Search:out of this world

Schmer has tried to stop, we've all gone into therapy, but there's no hope, short of setting the world ablaze: we can't stop smoking! 2019 see's Schmer pressing TECHNO records in the EU and PRICED in Europe as a domestic release. As if the continent didn't already have enough problems, here we come with our latest COMPILATION!

First to drop a match is Amber Shoshona aka Bastet. She is a live electronic music performer and DJ based in Baltimore, MD USA. Her live set is coarse-grained and atmospheric, developing a slow-burning, hypnotic groove. In the studio she creates genre bending electronic experiments. For Schmer she made 'Torn', which sneaks right up to you and lights you up.

Delivering oil to the blaze from deep in the Russian arctic is Maxim Makarenko aka 777minus111. The unknown hero from the Russian Techno label he remains in the shade and keeps it real! He runs underground parties in Moscow and is a member of Vinyl Ambulance project in India. He keeps our compilation 'Getting Dirty Quick' with his Dan Bell inspired MINIMALISM.

On the flip the fires start with Vague Audio Tapes label head Dominic Martin aka Hero/Victim. Hero/Victim is a sonic attempt at translating unanswered and unheard emotions. Visceral and physical; so as to both, engage and purge the evolving dissonance. Never content. With sound as a context-sensitive metaphor, stories are heard. He also makes weird electronic music and then Schmers all over us with a 'New Stress'.

Schmerhead BPMF hides a track from another release in this inferno. Its super short as in it goes on FOREVER with a LOCKED GROOVE at the end. If you're gonna be an emcee, do it in a Wormhole on a LOCKED GROOVE so that the rock will never stop.

Liza Weinstein, Zach Vietze and Jason Szostek were Jack Move. In 1994 they may have made two tracks together, but this is the only one we found lying around in the basement floor. Long before the skinny jean hipsters were rocking beats deliberately designed to confuse the dance floor with their lack of flow, The Jack Movers were experimenting with cryptic funk... It was a Jack Move on their part and they immediately ran out of town to escape retribution, leaving behind their 'Krippy Shit'.

We Can't Stop Smoking so you'll always be able to find us because where there's smoke, there's fire... and where there's TECHNO there's SCHMER!

collecting orders for repress

The Messthetics are an instrumental trio featuring Brendan Canty (drums), Joe Lally (bass), and Anthony Pirog (guitar). Brendan Canty and Joe Lally were the rhythm section of the band Fugazi from its inception in 1987 to its period of hiatus in 2002.

This is the first band they've had together since then. Anthony Pirog is a jazz and experimental guitarist based in Washington, D.C. One half of the duo Janel & Anthony, he has emerged as a primary figure in the city's out-music community.

The trio's debut includes nine songs recorded at Canty's practice space throughout 2017, live and mostly without overdubs. It's a snapshot of a band dedicated to the live ideal, where structure begets improvisation.

Brendan Canty: drums
Joe Lally: bass
Anthony Pirog: guitar

Paul DeMarinis is a key figure in the history of electronic music since the 1970s. Collaborator with the likes of Robert Ashley, David Behrman, and David Tudor, DeMarinis is a pioneer in the development of gallery sound installation and digital music technologies. Black Truffle is thrilled to announce the release of a double-LP collection, selected in collaboration with the artist, focussing on DeMarinis's exploration of synthesized voice and the digital analysis and manipulation of speech sounds. Drawing together tracks dispersed on compilations along with a number of pieces previously unheard in any form, Songs Without Throats offers a revelatory look into DeMarinis's alternately accessible and uncompromising production between 1978 and 1995. Opening with a mesmerizing piece from 1978 pairing the voice and tamboura playing of Anne Klingensmith with strings of letters spat out by a Speak n' Spell to the accompaniment of the randomised melodic patterns of DeMarinis's homebuilt electronic instrument 'The Pygmy Gamelan', the record then dispenses with the live human voice in favour of its recorded and synthetic doubles. We follow DeMarinis's restless probing of the possibilities of new technologies, from the hacked Speak n' Spell (which gives us the austere 'Et Tu, Klaatu' 1979, another duet with Klingensmith, this time on bowed psaltery, in which the toy's synthetic voice is stretched into an alien song) through to the use of digital audio samples manipulated with home computer technology in the early 1990s (including a remarkable dream-like collage piece that weaves a rare recording of Stalin's voice and bird-like electronic twittering derived from its formant-glides into a rich tapestry of samples reflective of the dictator's musical life). In between we get a rich sampling of DeMarinis's signature work with speech melodies - usually unnoticed melodic inflections that lie within speech patterns - which he analyses and translates into synthesized musical accompaniment. These pieces draw on a wide variety of textual and vocal sources, which range from the hilarious to the menacing ('Cincinatti (1830-1850)' sets a detailed description of butchering techniques, for example) and an equally broad range of musical conceptions, combining elements as seemingly unlikely as Beethoven's Opus 31 pianos sonatas and the sounds of 80s synth pop. The results are an extraordinary combination of the alien and the familiar. As DeMarinis himself characterises his work with vocal synthesis, this is 'a kind of signal that simultaneously carried and obscured meaning and ideation, even as it created a sound world totally alien in esthetic'. Presented in a deluxe gatefold sleeve with archival images and liner notes by Paul DeMarinis. Design by Stephen O'Malley. Mastered and cut by Rashad Becker at D&M, Berlin

The record you are holding in your hands is a previously unheard masterpiece of Israeli multimedia artist Ami Shavit. As a professor of both philosophy and art and established kinetic artist in the 1970s Shavit was fascinated with new and interactive technologies. While mostly focusing on visual art and mixed-media installations, a trip to New York in 1972 introduced him to synthesizers and triggered his curiosity to do some explorations into the world of music or "sound" as he preferred to call it.

Ami's research was focused on the concept of meditative music that would help people to relax and create a cosy mood associated to the alpha brain waves and biofeedback. Before starting his artistic career, like all Israeli citizens, he had to serve in the army to his personal regret. Shavit had an operational position, which meant a high probability to get involved in a so called 'hot situation'. When in 1973 the Yom Kippur war broke out, Ami was enlisted again and got the unfortunate opportunity to encounter, in Hanoch Levin's words 'the dead'. Being an operation officer he was in charge of evacuating Israeli wounded officers from battlefields to hospitals. Some 6000 injured men passed through us during that war, he recalled one year later in a newspaper interview.

'I witnessed some sights that I can hardly forget. On the one hand I felt that as an artist I had to express the war events, on the other hand I felt that this is an almost impossible mission. Only Goya and Picasso, in his Guernica, addressed this topic successfully.'

Yom Kippur is the final and seminal of Shavit's sound experiments ever recorded and now finally available to the world. We believe that this is an extraordinary strong piece in which the hectic moods and terrific experiences of war are deeply transmitted to the listener. May all soldiers, who are often forced to go through traumatic experiences beyond their own will, find ways to artistically digest and process the unwanted memories.

Ami Shavit was born in 1934 in Tel Aviv-Jaffa. Known as visual artist, his work involves in creating virtual environments with optic and kinetic art, including structures worked by electricity, moving tubular configurations illuminated by colored lights. He published In Alpha Mood in 1977 on Amis records, his own record company, at 500 copies, republished by Finders Keepers Records in 2015 and Neural Oscillations And Alpha Rhythms in 2018. Yom Kippur is his ultime recordings.

Taken for the widely played and adored Lenny Williams Spark of Love Album, which was released during the Disco Era of 1976 and featured disco hits like, 'You got me Running', I still Reach and 'Midnight Girl' comes 'Changes.'

Edits and Overdubs Produced and Performed by Joaquin Joe Clausell; Changes is the tune that was mostly ignored from the extensive Lenny Williams music catalogue.
Similar to his past works where he chooses songs that are mostly un popular to the outside world but classics amongst himself and his siblings at home, Joaquin Joe Claussell takes this Jam that he used to groove to at home as a young teenager, lifts it out from obscurity and turns it into something that will sure be played by most DJ's who are into the Lenny Williams Sound, soulful disco and beyond.

Listed at a time length of (5:03) Joe cleverly up lifts this soulful disco composition and extends it to a time of (9:01). He achieves this, as usual, with respecting the original composition and with never anyself-masturbation. In the end, the results are a New Disco Classic that drives with relentless energy and enough soul for anyone who's seeking more soul that hailed mostly from the urban side of American disco music.
So, listen, dance and spin.

Lenny Williams - Changes Edits & Overdubs by Joaquin Joe Claussell will be the first single to come out from the forth coming Joaquin Joe Claussell Presents Edits & Overdubs PT 2 2XCD and Special Limited 7Inch.

James Place returns with his new LP "Still Waves To A Whisper" (the fourth release on Umor Rex). Flitting between the dreamworld of hauntological synth music and hypnotic techno functionality, Still Waves To Whisper showcases James Place's continuing development of dramatic (and varied) sound worlds.

