Suche:phil green

Scowl is a band that sounds exactly like their name implies. Venomous, fierce, antagonistic. A sneer not to be crossed. Over the last five years, the Santa Cruz, California, band has firmly planted their flag in the hardcore scene with their vicious sound and ripping live show, sharing stages around the world with Circle Jerks, Touché Amoré, and Limp Bizkit, and filling slots at prominent festivals like Coachella, Sick New World, and Reading and Leeds. But with their new album, Are We All Angels (Dead Oceans), Scowl is aiming to funnel all that aggression through a more expansive version of themselves.Much of Are We All Angels grapples with Scowl's newfound place in the hardcore scene, a community which has both embraced the band and made them something of a lightning rod over the past few years. Standout single "Not Hell, Not Heaven" outright rejects the narratives cast onto them by outsiders. "It's about feeling victimized and being a victim, but not wanting to identify with being a victim," explains vocalist Kat Moss. "It's trying to find grace in the fact that I have my power. I live in my reality. You have to deal with whatever you're dealing with, and it ain't working for me." The band breaks from a sense of disassociation to seek deeper connections on "Fantasy." "It's incredibly challenging to try to balance my love for the scene while also feeling, in some spaces, extremely alienated and hated," Moss says. "`Fantasy' is about feeling like I don't know how to connect with these people anymore, because I have shelled myself away so hard." The album ends in a philosophical place on the closing, titular track, "Are We All Angels," asking questions like, "Is this all there is?" and ultimately putting it on the listener to decide. "It's about the personal struggle between good and evil. It doesn't matter how `good' or `bad' you are, there are systems that will try to rewrite your narrative no matter what you actually do," explains Moss, noting that punctuation on "Are We All Angels" has been deliberately omitted in an attempt to leave the statement open-ended. Are We All Angels is the highly anticipated follow-up to Scowl's debut, 2021's How Flowers Grow, a 16-minute primal scream over punishing riffs. But amidst the pounding chaos, it was the record's sonic outlier, a cleaner interlude called "Seeds to Sow," that, true to its name, planted the seed for what was to come for the band. "It kind of laid out this destiny for us, and I feel like now we're fulfilling that," says drummer Cole Gilbert. The band continued to expand their sound on 2023's widely acclaimed Psychic Dance Routine EP, incorporating more pop hooks and favoring gentler singing over heavy screaming, paving the way for what would come next.Scowl's growth got a huge boost from producer Will Yip (Turnstile, Title Fight, Code Orange, Balance and Composure), who broadened the band's scope. "Will would say, `Everything you have here is correct, but it's in the wrong place,'" says Gilbert. Moss adds: "Will really helped restructure a lot of the material. Some songs he tore apart to make more space for the really good hooks and choruses." But even through this more eclectic approach, Scowl loses none of their edge, and still manages to convey the anger and frustration that lies underneath. They are deeply committed to carrying the ethos of punk and its sense of community. "Hardcore and punk have sculpted how we operate, what we want to do as a band, and how we participate," says guitarist Malachi Greene. "At our core, we are a punk and a hardcore band, regardless of how the song shifts and changes."

Repress!

In the mid-1970s, a force of nature swept across the continental United States, cutting across all strata of race and class, rooting in our minds, our homes, our culture. It wasn’t The Exorcist, Goodbye Yellow Brick Road, or even bell-bottoms, but instead a book called The Secret Life of Plants. The work of occultist/former OSS agent Peter Tompkins and former CIA agent/dowsing enthusiast Christopher Bird, the books shot up the bestseller charts and spread like kudzu across the landscape, becoming a phenomenon. Seemingly overnight, the indoor plant business was in full bloom and photosynthetic eukaryotes of every genus were hanging off walls, lording over bookshelves, and basking on sunny window ledges. The science behind Secret Life was specious: plants can hear our prayers, they’re lie detectors, they’re telepathic, able to predict natural disasters and receive signals from distant galaxies. But that didn’t stop millions from buying and nurturing their new plants.



Perhaps the craziest claim of the book was that plants also dug music. And whether you purchased a snake plant, asparagus fern, peace lily, or what have you from Mother Earth on Melrose Avenue in Los Angeles (or bought a Simmons mattress from Sears), you also took home Plantasia, an album recorded especially for them. Subtitled “warm earth music for plants…and the people that love them,” it was full of bucolic, charming, stoner-friendly, decidedly unscientific tunes enacted on the new-fangled device called the Moog. Plants date back from the dawn of time, but apparently they loved the Moog, never mind that the synthesizer had been on the market for just a few years. Most of all, the plants loved the ditties made by composer Mort Garson.



Few characters in early electronic music can be both fearless pioneers and cheesy trend-chasers, but Garson embraced both extremes, and has been unheralded as a result. When one writer rhetorically asked: “How was Garson’s music so ubiquitous while the man remained so under the radar?” the answer was simple. Well before Brian Eno did it, Garson was making discreet music, both the man and his music as inconspicuous as a Chlorophytumcomosum. Julliard-educated and active as a session player in the post-war era, Garson wrote lounge hits, scored plush arrangements for Doris Day, and garlanded weeping countrypolitan strings around Glen Campbell’s “By the Time I Get to Phoenix.” He could render the Beatles and Simon & Garfunkel alike into easy listening and also dreamed up his own ditties. “An idear” as Garson himself would drawl it out. “I live with it, I walk it, I sing it.”



But as his daughter Day Darmet recalls: “When my dad found the synthesizer, he realized he didn’t want to do pop music anymore.” Garson encountered Robert Moog and his new device at the Audio Engineering Society’s West Coast convention in 1967 and immediately began tinkering with the device. With the Moog, those idears could be transformed. “He constantly had a song he was humming,” Darmet says. “At the table he was constantly tapping.” Which is to say that Mort pulled his melodies out of thin air, just like any household plant would.



The Plantae kingdom grew to its height by 1976, from DC Comics’ mossy superhero Swamp Thing to Stevie Wonder’s own herbal meditation, Journey Through the Secret Life of Plants. Nefarious manifestations of human-plant interaction also abounded, be it the grotesque pods in Invasion of the Body Snatchers or the pothead paranoia of the US Government spraying Mexican marijuana fields with the herbicide paraquat (which led to the rise in homegrown pot by the 1980s). And then there’s the warm, leafy embrace of Plantasia itself.



“My mom had a lot of plants,” Darmet says. “She didn’t believe in organized religion, she believed the earth was the best thing in the whole world. Whatever created us was incredible.” And she also knew when her husband had a good song, shouting from another room when she heard him humming a good idear. Novel as it might seem, Plantasia is simply full of good tunes.



Garson may have given the album away to new plant and bed owners, but a decade later a new generation could hear his music in another surreptitious way. Millions of kids bought The Legend of Zelda for their Nintendo Entertainment System back in 1986 and one distinct 8-bit tune bears more than a passing resemblance to album highlight “Concerto for Philodendron and Pothos.” Garson was never properly credited for it, but he nevertheless subliminally slipped into a new generations’ head, helping kids and plants alike grow.



Hearing Plantasia in the 21st century, it seems less an ode to our photosynthesizing friends by Garson and more an homage to his wife, the one with the green thumb that made everything flower around him. “My dad would be totally pleased to know that people are really interested in this music that had no popularity at the time,” Darmet says of Plantasia’snew renaissance. “He would be fascinated by the fact that people are finally understanding and appreciating this part of his musical career that he got no admiration for back then.” Garson seems to be everywhere again, even if he’s not really noticed, just like a houseplant.

