. Saving the best for last, “Slarutan (Water Mix)” dips its toes into the early days of dance music, shifting into futuristic, ambient dub territory with divine melodies and filtered percussion.

“This one is for the plants and the trees. Return to planet Tartelet,” Glenn Astro says.

R&S present the eponymous, debut, full length album transmission from Lost Souls Of Saturn.
Epic in scope, time and space, this multidimensional mind trip is for fans of Mark Leckey's 'Fiorucci Made Me Hardcore', David Morales' Red Zone dubs, Don Cherry's 'Organic Music Society', The Orb's 'Ultraworld' and KLF's 'Space' and much more besides.
This ambient house masterpiece combines flavours gathered from across the galaxy, stewing them up into a delicious primordial soup. Old sci-fi soundtracks, acid, free jazz, avant garde, musique concrete, world music and more all whirl around an underground-dance-music axis.
Primarily LSOS are Seth Troxler and Phil Moffa, plus further opaque participants congregating to combine music, imagery, and storytelling into an inextricably linked whole, all wrapped-up in a philosophy of their own making.

In early 2018, Jas Shaw, one half of Simian Mobile Disco was diagnosed with a rare health condition – AL amyloidosis – a disorder of bone marrow cells. Having just completed SMD’s 7th studio album Murmurations and with a special show at the Barbican scheduled for April, things were thrown into confusion. At the time, no one, including Shaw, knew how the prognosis would pan out. Jas had to start chemotherapy almost immediately, which meant cancelling the tour. The duo decided to go ahead with the Barbican show in spite of Shaw’s illness, which was especially poignant as all involved knew it could potentially be SMD’s last ever live performance – in the end it turned out to be a tour-de-force. If this was SMD’s swansong, so be it.

In the year that followed, Jas spent months receiving weekly chemotherapy, learning to live with his condition, and when he felt well enough, spending hours in his studio making music.

The result of this was twofold, firstly a collaborative album with Derwin Dicker (Gold Panda), released as Selling – On Reflection, on City Slang Records Secondly, a growing archive of solo work, which is now ready for release. Entitled “The Exquisite Cops”, this 20+ track growing body of work will see the light of day via SMD’s Delicacies label – with a 2-track single released every fortnight /month and a limited
edition double LP scheduled for 27th September.

At the end of 2018 a difficult year was capped with hopeful news. With his condition in remission, able to stop chemotherapy Jas is able to start DJing and playing live again.

Jas: “The Exquisite Cops tracks seem to have made their own system for creation. Normally I record electronic music like a band would, as a take. So, it’s kind of surprising to me that that this batch of tracks wasn’t made this way. Instead of a single take that gets edited and developed these tracks were all made in bits, usually months apart. Some days I’d make a drum track, often editing it down so that it’s some sort of semblance of a structure; on other days I’d end up just making a synth sound or texture. This wasn’t something that I gave into reluctantly, it’s nice to be able to give a feedback based pad your whole attention rather than just set it up and only attend to it if it gets really out of hand.

The process of matching these misfits together was originally born out of laziness, rather than break open the synths to make something to develop an idea, what if I could just use something that I already had; slack. The interesting thing was that in pulling two takes together that were done months apart, they cast each other in a different light and though sometimes making them fit together was a hatchet job, sometimes they locked up together in an improbable way, making the rough structures that I’d improvised make a different sort of sense; often a more interesting sort of sense.

The more I did this the more it felt like this was not just a slacker’s way to use up offcuts, this resulted in combinations that I’d probably not have chosen if I’d done the tracks in one go. Also, and I know this isn’t something that’s important to everyone, there was a level of fastidious detail that I’d never have got if I’d had the textural and rhythmic elements playing together. It’s a longwinded process but it’s changed how I record and how I think about recordings I’ve made; plus I enjoy all parts of it so why cut it short?”

PLR is proud to host a variety of talented producers from around the hemisphere, from Berlin to Montréal to San Francisco. The label is a brainchild of independent artist Experimental Housewife and was kicked off by prolific producer Roche (100% Silk, Jacktone, Hobocamp) and his breath-taker A Genuine Effort To Make You Comfortable. Soon after, the spring saw italo-sprinkled dance floor beats followed by slamming techno and weirdo-tronica, a non-genre made of intriguing sounds that play tricks on DJs. In closing, the roster will be opening ears up with a wonderful miniseries of ambient releases before the final EP: arpeggiated pop from conceptual two-man band Star Service .

