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Formed in New York City in 1993 around singer, guitarist and songwriter Chris Leo, the band emerged from the same fertile underground scene that gave rise to many of the most influential post-hardcore, indie rock and emo acts of the decade. Yet while many of their contemporaries went on to achieve wider recognition, The Van Pelt chose a different path: one built on artistic independence, restless experimentation and a stubborn refusal to fit comfortably into any scene or trend.
Across two landmark albums — Stealing From Our Favorite Thieves (1996) and Sultans Of Sentiment (1997) — The Van Pelt developed a singular language that combined intricate guitar interplay, spoken-word intensity, literary lyrics and emotional depth. Their music occupied a unique space between post-hardcore urgency, indie rock invention and the introspective sensibility that would later become associated with emo, influencing generations of musicians while remaining largely outside the spotlight.
After disbanding in 1997, the band's reputation continued to grow. What began as a well-kept secret among underground music fans gradually became a touchstone for listeners searching beyond the obvious narratives of 1990s alternative rock. Reunions in 2009 and 2014, the release of the long-lost Imaginary Third, and a series of acclaimed live performances introduced their music to a new audience while reaffirming their enduring relevance.
In 2023, The Van Pelt returned with Artisans & Merchants, their first collection of new material in more than twenty-five years. Rather than revisiting old formulas, the album expanded the band's sonic vocabulary while preserving the qualities that made them unique: curiosity, intelligence, vulnerability and an unwavering commitment to following their own instincts.
Now, more than three decades after their formation, The Van Pelt are set to return in 2026 with Remain Obscure, their fifth studio album. Continuing their tradition of defying expectations, the record pushes beyond the familiar boundaries of the band's sound while embracing the same spirit that has defined them from the beginning. A band whose influence has consistently exceeded its visibility, The Van Pelt remain one of independent music's most enduring and rewarding secrets.

Remastered limited edition double vinyl with double-sided screenprinted poster-cover (sleeve folds out to be one huge poster). A real collectors item!

When Off Off came out around June 1984, one couldn’t speak of an independent music scene in Portugal. Warm Records’ vague existence didn’t have any impact and Dansa do Som’s inaugural release appeared only in December. 10 years after the revolution, after two IMF interventions, a lot of political instability (not to say turmoil, in the first couple of years) and the natural excesses of a sudden burst of freedom, the Portuguese consumer had more choices but a generally poor standard of living. There was no entrepreneurial culture and serious second thoughts about investing private money in risky ventures.

After many complaints about the whole music scene (institutions, critics and record label executives, popular and classical music alike), something that would continue well beyond the end of the decade, Telectu decided to finance, record, produce, release and sell an album with complete independence from outside structures. Their karmic reward was profit. According to Vítor Rua, Off Off was the only album fully payed by the duo and the only one that really payed off. Not an easy accomplishment for a double LP housed in a large (also double-sided) screenprint with complicated cuts and folds. The artwork was conceived by António Palolo, a friend and multidisciplinary artist. It was based on a collage of heavily saturated and xeroxed polaroids framed in shocking pink and green. Palolo was considered the third member of Telectu, regularly producing slides, video and other visual support for their shows. The inspiration for the type of cover came from GRM’s Gramme series.

Off Off is divided in four distinct sides, each one corresponding to a “theme” or “function” related to Telectu’s manifold artistic interests and interactions. The titles are also gateways to influences and a small portion of Portuguese cultural life:

- Side 1 / “Diagonale” is dedicated to Egídio Álvaro, art critic and gallery director (he opened Diagonale in Paris). Performance art was arguably his main artistic concern over the years, so the music on this side is suggested for use by one or more performers in live or playback situations. The three tracks segue into each other, linked by a synth arpeggio much in the same way as Telectu’s previous “Belzebu” álbum (1983);

- Side 2 / “Anarké” is dedicated to the composer Filipe Pires, one of Jorge Lima Barreto’s recurring invocations when asked about worthwhile contemporary music in Portugal. It is subtitled “concert music”, proposing «a new form of listening». Three tracks also, and these are separated by “clap interludes”, which basically consisted in the following: JLB and VR each had a pair of headphones on, and they clapped their hands according to the rhythm of the music each one was listening. Both musicians were interacting with a different Steve Reich piece: Vítor with “Music for Mallet Instruments”, Jorge with “Six Pianos”. The result is disjointed clapping, an awkwardly deliberate celebration of their own music. Telectu applauded themselves.

- Side 3 / “Cornucópia” is subtitled “music for theatre” and dedicated to Luís Miguel Cintra and Luís Lima Barreto (JLB’s brother), both connected to the Cornucópia theatre company. The side consists of several short pieces previously used as interludes in the Cornucópia staging of “Mariana Espera Casamento” (1983). Field recordings, mood pieces, ambience and a numeric poem (“Soneto Soma 14x”, by E.M. de Melo e Castro) read by João Perry, a quite well-known stage actor. His voice is treated with a flanger effect;

- Side 4 / “Palolo” is “video music”. It’s a one-take mix recorded from cassette sources (Telectu studio experiences) and done live while watching António Palolo’s Om film (1978) projected on the living room wall. It’s a deep, immersive, quasi-mystical 20-minute piece perfectly suiting the meditative, abstract, fluid images created by Palolo by mixing paint and water inside a bathtub. One imagines the Cosmos, hardly suspecting the technique. The film is 90 minutes long, so the music on the LP is of course edited.

The six titles on sides 1 and 2 evoke demons, all of them with conflicting symbolism, since it varies from culture to culture, religion to religion. No explanation is given and Vítor Rua has no idea where this imagery comes from. During virtually the whole stretch of the 1980s, Jorge was the one in charge of titles and concepts, and Vítor didn’t bother too much even reading the liner notes :) In any case, when you synchronize the listening experience with the imagery, a powerful impression emerges, a feeling of being in the presence of these entities while placing yourself inside the sonic narrative.

Off Off is undoubtedly a seminal album in the history of electronic music, as much Heldon as Fripp & Eno, jazz and American minimalism, cosmic out-thereness, mantric miniatures. Telectu at the height of their powers, still very early on, delivering an album-manifesto advocating intermedia art and the fierce independence of Portuguese musicians «from the scum of capitalist music industry monopolies. It’s a path to follow, albeit one that requires enduring hardships and retaliation from music industry gangsters.» Despite a few journalists deemed «capable of being free», the media are «enslaved by the dominant and fascist imbecility of the speculators of light music.» Off Off is addressed to those journalists «and to an audience angry at the cultural misery imposed upon us ..., certain that this music will open new horizons of musical pleasure in the conception of Portuguese avant-garde music, and in the open consciousness of us all. OFF OFF repeats Freedom.»

Those two words are a direct lift from Alberto Arbasino’s 1968 book Off Off, the basis of which is a critical analysis of Theodor Adorno’s and Dwight MacDonald’s ideas concerning the stratification of culture in different levels (high, mid and low) and the pervasiveness of mass culture in the form of a culture industry. In very simplistic terms, and that is precisely the point that inspired Jorge, Arbasino argued that it was possible and desirable to effect a revolution from below, cultivating alternative circuits completely cut-off from what he termed the in-in reality. Telectu’s record was a deliberate demonstration that it could be done, displaying Freedom in the face of all the gatekeepers and other human obstacles.