"Chasing the funky symphonies that filled my head and my dreams..."

December 25th, 2023 - an Instagram post. Stimulator Jones shared half a dozen FIRE tracks from his beat tape archive. We were immediately drawn to the rough hewn boom bap.

"I'd release that", Rob commented.

Hours of material was shared and the result is this: Cool Green Trees (1999-2005). A collection of beats and loops Stimulator Jones created between the ages of 14-20 at home in his basement, bedroom and computer room in Roanoke, Virginia.

You will not believe the profound soulful genius contained within these naive schoolboy melodies.

December 25th, 1998 - 25 years ago to the day and his much-coveted Yamaha SU10 sampler was finally bestowed upon young Stimmy AKA Sam Lunsford: "I immediately hooked up a CD Walkman to the input jack and looped the beginning two bars of Grover Washington Jr.'s "Mercy Mercy Me". I don't know what exactly was so thrilling about hearing two measures of music repeating over and over but it was so infectious and hypnotizing and enthralling to me. I'll never forget that ecstatic rush of making my first loop - an uncontrollable, gleeful smile plastered all over my face." When you hear the pocket breakbeat symphonies featured here on Cool Green Trees, you'll feel the same sense of frisson.

In the wake of his Stones Throw breakthrough - Exotic Worlds & Master Treasures - Stimulator Jones was pegged by many as a 90s throwback artist. However, he literally IS a 90s artist. He's been recording music most of his life and he's now 40. He created the bulk of Cool Green Trees as a teenager. Everything before 2004 was recorded when Sam was still in school. He was in 8th grade when he made the 1999 tracks - he didn't even have his learner's permit. This album is a snapshot of a young man in a simpler time. Things were still mysterious back then and he was flying blind, relying on his ears and having to figure things out for himself: "I had no road map for becoming a beatmaker. I have been collecting music since I was a kid, I am a lifelong digger and seeker of cool and interesting sounds. I was there in the golden age of Hip Hop, and while I may have been a suburban white kid in Roanoke, Virginia, I was tuned in and I bought so many classic albums when they came out. I was attracted to Hip Hop because of the musical and poetic quality. I was hypnotized by the rhythms, partially because I was a drummer. I didn't brag about collecting my breakbeat records or making beats - it was something I did in isolation. It wasn't something I generally wanted to bring attention to and it didn't really score me any cool points. I certainly wasn't flexing on social media about it."

Hell, he can do that now!

Opener "Pharoah Jones" was inspired by Yesterday's New Quintet and Madlib's ability to capture that classic 70s sound whilst playing all the instruments. Sam created this one stoned afternoon by laying down a 2 bar loop and a shaker loop on his Yamaha SU700 sampler. He hung a microphone from the ceiling and played his Yamaha Stage Custom drum kit over the top before adding ender Rhodes and playing his dad's Selmer tenor sax through an Electro Harmonix Memory Man echo pedal. Yes! Up next, "Ghost Gospel" utilises a dope loop from a gospel record and adds some soul-funk drums overtop, whilst working that filter knob. Says Sam: "The loop reminded me of something Ghostface would rap over. The sample was in 3/4 waltz time but I flipped it for a 4/4 groove, a technique I picked up from RZA. "Ill Feeling" uses sped-up pieces from a dusty old funk record and putting them over a classic NOLA drum loop; gain chopping up a slow, bluesy 3/4 time signature and bending it to a 4/4 groove. Classy shit. "Capital Punishment" features drums tapped in live, inspired by MF Doom's Special Herbs series. "Do Not Adjust" consists loops found on a compilation of 70s French music at Happy's Flea Market, a classic Roanoke digging spot.

The sublime, evocative title track, "Cool Green Trees" was created when Sam was still living at home. He dumped samples off his SU10 into the family desktop and arranged them in a demo version of Pro Tools: "This track was sort of my ode to the DJ Shadow style of sample based production. Super spacey, slow, and moody. The heavily filtered drums were inspired by Alec Empire's 'Low on Ice' album. I later added some scratches and sounds from a Spider Man storybook record." "Chill Scratch" snags the final bit of a bossanova record and pairs it with a drum loop before adding experimental scratching run through an Electro Harmonix Memory Man echo pedal. "Poisonous Fumes" was made using a sampler, mixer and a turntable; a kind of mixtape beat collage with added scratches and sounds from various records. Using dialogue from superhero records was a nod to Madlib. "Welcome Aboard The Starship" is dark, downtempo trip-hop with a spooky bent. Sam paired a slow, hard drum loop with a guitar sample grabbed off a psychedelic rock record. To finish, he added various backwards sounds and weird atmospheric effects and a little scratching. Swoon.

Side B opens with "Keep On Runnin", made on a borrowed Roland SP202 sampler. Having always loved the sound of the Lo-Fi filter on those machines, reminiscent of the Emu SP1200, Sam always imagined Del or another of the Hieroglyphics crew rapping over this beat. You can certainly hear why. "Sounds Impossible" sees Sam experimenting with layering multiple kick samples at different volumes to create patterns similar to those heard by Showbiz and Lord Finesse during their God-level 1995 period. "Painted Faces" was made by chopping up a REDACTED record which he had gotten from Happy's Flea Market and paired it with a REDACTED drum loop. By the time Sam recorded "The Knew Style", he had acquired a shitty old 1960s portable turntable off eBay. It didn't function properly when he bought it but his brother opened it up, cleaned it out and got it working: "I remember he told me that there was a bunch of sand inside of it when he opened it up, as if its previous owner had taken it to the beach. I would take that turntable on my Happy's Flea Market digs so I could preview records...that's how I found this loop."

"Chicken Wing Blues Sauce" loops up a classic blues joint and pairs it with some REDACTED drums. A bit of filtering and arranging et voilà! "Kool Breeze", from 1999, is one of Sam's oldest surviving beats, as is "Sexx Bullets". The Roots sampled the same record, leaving Sam frustrated yet vindicated. "Soul Child" was an early SU10 creation, looping a dusty old Soul Children 45 and pairing it with 70s rock drum loops to great effect. "Take Off Runnin" was another loop found digging with a portable turntable. Paired with some boom bap drums it makes for a hypnotic head-nod groove. "Centurian" was intended to be a little beat interlude a la Pete Rock. The sample is from a sun-dappled soft-psych record and it's paired with a Robin Trower drum loop that just happens to fit perfectly. Sometimes you slap things together kind of haphazardly and magic happens. "Bozack" was the first beat Sam made using Pro Tools, his first foray into using chopped sounds instead of loops, an exciting new world. "Church" is beat interlude using a Phil Upchurch loop with the "Long Red" drums - a favourite break of Dilla et al. Sam was really on a tear in late 2004, probably because he was unemployed and phoneless and able to just make beats all day. He made "Splash One" on a borrowed Yamaha SU700 and again was experimenting with tapping the drums in live with his fingers, instead of using a loop or sequenced pattern. Channeling 9th Wonder, Sam used a water splash sound effect from a Batman record as a percussive element, hence the title (also a 13th Floor Elevators reference). The main loop is a backwards portion of one of his favourite Roy Ayers songs.