Premiere producers like Lily Ackerman (As You Like It, Mioli Music), CMD (Jacktone, basic_sounds), Golden Diskó Ship (Monika Enterprise, Spezialmaterial, Klangbad), BLEIE (B.O.D.I.E.S., 3am Devices), Mo Kudeki (Noctuary, Public Works), and Tape Ghost (Asterisk, Night Sea) have all signed up to the roster, releasing fierce and excitable works that they have had for a while but hitherto were not able to release to the public.

Reverenced names like Ryan Merry (now Elexos Park but formerly Ghosts On Tape), Roy England (Make Mistakes, Communikey), Caltrop (In The Dark Again), Loren Steele (Wolf + Lamb, Jacktone), and Philadelphia warriors Sean Thomas (Drumsong, Sound Between Movement) as well as bpmf (Schmer, Serotonin, Prototype 909) have all offered exclusive productions.

Mysterious and up-and-coming producers like Emmett Perlman (Wage Slave, Make Mistakes), Bad Person , gayphextwin (Jacktone), BIlagáana (VODER), and Atlas Of Nothing can be explored in the catalog alongside new names like Memeshift, The Hug , and Jaclyn Kendall .

Our spotlight mastering engineers for digital releases include David Last, Abe Duque, Dark Star Audio, David Tatasciore, and Helen Heß. Our resident and extremely generous/talented engineer for the year has been the one and only Roy England.

Sarah Benabdallah and Alexis Lebon are a very 21st century musical coupling, absorbing their metropolitan surroundings while tapping into a rich cultural heritage, not unlike fellow countrymen PNL or the Dutch band Altin Gün. A Paris-based duo set for greatness they might be, but it’s fair to say Mauvais Oeil are operating under a misnomer: while their name means “evil eye” in French, you’ll only experience enlightenment when you lay eyes (and ears) upon them. Mauvais Oeil are set to release their debut EP Nuits de velours, a magical melting pot of musical shibboleths and contemporary grooves. On opener “Mes nuits de velours”, we’re transported in the land of 1001 Arabian Nights, with the music every bit as smooth and alluring as the subject matter. “Afrita” is a trance-inflected musical acclamation evoking all
the madness and gayety of a midsummer souk. Sung entirely in Arabic with delightful blasts of strings, it’s a North African-influenced banger with a delicate wistfulness. “Asha” meanwhile is in a reference to Asha Vahishta, the middle-eastern concept of truth
according to the ancient religion of Zoroastrianism. Sung again in Arabic, it features catchy Phrygian guitar manoeuvres played over ambient analogue keyboard strokes. The E.P. is completed by “Constantine”, a song of longing, dedicated to the home of Sarah’s forebears. Having met in the arty northern faubourgs of Paris, Sarah and Alexis soon developed a musical telepathy and a shared sonic agenda, mining their own histories for the profound
cultural roots that underscore Mauvais Oeil, while absorbing the ubiquitous sounds of the suburbs, where Turkish, Armenian and Ethiopian music ring out. The band’s moving and melancholic chansons are delivered with a delightful French pop sensibility, making Mauvais Oeil one of the most exciting and musically diverse prospects in 2019.

rRoxymore's long-anticipated debut album, Face To Phase, was born of her annual creative hibernation practice. Whereas her previous appearances for Don't Be Afraid - Thoughts Of An Introvert, Parts 1 & 2 - revealed inner worlds of saturated colour and natural expressiveness, she retreated into her studio at the turn of winter 2018 occupied with the idea of dismantling the dancefloor-centric pressure paradigm.


The resulting album, Face to Phase, finds rRoxymore methodically and mindfully stripping back to fundamentals: rumbling minimalist dub, sparse polymetric drums, boldy unpredictable melodic narratives and subtleties which hover out-of-reach or disappear into vapour. Forged by the spirit of club music cultures, Face To Phase favours deep listening; resisting the temptation to reflect on the past or project towards the future, it's an album that is firmly rooted in the contemporary.


Sparked by her own archive of field recordings, and produced primarily but not exclusively in the box, Face To Phase adds several facets to rRoxymore's already wide repertoire. The pensive and beatless opener "Home Is Where The Music Is" was inspired by her longtime friend Planningtorock, while "Forward Flamingo" is a spiraling dream-state of house music dissociation; elsewhere "Energy Points" remains anchored to the ocean floor, radiating heavy dub waves, "Passages" is a ghoulish skeleton of UK break beats, "What's The Plan" closes the album in a blissfully blunted fashion, while twisting, shape-shifting rhythms push and pulse "PPS21" into series of ever-evolving shapes and forms.