Musically, Still Waves To A Whisper contains both some of the most immediately danceable and straight up beautiful tracks of James Place's career. Utilising voice samples from the same source as his last album, Voices Bloom, opener 'Known Cry' is a heavenly coda of sunlight bursting through clouds, warm synths drifting across restrained pulses. 'Timing and Lighting' went through countless live iterations before the current version was tracked for this album, a tunneling exploration of rhythm with a dose of sardonic humor. 'Move In Blue (Homeward Mix)' is James Places' rework of a track from 2017's Voices Bloom, obsessively remixed and revisited, here littered with additional melodies and populated by newly sampled voices. Closing track 'Names' is perhaps the most outright beautiful James Place recording to date. A stripped back rework of a live version of Living On Superstition's 'Another Mourning In America', the tune is based on a melodic line written after the studio recorded version. Interwoven with a sampled vocal, and rinsed of all of the original song, 'Names' is left behind a stark and compelling descendant. The digital release includes a remix of 'Move In Blue' by Persuasion aka Devon Hansen.

The title, Still Waves To A Whisper, stems from a conversation between Place and another artist on methods to ease anxieties and the benefits of a focused practice. The hope's for this music to continue that conversation on a larger scale.

All songs written, produced and recorded by Phil Tortoroli between 2015 — 2018 in Brooklyn, NY. Vocals by Sam Sally and an unknown guest.

Mastered by Rafael Anton Irisarri at Black Knoll Studio, NY. Photos & Design by Daniel Castrejón.

Tradition and experimentation are two familiar
territories that C'mon Tigre, a duo who find
their identity by working with musicians from
all over the world, can balance between very
well. As they did for their debut album (2014),
they have put together a multicolored collective
for their second record 'Racines', out on
February 15, 2019 for BDC/K7.
The title is a French word that means "roots",
referring to the musical roots in which C'mon
Tigre's feet, head and heart are immersed, and
from which their contaminated tracks sprout to
create unusual and original sound environments. In their new album the sounds of the
Mediterranean - the sea of their land -
intersect, intertwine and overlap with a
kaleidoscope of other sounds and a new
approach based - they explain - "on the type of
work we had done when we rearranged the first
album for live shows, by emphasizing the
synthetic part of our tracks". This time around
they did it from the very beginning: "The
composition of the pieces immediately included
the use of machines and synthesizers as a
basis for acoustic instruments. The goal was to
reprocess the terrain of Mediterranean
influences that was undoubtedly our starting
point".
Imagine a work in progress where bass and
guitars interact with woodwind, synths, percussions, vibraphones, dipping the listener into a
sensual and hypnotic musical journey. Sailing
from the Mediterranean basin and being guided
by the fascination for Africa and the Middle
East, C'mon Tigre give rise to a personal
language, made up of mixtures with jazz,
afrojazz, the rhythmics of hip hop, funk, 70s
disco. All without ever confining their songs to
one style, but pushing the exploration as much
as possible, into a dimension that every journey
worthy of this name should encompass. "With
the musicians we work with the exchange and
experimentation continue till the end, the
songs can take different directions at any time'.
The result is a mixed, cosmopolitan record,
which escapes from any label for the affirmation of a free attitude. The attitude that led
C'mon Tigre to seek a connection with dancefloor culture, even if considered only as an
evocation to revisit in an absolutely personal
way

The OUER guys just live down the road from us in Berlin and we have been crossing paths many times these past years so it is with great joy we can finally present a full EP with their unique approach to electronic music on Dirt Crew Recordings. Since their debut on 'HEIST' in 2016 Xaver and Oliver have consistently pushed their sound and production, on their own OUER imprint they released four EP's up till now and the latest called 'E' is just a few weeks old as we speak. The A side opens with the title track 'Stingray Nebula', a bliss composition of layered arpeggios underlined by a deep sub bass, building steadily towards etheric strings setting in and descending again with a break beat ending that builds perfect grounds for the following dance floor stomper 'Undine'. That second A side track is a great mix of Deep House and Electronica and is what makes OUER's music so special, almost entering trance territories here but keeping those Chicago and Detroit references alive. When we head over to the B side we encounter some new tracks that really made us want to release this EP in the first place. The beautiful 'Thales' contains live bass and percussive instrumentation and is a crossover indie-tronica gem. Following that is the deep 'Inside' where an 'emo' piano themed House jam meets clever vocal sampling and filtered synth stabs to produce a great going groove. Closing out we have some real ambience electronica for you in 'Train Ride to Bratsk', again played mostly live and using acoustic instruments recorded in their Berlin studio the OUER guys are crossing borders again and turned out this piece of goodness. Enter the world of OUER, we hope you like it as much as we do!

Due to popular demand, 22a presents the out of print Ruby Rushton LP's from 2017, in a deluxe gatefold vinyl format, strictly limited to 500 copies.

The Tenderlonious led jazz quartet Ruby Rushton and their 22a imprint have been at the forefront of the UK jazz scene since the release of their debut album 'Two For Joy' in 2015. The band transport you back to the 70s Headhunters era, whilst still adopting the spiritual concepts of John Coltrane and Yusef Lateef. Audiences can expect to be treated to high energy compositions, fusing flavours of afro beat, hip hop, and Latin jazz.

Both Trudi's Songbook Volume One and Two were met with mass acclaim in the summer and autumn of 2017. They received regular airtime and support from DJ's, tastemakers and radio stations across the world, including Gilles Peterson, Benji B, Bradley Zero, Jazz FM, BBC Radio 6 Music, Worldwide FM, NTS and many more. The huge support for the albums led to Trudi's Songbook: Volume Two being nominated for Jazz album of the year at the 2018 Gilles Peterson Worldwide Awards.

With a brand new album due for release in March 2019, this limited edition, 2xLP, deluxe gatefold issue of Trudi's Songbook: Volume One and Two closes this chapter for the band and paves the way for new material.

Visions Recordings is happy to welcome the Italian trio Jaxx Madicine for a single with two jazz/house influenced tracks aimed for the dancefloor with enough music and fat beats to make you wanna fly and dance .Their specific mix of vintage and modern sounds keep the bouncy feeling that deejays love to play in their sets . Round bass, Fender Rhodes , piano and warm keys are the ingredients to this delicious meal we invite you to share with us.

The name Jaxx Madicine suggests a wide range of influences - 'Jaxx' obviously being a tilt of the hat to the original rhythms and basslines born out of Chicago house while the 'XX"s suggest a keen passion for jazz.These are the two main ingredients used by the projects founders Turbojazz and Parker Madicine, who are joined by the talented and mysterious Veez_0 - a young Italian piano player that you're bound to hear more from in the near future.Turbojazz plants his roots in the rhythms and futuristic sounds of the Broken Beat golden age while Parker Madicine leans more towards the sounds and timbres of Detroit's spacey atmospheres. These two musical worlds are married by Veez_o's incredible playing and harmonic backing. To get a proper idea of what this is about you should consider George Duke in his peak cosmic period jamming in a studio with 'High Tech Jazz"-era Underground Resistance before joining Pete Rock for dinner and then heading to a Roy Ayers concert. Absolutely delicious !

The four tracks on this EP represent a bit of a transitional phase for Louis Jaquet (aka Kid Who), marking a move from a basic setup with an MPC2000XL sampler and a computer to a fully-fledged hardware studio. The initial versions of these tracks were quick jams that he had made early on in this change, but which had lay dormant on his hard drive for some time, before being revisited and reworked for this release with the new equipment.

'Rhythm Code' began life as an exercise in using only freely distributed software synths, and the majority of those sounds are still there, bar some additional acid sequences and tweaks to the rhythm parts.

On 'ZF Cut' his focus switched to samples, in an effort to squeeze the most he could out of his MPC, which at the time had only recently been upgraded. The unassuming beige box gives colour to anything you feed into it (breakbeats in particular), and a host of basic onboard effects add further quirky character, in this case hollow drones and rumbles which are the core of the track.

One of Kid Who's early purchases was a cheap old Yamaha multitrack cassette recorder, which presents many opportunities for sound manipulation. Different tape speeds, tape types and manual manipulation during playback open up a world of noisy, woozy atmospheres, some of which formed the basis of 'Spool Night'.