"Hank" is another fun little beat interlude thing, created on a borrowed Roland SP202 sampler with the fantastic Lo-Fi effect that resembled the Emu SP1200 at a fraction of the price. "73 goatee", from 99, is another of his oldest surviving beats, created in his bedroom with his Yamaha SU10 and his brother's Vestax MR-300 4-track recorder: "This one will always feel special. I can remember having a feeling all the way back then on the night that I created it that this was a solid beat with a catchy loop. There was something in the Fender Rhodes melody that resonated with me emotionally, and I had never heard a producer sample that portion before. I felt like I had found my own unique sound, my own unique loop. It came from an Ahmad Jamal '73. I actually even recorded myself rapping and scratching over this beat way back then, I still have that version in all its imperfect sloppy glory."

Sam explains just how much these tracks mean to him: "They all have immense historical and sentimental value and I'm proud of them. These beats come from an innocent, simple time when I was just figuring out how to craft these sounds. They're something very personal to me. They are the initial part of a journey that I really was taking *alone*. There was no YouTube. I couldn't Google shit. I didn't even know any other beatmakers, producers or DJs in my town that could teach me anything. It was always just me, alone, in a room with some equipment - chasing the funky symphonies that filled my head and my dreams. What I was doing wasn't cool. Most of my peers thought I was a weirdo and couldn't care less. Creating these sounds was an anti-social endeavour. In a sense, I felt like it was me against the world, and all I had to instruct and assist me were the recordings produced by my heroes - RZA, DJ Premier, Erick Sermon, Beatminerz, Showbiz, Diamond D, Beatnuts, Prince Paul, The Bomb Squad, Pete Rock, Q-Tip, E-Swift, Mista Lawnge, DJ Shadow, Cut Chemist, Peanut Butter Wolf, El-P and so many more...I dedicate this collection to them, and to my older brother Joe who has always been a musical and technical guiding light for me.

This was a time before every kid was a self-described producer and beatmaker, before everyone had a DAW, before Kanye and "chipmunk soul", before Red Bull beat battles, before there was any social media beyond chat rooms and AOL Instant Messenger, before Soundcloud, before SP-404 mania, before lo-fi beats to study to, before Splice, before targeted ads for MIDI chord packs, etc. In 99 when I told people that I had a sampler and made beats I was mostly met with bewildered confusion and indifference. Kids and adults alike would wonder why I got this weird machine for Christmas instead of something worthwhile like a Playstation or a mountain bike or even a guitar for that matter because at least that could be used to make "real music". Back then, sampling was still not widely respected as an art form - it was seen as lazy, talentless and unoriginal at best and outright criminal theft at worst. I had gotten respect for playing drums and guitar and things of that nature but this was a step in the wrong direction in the eyes of many."

The cover photo is a picture of Sam standing on his back porch in the latter part of 1998, just before he got his first sampler. He was 13 years old, in 8th grade. His dad took the picture with his 35mm film camera: "I actually wanted to be pointing my dad's .22 pistol at the camera lens but he wouldn't let me. He gave me an old walking cane to use instead. The Tommy Hilfiger puffer jacket came from the lost and found at William Fleming High School where my mom worked as a secretary. I was thrilled when she brought it home because we never spent money on expensive name brand clothing like that - we were for the most part strictly a sale rack, bargain bin, thrift store, yard sale, flea market kind of family when it came to clothes. My watch is some cheap off-brand fake gold department store watch." Mastering for this vinyl edition was overseen by Be With regular Simon Francis and it was cut by the esteemed Cicely Balston at Abbey Road Studios to be pressed in the Netherlands by Record Industry.

2023 gab Saxofonist Joshua Redman sein erfolgreiches Blue Note-Debüt mit dem für ihn überraschenden Album ”where are we”, seinem ersten Projekt mit durchgehender Beteiligung einer Vokalistin: Gabrielle Cavassa.

Auf seinem neuen Album kehrt Redman nun zum instrumentalen Jazz zurück - Gabrielle Cavassa singt nur einen einzigen Titel -, stattdessen interpretiert Redman stimmungsvolle Originale aus eigener Feder, die er in den letzten Jahren ohne ein bestimmtes Projekt im Kopf erarbeitet hat, mit ebenso jungen wie sensationell guten neuen Musikern (Pianist Paul Cornish, Bassist Philip Norris und Schlagzeuger Nazir Ebo). Als Gäste setzen Saxofonistin Melissa Aldana und Trompeterin Skylar Tang Akzente.

Ein neues musikalisches Projekt des renommierten, französischen Studio-Cracks Renaud Letang mit Freunden & Familie: Feist - Connan Mockasin - Benny Sings - Chilly Gonzales - Jamie Lidell - Saul Williams - Vladimir Cosma - Philippe Katerine - Infinite Bisous - Jerry Paper - Chuuwee - Mel D. Produziert Von Renaud Letang + Chilly Gonzales. Aufgenommen In Den Studios Ferber.

Das Album eines Lebens. Oder besser gesagt eines halben Lebens, das er seit seinem 18. Lebensjahr im Schatten der Aufnahmestudios verbracht hat. Unter dem facettenreichen Pseudonym DRIFT ist 'At The Party' ein Album von Renaud Letang, einem der weltweit renommiertesten und gefragtesten französischen Toningenieure und Produzenten der letzten drei Jahrzehnte. ManuChao, Chilly Gonzales, Feist, Mathieu Booagerts, Lianne La Havas, Philippe Katerine, Saul Williams, Jane Birkin, Seu Jorge, Micky Green, Connan Mockasin und Amadou & Mariam zählen zu seinen Klienten.
Seit Jahren bereitet der Victoires de la Musique-Preisträger und Grammy-nominierte Letang heimlich mit all seinen Künstlerfreunden im Keller der Studios Ferber ein Albumprojekt vor.
Sein kanadischer Komplize Chilly Gonzales, mit dem er in den 2000er Jahren das erfolgreiche Produzenten-Tandem VV bildete, hat ihn ermutigt, seine Songs zu veröffentlichen. Renaud Letang versteht seine Kompositionen als "Driftmusik" mit einer breiten stilistischen Palette - von sonnigem Disco-Pop (At the Party, Working on Me) bis hin zu Jazz-lastigen Sounds ('Papaya', 'A Night In Waimea'), von futuristischem Hip-Hop ('Cosmic Drift', 'That's All') bis hin zu traumhaften Tracks ('Très Gentiment In Waimea'). Das Wort DRIFT, das facettenreiche Pseudonym, das Renaud Letang gewählt hat, beschreibt genau diese ständige Bewegung, die sich wunderbar in dieses kollegiale Album einfügt: Feist, Chilly Gonzales, Connan Mockasin, Benny Sings, Philippe Katerine, Jamie Lidell, Saul Williams, Infinite Bisous, Jerry Paper, Chuuwee, Mel D und Vladimir Cosma sind alle in den Credits des Albums zu finden. Eine faszinierende musikalische Reise, die sowohl an einem sonnigen Tag als auch nach Einbruch der Dunkelheit zu hören ist. Der Soundtrack des Sommers mit der Besetzung des Jahres.
Erhältlich als Digisleeve und Doppel-LP (Black Vinyl).