Prague-based talent atch22 makes his debut on Harmony with Equal Transients, an EP shaped by a winter spent locked away in a Neukölln studio while temperatures outside dropped to nearly –14°C. Running on all gas and no brakes, the record fuses classic progressive influences with atch22’s contemporary perspective. High-velocity rhythms, driving basslines, and explosive breakdowns define a release built for late-night dancefloors and long open-air mornings.






d B2: Equal Transients Kohra’s Spirit of Goa Remix




[d] B2: Equal Transients [Kohra’s Spirit of Goa Remix]




[d] B2 | Equal Transients [Kohra’s Spirit of Goa Remix]

Still hot on the heels of compiling the first volume of the Italian Dancefloor Outsiders, and moved by the urge to explore new musical landscapes and discover sounds produced in subsequent years, we decided to continue our quest of tracking an alternative map of what was happen- ing in the Italian electronic music scene. This second volume takes inspiration from the concept of “Mezzanotte Mezzogiorno” (literally “from Midnight to Midday”), a term first used for a now legendary party held in 1992 at Club Imperi- ale in Tirrenia, Tuscany. The owner of the club, Roberto Pannocchia, was eager to attract a different kind of audience to his venue and so decided to extend the closing time until midday, well beyond the Italian law limits. But as Imperiale was a members club, he was allowed to do it, and he already knew that this act would forever shape the Italian club scene. "Mezzanotte Mezzogiorno" was then used to describe long dancing marathons that lasted for the whole weekend, spread across clubs, after-parties and more off-the-grid open air venues but, most of all, became the symbol of an era. The music ranged from slow, pitched-down landscapes to epic techno progressions, filling both feverishly packed big rooms and colourful chillout zones. A parabola of musical move- ments related to specific genres was born, reaching its peak and then fading towards the end of the millenium.

Windy & Carl Meet Optigan Conservatory is a purposefully misleading title for the first collaborative work from four friends who met close to thirty years prior. All active participants in Michigan independent music circles since the early ’90s, Windy & Carl are well-known for their foundational contributions to drift and guitar-born ambient sounds, with songs characterized by deep connections to the natural world and a hard to pin down yet impossible to miss emotional vulnerability.

Optigan Conservatory is another duo, made up of Frank Rotondo (leader of Detroit area free music ensemble Laughing Gas) and Fred Thomas (songwriter and producer most often associated with his band Saturday Looks Good To Me), who have been making minimalistic and time-defiant electro-acoustic sounds since 2016. The album came together almost effortlessly in a very short timeframe, but the idea had been building steam for many a year.

In the last days of 2024, Windy & Carl and Optigan Conservatory got together, falling into a mode of sound creation that was almost hyper-natural. Without any discussion outside of the usual stream of jokes and chatter, the quartet set up and started communicating. Added to Windy & Carl’s hovering augmented chord voicings and vaporous guitar drones were electric piano and synth bedding from Frank & Fred. After the initial sessions, all involved parties took time to consider what they’d made, adding new layers and editing the pieces into more definitive articulations.

A beautiful and hermetic energy larger than the sum of its parts is captured in the process. There are echoes of the earliest releases from Windy & Carl as well as refractions of the same opacity that surfaced in the early kranky catalogue.

When a British alt-soul and art-pop duo collaborates with Filipino musical royalty, the result is a blinding flash of artistic spirit that transcends geographical andgenerational barriers.

For Margate-based act Thandii, a chaotic whirlwind of a trip to Manila allowed Graham Godfrey and Jess Berry to explore a new cultural context of song- writing. After several prolific years of self-released albums together, they took the opportunity to channel Graham’s Filipino heritage through an ambitious project proposed by the label Sama Sama Records: for Thandii to make their next album with the most recorded drummer in the Philippines, Jun Regalado.

Now in his late 70s, Regalado has recently gained more recognition internationally after the reissue of his track ‘Pinoy Funk’ (from the Soundway compilation Ayo Ke Disco in 2024), along with the discovery of nearly 500 album appearances that are now finding themselves in the collections of younger generations. And on Coco Okayo - the first time he has collaborated outside of his contemporaries - Regalado effectively passes the torch.

In exploring a sound born of the diaspora with roots in British soul music, Coco Okayo makes full use of the polymath abilities of Thandii. While they provide vocals, percussion, flutes and production, they still manage to carve out space for regular Margate collaborators (including keyboardist Steve Pringle, Graham’s bandmate in Pigeon), as well as tapping Filipino connections in the United States such as Wyn Avillas and Ian Santillano.

“It’s a new genre coming from Filipino diaspora artists paying tribute to the Manila sound of the 70s,” say Thandii, “but combining it with modern day post-punk- disco, beat-driven-art-pop music coming from the small seaside town of Margate”. However the listener might interpret it, it’s clear that Coco Okayo is not stuck between worlds, but rather, has built a utopian world of its own.

Connecting Dots Records CDR001 Self titled debut release from Detroit based record label.

CDR plans to be a vessel for more human connection in dance music and beyond in the digital age. This first record ended up

having a life of its own when it comes to truly connecting with people who are giant's in Detroit.

All 3 tracks on this record include
Javonntte - Keys and Synth
Ben Green - Trumpet
Dez Andres - Conga's

A1 SUNSHINE - Starting off with an open trumpet arrangement over a 4/4 drum groove with whispering gospel chops before
a full breakdown into The Clark Sisters "you brought the sunshine" vocals. Conga's leading the groove into smooth keys and organ riffs.

A2 STEP OUTSIDE - Bangin instrumental with heavy bassline with a Latin inspired conga groove.
Trumpet stabs with biting synths weaving through the percussion. Synth solo's to switch thing's up into each breakdown.

B1 ALL MY LOVE - Shaker's are dominating the groove until a flowing synth solo lead's your ear's into
Michael Watford's vocal chop's. Feel good vocal's about love right before the full breakdown into a trumpet
arrangement over percussion. Bangin bassline bring's everything back in just in time for the full organ solo

The newest sound suite by Night Foundation, the solo project of visual artist and Noir Age label owner Richard Vergez. Inspired by reality and light. Mental objects that traverse our minds in the form of sound. Things familiar, but new to your ears. Interest in the things left behind. Some were just accidents that fell on the tape. Manipulations of time.

A memory archive containing exposed wires, slightly broken machines, and those slow, morose moments in film or the happy accidents in dreams. Live, improvised sequences for liminal synths, one-string guitar, mutated trumpet, metal objects, drum box. That type of thing. Under the spell of Brussels, Leeds, and Berlin.

Night Foundation is a current collaborator with Little Annie and has releases on labels such as Psychic Liberation, Jungle Gym, and Amulet of Tears.

For fans of:

Bourbonese Qualk, Klaus Schulze, x.y.r., Tomaga

Limited edition cassette with Rispgraph cover and newsprint insert.