Of all four, 'Timescape' required the least revising, and the version presented here is very close to the original, 100% computer-based draft. Although the beat was built with Roland 707 drum machine sounds, a staple of early Chicago house records, he wanted to juxtapose these with a more up-to-date techno aesthetic, with a handful of final touches added in the new studio to finish

'For The Colleagues Of Ubu & Their Authorities' is the brainchild of Vienna based vinyl enthusiast, DJ & producer The Reboot Joy Confession. What once started as a series of mixes has been expanded into this compilation, on which he brings together diverse genres of music like electronica, modern minimalism, folk, post-rock, avant-garde or modular music, which also reflect his own versatile musical taste. 'As I stopped thinking in genres, my attempt was to merge my musical taste in the most fluent way possible onto one record. There are mesmerizing songs from some of my favourite contemporary artists - I feel a timelessness in their music, I can ´t get tired of. With the compilation I wanted to create a contemplative, fictitious, surreal world, merging those different styles together. Giving it that title, I wanted the listener to be able to imagine a tale that is building up with each song. I am really happy about the outcome of this compilation and hope that many other listeners can feel the magic.' The compilation includes the surreal work of Swiss producer Dim Grimm (also known as Dimlite), as well as a collaboration between Merz & Julian Sartorius Drum Ensemble who radically altered the original version of 'The Hunting Owl' into a monstrous percussive live version. Taken off the debut album from one of Poland ´s most interesting musicians at the moment, Waclaw Zimpel & Kuba Ziolek, 'Wrens' is a fusion of folk, jazz and modern minimal music. Experimental pop musician & filmmaker Tujiko Noriko appears with an emotional piece that challenges the paths between pop and avant-garde. Gerhard Zander, whose musical work started on the outskirts of experimental pop music in the early seventies in Germany, delivers a modular synth masterpiece with unique sounds, textures and a far-out synth choir. Rock and ambient influenced musician Helen Money (also known as Alison Chesley) is a Los Angeles based cellist and composer who appears with a massively dark post-rock song called 'MF', which was recorded at Steve Albini's Electrical Audio studio in Chicago in 2009. Often compared to Frank Zappa and known for their richness of ideas, Liverpool's a.P.A.t.T. contribute the hypnotic 'Young Free & Parasite', with references to British glam, post-punk or synth rock, but in a fresh and obscure sounding outfit. SSELLF, the moniker of New Zealand ´s Christoph El Truento, inspired by post-punk and noise. 'Visitors' is simple and simply in your face, with lo-fi drums, distorted synths and raw vocals by Christoph himself. After a few seclusive years, The Reboot Joy Confession returns with a new, crispy and soulful track. Cinematic strings written by Martin Riedler, arranged by Flip Phillip, and recorded at the established Vienna Konzerthaus, based on a properly arranged drum outfit and played by a villain named Gurlimu. Both strings and drums are guiding through the whole song and culminate in Glockenspiel and Rhodes melodies. Oceaneer aka Japanese pianist Oneechan Nanashi completes the compilation with her beautiful and profound composition 'The Sea, Forever'. She describes her music as 'improvised instrumental underwater music from the bottom of the Pacific Ocean, played with broken instruments, directed by the spirit of drowned people who are talking through the hands of the pianist. It's lonely and bleak music for the dead.'

TUTTI is comprised of eight soundscapes: an audio self portrait comprising of manipulated sound recordings from Cosey's life, music and art:
'It's the only album I've made that is an all encompassing statement expressing the totality of my being. A sense of the past in relation to the present and everything in between.'

These eight pieces were originally conceived as the soundtrack to the autobiographical film 'Harmonic Coumaction', and performed live in February 2017, part of a series of events that accompanied the COUM Transmissions retrospective which opened Hull UK City of Culture 2017. Later that year, 'Harmonic Coumaction' was presented as an audio-visual installation for Cosey Fanni Tutti's solo exhibition at Cabinet Gallery, London.
Cosey Fanni Tutti explains: 'Working on the COUM Transmissions exhibition also coincided with writing my autobiography - collating archive material and re engaging with my past. My work is a continuum, the past feeding the present and vice versa. The album is an interpretation of my past and present, of my understanding the shifting perceptions of how they inform one another. One form creating another through a metamorphic process.'

On TUTTI, the music has been updated and enhanced with elements of the original tracks re-recorded and further processed specifically to create a unique stand-alone document, separate to the live performance and installation. Recorded at Cosey Fanni Tutti's studio in Norfolk, the album, as on her debut release, Time To Tell, merges Cosey's art activities with her exploration of sound: The album's autobiographical theme is not locked into any specific time or place, the 'voices', instruments and sounds together span decades of my life, music and art. In this context my name 'TUTTI' shifts from its role as a noun to perfectly represent the concept of the album, also acting as sign for me the artist.
TUTTI is Cosey Fanni Tutti's only solo album release since 1982's Time To Tell. Time To Tell was recently given its first release on vinyl, on a long awaited official deluxe edition. The interim years between solo releases has seen a blisteringly prolific output as an artist and musician. Renowned for her art, her work in the sex industry, as co-founder of Industrial music and Throbbing Gristle, and her pioneering electronic music solo and as Chris & Cosey, Carter Tutti and Carter Tutti Void, she has created throughout with the motto 'my life is my art, my art is my life'.

Cosey's autobiography ART SEX MUSIC was published to worldwide acclaim by Faber & Faber in 2017, a Japanese edition has just been published with further translations and an audio book to follow. TUTTI

The second release on AF Trax, again with all profits being donated to Hope Not Hate, is the debut from Al Jerry who has the following to say -

I was initially picturing Al as an ambivalent character trying to evoke in his music deep issues and emotions related to Middle Eastern cultures, but not without a certain self-depreciating sense of humour and a questionable taste for stereotypical arabesque harmonies.

On a personal level, I'm from a family who is half-French, half-Armenian (from Turkey). I grew up with this sort of historical ambivalence in mind, born and bred in the relatively untroubled French culture but not completely oblivious (how could I) of the troubled past of my modern Armenian ancestry who had experienced the first genocide of the 20th century - which as you may know some people and countries still deny its very existence as we speak now in 2018. So, instead of doing something purely on my personal history and origins, I just wanted to celebrate/acknowledge the modern history of the both fascinating and chaotic Middle Eastern cultures.

When I introduced that vague idea of a project/alias to B with an early version of Sana'a Riots, he got instantly into it. The hybrid feel of the project really allowed us to experiment and mess around with odd tonalities and enthused solos. It was the first time for both of us that we manage to collaborate on an EP with someone else. We had never tried something together before and it actually turned out to be a lot of fun. More to come from Al then :)

AF Trax = Against Fascism Trax and is a new label project instituted by JD Twitch/Optimo Music. Its aim is to make a musical and cultural protest in opposition of rising far right politics and ideology in the world. Encouraging artists to make music intended to interrogate these toxic ideas, and with all label profits donated to Hope Not which campaigns to counter racism and fascism. Against Fascism Trax's intent is to provoke conversation, inform and financially support the opposition to fascist thinking. Its simple idea is that we must do something more than just talking. The moral thing to do is to act

Midday Moon is a survey of ambient and experimental music that emerged from Australia and New Zealand between 1980 and 1995. These recordings are sourced from a rich variety of micro-labels, private pressings, theatre soundtracks and artists' personal archives. Curated by Melbourne based DJ and archivalist, Sanpo Disco (a.k.a Rowan Mason), the collection delves deep into the world of outsider music that emerged in Australia and New Zealand in the latter half of the twentieth century, as synthesisers and early workstations began to enter the consumer marketplace. The record is an odyssey in itself, a journey that takes listeners into the unsung world of Australian new age composers. There are stories abound within this volume, from the mysterious disappearance of Helen-Ripley Marshall after the release of her 1988 album 'Green Chaos', to the journey of American-born, Perth based blues/rock guitarist John Heussenstamm, who unexpectedly turned his finger to 'ambient' music in the late 80's; and again from Melbourne based Ros Bandt, who made a series of recordings exploring the resonance of a hollow concrete cylinder 5 stories beneath busy Collins Street in Melbourne's CBD. Compiled by Sanpo Disco / Mastered by Mikey Young . '(Ambient music is) a surrounding influence that induces calm and a space to think... it can accommodate many levels of listening attention without enforcing one in particular.' - Brian Eno / 'A richer and more diverse ambient genre began to form. Music that crafts a unique cultural geography of landscapes and atmospheres: real and imagined, natural and man-made. Some artists turned their attention to the singular acoustic ecologies of overlooked spaces around the country. Others fostered interests in non-Western music cultures and instruments. The common thread is their use of new technologies to conjure interior and exterior regions, through acoustic and synthesised sounds.' - Sanpo Disco

In 1991 Baritone Tiplove released the highly acclaimed 'Young Ladies Drive Me Crazy' 12' on Easy Street
Records introducing the world to the bizarre minds of this fictional duo. The 12' was well received and
followed up by the cassette only LP 'Livin Foul' which has gone on to be a highly sought after rarity and has
even been called the greatest cassette only rap album. In 2017 Diggers With Gratitude released the first of a
planned three part series of unreleased Baritone Tiplove material, recorded across the late 80's and early 90's.
Now, in December 2018, In Effect Recordings and Diggers With Gratitude are proud to announce the second
EP in this series.
Many people know Baritone as the alter ego of the multi-talented Phill Most Chill (aka Soulman) who has been
enjoying somewhat of a resurgence in popularity of late amongst hip-hop vinyl fanatics. Recent collaborations
with DJ Format ('The Foremost') and Paul Nice ('The Fabreeze Brothers') have been widely acclaimed, as
have his numerous guest appearances, and our previous release of vintage material from Phill, 2011's 'All
Cuts Recorded Raw', remains our best selling release to date and is now highly sought after. Suffice it to say
we expect these to sell out quickly, don't say we didn't warn you!