Through and in between the eight songs of Face To Phase, rRoxymore fortifies her status as a seasoned artist, grounded by over a decade of live performance and touring, collaboration, composition and experimentation. With a new live performance collaboration with a percussionist set to debut the LP at Atonal on 1st September, rRoxymore is primed to expand her reputation even further as one of the most vital and distinctive artists on the fringes of contemporary club culture.

Will Saul is a key figure in UK dance music. Approaching his twentieth anniversary as a DJ, producer and label founder, Saul has helped break the career of key artists such as Leon Vynehall, Midland and Dusky via his Aus Music label, has himself played some of the world’s finest nightclubs and contributed to !K7’s storied ‘DJ Kicks’ mix series, which he also curates.

Finally returning to the production fold himself with his first full-length album in thirteen years, ‘Open Too Close’ is a condensed trip through the influences, discovery and sense of history that have helped shape his career and drive a forward-facing, unblinking passion for new music. The record’s concept reflects Will’s enormous skill and knowledge as a DJ, and as it’s title suggests, “"represents what I play in a club if an 8 hour set was condensed into 10 tracks.”

Having held residencies and made regular appearances at some of the world’s finest clubs including The End and Fabric in London, Panorama Bar in Berlin, Trouw in Amsterdam and Robert Johnson in Offenbach, Saul is uniquely qualified but this refreshingly straightforward approach. Eschewing the lingering, almost cliched expectations for a dance artist to create an album “that sounds good at home, as well as in the club”, ‘Open Too Close’ instead draws on the timeless futurism at the heart of the music that drew Saul into electronic music culture. Simply put, futuristic, melancholic sci-fi soundscapes meets stripped back raw sample driven house music, all executed with the precision and panache of an artist who truly understands how to move a dancefloor.

Having built up his self titled label alongside his sterling work as part of Oscillat, Lazare Hoche and Will & Ink, the one and only Malin Genie delivers his debut solo album. Moving beyond the pure club focus of his singles and EPs, the Genie has seized this opportunity to present a widescreen panorama of his sound, leading in with the subliminal ambience of "You" as a springboard to explore breaks, electro, techno, and especially IDM. There are so many ideas swirling round Anthropomorphic Sympathy, it's hard to know where to begin describing it. A true headphone commute for the deep listener to burrow into.

The title Ghost Frequency works on several levels. I was introduced to the term when I first began learning about recording techniques. It was used (usually negatively) to describe sounds that appeared on recordings due to signal interactions that resulted from “improper” mixing or recording and read as “noise” rather than the “music” that was being recorded. I became instantly fascinated with the phenomenon and intentionally creating these sounds in my recordings by deliberately using supposedly incorrect techniques has become a big part of my composing and recording process, probably the most central and consistent practice of it. I’m interested in how the presence of these sounds, and traditional production’s insistence on eradicating relates to larger ideas about the eradication of vital social practices relating to the dead such as ancestor worship, mediumship and history itself in favor of state and market dictated modes of understanding existence. The internet abounds with references to the the term, but applied to ultra low frequency or “infrasound” which can allegedly be responsible for inducing supernatural perception experiences. These posts from the margins posit a Ghost Frequency that operates on the same level as a radio station, one can simply tune into paranormal activity. It’s also a pun on an imaginary metric of how frequently ghosts might be around at any given moment. The songs on the EP employ (as does all of my music) a large amount of Ghost Frequencies (i.e. sounds that appear on the recording as the result of signal interactions rather than those sounds being performed on an instrument) and they also orient themselves toward interaction with the dead as a necessary component of human experience, and a mode of resistance to state power and it’s accompanying carceral technologies.

It seems KPM have long been fans of Smith and Mudd and, after being introduced to each other by mutual friend Andy Allday, the peerless Balearic maestros were invited to contribute to the library label’s digital-only “Album Shorts” project. The results are predictably wonderful.

With past projects under our belt working with everyone involved so far it made perfect sense for Be With to take on the vinyl release of this instant library classic. But why is it called “Tea With Holger”?

“Holger” is of course Holger Czukay and the whole LP is dedicated to Smith and Mudd’s time spent with him and Ursa Major at Can’s famous Inner Space Studio in Weilerswist, near Cologne.