Again Mysteries delivers 3 exellent long dark atmospheric tracks upholding the established label philosophy. Mastered by Pozek. Artwork by Darkam.
The tribal triumvirate of C. Ysme, Kbyl and Yukai supply fuel for the nomadic war machine. Relentlessly driving, pushing forward at 150 bpm, only stopping for the next gathering in pirate utopia. A maelstrom swirling, drawing you in to the centre of the dance.
Darkness merchants and veterans Too Old Boyz team up with Kaoslog and descend into the catacombs to deal with the fear factor. In the blackness a synth melody shines like a greenish light. Amply named Adrenaline this track urges to keep on moving and confront the monsters. 150 bpm, epic and hard as nails.
After Mysteries #6, #10 and VC 27 Keflat 23 is back and ups the pace going 170 beats full on pumping tribalistic yet subtle in line with the spirit of Mysteries, carefully laying out a mental map of realms and conzepts unknown. Immer geradeaus but when you see the rabbit ask it for directions.
This release includes a 2 side poster, digital download code and artwork sticker.

Co-directed with Maxime Daoud (Ojard), this 7th opus was written and composed with passion and recorded with an outstanding team of musicians. The message of Barbara Carlotti's new album is direct and essential: "Cherish your future!" It is an invitation to welcome the unknown, to view our destinies with tenderness, to strive toward the future while taking care of our style, to counter life's setbacks, to chase the green ray, and to reinvent love. The goal is to liberate expression, heal the wounds of the past, articulate desire with elegance and humor, and let ourselves be moved by fleeting yet eternal joys, the sight of the ocean, or the infinite beauty of a singing voice that fills us with hope and strength in an outpouring of freedom.

Yannis Philippakis von Foals veröffentlicht sein erstes Solowerk, eine Kollaboration mit dem verstorbenen legendären Schlagzeuger Tony Allen. Yannis & The Yaw" präsentieren die EP 'Lagos Paris London', die nach den Orten benannt ist, an denen sie geschrieben und aufgenommen wurde und an denen sie beide gelebt haben. Das fünf Tracks umfassende Werk wird am 30. August auf Transgressive veröffentlicht.

Im Jahr 2016 bot sich Yannis die Chance seines Lebens: eine zweitägige Session mit dem großen Schlagzeuger Tony Allen, den er für seine einflussreiche, genreübergreifende Arbeit mit Künstlern wie Fela Kuti, Sébastien Tellier und Jeff Mills sehr bewundert.

Als Yannis sich in ein verrauchtes 70er-Jahre-Studio in Paris begab, erwartete er, dass sie eine nostalgische Afrobeat-Platte aufnehmen würden. Doch es kam etwas ganz anderes dabei heraus. Die beiden entwickelten schnell eine intuitive Telepathie, die Musik entstand aus Jams und Loops, und die verschiedenen Berührungspunkte - Rock, Funk, Jazz, Dub und mehr - wurden durch die einzigartige Atmosphäre des Aufeinandertreffens zweier Kulturen und kreativer Köpfe ergänzt, deren Ausdruck durch das Musizieren im und für den Moment selbst befreit wurde.

Zusammen mit Tonys regelmäßigen Mitstreitern Vincent Taeger (Schlagzeug), Vincent Turrell (Tasten, Marimba) und Ludovic Bruni (Bass, Gitarre) entstand bei diesem ersten Treffen eine Handvoll fast fertiger Songs, die in einigen nachfolgenden Sessions weiter entwickelt wurden. Aufgrund von Terminproblemen und Corona-Einschränkungen wurden die Aufnahmen jedoch nie abgeschlossen, bevor Tony im April 2020 im Alter von 79 Jahren verstarb.

Yannis fühlte sich zutiefst verpflichtet, das Projekt zu vollenden, nicht nur als bittersüße Art, seinen alten Freund zu ehren und zu feiern, sondern auch, weil Tony so begierig darauf gewesen war, diese Songs mit der Welt zu teilen. Das Ergebnis ist die kommende Fünf-Track-EP 'Lagos Paris London' unter dem Dach von Yannis & The Yaw - ein Projekt, zu dem er in Zukunft zurückkehren möchte, um weitere Kollaborationen mit inspirierenden Musikern aus der ganzen Welt einzugehen.

- Ltd. 12" EP

Mint Green Vinyl. Graham Jonson is drawn to the comforts of melody and noise. How the two conspire in tension, tonally and atonally, stirring up memory and mood. This quality animates the technicolor world of quickly, quickly, the psych-pop project that emanates from Kenton Sound, his basement studio in Portland, Oregon. "Everywhere your eye lands, there's another curio to marvel over," noted Pitchfork's Philip Sherburne when he visited Jonson's recording space for a Rising feature just after the release of his "strikingly original" 2021 debut LP, The Long and Short of It. Since then, Jonson formed a live band, released his Easy Listening EP in 2023, and navigated the up-and-downs of a young musician, the sustainability of tours and relationships. While shaped by personal bouts and fallouts, his highly-anticipated full-length follow-up finds Jonson making music that's universal, open-ended, and rewarding, like great songwriters can do. He set out to make a folk album but couldn't help coloring it in with noise; a confluence of lush instrumentation and unexpected sounds. Ambitious yet intimate, hi-fi yet homespun, the idiosyncratic songs on I Heard That Noise curve around the contours of everyday life with warmth, wit, and dissonance.

"As one of the founders of Philadelphia soul, Harold Melvin & The Blue Notes played & recorded for a few decades, but the musical highlight of their career must have been when Teddy Pendergrass joined ranks between 1972 and 1975. Wake Up Everybody from 1975 is the last album on which you can hear his sultry vocals before he went solo, and it is filled with profound, uplifting & thought provoking songs that in some cases are better known for their covers than for their originals. The song ""Wake Up Everybody"" was a radio hit for John Legend & The Roots, and ""Don’t Leave Me This Way""’ is a disco classic that was made even bigger by Thelma Houston. This 180 gram audiophile vinyl version has a special bonus track: an 11-minute remix of ""Don’t Leave Me This Way"" by inventor of the remix and the 12”: Tom Moulton! Wake Up Everybody is available as a 50th anniversary edition of 750 copies on dark green coloured vinyl."








[h] Don T Leave Me This Way [Tom Moulton Mix]