Phil Ranelin's first record as a leader is worlds away from his later 1976 offering, Vibes From the Tribe. The Time Is Now is a vanguard jazz record, full of the spirit, determination, and innovation inspired by John Coltrane, Eric Dolphy, Cecil Taylor, Pharoah Sanders, and Archie Shepp. Recorded in 1973 and 1974 and released at the end of 1974, the set shows Ranelin to be an imposing composer and frightfully good trombonist. The original album contained six compositions that are a deep musical brew of avant-garde improvisation, hard bop jazz esthetics, and soulful melodic ideas that were superimposed as a jump off point for both harmonic and rhythmic (read: Latin) invention. The stamp of Detroit is all over this thing. Tracks like the title and "Black Destiny" reflect the anger and vision of the era, while moving it all in a positive musical direction. Soloists on the set include the rest of the Tribe collective -- Marcus Belgrave and Wendell Harrison -- as well as local players who deserved far more than they received in terms of national recognitions: bassist Reggie "Shoo-Be Doo" Fields, trumpeter Charles Moore, pianist Keith Vreeland, drummer Bill Turner, and others including Ranelin himself. The arrangements on The Time Is Now were ahead of their time, clustering a rhythm section as part of the horn's front line ("13th and Senate" and the title track) and a stylistic angularity that reflected both musical history and futurism in jazz and R&B ("Time Is Running Out" and "Times Gone By"). The Time Is Now is a must for any vanguard jazz aficionado or anyone interested in the strange, rhythm-oriented evolution of Detroit music. Thom Jurek/AMG

Our Favourite Bothy Botherers Mac-talla Nan Creag (comprised Of Hoch Ma Toch, Other Lands And Lord Of The Isles) Return To Firecracker Recordings, Channeling Ancient Rites, The Mysteries Of The Scottish Landscape And Its Elements Through Technologies Both Old And New For Your Listening Pleasure.

This Time Round The Archaeological Work Of Forestry Commission Scotland At Dun Deardail In Glen Nevis, And The Links Between That Site And The Ancient Celtic Myth 'the Sorrow Of Derdriu' Provided Fertile Ground For New Exploration And Response. Accompanying The Music Once Again Will Be A Lush Booklet Containing Some Of The Stunning Imagery That Results From The Work Fcs Have Done There, All Packaged And Silk-screened With The Usual Finesse We've Come To Expect From Firecracker Recordings And Their Chief Visionary House Of Traps, In Conjunction With 12th Isle's Al White.

Captured In Part In A High Vaulted Medieval Church, Then In Home Studios, Bouncing Ideas Back And Forth Over The Internet, Mtnc Have Once Again Drawn On Field Recordings, Traditional Instrumentation, Analogue Electronics And The Simple Power Of The Human Voice To Create A Shimmering And Expansive Song Cycle.

Whereas The First Album Was Borne Out Of An Intense Period Of Field Trips And Whisky Fuelled Jam Sessions In Brochs And Had A Loose Approach Overall, The Second Is Perhaps More Focussed In Its Themes Relating To The Ancient Tale - Love, War, Beauty And Tragedy All Intertwined - And They Arguably Go Deeper This Time, Conjuring Up Something Of The Fourth World Feel, By Way Of The Firth Of Forth.

With Additional Contributions From Professor John Kenny - Whose Primal Zummoesque Playing On A Range Of Horns Including A Giant Conch Shell And A Replica Of The Ancient Deskford Carynx Underpins Several Tracks On The Album - And Eva Sutherland (daughter Of Other Lands) Who Provides A Reading From The Myth At The Very Beginning, This Is An Album That Not Only Carries The Heaviness Of History But Also Looks To The Light Of The Future.'

Split album by Joe Corfield and Slim, two of UKs most promising beatmakers. It's the follow-up to the 'KO-OP 1' album by Smoke Trees and Juan Rios on KO-OP, the sub-label and community dedicated to the art of beatmaking founded by reknown hip-hop label Melting Pot Music from Cologne, Germany.

When we started KO-OP in the summer of 2017, little did we knew where this journey would take us to. Ever since we had the pleasure to work with 21 artists from all over the world and have put out almost 80 tracks on lp, tape and digital. Now we are happy to share with you KO-OP 2 - a split album by two of our favourite producers from the UK: Slim and Joe Corfield. Slim is one half of London rap group Summers Sons. The Sons are signed to MPM where they have released two albums ('Undertones' & 'Uhuru').

In February 2019 Summers Sons will play their first German tour together with Children of Zeus. Slim has released instrumental cuts on KO-OP, Brownswood and Banoffee Pie, plus a beattape on Yogocop Records. Joe Corfield hails from Birmingham and has released a string of albums via Radio Juicy and Yogocop.

He is coming with his very own sound. Futuristic and soulful, with a great ear to detail. It was actually Flofilz' idea to have them both on one record. 'KO-OP 2' will be released on one LP with two individual covers by Rahel Süßkind, a Berlin based artist (and part of Money $ex Records) who is responsible for all KO-OP artwork.

Malfunctioning speakers, & digital dreamscapes, SQUIRRELS ON FILM's 4th release explores the outer reaches of techno with impolite, reckless abandon.
Psychedelic sound explorer Its Own infinite Flower, who was
responsible, along with head squirrels Solar & C.l.a.w.s., for San
Francisco underground punk rave/happening Hostile Ambient
Takeover, unleashes his first official release, The Plumes of Love (ARE BLACK!). After contributing a track to 2017's Spacetime Continuum/ Juju & Jordash curated Air Texture V compilation, this four track EP of abstract tech-noise brings the sounds Its Own Infinite Flower refined in the basements & warehouses of the Bay Area's underground music scene to the wider world, whether it's ready or not.
'Drone, Drugs 'n' Dissonance' creeps into life as a thunderstorm of
white noise, out of which a cold-rave pulse somehow metastasizes into something resembling techno, although this is a deformed, uncivilized, unwanted mutation, separated at birth & raised in a toxic wilderness. It builds slowly before turning up in a rage of digital distortion, a black metal dub party held at the edge of a melting glacier. 'Oh, Empire of Roses' is a Dada Phycho Jazz Electro number. Dissonant synth chords snake around each other in a playful ouroboros of manic future funk, never knowing if it's starting or stopping, coming or going. Relentless bass throbs through the track, which almost threatens to bubble into classic acid electro before fizzling out. On side two there is 'Devotion to a Peacock Angel,' an angular breakdance groove for the characters in the bar scene in Star Wars. Electro dub rhythms keep stay grounded as everything else rips apart in all directions over the course of the track. On 'Misfortunes of El Dorado' a soundsystem bangs in the next room, only the deepest bass escaping, shaking reality until it's torn apart in waves of distortion, a classic techno synth string wandering over the top of everything in a full blown Techno Jazz Odyssey.

SQUIRRELS ON FILM continues its adventure at the edges of techno
with the mind bending stylings of Its Own Infinite Flower's debut EP,
fitted with another beautiful hand-drawn, full color sleeve by New York artist Bert Bergen. The Plumes of Love (ARE BLACK!).

Alter follow on from the bilingual dark ambient theatricals of Liberez with this four track EP from veteran Hamburg producer Christoph De Babalon.

As an affiliate of Digital Hardcore, Fat Cat and the recently founded V I S, CDB has tirelessly explored the intersections of breakcore, illbient and drum and bass. His work is at once uncompromising yet stylish - broken, punishing rhythms collide with dreary, doom-laden melodies and those eerie in-between spaces of vintage Unit Moebius or Deutsch Nepal. With Hectic Shakes he delivers a meditation on the 'inner abyss', the sort of abyss that lulls the listener into his sound world with next to no resistance.

'Shakes and Shivers' fixates itself on deceptively playful grooves with eerie, nightbus-to-nowhere atmospherics whilst opening cut 'Harakiri' manages to distort familiar jungle tropes into something even die hard devotees of the sound will find fresh. The EP closes with what we can only describe as a homage to 90s ambient techno in a ruff, post-hardcore fashion. Skittering drums weave in and out of longing, futurist synth lines and enough breakdowns to satisfy the dance floor.

Domestic Exile are proud to present the devastatingly deplorable and malevolent recordings (that are sure to corrode yet electrify your ears) by Glasgow's very own KLEFT.

KLEFT aka Vickie McDonald is rooted in and has actively propagated the underground DIY radical queer punk and feminist movement here in Glasgow. Their projects have included the skull crushing sludge doom of Cartilage, the unflinching and infamous multi- membered hard core stars that were DIVORCE and the sacrificial, druid drone glitch of MOURN. Alongside these projects they have uncompromisingly disrupted, motivated and facilitated collective endeavors to take down the capital power structure of the dominant system of patriarchal club venues and abhorrent fuckers in this town.