Set for release Sept. 11, 2026

Das Indie-Pop-Trio almost monday aus San Diego – Dawson Daugherty (Gesang), Cole Clisby (Gitarre)
und Luke Fabry (Bass) – präsentiert mit „THANK GOD IT’S ALMOST MONDAY“ bereits sein zweites
Album.
Die 13 Songs verbinden die energiegeladene Leichtigkeit der Band mit einer neuen emotionalen Tiefe. Nach
intensiven Tourneen und persönlichen Höhen und Tiefen entstand ein Album über Freude, Verlust, Freundschaft, Nostalgie, Dankbarkeit und den Mut, seinen eigenen Weg zu gehen.
Musikalisch entwickelt die Band ihren Sound weiter und arbeitete dafür mit Simon Oscroft und Chase
Lawrence zusammen. Zu den Highlights zählen die Singles „leaving is easy“, „no more regrets“, „french
kids“ und „better late than never“. Die erste Single des neuen Albums „No More Regrets“ ist bereits im
Mai erschienen und hat auch in Deutschland schnell die Airplay Charts erobert.
Nach dem vorherigen #1-Hit „can’t slow down“, einer ausverkauften Welttournee und Auftritten bei Lollapalooza, BottleRock und Outside Lands knüpfen almost monday mit ihrem neuen Album an ihre bisherigen
Erfolge an.

Recorded in Los Angeles over the course of a single day at a studio in the Eagle Rock neighborhood, Dois Desertos was produced by Mario Caldato Jr. and emerged without a predetermined plan or schedule. The project took shape during Portuguese musician João Pimenta Gomes' stay in Los Angeles with his family. During that time, through Rodrigo Amarante, João met Mario and Samantha Caldato, as well as musicians Abe Rounds (drums and percussion) and Gabe Noel (bass and cello). From those encounters, the album began to unfold organically.

Working from simple scores—some containing little more than chord progressions—the sessions left plenty of room for improvisation. Every performance was captured live, in a single take, with no overdubs. The mixing process, also carried out live by Mario Caldato Jr., followed the same philosophy: effects and level adjustments were performed in real time and printed directly to the final two-track master.

At the heart of the album's sound is the Cristal Baschet, a rare instrument played by rubbing glass rods with the hands, causing metal resonators to vibrate and produce an ethereal, resonant tone. João describes its sound as "a trace, almost like a shadow." Rather than taking the lead, the instrument serves as a textural foundation, while the bass and cello carry the melodic lines. Some of these melodies are original compositions, while others draw from traditional Portuguese fado, reimagined through an open and exploratory approach.

The album has a dreamlike atmosphere, reflecting the perspective of someone experiencing Los Angeles from the outside—not in a rush to belong, but fully receptive to the city's unique energy. Two films helped shape this imaginary landscape: Model Shop (Jacques Demy, 1969), in which the French filmmaker uses Los Angeles as a pretext to simply observe and inhabit the city, and Thom Andersen's Los Angeles Plays Itself. The result is Dois Desertos, an album that, in João's own words, "could never have been made anywhere else."

With Dois Desertos, João Pimenta Gomes invites listeners into a deeply immersive experience, revealing a more exploratory side of his artistic practice while reinforcing Amor in Sound's commitment to releasing original works that engage with the many languages of contemporary music.

Nintendo and Laced Records are linking up to bring the sweeping music of The Legend of Zelda™: Breath of the Wild to vinyl records with this 8LP box set featuring nearly four hours of music.

This collaboration marks the first time a Nintendo soundtrack has been commercially released on vinyl outside of Japan. This box set features heavyweight LPs that come in printed disc inners and spined inner sleeves, all housed in a rigid board dual slipcase. All packaging is adorned with archival artwork by the team behind The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. Each disc side is sequenced around a theme, reflecting players’ adventures in the game, whether exploring Hyrule, battling enemies, freeing the Divine Beasts from Calamity Ganon’s hold, or unlocking the mysteries of the Shrines. The unforgettable music of The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild introduced bold new musical textures to the series, while embracing classic themes. From the first spine-tingling piano notes of “Main Theme” to the final choral-orchestral stirrings of “Epilogue”, the soundtrack follows the ups and downs of Link’s epic adventure. Each element of the game enjoys a distinct musical palette, including the iconic minimalist piano of the open world, the alien sounds of Sheikah technology, the tension-filled rhythms of enemy encounters, and the orchestral grandeur of the Divine Beast battles. The pieces were composed by Manaka Kataoka, Yasuaki Iwata, Hajime Wakai, and Soshi Abe. Along with this wonderful soundtrack on vinyl, fans can experience the full digital soundtrack for The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild by downloading the Nintendo Music app.*

ELEPHANT is an album that doesn’t ask for space, it takes it.
Built on weight, grit, and undeniable presence, ELEPHANT moves like its namesake: loud, heavy, and impossible to ignore. There’s a swagger to it, a confidence that leans into chaos, desire, and the pull of living all the way, even when it leaves a mark.
But like an elephant, it’s not all brute force. Beneath the heavy stomp is something more human. There are moments of vulnerability, cracks where emotion slips through, where longing, doubt, and reflection take over. The album balances power with sensitivity, and strength with softness. A notion that even the biggest presence can feel deeply.

Like the massive creature pushing through brush and unbroken paths, ELEPHANT is about confronting what’s right in front of you; the noise, the weight, the truth, and choosing to move through it anyway.

William Onyeabor was born outside Enugu, a small, rural town in Eastern Nigeria, he created his own genre of African electronic funk in the late 70s and early 80s, making music completely unique for his time. Today, he is reaching cult status among a growing list of admirers, including everyone from Damon Albarn and Hot Chip to Carl Craig and Madlib, with some likening him to the Kraftwerk of West Africa, or a precursor to LCD Soundsystem.

Among the crate-digging few that knew of him, he is considered a complete myth. While he has never performed live and almost never given interviews, his fantastical biography is scattered and has to this day not been verified. And he refused to speak about anything regarding the past.

According to various rumors, he left home following the Biafran War and went to study cinematography in the Soviet Union, returning in the mid-70s to start his own film company and record label, Wilfilms. He then self-released eight remarkable records from 1978-1985. He wrote and produced everything on his own, and possibly played every instrument himself. Then, at some point of his life, he became born again and denounced his earlier music, deciding it is something he would never speak about.

Back for its 29th (!) birthday, No Use's fifth full lenght! "Bay area punk wonder-boys No Use For A Name have begun pleading for your friendship. Show your love for the boys, who were each reared with the ideals of Boy Scout Troup #221, by giving 'em wet sloppy ones when they come to your town." No Use for a Name was a melodic punk band from San Jose, California blending blistering skate-punk speeds with deeply melancholic, unforgettable pop melodies. What began as a scrappy late-80s hardcore act grew into a defining pillar of the 90s punk rock explosion, earning fans through relentless international touring and releases that perfectly balance grit and heart. Drawing comparisons to Lagwagon, Millencolin, and Strung Out, No Use for a Name pairs introspective, emotionally raw lyrics with fast-paced, harmony-driven arrangements built for sweaty club shows and massive circle pits. Their songs tackle alienation, broken relationships, and the struggles of everyday life, creating a connectionthat feels both intensely personal and universally cathartic. Their first two albums were released through the New Red Archives label, after which they signed to Fat Wreck Chords where they would remain, releasing seven studio albums and shifting to a melodic punk rock sound. With their fifth album `Making Friends,' the band continued to build on their momentum, delivering their tightest, most emotionally resonant, and career-defining collection of songs in 1997. 2026 it comes in brown vinyl color.