Scowl is a band that sounds exactly like their name implies. Venomous, fierce, antagonistic. A sneer not to be crossed. Over the last five years, the Santa Cruz, California, band has firmly planted their flag in the hardcore scene with their vicious sound and ripping live show, sharing stages around the world with Circle Jerks, Touché Amoré, and Limp Bizkit, and filling slots at prominent festivals like Coachella, Sick New World, and Reading and Leeds. But with their new album, Are We All Angels (Dead Oceans), Scowl is aiming to funnel all that aggression through a more expansive version of themselves. Much of Are We All Angels grapples with Scowl’s newfound place in the hardcore scene, a community which has both embraced the band and made them something of a lightning rod over the past few years. Standout single “Not Hell, Not Heaven” outright rejects the narratives cast onto them by outsiders. “It’s about feeling victimized and being a victim, but not wanting to identify with being a victim,” explains vocalist Kat Moss. “It’s trying to find grace in the fact that I have my power. I live in my reality. You have to deal with whatever you're dealing with, and it ain’t working for me.” The band breaks from a sense of disassociation to seek deeper connections on “Fantasy.” “It’s incredibly challenging to try to balance my love for the scene while also feeling, in some spaces, extremely alienated and hated,” Moss says. “‘Fantasy’ is about feeling like I don't know how to connect with these people anymore, because I have shelled myself away so hard.” The album ends in a philosophical place on the closing, titular track, “Are We All Angels,” asking questions like, “Is this all there is?” and ultimately putting it on the listener to decide. “It’s about the personal struggle between good and evil. It doesn’t matter how ‘good’ or ‘bad’ you are, there are systems that will try to rewrite your narrative no matter what you actually do,” explains Moss, noting that punctuation on “Are We All Angels” has been deliberately omitted in an attempt to leave the statement open-ended. Are We All Angels is the highly anticipated follow-up to Scowl’s debut, 2021’s How Flowers Grow, a 16-minute primal scream over punishing riffs. But amidst the pounding chaos, it was the record’s sonic outlier, a cleaner interlude called “Seeds to Sow,” that, true to its name, planted the seed for what was to come for the band. “It kind of laid out this destiny for us, and I feel like now we’re fulfilling that,” says drummer Cole Gilbert. The band continued to expand their sound on 2023’s widely acclaimed Psychic Dance Routine EP, incorporating more pop hooks and favoring gentler singing over heavy screaming, paving the way for what would come next. Scowl’s growth got a huge boost from producer Will Yip (Turnstile, Title Fight, Code Orange, Balance and Composure), who broadened the band’s scope. “Will would say, ‘Everything you have here is correct, but it’s in the wrong place,’” says Gilbert. Moss adds: “Will really helped restructure a lot of the material. Some songs he tore apart to make more space for the really good hooks and choruses.” But even through this more eclectic approach, Scowl loses none of their edge, and still manages to convey the anger and frustration that lies underneath. They are deeply committed to carrying the ethos of punk and its sense of community. “Hardcore and punk have sculpted how we operate, what we want to do as a band, and how we participate,” says guitarist Malachi Greene. “At our core, we are a punk and a hardcore band, regardless of how the song shifts and changes.

Scowl is a band that sounds exactly like their name implies. Venomous, fierce, antagonistic. A sneer not to be crossed. Over the last five years, the Santa Cruz, California, band has firmly planted their flag in the hardcore scene with their vicious sound and ripping live show, sharing stages around the world with Circle Jerks, Touché Amoré, and Limp Bizkit, and filling slots at prominent festivals like Coachella, Sick New World, and Reading and Leeds. But with their new album, Are We All Angels (Dead Oceans), Scowl is aiming to funnel all that aggression through a more expansive version of themselves. Much of Are We All Angels grapples with Scowl’s newfound place in the hardcore scene, a community which has both embraced the band and made them something of a lightning rod over the past few years. Standout single “Not Hell, Not Heaven” outright rejects the narratives cast onto them by outsiders. “It’s about feeling victimized and being a victim, but not wanting to identify with being a victim,” explains vocalist Kat Moss. “It’s trying to find grace in the fact that I have my power. I live in my reality. You have to deal with whatever you're dealing with, and it ain’t working for me.” The band breaks from a sense of disassociation to seek deeper connections on “Fantasy.” “It’s incredibly challenging to try to balance my love for the scene while also feeling, in some spaces, extremely alienated and hated,” Moss says. “‘Fantasy’ is about feeling like I don't know how to connect with these people anymore, because I have shelled myself away so hard.” The album ends in a philosophical place on the closing, titular track, “Are We All Angels,” asking questions like, “Is this all there is?” and ultimately putting it on the listener to decide. “It’s about the personal struggle between good and evil. It doesn’t matter how ‘good’ or ‘bad’ you are, there are systems that will try to rewrite your narrative no matter what you actually do,” explains Moss, noting that punctuation on “Are We All Angels” has been deliberately omitted in an attempt to leave the statement open-ended. Are We All Angels is the highly anticipated follow-up to Scowl’s debut, 2021’s How Flowers Grow, a 16-minute primal scream over punishing riffs. But amidst the pounding chaos, it was the record’s sonic outlier, a cleaner interlude called “Seeds to Sow,” that, true to its name, planted the seed for what was to come for the band. “It kind of laid out this destiny for us, and I feel like now we’re fulfilling that,” says drummer Cole Gilbert. The band continued to expand their sound on 2023’s widely acclaimed Psychic Dance Routine EP, incorporating more pop hooks and favoring gentler singing over heavy screaming, paving the way for what would come next. Scowl’s growth got a huge boost from producer Will Yip (Turnstile, Title Fight, Code Orange, Balance and Composure), who broadened the band’s scope. “Will would say, ‘Everything you have here is correct, but it’s in the wrong place,’” says Gilbert. Moss adds: “Will really helped restructure a lot of the material. Some songs he tore apart to make more space for the really good hooks and choruses.” But even through this more eclectic approach, Scowl loses none of their edge, and still manages to convey the anger and frustration that lies underneath. They are deeply committed to carrying the ethos of punk and its sense of community. “Hardcore and punk have sculpted how we operate, what we want to do as a band, and how we participate,” says guitarist Malachi Greene. “At our core, we are a punk and a hardcore band, regardless of how the song shifts and changes.

Besançon, sometime before lockdown… Still in high school, Laszlo, Baptiste, Matthieu, Maël and Marius, driven by a common desire to make people dance till they sweat, formed Wet Enough!?, and began to make music together, driven by a burning passion for funk, electro, rap and disco.

Early 2023, they were contacted by Antoine Rajon from label KOMOS who was to go on to produce their debut EP “DASH”, released in January 2024. A series of gigs followed in Paris, London, Brussels and the Jazz à Vienne festival under the aegis of Astérios Spectacles. That same year, they were also selected to take part in the Inouïs talent showcase at the Printemps de Bourges, as representatives of the Bourgogne Franche-Comté region.

The “Burgundy Five” then studied at music schools in Brussels, Amsterdam and Lausanne, in institutions more open than their French counterparts when it comes to exploring the full gamut of musical styles; they also frequently met up for composition sessions and concerts.

In September 2024, they left for London to record their debut album, in the studio of producer and musician Malcolm Catto, as he was charmed by a live at ‘91 Living Room’ in Brick Lane. The Heliocentrics drummer and sonic wizard behind Yussef Kamal’s famous ‘Black Focus’, used his trademark analogue approach to help craft 10 powerful tracks, collectively composed and arranged by the group.

On this release, we detect the influence of American groups like Ghost-Note and Butcher Brown, but also an energy almost akin to punk rock. And especially, we can sense an enthusiastic appetite for defying genres, without a care for codes or the constraints of aesthetic purism.

Their starting point is new jazz, conjuring up current scenes in the UK and America (‘Green Tangerine’, ‘Emile Lédonien’, ‘Lullaby for a riot’), but they soon wander into the club with the unashamed housey inflections of ‘Dump’ (carried aloft by Galawesh Heril on vocals). When Marius, the trombonist grabs the mic, he displays mastery of chiselled flow and old school French hip-hop vibes (‘Lascars, San Pé’) as well as ultra-modern, alternative aesthetics (Les 2).

During the studio sessions in London, the band invited two British musicians to guest on the record - a junglist rapper from Manchester, OneDa, who illuinates up single ‘One Leg’ with the brightness of her rhymes; and a Londoner, saxophonist Camilla George who offers a vibrant solo, riding high over the amped-up groove of Funk4.