For this record 'H+ Sexualis', KLEFT explores the neo-modern space where flesh is left behind. Negotiating, analyzing and tearing to shreds the relationship and balance between flesh and technology. KLEFT's expansive and palpable sonic offerings delve into themes of transhumanism and body hacking and seep into our collective skin begging the question; can flesh ever be created digitally. Does a lack of physicality alienate human experience in a post transhumanism society Are we all destined to be skinless yet digitally connected Will the body become superfluous Toward "the utopian dream of the hope for a monstrous world without gender," as stated on Donna Haraway's essay ''A Cyborg Manifesto.'

From the opening track 'Ossein' the listener grasps a foreboding lethargic build up, lurking out of the spatial ritualistic shadows into a sea of suffocating nothingness. A void where there is no gravity. Skeletal and brittle shattering rhythms which echo DMZ / Skull Disco dubstep alongside the more frozen, glacial ominous explorations of grime are often felt proving KLEFT is an artist whose inspirations run deep and wide and generally exist in the darkest recesses of our subconscious. These fearful, disjointed rhythms are set against weightless atmospheric oscillated synths, as if roaming through bleakly opaque, claustrophobic narrow corridors on a first person survival horror video game such as Resident Evil.

Moving through to 'CMBR', KLEFT's dissonant, degrading soundscape ferociously ascends. The resilient kick drum is propulsive and pulverizing akin to 'ardcore tekno - or intense gabba if you have the guts to adjust the tempo up to +8 - aesthetics that overwhelm and agitate finally revealing it's grotesque biological / amorphous bio structure. Elevating the repetitive 4/4 kick to a destructive, distorted banger of a track as layers of converging atonal noise and sound design simultaneously further enhances the sense of imminent radioactive contamination.

Next is 'Writhe, Squirm, Broken' continuing the convulsive, nauseating permutations of the prior track but reconfigured like a mangled, gruesome Cronenberg-esque parasite that has infiltrated an open wound, excruciatingly feeding off of the inner anatomy of it's hosts body from within. Repulsively reformulating the shape and dimension. The intro is akin to a panic stricken bouncy ball contracting and expanding, the spring reverb building momentum and traveling further away in distance and speed.

'Hackfleisch Deluxe' is a muuurrderous stomper and is one of the more grime / bass orientated tracks that deconstructs and disrupts the tempo familiar to sub-low producers on Black Ops / Jon E Cash / DJ Dread D. The crawling, plummeting frequency of the synth is a nauseating rush of coagulating blood to the heed; a deep throbbing sensory depravation in sharp, paradoxical contrast with the driving harmony layered on top which proves to be infectiously addictive. Furthermore are splintering programmed vocal samples that gives a sense of artificial disorientation, mind over matter, a possible hint at our evolving sentient cognition within a nightmarish simulated, augmented reality

Second to last we have 'Keratin' which is filled with the near fatal dissolving thud of Djax-Up acid that gives the impression that you're a biologist peering through a microscope into a petrie dish and witnessing the rapid and furious genetic cellular replication of bacterial and viral organisms.

Culminating in 'Bruised and Bleeding Hands' where the squashed density of a deflated and depressurized helium filled balloon and elastic umbilical cords, barbed wire and copper wires grind n' coil around the lens of a zooming camera. Taking no prisoners, this is a punishing grime weapon. A phat, surgical kick drum bulldozes its way thru causing carnage, syncopated punching snares after every rave stab and dizzying third beat. It won't be long until ye hear this on Silver Drizzle's youtube channel in the near future.

This record transports us to the hyperkinetic mutation scene on the cult cyberpunk film Tetsuo The Iron Man where the organic flesh / mechanical rust of the Iron Man metamorphoses with the Metal Fetishist during the rebirth sequence and we say 'LONG LIVE THE NEW FLESH!''.

Jac Berrocal, David Fenech and Vincent Epplay return with Ice Exposure, their second album for Blackest Ever Black. A sequel and companion piece of sorts to 2015's Antigravity, its title couldn't be more apt: sonically it is both colder, and more exposed - in the sense of rawer, more volatile, more vulnerable - than its predecessor, capturing the combustible energy and barely suppressed violence of the trio's celebrated live performances with aspects of noir jazz, musique concrète, no wave art-rock, sound poetry and spectral electronics all interpenetrating in unpredictable and exhilarating ways. While there are moments of great sensitivity and even a cautious romanticism, the prevailing mood is one of anxiety, paranoia, and mounting psychodrama: close your eyes and Ice Exposure feels like a dissociative Hörspiel broadcasting from the seedy backstreets of your own troubled mind. Before he picks up an instrument or opens his mouth, Berrocal's unique and compelling presence can be felt: a combination of studied, glacial cool and anarchic, in-the-moment intensity that has served him well over a long and storied career. It was honed during his time as a theatre and film actor, and in the 70s Paris improv scene, it powered his influential Catalogue group in the 1970s, numerous seminal, sui generis solo sides, and far-sighted collaborations with the likes of Nurse With Wound, Lol Coxhill, Pascal Comelade and James Chance which have seen him come to be valorised by two generations of avant-garde agitators and eccentrics. Now in his eighth decade, it comes with an added gravitas, perhaps, but no less energy or vitality. On Ice Exposure, his lyrical, instantly recognisable trumpet playing is a key feature - see especially the ghostly, dubwise take on Ornette's 'Lonely Woman', the dissolute exotica of 'Salta Girls', and the sublime echo-chamber soliloquy 'Opportunity'. But more often it's his voice that commands centre-stage, whether casually discharging surreal poetic monologues or moaning in animal despair - a vocal tour de force that transcends language and culminates in the Dionysian frenzy of 'Why', Berrocal's half-spoken, half-howled exclamations jostling with David Fenech's slashes of dissonant guitar, over Badalamenti-ish, panther-stalk drums. Fenech's origins are in the mail-art scene of the early '90s, when he led the Peu Importe collective in Grenoble, and since then, in addition to his own recordings he has worked as a software developer at IRCAM and played with Jad Fair, Rhys Chatham and many others. Together with Vincent Epplay he is responsible for Ice Exposure's inspired arrangements and vivid, vertiginous sound design. Epplay is a visual artist and composer with particular interest in aleatory composition, concrete, and the reappropriation of vintage sound and film material. He and Fenech fashion a remarkable mise-en-scene for Berrocal to inhabit, one that embraces cutting-edge electronics while also paying homage to the best traditions of outlaw jazz and libidinous rock'n'roll ('Soundcheck' invokes the brutish spirit of Berrocal's hero Vince 'Rock N Roll Station' Taylor). On 'Blanche de Blanc', Berrocal's voice is framed by a groaning, ghoulish orchestra of industrial drones, while 'Equivoque' evokes the most humid and hostile Fourth World landscapes and 'Panic In Surabaya' lives up to its name, a hectic, pulse-quickening concrète collage that leaves you gasping for air. This is a searching and singular trio operating at the absolute peak of their powers, with an interplay that transcends studio and stage and occurs at an almost telepathic level. Ice Exposure is a triumph of that group mind, an underworld dérive as life-affirming as it is unnerving and psychologically precarious.













Panic In Surabaya

G.I. Gurdjieff was an Armenian and Greek philosopher, spiritual teacher, and musician, whose teachings of The Fourth Way influenced thousands worldwide and created communities that still exist to this day. His goal was to teach humans to reach a higher consciousness out of the "waking sleep" he considered most to be living in. Music was an important part of his teachings and these brilliant harmonium improvisations were recorded in 1949 in Paris, just a short time before his death. Droning and ethereal, these beautiful pieces mark a pinnacle in the work of a legend of human spirituality.

Bremen finds two luminaries of the Swedish punk underground, Jonas Tiljander (Brainbombs) and Lanchy Orre (Totalitär, Brainbombs, Teenage Graves, etc), coming together to explore the dark side of kraut and progressive rock, early electronic and drone music, whilst also invoking the fathomlessly bleak interior landscapes conjured by Nico/Cale on The Marble Index and Desertshore.