Zur Feier des 25-jährigen Jubiläums von Stainds Klassiker-Album *Break The Cycle* veröffentlicht die
Band *Break The Cycle 25th Anniversary* – eine Live-Aufnahme, bei der die Band das legendäre Album in
voller Länge spielt. Die Performance umfasst jeden Song des Albums, einschließlich der klassischen Singles
„It’s Been A While“, „Outside“ und „Fade“.

The live EP arrives on vinyl via a collaboration between boutique label Crafting Room Recordings (Maximilian, Soft Top) and indie festival Left of the Dial. The live record follows a massive 2025 where a limited vinyl run of the Spill EP and debut EP 'Hullo, Reality!' both sold out soon after their releases. With champions already found at BBC Radio 6Music (Steve Lamacq, Emily Pilbeam) and earning a spot on the 2026 artists to watch lists for DIY, DORK, and Far Out, ELLiS.D is rapidly cementing his status as one of Europe's most striking, tireless and "sought after live acts" (Far Out Magazine). "As our first sold- out headline show outside of the UK, it felt like a real milestone for myself and the band. We wanted to capture the amazing connection we've felt playing to European audiences, with nowhere better to do it than the basement of a boat in Rotterdam. Each of the tracks on the EP have been staples of our live set for a long time but switching into the mindset of performing and recording for the EP gave us a fair few jitters pre-show. Once we crashed into 'Chasing The Blue' that all melted away. Elmo on sound did a brilliant job capturing the energy of the performance and the audience gave us the response we were hoping for!"

2026 Repress

Desert planet house from inner spaces - the mountain people‘s premiere full EP outside their own imprint. Featuring sand shattering subbasses alongside vintage stabs, wobbling chords and otherworldly chanting. Something you will not dig up easily from your discogs collection and which will further enchant the children of the light.
Play or face the Gom Jabbar.

For the orbit travelers comes the new instalment by the Spanish maestro Do or Die. This very well-known figure in the world of non standard audio frecuencies has crafted 4 trance infused weapons for different occasions and settings one might find themselves in. The appropriate clothing attire is needed for this space journey without any holes or tears in, so it can be assured no outside force will penetrate through. All four tracks has been crafted immaculately with the unified idea of orbit travel and translates this epic journey well. Ahead of the listener is an important trip from the moment needle will touch the grooves to the very last second of the title track located on the B side. It is a great honor to welcome this talented artist to the label family roster and marks a beginning of a beautiful story that will be told through the medium of music.

A hypnotic drift through dub house and techno textures that seem to exist outside of time entirely. From somewhere deep in the Finnish night, Havsmörker surfaces with two pieces of weightless, waterlogged sound. Ilväder, Swedish for "storm weather" belies its name: there is no violence here, only the slow drift of pressure systems moving across open water.

Manonmars’ 3rd album sees him at his most amorphous and psychedelic, at points sharper and laser focused, and at others more blurred and impressionistic than his previous records. Many of the core players remain the same, all of the production is once again handled by O$VMV$M (the duo of Neek and Amos Childs of Jabu) while Paulina Korobkiewicz (also of Young Echo) makes a return handling both the album’s cover artwork and contributing a series of diaristic field recordings and voice notes.

‘The project references movies, cartoons, fictional characters and video games, among other things. The album title is open to interpretation but all of these elements are forms of visual entertainment which have their own unique ability to transcend things like language barriers and cultural divides. The visual element is key because those details bridge the gap on a communicative level.’ - Manonmars

The album blends abstract, blurred braggadocio with more immediate personal details such as on ‘Volcanic Shield’ a posse cut of sorts featuring Bristol improv luminary Dali de Saint Paul and Franco Franco (½ of cyborg rap duo Kinlaw & Franco Franco) - where Mars recalls;

‘Memories of brighter days, happy meal hit the spot
Mum was spinning vinyl playing Super Ape or Pressure Drop
I would spend the weekend with the Turkish mandem on the block
single parent household, mum was studying or on the job
money came and went always was an on and off
made it back from school time to see what’s on the box’


The beat fades away to leave one of Korobkiewicz’s recordings of Mars’ mum talking about her life in London in the 80s, spending her money on reggae records as an ambient chord fades in like an echo of a jungle intro – stretching out as a link between generations of UK music.

The production by and large is brighter and more kinetic than earlier Manonmars records – with O$VMV$M drawing on everything from modern underground rap and drill through to jazz and acid ambient passages.

London is also a central character here, bustling and constantly shifting, either when bleeding in through field recordings, or as an ever-present backdrop in the lyrics;

‘I’m a fusion of Tippa Irie and Topper Harley
Hit the target like the black Atari
I dropped a tab now shit’s A Scanner Darkly
Got the munchies, Imma yam a sarnie
Pour the Wray and Ting like man at Carni
Exit Peckham Rye and turn left, walk past Hannah Barry
Get your (w)raps up like its January’

‘I've always considered London my home, despite spending some time in the South West of England too. My mum had been living in London for 25 years (...) That was a pretty big deal in some ways because it removed us from multicultural society during the period which overlapped with my teenage years. (...) I never got used to how quiet it was in the countryside (...) Bristol was the closest city to where we lived and it was through travelling there and making connections that I became involved in making music and playing gigs.’ - Manonmars

Mars’ practice as a painter (under his given name Jack Martyn Richardson) and photographer also loom heavy over the album, he cites Paul Verhoeven, Abdul Mati Klariwein and H.R Giger as influences – as well as Miles Davis, Drakeo the Ruler and DJ Rashad.

As with much of Richardson’s work the raps at times feel blurred to a point of almost inscrutability, creating a distance between the audience and himself. A process that ties into his visual work and the way he experiences the world as mainly abstract colour without his glasses. He explores this further in an ongoing visual collaboration with Korobkiewicz, ‘Fun and Games’ which serves as a visual archive of one of London's largest and oldest travelling fairgrounds.

‘I was diagnosed with very severe short-sightedness at the age of seven. I remember my early formative years as visually blurred. Some of my photography reflects this experience of partial vision and uncertainty, referencing memory and perception rather than fixed representation.’

Manonmars’ first public outing as a rapper was at a Young Echo radio event, broadcast shambolically from a practice room just off Jamaica street, Bristol in 2011, as much as things have moved on both stylistically and in terms of focus - strong links back to the city remain a key foundation throughout the collaborations and guest appearances.

‘I have no problem with being an outsider looking in. One of the things I enjoy about London is the anonymity (...) it's easy to be a stranger here when so much is happening. I feel like thats more valuable than people may realise.’

When everything around is racing blindly toward ruin, change direction and spin as fast as you can until you defy gravity and rise above the ground into blissful madness. "K-drone", the debut album by three renegades—Jakub Šimanský, Michal Vaľko, and Ján Podracký—is like a hallucinatory Calvary with five stations. Each station is a time-loop capsule, a tiny utopia sneering at the phantom progress of the world outside.