There’s no doubt they shall join the group for upcoming shows whose philosophy is also expressed in the album’s title :

DANCING PEOPLE DON’T DRY.

A valentine for black hearts! An electric array of magic sounds! The shock return of a missing legend! The surprise formation of HOUSE Of ALL by five former members of The Fall was bound to provide some pleasant surprises, not the least of which being the creation of an identity distinct from that of any specific Fall line-up, and here the band offer an steep evolution of sound of their two previous albums . . . darker, more elliptic and can we say it? A more mystical sum of talents than most groups ever manage. They've kept their open door policy to former members of The Fall and expanded it. Phil Lewis, who's stepped in live for Pete Greenway, makes his studio debut, and the long-lost Karl Burns has emerged from his mystery lair to add a third set of drums to the line-up . . . besting The Glitter Band by 50%! How this will work live has yet to be determined, but the band has already scheduled dates in Spring, 2025. House Of All Souls is somewhat more psychedelic than its predecessors, and despite seven players, each with his own particular style, the songs and production are shockingly cohesive. From the breakneck pace of first tune, Tempest And Storm to the superb album closer, Born At Dawn And Dead At Sunset, there's quite a lot to unpack - it's an album-lover's album, each track magnificent in its own way and impossible for us to pick a fave from the lot of 'em. Plenty has been written about The Fall, whose 50th birthday is just a few years off, but rare is the group with an equally perverse and persuasive influence in that period. When HOUSE Of ALL debuted, Martin Bramah remarked on it being "part of the Fall family continuum" - a matter of actual fact, given the pedigree of its members. With this, HOUSE Of ALL's third full-length album, it's proven fact that the bright lights of those multiple talents behind the band have yet to dim.

Exploding In Sound Records is thrilled to reissue Yeddo, the debut album from Boston’s Grass Is Green. Originally self-released back in 2010, the seminal record, which pre-dates the label, celebrates fifteen years in 2025, and the band will reunite to play a weekend of shows together with Ovlov, Speedy Ortiz, and special guests in Boston, Brooklyn, and Philadelphia. A truly legendary debut, this record served as a major catalyst for the formation of Exploding In Sound, and Grass Is Green’s third album, Ronson, eventually became the label’s very first release. We’re beyond excited to bring Yeddo to vinyl for the first time ever, a raw and flawless album of arty punk, post-hardcore, and math rock that feels exuberant at all times.

Released in 1955 on Prestige Records, The Musings of Miles is the first 12” LP from legendary trumpet player Miles Davis. With Davis as bandleader, other players include Red Garland (piano), Oscar Pettiford (bass) and Philly Joe Jones (drums). This new edition of the album is released as part of the Original Jazz Classics Series on 180-gram vinyl pressed at RTI with all-analogue mastering from the original tapes at Cohearent Audio and a Stoughton Tip-On Jacket.

f11 FLRNTN, Benjamin Duchenne - "Last Man Standing" (feat Sivan) (1:08)
f12 Nicholas Gunn & Harshil Kamdar - "Here I Am" (feat Alina Renae - Richard Durand remix) (1:08)
f13 DJ TH X TH3 ONE X Sue McLaren - "Everything To Me" (1:08)
f14 Matty Ralph - "Te Adoro" (1:08)
f15 Armin Van Buuren & Vini Vici - "Sarabande" (feat Anna Timofei) (1:08)
f16 Lilly Palmer - "Hare Ram" (1:08)
f17 David Forbes - "Techno Is My Only Drug" (1:08)
f18 Armin Van Buuren - "Blah Blah Blah" (Lilly Palmer remix) (1:08)
f19 Armin Van Buuren - "The Road To Your Destination" (A State Of Trance Year mix 2024 outro) (1:14)

Philmore Greene's The Grand Design blends reflective storytelling with dynamic hip hop, now on red/pink bloom vinyl.

"I'll Be Your Rainbow is the only recorded album by classic soul singer Bobby Wilson. Originally released in 1975, the album is a perfect blend of the styles of soul that were running through the east coast underground of the early 70s. It includes elements of the burgeoning club scene on the more up-tempo songs, and sweet warm vocals on the strong mellow cuts. The album was recorded in Detroit, Philadelphia and Miami, produced by Vernon Bullock and orchestrated by Paul Riser. It features the UK soul scene hit ""Deeper and Deeper"". I'll Be Your Rainbow is available as a 50th anniversary edition of 500 copies on light green coloured vinyl and includes an insert. It is the first time the record is pressed on coloured vinyl and the first repress since its original release in 1975."

Philmore Greene's "The Grand Design" is a masterful blend of reflective storytelling and dynamic Hiphop. Deeply rooted in the rhythm and streets of Chicago, Greene is a luminary who epitomizes passion for music and undying love for the art form. The album weaves personal experience from the Westside of Chicago with sharp lyrical compositions. The follow up to Philmore's collaborative album with Apollo Brown (Cost of Living), The Grand Design continues the Chicago boom bap tradition with guest features from Bruiser Wolf, Skyzoo, UFO Fev, RJ Payne and Rashid Hadee

Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Member Little Richard is a musical institution. The Architect Of Rock ’n’ Roll’s 1970 return. Pressed on opaque pink vinyl. Mastered by Grammy®-winning engineer Michael Graves. Lacquers cut by Jeff Powell at Take Out Vinyl/Sam Phillips Recording Service in Memphis. Packaging contains liner notes from Bill Dahl. Some successful recording artists are lucky to enjoy a lengthy career and perhaps one successful comeback after their popularity wanes over time. Rock ’n’ roll pioneer and absolute legend, Little Richard, achieved several. In the ’50s he racked up a non-stop string of smashes for Specialty Records with producer Bumps Blackwell like the blistering cuts, “Tutti Frutti,” “Long Tall Sally,” and “Rip It Up.” The Georgia Peach was deemed too uninhibited and unpredictable for TV variety shows to present to the nation, but the records were undeniable hits. He was clearly, an artist far ahead of the culture and times. Little Richard returned in 1970 with The Rill Thing and instead of sticking around his adopted home of Los Angeles, Richard set out for Rick Hall’s FAME Recording Studios in Muscle Shoals, Alabama to record the album for Reprise, joined by Bumps, who was now his manager. The opening track, “Freedom Blues,” was released in April of 1970 and hit #28 on the charts. The second cut, “Greenwood Mississippi,” was also released as a single in August and also made a Billboard appearance. The marathon title track (running a whopping 10 minutes and 20 seconds) was an intense funk jam that was captured in one take. The album also featured covers of tunes by The Beatles and Hank Williams—it was a different sound by far than the savagely rocking attack he’d ridden to fame like a rocket at Specialty close to a decade and- a-half earlier, but it was every bit as effective. The Rill Thing bore the slogan “The Little Richard Sound” on its labels. “He was at his peak with his vocals on there,” says guitarist Travis Wammack admiringly. “He was just singing his booty off!” The Rill Thing is back as a 12" long player, and pressed on opaque pink vinyl with a printed inner sleeve that includes liner notes by Bill Dahl.