'Following a trio of sprawling, planet-gargling double-LPs, 2013's self-titled LP on Skrammel, and Second Launch (2015) and Eclipsed (2017) on Blackest Ever Black, Bremen - J. Tiljander and Lanchy, previously best known for their contributions to Brainbombs' long rapsheet of genius-and- brutality, but latterly exponents of a rarefied cosmic melancholy - return with Enter Silence, their most concise, and powerful, album to date. Once again the Uppsala multi-instrumentalists combine elements of trogged-out psychedelic rock with a deadly serious Arctic minimalism and weeping modal improvisations that owe more to the outer limits of jazz and burnt-out free music from Japan. It's connoisseur's space music, grown-up and grievously honed; outwardly inclined towards the epic but studded with details that reward attention and introspection. There's always been a strong undercurrent of sadness animating Bremen's work, and that existential burden is present and correct on Enter Silence, culminating in the all-out cosmic anguish of 'Palladium'. Even 'The Middle Section', whose ragged chords are nothing if not the sound of optimism and defiance, sounds like it's navigating some kind of unsayable trauma. But this band has always allowed plenty of room for bonehead slash-and-burn as well: see here especially the Stoogeian/39 Clocks-ish rock'n'roll of 'Aimless Cruising' and the pulpy quasi-cinematic tension of 'Sinister', or the brilliant 'Too Cold For Your Eyes', a blast of voidal motorik that sounds like a cranked-up Clean. It's a cold, cold world out there'

When Dunham Records/Daptone producer and musician Thomas Brenneck first heard the close family harmonies of the Sha La Das he had a revelation; he knew he had to get it on tape.



Direct from Staten Island, the four Schaldas, father Bill and sons Will aka Swivs, who also toured the world playing keyboard for Charles Bradley and his Extraordinaires, Paul of Paul and the Tall Trees and Charles Bradley and his Extraordinaires, and Carmine had come into the studio in Brooklyn to record background vocals on Charles Bradley's Victim of Love. It was a passion that drove Brenneck from the very beginning.



'Hearing them sing together in the studio was incredible', says Brenneck. He collaborated with Bill Schalda writing songs and applying harmonic sensibilities rooted in doo wop, blues and soul. It wasn't a stretch for Bill, after all he'd been second tenor when still a teen in Brooklyn vocal group, The Montereys in the 1960s (their 45, Face In The Crowd/Step Right Up on Blast records sells for $500 these days) who would play venues from neighborhood bars to the 1964 World's Fair in Queens.



'Bill is the genuine article, just like Charles Bradley and Sharon Jones, he came directly from the source,' says Brenneck. Indeed, Bill Schalda was right there amongst doo wop and r&b groups of the era, singing Moonglows and Flamingos tunes.

'You'd go out on the street and constantly hear a bunch of guys singing on the corner, they'd finish playing handball in the schoolyard during the day and then they'd start singing at night,' says Bill. 'We were all just guys in the neighborhood in Brooklyn, who gradually found each other.'



After their children were born, Bill and wife Linda moved the family across the Verrazano-Narrows bridge to Staten Island. Growing up, sons Will, Paul and Carmine remember summer nights singing group harmonies on the stoop of their home with their father Bill guiding them. 'He would bring us out on the stoop on Staten Island and he would teach us each parts of say, the sesame street song - we were his backing group very early on - that was fun,' says eldest son, Will.



On this, their debut, the talent is harnessed in 11 songs, each tender-voiced delight delivered with absolute conviction combined with musicians that have help define the Daptone/Dunham Records sound including Brenneck, Homer Steinweiss, Dave Guy, Leon Michels, Nick Movshon and Victor Axelrod. 'I wanted to take the Sha La Das outside of the doo wop genre,' says Brenneck. 'To take the whole vocabulary of doo wop harmony and reapply it to soul - so you get super soulful harmonies along the lines of The Manhattans & The Moments.'



From the opening atmospheric guitar strum of Open My Eyes via a walk along the Coney Island boardwalk catching the last glimpse of sunlight at dusk of Carnival to the sublime crescendo of harmonies of the winsome Love in the Wind, each song evokes a deeply personal yet universal yearning that none of us can escape. Quite simply every song yields magic.

There's something special when a family can meld voices in close harmony. The Everly Brothers had it, The Beach Boys had it, the Schalda's have it.

Starr's known output consists of a single release, the hyper in-demand 'She's So Fine' single, but this is only the first light in a constellation of recordings he made in the 1980s. Being the go-to guy for collaboration in Harrisburg offered him the best local talent. A young and soulful singer, the aptly named Fawn came into Starr's life, laid down a session or two and went back to the real world. Aside from an incredibly rare cassette-only compilation appearance, this is the first time her sweet and sultry voice makes an appearance on the world stage. Backed by Starr's stellar production, these tracks are truly lost gems, ready to shine for the first time on a lovingly remastered 45 straight from the original tapes.

"The bird songs which I had recorded in the West Indies in 1969 made me inclined to find out more about those of the nearby South American continent, and convinced me, moreover, that musically speaking, they possessed an unquestionable originality in comparison with those of Africa and Europa. I therefore decided to carry out a series of orthonological trips on this continent, starting with the North: Venezuela, and so, with this in mind, i disembarked at Caracas on 27th May 1972.

The unusual musical volume of this tropical country made its impact on my arrival in town, where the unbearably shrill chirping of the cicadas overwhelmed me each time I passed under a tree. At night fall, around even the meanest of ditches filled by the daily rain, myriads of toads and frogs struck up a concert, which, through its sheer intensity, muffled all other surrounding noises. When I penetrated the forest, I could hear bird species literally by the dozen and individuals by the hundred, all calling and singing together at dawn and at dusk..."
- Jean C. Roché

"Among many of his amazing records I came across Jean C. Roché's Birds of Venezuela, beautifully produced LPs of birdsong. I began to plan a trip to Amazonas, to record the unearthly song of potoos and Yanomami shamanism."
- David Toop

Jean-Claude Roché (May 11, 1931) is an French ornithologist and wild life field recordist. Roché recorded bird songs worldwide for over 30 years and released over 130 records out of his recordings.

Led By Nigel Ayers And Caroline K, The Band Was One Of The First To Use Tape Cutting, Avant-garde Art, And Underground Video Works To Create A Stage Experience That Was Being Cultivated By Like-minded Artists Like Throbbing Gristle, Spk And Cabaret Voltaire.

Originally Self Released In 1988 On Earthly Delights, Spiritflesh' Is A Masterpiece And A Major Reference For The Early Drone/dark Ambient Minds.

By The Time The Album Came Out, Nocturnal Emissions Had Already Produced Several Albums Of Electronic Music Which Varied From Noisy To Funky. Displaying His Usual Perversity, Nigel Chose To Ditch Electronic Dance Music Immediately Before The Acid House Revolution And Produce A Series Of Utterly Compelling Atmospheric Albums Which Are Often Referred To These Days As Being 'ambient Industrial'.

"spiritflesh" Was The First Offering By The New Shape Of Nocturnal Emissions. The Record 'came Out Of A Long, Hard Thinking, A Personal Examination Of My Own Motives For Working Within Music.' Nigel Ayers Played Church Harmonium, Chime And Music Box On The Record, And Used Samples Of Chimpanzees, Cattle, And African And European Wild Birds. While Generally Ambient, The Music Is Not Like Brian Eno's Work; It Is Atmospheric, But Impossible To Relegate To The Background.

'there's Always A Dangerous Intrusion Of The Real World Into Our Music,' Ayers Said. 'we're Looking Into The Relationship Between People And The Environment, The Kind Of Feedback Which Happens Between People And Locations. Underneath It All, This Planet Has Got Its Own Message.'

Its Rap and Roll, 2nd Generation.(1st generation was Run DMC, Beastie Boys,LL Cool J).A mash up of styles all under one album.. 

Trying to explain the immoral wrongs of the world within the world we come from... Re educating our selfs and saying what we believe in our songs.. Hence 'Teach Peace'. Education, housing, healthcare, food banks, racism, corporate greed, tax evasion, climate change, child abuse and religion all need to be addressed properly.

Not swept under the carpet to be covered up by the next scandal.. We need moral leaders who are strong and willing to die for they're beliefs.. Not selling their people down the river to the highest bidder!!... We all need to be speaking our minds about whats going on... Peace is the only way for everyone... Peace can be just as prosperous as war.. Even for the corporations..there's nothing wrong with making money. It's what you do with it that counts..

It just takes a little bit of time and thought. But greed leads to the inequality of more than 80% of our world.. We need to help people become aware of this.. It's not where we're from, it's where we're at!

To throw a CANDELA is a popular expression for hosting an impromptu encounter revolving around tobacco, fire and music. CANDELA and fire are used as metaphors of passion, warmth and love, and this is what CANDELEROS transmit in their live performances, delivering their very own unique Afro-Caribbean vibes with a strong identity: folklore and psychedelia given a modern twist in a ritual of catchy drums, surf guitar riffs and South American percussions.
Infusing punk energy into their remarkable interpretation of traditions, the six-piece band embarks on a journey through the vibrant and immensely rich musical culture of the Caribbean, fusing merengue, champeta, salsa, and son, with bullerengue and cumbia; constantly reinventing themselves.
William, Fernando, Urko, Sergio, Alex and Andrés, come from different regions of Colombia and Venezuela. Their paths crossed in Madrid, Spain, where the Latin American family comes together through art and culture, gathering in diverse groups that focus on bringing their common cultural heritage to the world.
Their passion for endless musical improvisation, always crossing the thin line between genres, can be felt in these two tracks selected by Galletas Calientes Records .
A-Side 'La Cumbia Del Chinche' is an experimental, mind-bending cumbia, driven by a heavy mix of electronic and acoustic drums, hissing guacharacas and hallucinogenic guitars.
B-side 'El Boleta' is a totally freaked-out, uptempo merengue; a clever blend of subtle electronic drums, organic and hard-hitting percussions, psychedelic guitars and keys with the iconic ghostly tremolo and trippy reverb of seventies Peruvian cumbia.