The opening track, "Speedrone", is pure vertigo; for seven long minutes, there's nothing to hold onto. Šimanský’s banjo cuts through the air, Vaľko’s hurdy-gurdy sounds like someone scraping a rusted sheet of metal with a handful of nails, and Podracký’s bass recorder hums like a slowly intensifying migraine. "Sine" is like a train journey through a barren wasteland, where the images outside the window constantly repeat like a bad trip. "Pro DJ" starts like a gig in a bar at the end of the line—a gig that never actually goes anywhere. It’s as if all three are locked in a spasm, their repeated motifs turning into haunting earworms. "Alien Radigue" shifts into a strange idyll in a clearing in the middle of the forest, where an unknown bird species trills in the background. The end and definitive dissolution come in "Slush", where everything suddenly slows down. Šimanský plucks a simple guitar melody, Podracký’s harmonica drifts from side to side like a boat gently rocking by the shore, and Vaľko’s hurdy-gurdy drones like a drunken mosquito buzzing around.

"K-drone" sounds like an acid anti-western movie recorded in a tucked-away burrow, like smoke-soaked folk and experimental campfire songs echoing through a deep forest. It evokes Third Ear Band's "Alchemy", it screeches and repeats like some of Henry Flynt's experiments, and you could easily imagine hearing it drifting from one of the windows on the cover of Hala Strana's eponymous album.

Jakub Šimanský is the bard of Czechoslovak guitar primitivism, an earthy folk sommelier whose fingerpicking you may also know from the duo Šimanský Niesner. Michal Vaľko, aka Line Gate, needs no introduction to fans. He has released three albums on mappa, and his hurdy-gurdy meditations hold an important place in the drone and minimalist music scene. "Den", "Apex", and "Trap" have become essential listening. Ján Podracký is a self-taught composer and musician whom you might know from various participatory music projects, such as an orchestra where all the players play diatonic harmonicas. Besides harmonicas, he has long explored a wide range of flutes. In short, a pied piper who will guide you through other worlds.

South Coast artist Howman lands back on DNO Records for his second outing, ‘Trap Eastwood’. First introducing his heavyweight fusion of rock, hip-hop, dubstep and electronica via his outstanding 2023 debut, ‘Moon Operator’, the multi-instrumentalist and producer returns with a refined palette. Still bearing the first class musicality, rich layering and imaginative sonics that we’ve come to expect, the new EP is more stylistically focused than its predecessor. This time, Howman homes in on a spot somewhere in the 140/dubstep/trap sphere, decorating it with digital fizz, alien bleeps, snarling bass, and the signature gruff twang of guitar that makes his music feel deeply personal and eternally human.

The title track is perhaps the most prominent example of the latter, where Howman’s Western-esque riff conjures up the tension before a duel at high noon, while the bend and wobble of each string shapes the movement of the track like the curves of a rattlesnake.
But it’s a constant from the start, like on opener ‘Strip Search’, with its cinematic guitar intro, and combination of repetitive keys, earnest strings and bear-hug bass that nods to classic hip-hop.
Or closer ‘Fatigue’, where the layers of stuttering plucks, emotive melody and scratchy slide noises form a downtrodden soundscape plagued by police sirens and punctured by “Champion Sound” snippets.
On ‘Navigator’, Howman’s approach is more subtle: fluttering strums and a simple bassline creating a brooding, enigmatic vibe in stark contrast to the urgent, alarm-like stabs which first grip the attention.

Throughout there is an overriding sense of the unknown. ‘No Spring’ weaves drawn-out flute notes, tinkling percussion, super-massive 808 lows and spurts of breakbeat into a twisting, winding thing that wants to lure and enchant. While ‘Frosty’ is as ice cold as its name suggests, murderous bass meeting a spidery piano melody in dread-inducing matrimony — along with snatched words from some familiar faces outside a Berlin edition of THE MINE.

Produced between 2022 and 2025 across various locations, influenced by Howman having to move into more solo live performance (as opposed to his previous band setups), and miraculously surviving a catastrophic data loss incident, the EP is a snapshot of disruption focused into creative cohesion. We’ve been told, however, that it’s not a new direction or a sign of things to come, which only serves to make his next release that much more enticing, that much more of a mystery.

Rhythms of postmodern realism at the very bottom of the DNO.

Swiss hard rock veterans Shakra return with renewed fire and unstoppable energy on *Just Live Loud*, their explosive new studio album and the band’s very first release through Frontiers Music Srl. Fueled by massive riffs, soaring melodies, and the unmistakable chemistry that has defined Shakra for decades, the album captures the spirit of classic European hard rock while pushing the band into a heavier, more modern sonic territory. Produced with a raw yet polished approach, *Just Live Loud* delivers a powerful mix of thunderous anthems, emotionally charged ballads, and adrenaline-fueled rockers designed for both festival stages and late-night highway drives. From razor-sharp guitar work and pounding rhythms to towering vocal hooks, every track reflects the band’s commitment to authenticity, passion, and pure rock’n’roll attitude. Lyrically, the album celebrates resilience, freedom, brotherhood, and the determination to live life at full volume — themes that resonate deeply with the band’s own journey through the international hard rock scene. *Just Live Loud* also marks an exciting new chapter for Shakra, combining the experience and songwriting strength of their legacy years with a fresh creative momentum that feels more vital than ever. With this landmark release, Shakra reaffirm their status as one of Switzerland’s premier hard rock exports and prove that true melodic heavy rock is alive, loud, and ready to conquer a new generation of fans.

Schwarzes 180g Vinyl im Gatefold Sleeve! Die Innenhülle kommt im schwarzen Doppel-Druck mit UV-Spotlack. LP mit 16-seitigem 12" Booklet und Downloadcode. "Do To The Beast" ist das erste neue Album von THE AFGHAN WHIGS seit eineinhalb Jahrzehnten. Gegründet 1988 in Cincinnati, Ohio, war die Band mit ihrer wilden, stürmischen Mischung aus Alternative Rock, klassischem Soul und den Obsessionen ihres Frontmanns Greg Dulli ihren Zeitgenossen immer mindestens eine Nasenlänge voraus. Das neue Album ist somit sowohl eine Heimkehr - zum Label Sub Pop, das die Band 1989 als ersten Act unter Vertrag nahm, der nicht aus Seattle bzw. dem Nordwesten kam und die beiden Alben "Up In It" (1990) und "Congregation" (1992) veröffentlichte - als auch ein Blick in die Zukunft einer der anerkanntesten Rock Bands der letzten 25 Jahre. "Do To The Beast" ist damit ein angebracht wilder Titel für die vielleicht intensivste, kathartischste Platte in der Karriere von Greg Dulli und sorgt für frischen Wind im AFGHAN WHIGS-Kanon: Da gibt es die brutale Selbstprüfung von "Gentlemen" (1993), die Film Noir Erzählung von "Black Love" (1996), den Überschwang von ,1965" (1998). "Do To The Beast" versprüht ein galvanisiertes musikalisches Spirit und rhythmisches Gewicht, das inmitten des Aderlasses Transzendenz und Hoffnung suggeriert. Aufgenommen zwischen L.A., New Orleans, Cincinnati und Joshua Tree - eine Landkarte der aktuellen und vergangenen Heimatstätten der Band - wartet das Album mit den AFGHAN WHIGS Gründern Greg Dulli und John Curley auf, zusammen mit der Kernband aus den Gitarristen Dave Rosser und Jon Skibic, dem Multiinstrumentalisten Rick Nelson und Schlagzeuger Cully Symington. Außerdem mit dabei: der Soul-Bilderstürmer Van Hunt, Marc McGuire (EMERALDS), Johnny "Natural" Nagera (der Musical Director von USHER), Alain Johannes (QUEENS OF THE STONE AGE, ARCTIC MONKEYS), Clay Tarver (BULLET LAVOLTA, CHAVEZ), Dave Catching (QUEENS OF THE STONE AGE, EAGLES OF DEATH METAL).