When not recording it seems they spent a great deal of time sat around being entertained by Holger’s stories and drinking many cups of different sorts of tea from all over the world. These moments provide some their fondest memories of their visits:

“Looking back, it was pretty incredible that we spent part of our lives with Holger in one of the most magical places we’ve ever known, Inner Space Studio. We have our memories and, of course, the Bison album we made with him. But to honour the time we spent with him, we wanted to dedicate an album to him called ‘Tea With Holger’. The names of the tracks are about that time.”

The album was recorded over several years in London, Margate and Gorthleck, a small hamlet in the Scottish Highlands. Mike Piggott, who played with Bert Jansch, handled the strings and played violin whilst Sam Creer lent his virtuoso cello work to the proceedings. The sessions employed a key recording technique from their time with Holger: hit record and play. They wanted to capture magical improvisational moments live and not do the work later on in editing.

In their own words (and in classic library record sleeve style) these tracks are collectively described as “Balearic themes including breezy soul, sun-dappled melodies, warm pianos and sweeping strings”. You want to hear this, right?

The album is vintage Smith and Mudd. The gentle piano ushering in opening track “The Gardener” is soon joined by low, bubbling drums. When the time is just right, lush guitars glisten above a Welsh language vocal that floats like silk. Easy as a sea breeze. “Innerspace” is of course a nod to Can’s aforementioned studio. Dark, heavy piano meets rolling drums before warm chords and luscious strings take over, gliding over moody grooves to drive you home. Closing out side A, “Weilerswist” delivers more beautifully rolling piano and guitars over thumping cellos and building drums.

Side B opens with the full, string-enhanced version of “Away From Me”. This is Smith and Mudd’s prefered version and it’s only available here on this vinyl issue. For us it’s the standout on this all-highlight album. Tribal tones, piano and cello set a melodic staccato for violin to soar over while rolling piano lines and gospel organ chords descend into a drum drop that leads to a glorious vocal lead finale.

Distant synths introduce sun-drenched guitars and uplifting strings in “Kölner Street”, before a spacey Moog solo leads to a spellbinding, sci-fi drop. The sunshine returns before the track ends. The album closes with “Tea With Holger”. Airy vocal swells are punctuated by plucked cellos and picked guitars, all wonderfully warmed by a soulful piano.

Cut by Pete Norman and pressed in the Netherlands by Record Industry, “Tea With Holger” comes in a classic KPM green sleeve complete with track descriptions from Smith and Mudd themselves. The finishing visual touches come courtesy of Richard Robinson. We’ve given this record the same care and attention as we give to each our KPM re-issues, and it’s just as essential.

Swedish composer and multimedia artist Marcus Fjellström's debut Miasmah release follows two critically acclaimed full length albums on Lampse (2006's 'Gebrauchsmusik' and 2005's 'Exercises In Estrangement'). In addition Marcus has had several commissioned works requested, leading to him working with, among others, the Swedish Royal Ballet, the Scottish Chamber Orchestra, numerous ensembles, soloists and filmmakers including 'Salad Fingers' creator David Firth. Currently based in Berlin, Fjellström's compositions often combine aspects of modern classical composition and arrangement and more avant forms of music, be that acoustic or electronic.

'Schattenspieler' (which translates as 'Shadowplayer') takes the form of eleven compositions which explore ambience and melody, texture and silence. Haunting synth and orchestral instrument-based audio constructions, flowing from one moment to the next - the fleeting ghosts of Fjellström's melodies rise, only to be buried under a claustrophobic clutter of percussion and creaking background noise. These pieces do indeed feel like you're listening to something more implied than obviously stated, as if Fjellström wants only to expose us to the shadow of the music - the implication being perhaps a more terrifying experience than to be confronted outright…listen to 'Schattenspieler' and you may find your mind starts to play tricks on you…

The undeniably Angelo Badalamenti-esque descending synth strings of opening track 'The Disjointed', lay the foundations for Fjellström's 'Schattenspieler' album; music resting somewhere between the unsettling horror soundtracks of Jerry Goldsmith, the elevating melodies of Cliff Martinez, and the subtle audio constructions of Miasmah label mates Kreng and Jacaszek. Marcus' wide ranging abilities in composition and his willingness to let go of accepted form and function makes 'Schattenspieler' a perfect choice of release for the Miasmah label. The suspense laden 'Antichrist Architechture Management', with its harrowing and tense undertones, weaving synth lines and a wash of static hiss and flicker, is a particular standout track. Despite it's a strangely oppressive sound, shafts of light grace 'Schattenspieler'; pieces such as 'Untitled 090616' find gorgeous melodies are boxed in by unsettling arrangements and sparse background ambience. There is a coldness to many of these compositions - not without emotion, but somehow remorseless. 'Schattenspieler' is, for the main part, a defiantly bleak journey.