On Still + Bright, her highly-anticipated follow up to, Wary + Strange, Amythyst Kiah shares a dozen songs that mark an evolution in her sound. Kiah says, “With this album, I’ve always been incredibly interested in stories and philosophy. Lots of the songs are inspired by the cosmos, space, meditation, and mindfulness. It’s a way to piece out what it means to be a human being in the modern world. It’s the general idea that we should all have the freedom to decide what path we want to choose.” Still + Bright is produced by Butch Walker (Fall Out Boy, Green Day, Weezer) and features special guests including SG Goodman, Avi Kaplan, and Billy Strings. All of the songs were brought to life by Kiah and co-writers, including Sean McConnell, Avi Kaplan, Sadler Vaden, and Tim Armstrong, among others. Still + Bright is set for release on October 25, 2024. “Years in the making, Still + Bright explores what it means to be a human being in the modern world. Songwriting is my way to marry big, overarching philosophical ideas and questions into a musical, more organized arrangement. Inspired by the cosmos, space, meditation, and mindfulness – this record directly challenges religious and political dogma, stating that we should all have the freedom to decide what path we want to choose.” Recently Kiah featured in Salon talking about her love of country and bluegrass music and was included in a New York Times T Magazine spotlight and documentary: The Next Generation of Black Folk Singers. Her episode of PBS’ The Express Way with Dulé Hill aired nationally on April 30, Kiah is featured in Episode 2: “Appalachia”. She recently appeared on a panel at the Television Critics Association Press Conference which was attended by over 200 television critics around the globe. This June she will be on the road opening for Iron & Wine.

Philadelphian Jazz legend Benny Golson, an American bebop/ hard bop jazz tenor saxophonist, composer, and arranger, has had a long and storied career.

He has played with luminaries such as John Coltrane, Dizzy Gillespie and Art Blakey, to name just a few.

With his 1978 album “I’m Always Dancin’ To The Music,” Golson took a unique turn. Known primarily for his hard bop roots and classic compositions like “Whisper Not”

and “Killer Joe,” Golson steps into the realms of jazz-funk and disco with this release.

The title song is a stellar dance groove, holding heavyweight status among underground soul, funk, and jazz aficionados—a true ‘rare groove’ indeed.

Produced by George Butler, the instrumental hook of this title song has been sampled many times by artists such as Naughty by Nature, Logistics, Leona Lewis, and many others.

This is a real hidden gem and well worth seeking out!

This release comes as a limited edition of 750 copies on light green coloured vinyl.

Deluxe Anniversary Edition. Jade Green Swirl Vinyl. LP+7". - Deluxe Anniversary Edition of LP celebratiing 10 years since it's initial release - Enclosed in hardcover photobook with 96 pages of photos from the era with liner notes from each member of Modern Baseball - Includes exclusive 7" with. It's been ten whole years of us listening to Modern Baseballl's iconic record You're Gonna Miss It All, and to celebrate Run For Cover has teamed with the band to deliver a deluxe anniversary edition worthy of it's legacy. This version of the band's second album is a collector's delight - two discs enclosed in a heavyweight, hardcover 12" x 12" book with 96 pages of photos from longtime collaborator Jess Flynn. Each member of Modern Baseball also contributed notes to provide context to the countless photos taken while touring, recording, skateboarding, napping, swimming and a whole lot more. This deluxe edition also includes two never-before released demos of "Rock Bottom" and "Pothole" pressed on an exclusive 7". These early, intimate versions show how the ideas behind these two favorite tracks progressed into the final takes that made it onto You're Gonna Miss It All. Modern Baseball was formed in 2011 by friends and guitarists Jacob Ewald and Brendan Lukens, who were soon joined by Ian Farmer on bass and Sean Huber on drums.The band self-released their first EP The Nameless Ranger in 2011 while still in high school. Shortly after the members relocated to Philadelphia to attend college and quickly gained a strong following in the Philadelphia music community, teaming up with locals Marietta to release the Couples Therapy split in the spring of 2012. Modern Baseball released their debut full-length Sports later that year on Lame-O Records, which they self-recorded and produced. After spending the summer of 2013 touring heavily across the US, the band headed into Studio A in Philadelphia to self-record You're Going to Miss It All. Mixed by Jonathan Low at Minor Street Recordings and mastered by Will Yip, You're Going to Miss It All features 12 tracks that showcase the band's signature witty indie-pop.

Ever-evolving the mythologies and magic of Dialect's sonic sphere, Andrew PM Hunt returns with Atlas of Green, elegantly molding unexacting details of memory and mistranslation into the framework of the British musician and composer's creative pursuit. The album imagines a young musician named Green working in a future dawning era where lost signals and enduring impulses are unearthed from the sediments of technology and time. Across twelve compositions, Green becomes the compass in an epoch of transition; one shaded with pastoral patinas and studded with the fragments of allegorical ruin. As tattered as it is tender, Atlas of Green is a patchwork of scavenged relics and bygone hues, cast through the iridescent shimmers of a mid-future in flux. Growing up on the Wirral Peninsula in North West England, Hunt was surrounded by stone age landmarks and rock carvings that infused the landscape with legend. It was beside those carvings on a residency at Bidston Artistic Research Center where he began the journey of Atlas of Green, experimenting with tape loops and exploring the center's library of sci-fi. Here Hunt also encountered the work of Italian philosopher Federico Campagna, a writer who believes we're at the end of our current world. This encouraged Hunt's exploration of how the fabric and fantasies of our current era might endure into the future of Green, as they try to make sense of the riddles of the past, utilizing broken electronics and simple acoustic instruments to create new mythic forms. This question of endurance led Hunt to inscribe Atlas of Green with its own lucid markings - sometimes almost anthemic adornments - which unfurl through the album's melancholic air as possible new metaphors for how the human spirit might persist through dark days and regain lost wisdom. As Hunt reflects, "We're not just on an endless procession through constantly better worlds. Our lack of action (on climate and inequality) feels hopeless at times. I find some comfort in the idea that maybe the world needs a new song in order to tell a new story about itself". The image of Green as a journeying adolescent in-between eras developed out of a burgeoning interest in the fantasy writing of Ursula K. Le Guin and Gene Wolfe and occurred at a point in Hunt's life where the question of starting a family was looming. Green became a device for thinking about the future, or futures, putting someone in another world and granting access to a slightly longer timeframe than one's own life. What would this person, in this as-yet-unsung world do with something as powerful as music? As Hunt notes, "I imagined them doing what we've always done with music - using it to build a map of feeling, providing boundaries and tracing the edges of our emotions, defining a space of possibility and giving voice to our intuition. This is an alternative future to the one of endless growth but one which still holds space for hopes and dreams." Mapping new folds in the passage of time, Atlas of Green is traced with an aura of sonic urgency which arises through its process-led construction. Following a series of live shows in early 2023, the record was created with an assemblage of analogue electronics and acoustic instruments, including scratched records and a broken four track, collaging studio work with recorded live recordings featuring work in progress. Where the indeterminate energies of Under~Between (2021) appeared through digital processing, Atlas of Green embraces chance encounters within the malfunctions of physical media and glitching gear. Within these interwoven clusters of organic and blemished sound, Dialect reclaims the joyfulness of the inner amateur and creates a soft landing for new seeds of magical possibility - rooted in the bounds and abundance of realism. "As a planet of people we have to deal one way or another with our finite existence. We have to deal with that loss with hope still in our hearts - our capacity to love cannot be contingent on things lasting forever, and so this image of Green is not a vision of dystopia, nor utopia but an expression of trust and an acceptance of limits."