A MUCH SOUGHT AFTER SOUNDTRACK, THIS NEW VERSION FROM SILVA SCREEN CONTAINS MUCH NEVER BEFORE RELEASED MATERIAL!!

After a decade of creating pioneering puppet series made for children, Gerry & Sylvia Anderson took their first steps into live-action, with the 1969 feature film Doppelgänger (re-titled outside Britain as Journey To The Far Side Of The Sun). This science-fiction film approached its outer space subject matter with a gritty realism, and would set the tone for what was to be their first live-action television series: UFO. This new series took as a starting point the pioneering work of Dr Christiaan N. Barnard, the surgeon who performed the world’s first heart transplant operation. In UFO a dying race of aliens travel across vast distances of space to harvest organs from human beings to help ensure their own survival. To combat this threat the United Nations created SHADO, a top-secret organisation utilising the latest technology available to defend the Earth.

To complement the series, the Andersons frequent musical collaborator Barry Gray created a multifaceted score that gave the programme its own musical identity. Elegantly crafted and a firm favourite with Barry Gray fans, the sound of UFO, particularly its ethereal “World Music” closing credits is, quite simply, a joy. Includes a bonus track, Trampoline performed by The Spencer Davis Group from the episode Ordeal.

With her new album Trespasser, Grace Potter introduces a beautifully unruly cast of characters who step into forbidden spaces with absolute abandon. As the spiritual sequel to 2023’s Mother Road, the four-time Grammy nominee’s seventh studio LP continues the kaleidoscopic storyline shaped by her many road trips from her Topanga Canyon home to her part-time residence in her native Vermont (a journey she’s made eight times in the last five years, usually on her own). But while Mother Road was born from a desperate need for solace in the midst of emotional freefall, Trespasser reveals an artist firmly anchored in her singular vision.

The latest chapter in a career marked by endless transformation and elite recognition—including sharing stages with rock & roll icons like the Rolling Stones & Robert Plant and earning praise from legends like Bob Dylan and Bonnie Raitt—Trespasser ultimately lights the way toward a more unbound and expansive means of moving through the world. Produced by her husband and frequent collaborator Eric Valentine (Queens of the Stone Age, Weezer, Slash) and recorded in a cross-country journey beginning at her home in Topanga with Benmont Tench, continuing in Nashville with Mother Road session players (members of Cage the Elephant, Kings of Leon, and Train), and completed in Vermont with members of her longtime live band, the album echoes its origins with a wayward sound that spans from stripped-bare soul to cosmic country to hellraising rock & roll—all while orbiting Potter’s force- of-nature voice and lavishly imagined storytelling. “We’ve always been taught that the trespassers are the bad guys, but to me it’s not about reckless rebellion,” says Potter. “It’s about exploring, physically and mentally and emotionally, and being willing to step outside the narratives we’ve accepted. Because in my experience, the places we’re told not to go are exactly the ones that show us who we really are.”

With her new album Trespasser, Grace Potter introduces a beautifully unruly cast of characters who step into forbidden spaces with absolute abandon. As the spiritual sequel to 2023’s Mother Road, the four-time Grammy nominee’s seventh studio LP continues the kaleidoscopic storyline shaped by her many road trips from her Topanga Canyon home to her part-time residence in her native Vermont (a journey she’s made eight times in the last five years, usually on her own).

But while Mother Road was born from a desperate need for solace in the midst of emotional freefall, Trespasser reveals an artist firmly anchored in her singular vision. The latest chapter in a career marked by endless transformation and elite recognition—including sharing stages with rock & roll icons like the Rolling Stones & Robert Plant and earning praise from legends like Bob Dylan and Bonnie Raitt—Trespasser ultimately lights the way toward a more unbound and expansive means of moving through the world. Produced by her husband and frequent collaborator Eric Valentine (Queens of the Stone Age, Weezer, Slash) and recorded in a cross-country journey beginning at her home in Topanga with Benmont Tench, continuing in Nashville with Mother Road session players (members of Cage the Elephant, Kings of Leon, and Train), and completed in Vermont with members of her longtime live band, the album echoes its origins with a wayward sound that spans from stripped-bare soul to cosmic country to hellraising rock & roll—all while orbiting Potter’s force- of-nature voice and lavishly imagined storytelling. “We’ve always been taught that the trespassers are the bad guys, but to me it’s not about reckless rebellion,” says Potter. “It’s about exploring, physically and mentally and emotionally, and being willing to step outside the narratives we’ve accepted. Because in my experience, the places we’re told not to go are exactly the ones that show us who we really are.”

London's Spearmint follow-up their acclaimed 2023 record `This Candle Is For You' with the ambitious new concept album `Chase Me' New single "1986" evokes a time when the world wasn't connected by technology, but there was still a strong connection across the globe: music. Specifically in the song, it's folk in Newcastle and Madrid who are dancing to the same music. The vinyl version also features an exclusive track "Is It Just Nostalgia?" which sees the band time-travelling past `The Tube' and `Soul Train` to Friday nights of the past. Standby for the follow-up single in July_ Spearmint have been making great records since debut `A Week Away' in 1999 (`Sweeping The Nation', `A Trip Into Space', `We're Going Out'). Still the same line-up: Shirley Lee (singing, guitar), Simon Calnan (singing, keyboards), James Parsons (guitar) and Ronan Larvor (drums). This will be their eleventh album proper and the 65th release on their own hitBACK label. Re-united with producer Rhodri Marsden (Scritti Politti, Cardiacs), the `Chase Me' album tells a story of success, disillusionment, disconnection, peril, and resurrection. Anchored by three chases across a city at night, book-ended by two out-of-body experiences, and working towards a suite of uplifting love songs, it's a thriller, it's a horror, it's an allegory. Song-writer Shirley explains "The story would make a good movie I think_ but we don't know how to do that, so we did this." `Chase Me' will be available digitally, and on limited edition CD and vinyl. The vinyl version will be released on WIAIWYA records, and will include an exclusive 24 page full-colour lyric book, including photos and illustrations. Spearmint will premiere songs from the album alongside tracks from their catalogue that haven't been played for years, or ever in one instance, live at Colours in Hoxton, London, on Tuesday 29th September 2026.