Jan Bertil Svensson: co-founder of the legendary Börft Records, member of arch techno-primitivists Frak, the man responsible for Villa Abo and all-round underground don active in the field of machine music since 1987!

Whilst Jan's output will always conjure comparisons to Techno with a capital T, he has (and continues to) plough a singular and peculiar path in the realm of electronic music. For the Glasgow-based Full Dose, he presents his first ever solo 12' under the name of J.B.S: a four tracker of sluggish, minimal funk that bears the hallmarks of his most classic work as Villa Abo, and adds dashes of the brutal grit that his Studio SS project is infamous for. If there's any sort of recurring theme in Svensson's work, it's playfulness and humour, a particular Scandinavian form of sonic banter that cuts right through the po-faced, black-clad heteronomy of much of today's electronic landscape. The music on this record, with it's odd blend of stripped-back synth pop and brutish dungeon funk evokes exactly that: a body of work that doesn't even seem capable of taking itself too seriously, yet evades anything resembling a recognisable piss take. After all, nobody said that humour and credibility in music had to be mutually exclusive, and J.B.S is a master at weaving the two together at will.

In a world where dance music is often subjected to ludicrous conceptual analysis, sometimes the combined effect of hot circuitry, sincerity, vivaciousness and an anomalous attitude are the only thing for it. But then again, this is not just dance music either...

Todd Osborn. For Many, The Name Conjures Up Myths, Tall Tales Told Within The World Of Electronic Music. Todd: Makes Hovercrafts, Repairs Motorcycles Out Of His Garage, Fixes Vintage Jukeboxes, Creates Handmade Components For Espresso Machines, Flies Fighter Jets, Is A Lego Expert, Owns A Record Label With His Son That Releases Music By Aphex Twin, Madlib And Underground Resistance, Has A Stunning Collection Of Rare Whiskeys. True All Of It, Of Course. Reviewing A Cv Of The Varied Styles And Sounds Of Todd Osborn Is Like A Museum-grade Survey Of Records From Electronic Music's Ultimate Outsider Artist. Yet, Todd Osborn Has Never Been Outside. From Releasing Jungle On Rephlex With Tadd Mullinix As Soundmurderer & Sk-1 To House And Jacking Club Music As Osborne On Ghostly International, To Bright, Chiptuned Boogie As Superstructure, Todd Osborn Has Done It All. From There We Haven't Yet Scratched The Surface. For Over 20 Years, Todd Osborn Has Been A Permanent Fixture In Music, Touring Internationally At Music Festivals, Warehouse Raves, Gabber Parties In Fields To Giving Lectures At Red Bull Music Academy And In Turn Hosting The Most Diverse Programme On Red Bull Radio. To Boot Todd Osborn Opened The Best Record Store In The Usa, In Ypsilanti, Mi. Portage Garage Sounds Is Thrilled, Humbled, To Present This Three Song Ep, Superdisc.

THIS IS NOT A REISSUE. THIS IS THE FIRST TIME THIS AMAZING MINIMAL SCORE HAS BEEN ISSUED ON VINYL

This is the first time the complete score to The Conversation has been released on vinyl. The film itself was originally released in 1974 and a 7' demo of the theme was sent out as promotional material by Paramount (PAA-0305), but a USA stock edition was never issued. In Japan the same music was also issued on a 7' at about the same time (JET-2273), with a picture sleeve, but until now nothing else has ever been pressed on vinyl.

Jonny Trunk's little obsession with this music began after I'd caught the film, late night, sometime in the mid 1990s. Musically it's an exceptional example of the 'new minimalism' in film music of the period, marking a departure (for some) from big scores to smaller, more economic ensemble sounds.

The film was written, produced and directed by Francis Ford Coppola and is still a thrilling journey into sound, mind and murder. Heavily influenced by Antonioni's Blow-Up (and not, as some thought, by Watergate), Coppola wanted to fuse the concept of Blow-Up with 'the world of audio surveillance'. The story centres around Harry Caul (Gene Hackman), a mac-wearing professional wire-tapper and clandestine bugger who gets unusually consumed by a conversation he's been paid to record. Caul is a loner, an obsessive-compulsive character with numerous neuroses that play out brilliantly throughout the film. And as he slowly pieces together the conversation fragments and forms his own story around it, his world falls apart.

Sonically this movie - all about sound - is groundbreaking in many ways, with actual 'sound Design' Provided By The Legendary Walter Murch - The Man Who Actually Invented The Term In The First Place.

For The Music, Coppola Wisely Chose A Young David Shire, His Brother In Law. Shire's Deceptively Simple Piano Theme (composed Because Of No Budget For Big Orchestra) Is One Of Tragic Beauty, Brilliantly Capturing Caul's Loneliness, His Slightly Disturbed Nature And This Trip Into Darkness. The Melody Has Both Sweet And Sour Tones, Feeling A Little Like A Slow Ragtime, Which Both Develops And Retreats Throughout The Film; There Are Even Trips Into Avant-garde Territory With Electro-acoustic Flourishes And Concrète. The Solo, Agitated Figure Of Caul, Wearing His Distinctive Transparent Mac, Is Made All The More Raw And Poignant By The Score - The Sparse And Curiously Emotional Compositions Are Unlike Any Others I Can Think Of From The Period.

The Soundtrack For The Conversation Proved To Be A Major Break For Shire, His Career Really Taking Off From This Musical Point. His Next Score Was To Be The Underground Classic Taking Of Pelham 123, Followed Up Later Ironically By All The Presidents Men - A Thriller About The Watergate Scandal.

The Conversation Went On To Win Several Awards And Nominations, And Has Become A Classic Of The 'new Hollywood' Movement. Hopefully Now This Music May Become Part Of The Renewed Interest In Old Film Soundtracks.

Lost Futures is a new label that explores experimental and often radical approaches to dance music from the past. In a musical landscape that increasingly claims to seek and reward new forms and ideas, Lost Futures delves into the recent past to revisit forward-thinking, optimistic projects that, owing to the social, musical or outright political climate, perhaps struggled to find an audience. Allowing only time to re-contextualise these leftfield, sometimes misunderstood and ultimately human bodies of work, Lost Futures taps into the inherent idealism of rave.

LF001 trips back until the early nineties to revisit the alternative scene emerging from the Dutch city of Utrecht. Here, three young men - DJ Zero One (Sander Friedeman), TJ Tape TV (Arno Peeters) and DJ White Delight (Richard van der Giessen) - joined forces to form 'The Awax Foundation'. Inspired by the transcendent and revolutionary electronic music arriving on their shores imported from Chicago and Detroit, combining their knowledge, gear and ever-expanding vinyl collection allowed additional freedom in paying sincere tribute to these intoxicating sounds, while also developing their tastes in a more personal, eclectic direction.

The musical flavours of Awax initially leaned toward acid house and the roots of techno. However, with three different mindsets in the mix, their tastes were rarely fixed. One thing each shared in common was a devotion to collecting rare sounds, specifically more adventurous and international samples than those emanating from the increasingly-hard, masculine dance music emerging from the Netherlands during the period. Inspired by the cross-over global sound of bands like Suns of Arqa, or 'World Music', as it was perhaps patronisingly termed at the time, the trio became interested in the idea of making techno with 'ethnic instruments'.

Of course, this being 1992, none of The Awax Foundation had access to such instruments, instead, they had a vast, collective library of samples from all over the world. There were no collaborations and no clear plan. Instead, they set to work using a Yamaha TX16W sampler, the legendary Atari 1040ST computer, a cheap mixing desk and a couple of low-end synths and FX machines. When Richard mentioned the project to his friend, Akin Fernandez, the London DJ and owner of cult label Irdial Discs, Fernandez was intrigued enough to invite the trio to record a one-hour show for his 'Monster Music Radio' series on London's then-burgeoning Kiss FM.

Forced to come up with a name, 'CultureClash' seemed like the obvious choice, even if the members of Awax were only creatively sparring among themselves. Along with the term 'ethno-techno', slightly dubious to a hopefully more conscious Western audience in 2017, these were the only guiding principles to the quietly ambitious project that soon combined cutting-edge machine rhythms with samples sourced from everywhere from Bolivia to Togo, and inspired by everything from Ravi Shankar's epic soundtrack to the Oscar-winning movie Ghandi, to the technical limits of their own setup requiring a dazzling degree of cut-and-paste work. Some tracks even emerged out of academic studies within the ethnomusicology department at The University of Amsterdam.