Vinyl edition ltd. to 300 copies, purple vinyl, incl. 8-page 12" booklet with drawings by Marcus Fjellström.

Microdosing is a series of compilation 12”s selected by Julienne Dessagne aka Fantastic Twins, and designed in collaboration with French visual artist Geff Pellet. Microdosing is a collective experiment aimed at helping you fighting back your modern obsession with happiness. You may deserve a nice day but the day does not need a nice you, nothing should be forced, everything is permitted. Microdosing will provide you with sonic healing weapons on regular basis and at irregular dosage. Those doses will favour psychedelic social techniques against self help tyranny, creation over soma, provoking over numbing, our outer-selves over our inner-selves. Microdosing refuses the fatality of the pleasure principle. Life is a struggle, time to embrace it. —— "My battery is low and it’s getting dark” We at Microdosing will make Opportunity’s famous last words fully ours. Some would see these as an epitaph on a black screen, we embrace them as a reclaimed fragility. Are we grains of sand wandering in space, hoping for a goal? No. We are the cosmos, the cosmos is us, unafraid of the end, unafraid of the void. Before the rise of the infinite silence, Microdosing brings you new guiding lights, white sun or black hole being a simple permutation of the kinetic rainbow. Oceanic’s “Parallel Lines Of Stripes” is a meandering mantra, an synthesised Moebius ring, a mission to your heart, that furthest star in the sky. Gilb’R’s “Cosmogonie” simply reminds us of the profound relation between spatial systems and the holy act of birth (cosmo, world and gon, conceive). The universe is a body, your body is your universe. Lucas Croon’s “Threshold Stimulus” is the soundtrack of a never ending voyage, the man is on a trip to the core sanctum. Imagine Space as a reverberation room cladded with bakelite. Losing yourself in delay repeats sometimes is the shortest way. Neuzeitliche Bodenbeläge & Sam Irl’s “Faeden” is another hymn to the umbilical chords joining us to the outer world, a black monolith of kraut acid, a pagan dance as portal to a destination only you can choose. Microdosing will be back soon with more enablers, helping to turn your petty struggles into a search for a meaning of life. The Quest lives on.

Marcus Fjellström's second album Gebrauchsmusik, initially released a decade and a half ago, is a bizarre sound document that deserves a closer look. Listening back to it now only re-confirms the unique mind of the Swedish composer, who sadly died in September 2017, only 37 years old.

"Gebrauchsmusik" is German for 'Utility Music', and his second excursion into post-classical experimentation is exactly that; thirteen tracks with each one written to suit a certain theme. War, art, festivity, sadness, death and resurrection are all interpreted by Fjellström in his unique style, taking a classical framework and distorting, confusing and manipulating them into far fetching scenarios that is only limited by ones own imagination.

Marcus worked with the Swedish Royal Ballet, the Scottish Chamber Orchestra and Sinfonietta Cracovia as well as numerous other orchestras, ensembles and soloists, artists and filmmakers. He spent the last half year of his life scoring the AMC series The Terror. In his works, Marcus often aimed to combine opposites so that they don’t contradict each other, but rather fuse into a natural, third element - “High” and “low” culture, the naïve and the sophisticated, good and bad taste. These are all elements that comfortably blend together in his works. Musical influences range from electronic acts such as Aphex Twin and Autechre to 20th century composers such as György Ligeti and John Cage. Further influences include impressionist composers Maurice Ravel and Claude Debussy as well as film music composers Bernard Herrmann, Angelo Badalamenti and Zdeněk Liška.

Vinyl edition ltd. to 300 copies, incl. 8-page 12" booklet with drawings by Marcus Fjellström.

Rolf Hansen, who as a guitarist is originally rooted in jazz, has been one of the most in-demand studio and session musician in the Danish rock, pop, and folk scene. Between 2010 and 2017, he toured under the name Il Tempo Gigante as a solo artist and released two albums: »Lost Something Good« (Speed of Sound, 2010) and »Watch It Watch« (Resonans, 2014). With subsequent tours throughout Europe, he made a name for himself in the alternative folk scene.

After a phase of reorientation, he now releases his first purely instrumental record under his real name through the Berlin-based Karaoke Kalk label in September. On his third album »Elektrisk Guitar«, the many different influences Hansen has gathered as a composer, solo performer, session musician and producer shine through.