Freeway was a California outfit that first formed in 1979 and set about fusing jazz, soul and outreach-driven purpose into a sound that sat outside the norms of the contemporary Christian scene at the time. Their sole album, this self-title gem, was cut in 1981 for New Born Records has since become an underground rarity, often changing hands for upwards of £400. Now, 45 years on, Vinyl Kitchen brings Freeway back to vinyl for the first time ever, complete with new liner notes and rare photos. It's a glorious, life-affirming work of bright jazz sounds, celebratory energy, boogie grooves, funky horns and prog licks. Perfect for listening and dancing alike.

2026 LP Pressung auf weißem Vinyl. Ursprünglich 1968 aufgenommen und für eine Veröffentlichung bei Sire Records vorgesehen, blieb Microminiature Love von Michael Yonkers, der Ikone des Outsider-Folk und Psych-Rock, unveröffentlicht, bis es 2002 von De Stijl Records wiederentdeckt und als limitierte, ausschließlich auf Vinyl erhältliche Auflage herausgebracht wurde. Damals hat die San-Francisco-Institution Aquarius Records es besser beschrieben, als wir es je könnten: ,Ein obskurer Visionär der späten Sechziger, der seiner Zeit weit voraus war, bekommt mit dieser LP-Neuauflage endlich die Anerkennung, die er verdient. Yonkers' Sachen waren anders als alles, was man damals (oder eigentlich auch heute noch) gehört hatte: abgedrehter Garage-Psych mit wahnsinnig genialen Texten und verrückter, von Acid durchdrungener Gitarre. Yonkers, eine legendäre Figur aus der Gegend um Minneapolis, baute seine eigenen Effektpedale, sägte seine Fender Telecaster auf die Breite eines Bretts herunter und spielte wie niemand sonst je zuvor. Mir fehlen die Worte, um das zu beschreiben. Es ist irgendwie eine Mischung aus reduzierten Black Sabbath, The Troggs, Pere Ubu und The Cramps??" Sub Pop veröffentlichte das Album anschließend auf CD und brachte 2011 eine limitierte Vinyl-Auflage heraus, die seit vielen Jahren vergriffen ist. Leider verstarb Michael Yonkers 2026 während der Planung dieser Neuauflage. Er war ein unglaublicher, wahrhaft einzigartiger Künstler und einer der liebenswertesten Menschen.

Gary Sullivan's Bodega Pop project returns to DINTE with a cassette-only collection of traditional sounds plucked from CDRs found in the night-markets of Savannakhet, Vientiane, and Luang Prabang.

"In Lao PDR, music was seemingly everywhere. Walking through an open field outside Savannakhet to the sound of someone playing a khaen on a distant porch, the bracing rush of electronic molam from of one of Vientiane’s many aging malls, the awkward blending of the blind so u player’s voice with the bustling sounds of Luang Prabang’s night market.

It was in that UNESCO World Heritage Site that I found most of the CDs and CD-Rs from which I’ve ripped the tracks for this compilation. I’m almost certain I picked up a thumb drive at the night market that held many hours of additional music that could have been included, but if so, I’ve misplaced it, lost it for good, or simply misremember purchasing it in the first place. What I do remember is that these discs were literally the last copies in the cafe, museum, bookstore, and night market where I bought them, and not all of them played all the way through without sonic deterioration.

The sounds compiled here play in stark contrast to the more contemporary recordings I found in Laos, most of which featured some form of upbeat digital workstation molam or children’s songs. In addition to the ever-present khaen, this collection includes recordings of the sanai, a single-reed instrument fashioned from a water buffalo horn, the ceremonial khong nyai gong, the pi and similar free-reeds, and at least a dozen more traditional instruments played by Lao and ethnic minority artists. While some of these tracks were laid down in Vientiane or Luang Prabang, most were recorded near where the artists lived, from the legendary Vat Phou in the far south to the former Pathet Lao capital Xam Neua in the northeast.

Unlike Laurent Jeanneau’s more focused Lao collections for Akuphone and Sublime Frequencies, which remain among my favorite albums of all time, the present cassette-only selection is literally all over the PDR map. The sequencing is entirely in response to rhythm and texture and includes recordings from the 1970s, 80s, 90s, and early aughts. This may frustrate those with more of an ethnomusicology bent, but my hope is that the listener experiences something akin to wandering for the first time through this majestic country, encountering the last copies of forgotten recordings one after another, and hearing in these remains fragments of the past and a living musical landscape."

qorakitobchi aka Anvar Kalandarov is a music archaeologist, musician and producer from Tashkent, Uzbekistan whose work is dedicated to uncovering forgotten sounds from across Central Asia. In recent years he has emerged as a singular voice documenting the region’s musical heritage, co-compiling Synthesizing the Silk Roads for Ostinato Records and curating Digging Central Asia: Musical Archaeology Along the Silk Road split release for Death Is Not The End, alongside presenting his own Maqom Soul imprint.

For this mixtape, Kalandarov turns his attention to the synth-pop, disco and electronic music that flourished across Central Asia during the 1980s and 1990s. Drawn from rare vinyl records & private archives, this selection explores a period when Soviet modernity, regional traditions and emerging synthesiser sounds merged to create a uniquely Central Asian vision of the future. From Uzbek disco and Tajik synth-pop to lesser-known oddities, the mix offers a glimpse into a musical world that remains largely unexplored outside the region.

Skyjack — the borderless five piece band spread across South Africa and Switzerland — announce their fourth studio album, Let The Sky Open Under Your Feet, out 3rd July.

Recorded in December 2025 at a secluded studio outside Stellenbosch, South Africa, the album captures the vibrant live energy of the band at its most expansive — drawing together free improvisation, South African jazz traditions, chamber music, kinetic groove, and ecstatic collective interplay into a singular body of work.

“This record is a very articulate representation of our sound, having grown deep roots into the earth with high branches reaching upward and outward”, says bassist Shane Cooper. “My desire is always to create sonic universes that can envelope the listener.”

The album’s title comes from a line in a poem by the 13th-century Persian poet Rumi, reflecting the music’s balance between groundedness and transcendence. Here, Skyjack move fluidly between meditative improvisation and lush orchestration across twelve tracks of free-spirited, cosmic journeying. Inspired both by the cultural traditions and natural environments of South Africa, Let The Sky Open Under Your Feet is a testament to the band’s intuitive connection and innate musical curiosity.

It arrives just over a year after Light Cycle (2024), a short gap that reflects the momentum built on tour. After exchanging sketches remotely across two continents, the band reunited in Johannesburg in late 2025, workshopped the new material onstage across South Africa, and then headed directly into the studio, where much of the album was recorded live in first takes — preserving the looseness and unpredictability central to Skyjack’s sound.

Comprised of Kyle Shepherd (piano), Shane Cooper (bass), Jonno Sweetman (drums), Andreas Tschopp (trombone), and Marc Stucki (saxophones), Skyjack first formed in Cape Town in 2013 during a fertile moment in South African jazz, as a new generation of musicians pushed against rigid genre definitions and opened the music outward toward broader sonic possibilities. Over the past decade, the band has built a singular sound drawing equally on South African groove traditions and European improvisation.