The show aired on October 2nd, 1992, recorded in one blistering take and without any rehearsals, traversing a huge variety of tempos and styles. If the performance wasn't seamless, it was undeniably thrilling, fresh and ambitious. As such, several labels, including Fernandez's aforementioned Irdial Discs expressed an interesting in commercially releasing CultureClash, while another imprint proposed a series of twelve-inches and an album. But the sheer complexity of the project meant that it never saw the light of day, while the trio embarked on different journeys ahead, both creative and personal.

Twenty five years later, and the original CultureClash lineup and founding members of The Awax Foundation provide the sound of the first release from Lost Futures. An otherworldly, ambitious and optimistic compilation, accompanied by extensive sleeve notes from the trio, CultureClash is a timeless ode to experimentation in dance music's ever-overlapping culture.

Damian Schwartz' "Existence Itself" is a compilation of well composed melodies that evolve, while gliding over the backbone of dance floor rhythms. Whilst containing five tracks, this record feels and breathes like a full length. "Public Domain" shows Schwarz' knowledge of jazz composition.

The opening track contains chord progressions that are unusual in popular music, but should soothe a more trained audience. Nevertheless, "Public Domain" is a positive composition that should appeal to selectors worldwide.

"Heavy Weather" is dripping with modulated chords, thoroughly selected bits of FX, and otherworldly arps. Deep rhythmic drum patterns guide the track into alterations of mood and a warm bath of intelligent melodies.

"Tyner" is a funked-out piece of work that sounds like a perfect PULP records. It's this track where Schwarz shows that he is up there with the giants of modern day funk sounds. Large synth basses growl through the palette, and an oozing lead synth serves as the recognizable element.

For the B2, a beatless version of Tyner is added to this package. This should be a welcome and fun element for selectors to play around with.

"Former DJ, Now Selector" is a breathing, positive track that's the perfect ending to a versatile work like "Existence Itself".

'1929 - Das Jahr Babylon" marks Thomas Fehlmann's third full length release of 2018 and presents what appears to be a creative peak in his career that spans beyond his solo career to his early days in Palais Schaumburg, collaborating with Moritz von Oswald as 3MB to his long time work with The Orb. Having left The Orb in late 2017 has set free unforeseen energies in Fehlmann's studio.

A departure from his recent dance floor-friendly album "Los Lagos" (KOM388, KOMCD148) released in September on Kompakt, Thomas Fehlmann's '1929 - Das Jahr Babylon" is a film soundtrack from the documentary that aired on ARD network on September 30, 2018 and is now available as a podcast series.

To compliment the internationally lauded TV series "Berlin Babylon", German director Volker Heise has created a documentary about 1929, the fateful year during Germany's "Weimarer Republik" in which "Berlin Babylon" is settled. Heise's stirring documentary portrays Germany's sizzling capital that is faced with radical changes by the dark forces whom are about to toss the world into the abyss we know as World War II.

This marks the second time that Fehlmann is partnering up with Volker Heise after 2010's marathon documentary "24 Stunden Berlin" which was released as "Gute Luft" (KOM211, KOMCD81) in the same year. Fehlmann's composition for "1929" consists of sample material taken from the era and thwarts the exaggerated lust for life with threatening undertones that anticipate the dawn of mankind's darkest chapter so far. Although all the sounds breathe yesterday's atmosphere this soundtrack bursts with modernity. Fehlmann accomplished the daring feat to musically render the unsettling resemblance between the political situation 90 years ago and our current time.

We at KOMPAKT feel that Fehlmann's score has turned out spectacular enough to give it proper release on limited vinyl and CD as well as on all digital platforms.

Mit '1929 - Das Jahr Babylon" legt Thomas Fehlmann schon seinen zweiter Longplayer innerhalb eines halben Jahres vor und dokumentiert damit eine kreative Hochphase seiner überaus stattlichen Musikerkarriere. Die Trennung von The Orb scheint bei ihm ungeahnte Energien freizusetzen.

Anders als auf dem cluborientierten "Los Lagos" tritt Thomas Fehlmann auf "1929" musikalisch einen Schritt zur Seite. Und das aus gutem Grund: Analog zur international gefeierten Fernsehserie "Babylon Berlin" entstand unter der Regie von Volker Heise der Dokumentarfilm "1929 - Das Jahr Babylon" - ein ergreifendes Sittengemäde Berlins während des Schicksalsjahrs der Weimarer Republik. Wie schon zu Volker Heises vorangegangener Berlin-Doku "24 Stunden Berlin" (2010 erschienen als das Album "Gute Luft" auf KOMPAKT) hat Thomas Fehlmann auch diesmal den kongenialen Soundtrack beigesteuert. Basierend auf Klangmaterial des Jahres 1929 hat Fehlmann eine beeindruckende Musik geschaffen, in der manchmal die übertriebene Lebensfreude und Dekandenz jener Zeit aufflackert. Eine Musik, deren Stimmung jedoch unterwandert ist von den bedrohlichen Strömungen, die Deutschland kurz darauf in seine dunkelste Epoche stossen werden.

Thomas Fehlmann ist damit ein wahres Kunststück gelungen. So sehr die Produktion den Geist einer vergangenen Zeit atmet, so modern mutet sie an. "1929 - Original Filmmusik" klingt somit wie die zu Musik geronnene Erkenntnis, dass sich Gestern und Heute auf erschreckende Weise ähneln.

Wir bei Kompakt sind der Ansicht, dass Thomas Fehlmanns Filmmusik zu "1929 - Das Jahr Babylon' so spektakulär geraten ist, dass wir sie nun als limitierte CD und Vinyl-Auflage, sowie auf allen digitalen Plattformen verfügbar machen.

Glasgow's Stephen Lopkin follows his fantastic album on M>O>S with The Imitator EP, a tongue-in-cheek tribute to the golden era of techno. 4 tracks covering a broad range of styles from Detroit to the classic UK sound of the 90s. Serene electronics abound though every track packs a considerable punch making this EP as at home for home listening as it is for packing out the dancefloor. Fans of Derrick May, Carl Craig, Balil and Kevin Saunderson are sure to find something here to prick up their ears.

Following on from Comfy Bella's Konkahs EP earlier this year, Released's second vinyl instalment comes courtesy of the Berlin-based production duo Horsemen, who mark their debut into the world of wax with the aptly titled 'Unknown EP'. Freshly faced and full of vigour, Horsemen deliver two unique cuts of engaging electronic music which are accompanied by a remix from Released's very own Jorgie.

The title track 'Unknown', features the delicate vocals of close friend Nomoko, atop a robust combination of thick kick drums, energetic percussion and a pulsating bass line. 'Motor Jungle' harks back to the early sounds of Detroit, assuming a 4/4 drum pattern which is laden with a rowdy bass arrangement accompanied by Hip Hop-esque vocal snippets. The EP is rounded off, and mellowed out, with Jorgie's hazy interpretation of the title track - a 110bpm ethereal excursion that takes the listener deeper into the unknown...

Limited Edition: 500 x 2 LP Gatefold Pressing. Bentley Rhythm Ace formed in Birmingham in 1996 when ex Pop Will Eat Itself bassist Richard March and DJ Michael Stokes discovered a shared love of obscure, oddball and eccentric tunes. Utilising lo-fi cut and paste sampling techniques combined with analogue synths and some wild turntable action their debut EP was picked up by Fatboy Slim's Brighton based Skint Records and released to widespread acclaim. The BRA live show added Fuzz Townshend on drums and James Atkin (ex EMF vocalist) on keyboards and the latter years of the 90s saw BRA firmly established as festival favourites with appearances at Glastonbury, Reading, V, T in the Park, Montreux Jazz and Fuji Rock amongst many others. Their irreverent approach mixed with big beats, thundering bass, wild synths and esoteric samples proved to be a hit with fans and critics alike. 1998 saw Bentley Rhythm Ace crowned 'Best Dance Act' in that year's NME awards. Their eponymous debut album was given a worldwide release after the Bentleys signed to Parlophone records and the band toured extensively in the UK, Europe, Japan, Australia and USA. As well as releasing a highly regarded DJ mix album on Ministry of Sound, and releasing a second album for Parlophone (featuring vocals from Black Grape/Ruthless Rap Assassins frontman Kermit), BRA also produced well received remixes for the Beastie Boys and Supergrass as well as soundtracking several TV shows and adverts. This "21st Birthday - Bonus Tracks Edition" of the album has been compiled by Richard March of the band and includes the original 11 track album along with 2 bonus tracks remastered and repressed to vinyl for the first time in almost two decades! Presented in a deluxe gatefold sleeve, complete with original artwork and comprehensive sleeve notes for all thirteen tracks written for this release by Richard March. Bentley Rhythm Ace (21st Birthday - Bonus Tracks Edition)