The concept of limitation - an album composed for and played with solo guitar - is being mirrored in the conception of the album itself. Not only does Hansen resolutely constrain himself to a sole instrument, he also eschews traditional composition techniques and follows an experimental approach.

»Elektrisk Guitar« is an album that enters into a dialogue with its conscious and attentive listener. Pieces whose melancholy is carefully weighed meet complex musical structures that again and again provide new challenges. In just 43 minutes, »Elektrisk Guitar« offers a plethora of ideas, impressions, details, and inspiration. And even more so, it opens up a room for its listeners to explore, precisely because its minimalistic compositions create a lot of space in which to get accommodated in.

Apart from his solo projects, Rolf Hansen has for several years been connected to Donna Regina as well as Anders Mathiasen (formerly Murder, now Vessel, DK) and Henriette Sennenvaldt (formerly Under Byen, DK) through close collaborations.

Future Times is very pleased to announce that our next release will be a 7" single from Oakland's Motoko & Myers! This duo is made up of Wonja & DJML, both of whom have blessed electronic music in numerous ways recently together and individually, via releases on Jacktone, DJing together for their Herzog Hideout radio transmissions, and their amazing album from 2018, Basis Key, released via Bass Clef's digital imprint Open Hand Real Flames.
M+M make music from a really special place, wild tones, drum-machine-breaths and weird, pitched synth space combine with a sense of rhythm that folds in on itself. B-Side "Whimbrel" represents this perhaps best of the two songs, with a loping, wandering-on-the-beach sense of synth space and not-quite-dancehall drums. "Plover", however, is a perfect set-starter for the techno freaks, with the lightest drums coming in halfway over a thick, shifting loop of perfect glass techno for the DJs. Tip!

Jatinder Singh Durhailay and David Edren released Tea Notes as a cassette back in April of 2018. London-based Jatinder Singh Durhailay is a painter and student of Indian Classical music. He has trained in both the sitar and the Hindi singing technique, Dhrupad. He also plays two traditional Sikh instruments; the bowed, stringed Dilruba and Taus. Poetic Pastel Press issued his solo debut, The Last Ballad Of Mardana, in 2017. David Edren`s expertise lies with machines and modular synthesis. His Kosmische and New Age-Inspired electronics have featured on numerous cassettes, and compilations, produced for imprints from the current Belgian underground, such as Jj Funhouse, Social Harmony, and Ultra Eczema. These recordings appearing, since the turn of the millennium, either under his own name, or the moniker DSR Lines. Jatinder and David’s collaboration, Tea Notes, is a celebration, a meditation, on both the beverage, and the communal time shared imbibing. The coming together to partake in its ritual. Each of the six tracks represents a different infusion. The opening piece is a tribute to semi-oxidised Oolong, from China`s Wuyi Mountains, with hammered dulcimer-like glissando. Gongs shimmering, gently crashing, as if signaling a change in the weather. A calm of thin, stretched synths and Ai angels introduces Tulsi from India. The Holy Basil of Hinduism, used in the worship of Vishnu, Krishna, and Rama. A traditional herb of Ayurveda and Siddha medicine. Automated arpeggiated sequences raising a vibrating wall of hallucinatory sound. Pairing swooning strings with a racing robot heart. Ceylon is a modern twist on the classical raga. Serving to tell the story of a tea smuggled into Sri Lanka in the 19th century. Plants stolen from South West China, where the brew had been enjoyed since the days of the Shang Dynasty (1766 to 1122 BC). The contraband founding fresh industry in its new home when the indigenous coffee crops failed. Muted organ and sleepy, treated sine wave microtones describe Kava, the Polynesian fireweed root, whose extract serves as both sedative and euphoriant.Shincha are the first young leaves of the season. Picked in Southern Japan and steamed to prevent oxidization, retain their flavour and green / gold colour. Their musical counterpart finds Edren establishing an ecclesiastical drone, while Durhailay`s strings chart an ancient romantic ache. Sonic stars shine. Singing out to the infinite, the universe, before dissolving into knots of Radiophonic Workshop noise.Melodies treated with subtle sustain and delay denote Pu-Ehr, from the Yunnan province. The only truly fermented black tea - made distinctive by the action of bacteria, moulds, and yeasts. Its musical themes hovering in the vapour trails, the atmospheres, they themselves create. Spiraling, soaring, reaching for the heavens, while pretty music box glitches - tiny chimes turned in on themselves. Catching, reflecting, like light at play on fresh running water. (words: Robert Harris)

Razen celebrate their 10 yr anniversary with “Ayîk Adhîsta Adhîsta Ayîk”, an album that takes a paragraph from CG Jung’s Memories, Dreams, Reflections as a reference point to set off a journey that goes from light to dark, from day to night, from life to death, and back.