Individually, the members move between jazz, electronic music, film scoring, rock, hip-hop and experimental composition, with collaborations spanning artists including William Parker, Lionel Loueke, Zim Ngqawana, Ben LaMar Gay, Jorge Rossy, Shabaka Hutchings, William Kentridge, Makaya McCraven and Sylvie Courvoisier.

Since their self-titled debut in 2015, followed by The Hunter (2019) and Light Cycle (2024), the group has developed a reputation for immersive live performances and music that continuously reshapes itself in motion — rooted in what they describe as “warm menacing African grooves,” while refusing fixed stylistic borders.

The fourth release on Samurai Music sublabel SAIBAI comes from Spanish techno mainstay Reeko. True to his long-standing reputation for hypnotic sonics and rhythmic precision, Juan Rico builds on a recent run of activity on Samurai to offer up a densely packed, evocative pair of 160/170 BPM soundscapes. In keeping with the spirit of previous SAIBAI releases, Rico emphasises exploration on both sides of this new record as he draws out continually morphing textures that land between melodic expression and percussive impact. It's instantly clear there's a free tekno undercurrent buried beneath 'Gathering 1' that defines the energy of this latest transmission. The difference is how Rico wields that energy, artfully submerging the kick drum propulsion and letting three-dimensional sonic sculpture beat a path towards the dance. Layers of arrhythmic delay ripples loosen the valve, but there's a constant pressure pushing at the edges of the production from start to finish. There's a more immediate urgency to the mixing of the rhythmic elements on 'Gathering 2' as Rico teases a gabba-like intensity tempered by misty clouds and textural sweeps that soften the attack without sacrificing the thumping energy of the track. Measured and meticulous, bristling with micro-details on top of the imposing presence, both 'Gathering's reaffirm Reeko's current hot streak working outside his usual field of focus.

There's a tendency in metal to mistake aggression for honesty, volume for depth. To confuse the performance of darkness with its actual weight. Hidden Fires Burn Hottest, the new album from San Francisco-based post-black metal band Bosse-de-Nage, sidesteps this entirely. It’s the group’s most fully realized work yet, precisely because it refuses to be pinned down.

Bosse-de-Nage have been working with The Flenser for over fifteen years. They were one of the first bands the label ever partnered with and have the longest active relationship in the label's history. But unlike most bands who build momentum through constant touring and visibility, Bosse-de-Nage has largely existed apart from the music world's usual machinery. They've evolved on their own terms, in relative isolation, allowing the work to develop without outside pressure or influence. What began rooted in black metal anonymity has mutated into something that actively defies categorization. The aggression is still there, but it's no longer the point. Hidden Fires Burn Hottest finds the band treating emotions like physical objects, feelings with spatial properties. “No Such Place"" describes a space that can't exist but does anyway, somewhere between thought and location. ""Immortality Project"" examines infinite possibility not as promise but as problem, endless options collapsing under their own weight. These songs don't use metaphor to describe emotion. They make emotion into something you could theoretically touch.
Tracked by Jack Shirley (Deafheaven, Oathbreaker) at Atomic Garden East and mixed and mastered by Richard Chowenhill of Agriculture, Hidden Fires Burn Hottest was years in development, with some tracks beginning in 2018.

The long writing process offered time that most records don't get. Time to live with ideas, revise endlessly, to let structures settle. For the first time, lyricist Bryan Manning wrote everything in advance, creating a surplus to pull from rather than working under deadline pressure. The difference shows.
Coming off Further Still, an album built on constraint and economy, Bosse-de-Nage sought the opposite: sprawl, strangeness, fewer rules. Space for ideas to develop without rushing them. Dynamics that move through quiet as much as noise. Presence earned through atmosphere instead of volume. The record even includes ""Mementos,"" which might be considered the first love song the band has ever written.

Nothing here coheres into a theme. These are pieces pulled from low moments and private feelings made public through sound. The band has never been interested in positivity, in music that resolves cleanly or offers comfort. But bleakness doesn't mean humorlessness. There's something darkly funny running through much of it, even when it shouldn't be.
Hidden Fires Burn Hottest doesn't explain itself. It just insists: what you feel is as real as what you can see."

born (literally) in fire, soma flared briefly as the alchemical pairing of two unique and dynamic musicians. david thrussell and pieter bourke met through mutual friends in the artistic melting-pot of early 1990s elwood, melbourne, australia. bourke was an integral member of the gothically ambient eden, thrussell frontman of anarchic industrial combo snog. both admired each others work, and though some considered them an unlikely combination, something rather potent was brewing which drew them inexorably together.

initially bourke joined snog live and then in the studio, contributing mightily to their epic second album ‘dear valued customer’. as a natural result of their friendship and muse, thrussell and bourke instituted their own project, soma, to explore the intersections of arcane and mysterious technologies. the first soma album “hollow earth” was released to acclaim.

soon after, thrussell was awoken by a 3am knock on his door. bourke was now homeless - the result of a devastating fire that had just torn through his apartment and studio - and he needed somewhere to sleep. this is when work on ‘the inner cinema’ began, with bourke and thrussell ensconced in the same dwelling, able to write and record around the clock (often only leaving to plan the next session while dining at local vegan eateries).

at the time thrussell was obsessed by the testosterone bravado and haunting alienation of ‘spaghetti-western’ theme songs, while bourke brought his love of all things percussive and the other-worldly atmospherics of arvo pärt (with the outer-space dub of king tubby) to the mix. together, on a diet of blood-plum sago, fortean times and lingering smoke fumes, they concocted their dadaist brew.

magical and unforgettable, ‘the inner cinema’ stands apart and outside of the musical mainstream. since its 1996 release the album has developed a mythical reputation and is spoken of in hushed and adulating tones among acolytes of atmospheric and electronic music. you hold in your hands a lovingly remastered deluxe reissue of this sonorous gem.

time marches on, and after a few more sporadic soma recordings bourke and thrussell moved on to other pastures. bourke would work with dead can dance, lisa gerrard and hollywood auteur michael mann, as thrussell toured regularly with snog and black lung, cut some interesting soundtracks and birthed the idiosyncratic omni recording corporation.

expelled from its fiery crucible, this dark jewel of sound, this soundtrack of the mind, has lain in the soft earth awaiting rediscovery. fluid metabolic rhythms and breathy washes of timeless melancholy pulsing, inviting, in the warm soil. now is your chance.

Emerging from the shadows, Audio-Unknown is a vinyl-only imprint built on anonymity, intention, and pure sound. No names, no faces, no algorithms — just carefully crafted records designed to be discovered without preconceptions. Every release strips away identity to refocus attention on what matters: the music, the texture, the moment.

This is not a label driven by hype or visibility. It exists outside the cycle — no digital platforms, no previews, no tracklists. Each record is a closed object until the needle drops.


AUDIO-UNKNOWN 001

The first transmission.

An unnamed artist.
Untitled tracks.
Uncompromising direction.

AUDIO-UNKNOWN 001 delivers a tightly curated selection of cuts that move between tension and release, precision and rawness. Built for deep systems and attentive listeners, this debut sets the tone: functional yet elusive, minimal yet charged with intent.

Pressed on vinyl only. No repress guaranteed.

You don’t follow this — you find it.