As much a reflection of primal imagery and rituals of knowledge as a way of coming to terms with anxieties about the chaos of the night, the album concerns itself with the question: who - or what - are we in the moments before (re-)birth, before waking up, in the state inbetween darkness and light?
On “Ayîk Adhîsta Adhîsta Ayîk”, the wind instruments and organ stabs of band leaders Kim Delcour and Brecht Ameel are expanded with Pieter Lenaerts’ five string double bass and sarangi, Jean-Philippe Poncin’s bass clarinet and chalumeau, and Paul Garriau’s hurdy gurdy.

The album sees the group explore new straight-to-the-gut emotional territory, while simultaneously showcasing Razen’s intuitive, continuous investigation of the acoustic properties and resonant possibilities of churches and chapels in the countryside around Brussels; after “Remote Hologram” (2014) and “ The Xvoto Reels” (2017), this time the St Agatha Church (St.-Agatha-Berchem) functions as the conduit for Razen’s acoustic sound jolts.

With the past ten years entirely devoted to the search for archetypical timbres and connotations by improvising on Early Music instruments, it’s no wonder that the world of Razen would one day collide with the world of CG Jung and take his writing as an inspiration.

A sonic hex tour de force from this unique ensemble, “Ayîk Adhîsta Adhîsta Ayîk” is a present-day, nocturnal emitter of the Coleridge quote that opens Jung’s Memories:
‘He looked at his own soul with a Telescope. What seemed all irregular he saw and shewed to be beautiful Constellations and he added to the Consciousness hidden worlds within worlds’.

Green Marbled Vinyl

AboutBlank produces here 3 magestic tunes...

Super positive state of mind style, not too happy through but really sunny and full of energy, with a repetitive serial music acid melody on the Cosmicology A side 45 RPM killer 180BPM harfloor track.

The flip open on a regular 160 BPM heavy kicker, trippy mental acid-pikes-of-ice more classic but bloody efficient...

Last track (same speed as A1) is a serious hard-kicker too... at the hardcore frontier with a crazy melody coming in, reminding the old school 90's transecore best-of...

This record was produced both by Brain Bending and Acid Night.

Visual by X.G.

Raised in the multicultural and mind-broadening London borough of Enfield, Loraine James grew up hearing everything from steel pan music to Metallica, from jazz and electronica to drill and grime, and the results of this exposure can be heard on ‘For You And I’. In part the album explores the complexities of being in a queer relationship in London - “I’m in love and wanted to share that in some way … to make songs that reflect layers of my relationship.” – and as a whole ‘For You and I’ is rhythmically free flowing and sprawling, with melodies that evolve into rippling keys, feeling like a live jam session with a jazz mentality, contrasting the delicate and abrasive. Opener ‘Glitch Bitch’ is a warm ear-worm, brandishing swirling textures with undulating keys and compressed percussion, with an introspective theme revisited soon after on third track ‘So Scared’, whose glitched percussion and syncopated dub bassline build to a frantic meltdown melody. On ‘London Ting // Dark As Fuck’, inspired by Dizzee Rascals's ‘Boy In Da Corner', James explores the darker side of her production with her frequent collaborator Le3 BLACK laying verses over the skeletal track. ‘Hand Drops’ is an instrumental, about public displays of affection in a queer relationship. ‘Sensual’ reflects on intimacy with vocals by UK singer Theo, who's lyrics capture love and gentleness over a soft, minimal production of ethereal keys and scattered glitches. The albums’ title track is also the most colourful, it’s ecstatic and effusive chaos driven by fervent synths expressing elation and the joyful side of her relationship, while ‘My Future’ is a more reflective moment, where warping synths wash in and out with compressed kicks, as the artist considers the dangers that may come with her relationship : “I wanna tie the knot / But the rope is dangerous”. ‘For You And I’ is a deeply intimate and personal offering, expressing happiness, anxiety, joy, sensuality and fear through a vivid sound palette and an experimental sense of rhythm.

With the release of their first two albums and live shows supporting Snarky Puppy, Roy Ayers, Marcus Miller, Larry Mizell & the Blackbyrds, Butcher Brown, Yellowjackets and more, Resolution 88 have already established themselves as one of the UK's leading exponents of funk jazz. Their music is synonymous with the silky, buttery sound of the Fender Rhodes. They're also a bona fide band, a refreshing change in a musical world increasingly occupied by online collaborations and viral videos. They're best mates who love to hang out, play together and make their own music - that sincerity is evident in their songs and their chemistry on stage.


'Revolutions' represents a lot of firsts - the first time Resolution 88 have recorded to multi-track tape, the first time that they've included a real string and brass section, the first time they've included special guests on record and the first time they've pressed an album on vinyl. Imagine a combination of an undiscovered Herbie Hancock album from the mid' 70's, rare-groove samples from the golden era of hip hop (ATCQ, Pharcyde etc) and the new London sound of bands like Yussef Kamaal.

Every track on'Revolutions'represents an aspect of music on vinyl. On'Pitching Up'you hear the DJ pitch the record up from 33rpm to 45rpm.'Out Of Sync'simulates a clumsy attempt at beat-matching. The hypnotic, circling sax line that opens the title track'Revolutions'(echoed by the strings at the end) evokes the mesmerizing sensation of watching the record label artwork whirling as it spins on the platter.'Runout Groove'fades in and out; the drum beat mimics the distinctive, perpetual rhythm tapped out by the stylus as it reaches the runout groove. On the second side,'Sample Hunter'unexpectedly deviates from the main section into Rhodes-drenched interludes; the type of moment that producers searched high and low for back when hip hop was great.Marcus Tenney's (Butcher Brown) lyrics on 'Dig Deep'are all about the thrill of digging for records and'Matrix'is inspired by the hidden messages sometimes left in the matrix markings on record pressings. On'Tracking Force', you can hear the beat twist and morph as the stylus skates over the record. Finally,'Warped Memories'closes out the album with a wistful, melancholy melody. Sit back with a glass of Japanese whisky and a Cuban cigar (or whatever your chosen poison is), stick the album on and enjoy it from start to finish - although if you're listening to it on vinyl, you'll need to get up to turn it over to the B-side ;)

Wewantsounds continues its collaboration with Bob Shad's grandchildren, Mia and Judd Apatow, to present a 2LP selection of 13 turntable-friendly Mainstream Records tracks recorded between 1970 and 1973 and showcasing the label's superb blend of Funk, Soul and Jazz. All tracks remastered from the original tapes, most of them released for the first time since their original release with a few highly sought-after ones. Liner notes by UK journalist Paul Bowler. The Mainstream sound is unmistakable: earthy, rich and funky, it's the signature sound of producer Bob Shad. After working with such geniuses as Charlie Parker, The Platters, Billie Holiday and Janis Joplin over three decades, Shad decided to go back to producing Great Black Music in the early 70s through his label Mainstream Records and started releasing a formidable series of jazz albums known as the 300 series. Released between 1971 and 1974, these albums are the main source of this set. Coincidentally, it opens with one of the two tracks on the tracklist not produced by Shad himself. Saundra Phillips' "Miss Fatback" is nonetheless fascinating as it's one of cult disco producer Greg Carmichael's earliest productions from 1975 (before he went on to produce Inner Life, Bumblebee Unlimited, Universal Robot Band with fellow producer Patrick Adams). The other track not issued by the Shad sound factory is Almeta Lattimore's 7" single "These Memories," a truly great soulful track from 1975 and now a sought-after classic on the international Soul scene. Shad's forte was Jazz, and the sessions usually used the best musicians you could think of, including Bernard Purdie, Billy Hart, Stanley Clarke, Dom Um Romao, Joe Sample, Freddie Robinson, Gordon Edwards, Larry Willis, Wilbur Bascomb to name just a few. Filled with gorgeous Fender Rhodes chords and heavy basslines, they define the unmistakable Mainstream sound which had one foot in the great jazz and bop tradition and the other in the sonic jazz explorations of the early 70s. Oscillating between jazzed-up covers of soul hits like Jay Berliner’s "Papa Was A Rolling Stone" or Afrique’s "Kissing My Love" and more introspective originals such as Hal Galper's "This Moment" or Dave Hubbard's "T.B.'s Delight", They all have this perfect balance between groove and depth. One perfect example is Pete Yellin's "Bird and The Ouija Board," a superb 12 min opus starting off with a deep abstract improvisation before switching to an up-tempo funk beat fueled by drummer Billy Hart and bass player Stanley Clarke.