Nigerian electronic musician and violist Ibukun Sunday debuts on Phantom Limb with Harmony / Balance, a brooding, introspective take on Afro-ambient music that follows two acclaimed digital-only albums for Phantom Limb imprint Spirituals.


Based in Lagos, Ibukun Sunday has expertly positioned himself between the rarely-married cultures of ambient and West African musics. He entwines his compositions with field recordings from his native Nigeria and deeply considered philosophies of existence, humanity, and society. The themes of Harmony / Balance derive from Swami and Hare Krishna founder A. C. Bhaktivedanta and his work Bhagavad-Gita Eng: “As It Is”, a script on the duality of human nature. In Bhaktivedanta’s text, two cousins - warriors from the sacred Hindu text the Mahābhārata - and their armies are pitted against each other. The humility, self control, and devotion of one cousin against the arrogance, envy, and pursuit of power of the other. Bhaktivedanta writes that from this battle we see the necessity to cultivate and nurture our love and faith, but to simultaneously understand our selfishness and hubris. Appropriately, in Ibukun Sunday’s music, a heavy, apocalyptic dread contrasts fascinatingly with passages of light. The static-spiked, corrosive sound design of Harmony / Balance conjures darkness, but its skipping rhythmic patterns and melodic contours are made of beautifully vibrant colours.



Though Sunday excels in the kind of drawn-out elegance also found in the work of Kali Malone, William Basinski or Fennesz, and also in a magisterial repetition akin to Terry Riley or Manuel Göttsching, his unique practice, classical training, and core culture shine through in a pure and singular way. Scattered throughout Harmony / Balance are unexpected melodic antiphonies closely aligned with African music, interspersed between huge, spacious drones and field recordings.



Lead track “Arrayed On The Battlefield” evokes mythical and deific wars with hissing, buzzing synthesis that could be dystopian if not for a levitational, sunlit harmonic structure. It rolls and shimmers, transcendent frequencies alive with rhythm. Later, “Enemy Of My Enemy” employs shimmering, meditative chord pads and blissful negative space, while towards the end of the record, “To Fight With” could have been taken from a Denis Villeneuve sci-fi - the fizzing, fiery distortion at its peak gradually, carefully yields a rumbling, distant thunder as it closes. Throughout the record, Sunday’s education as a classical viola player is also evident. A honed musicality and developed ear for harmonic resonances lend the work a measured eloquence, even amidst deep, spiritual intuitiveness. This intensely personal and powerfully expressive creativity is key to the grace with which he crosses divides.


Ibukun Sunday is a solo electronic musician and violist based in Lagos, Nigeria. He has released two albums with Phantom Limb’s digital-only imprint Spirituals, which enjoyed rightful acclaim as unique and powerful works of experimental ambient music. He also performed at Phantom Limb’s 5th anniversary celebrations in 2023, playing alongside Richard Skelton at St. John’s on Bethnal Green in London, UK.

Over a catalog of six albums, Native Harrow have produced a discography of “rich, engrossing records” and “instant classics” while single-mindedly following their own artistic code, acquiescing only to the exigence of the song: each song its own world with its own rules.

Formed a decade ago, Native Harrow spent their first five or six years crisscrossing the United States and Canada on numerous tours, averaging more than 150 concerts per year in 47 states and 4 provinces, on the back of two self-released albums, Ghost (2015) and Sorores (2017). In 2019, they released Happier Now, partnering with London alt-country stalwarts Loose Records. The record garnered glowing reviews, with Rough Trade selecting it for its album of the month, writing “Beautifully soaring... rolling grooves ground languid and dreamy clearwater shimmers of sound.” The critical acclaim and Americana chart success of the album prompted three back-to-back UK tours in 2019 and early 2020, ultimately leading to a three-year stint living and touring in the UK and Europe. In this time, Native Harrow released two more critically acclaimed records with Loose; Closeness (2020) and Old Kind of Magic (2022), playing for audiences ranging from rock clubs in Norway and Sweden to opera halls in Portugal, and every stop in-between, as well as performing at festivals such as BST Hyde Park (supporting the Eagles and Robert Plant & Alison Kraus), Greenman Festival, Black Deer Festival, The Great Escape, Celtic Connections, Moseley Folk Festival, SXSW, and many more.

Following the eruption of its title track, Side A of “Divided Kind” transitions nimbly through hazy tremolo-laden dusty canyons, past an intimate soulful love letter, and towards a moody anthem of devotion buoyed by propulsive grooves, before ultimately settling on a gentle bird’s-eye-view of love and transcendence. Side B opens with the debut single, “Goin’ Nowhere” a soul transmission over incendiary bass and undulating layers of guiro, congas, tambourines, shakers, and handclaps that sidesteps into moments of infinite dial-toned burnished, Rhodes-propelled soul-jazz and self-assured blues rock à gogo before ending in a spectral folk reading on celestial meditation.

“Divided Kind” was produced and recorded by the pair, in their home studio surrounded by the vintage acoustic and electric guitars, dusty semi-functional amplifiers, and out-of-date Rhodes, B3, piano, and assorted percussion they’ve grown accustomed to. Chicago-based Alex Hall was again drafted to add drums and to mix, and Philadelphia drummer and engineer Joshua Friedman mastered the record. London-based musician Joe Harvey-Whyte added the pedal steel to “Borrowing Time”, with all other voices and instruments being performed by Tuel and Harms.

Edwin Birdsong’s self titled album was released in 1978 on Philadelphia International Records at the height of the Disco craze. By this time, Edwin was a major player at PIR and a talented songwriter and producer as well. Birdsong’s vision hits the mark as the album boasts several gems that became dance floor classics, especially in New York, Philadelphia, Chicago, LA and San Francisco. “Cola Bottle Baby”, “Kunta Dance” and “Goldmine” are all hard hitting funks gems that kick in hard and are ready for partying. Daft Punk sampled the hitsong "Cola Bottle Baby" in "Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger". The sexy “Lollipop” is years ahead of its time and the irresistible “Freaky Deaky Sities” and “Phiss-Phizz” both became huge club hits, despite not having charted on any of the Billboard charts. Even though the album missed the charts, it became something of a hot item for disco/soul music collectors. Edwin Birdsong is available as a 45th anniversary limited edition of 750 copies on crystal clear and transparant green marbled vinyl.

Yannis Philippakis von Foals veröffentlicht sein erstes Solowerk, eine Kollaboration mit dem verstorbenen legendären Schlagzeuger Tony Allen. Yannis & The Yaw" präsentieren die EP 'Lagos Paris London', die nach den Orten benannt ist, an denen sie geschrieben und aufgenommen wurde und an denen sie beide gelebt haben. Das fünf Tracks umfassende Werk wird am 30. August auf Transgressive veröffentlicht.

Im Jahr 2016 bot sich Yannis die Chance seines Lebens: eine zweitägige Session mit dem großen Schlagzeuger Tony Allen, den er für seine einflussreiche, genreübergreifende Arbeit mit Künstlern wie Fela Kuti, Sébastien Tellier und Jeff Mills sehr bewundert.

Als Yannis sich in ein verrauchtes 70er-Jahre-Studio in Paris begab, erwartete er, dass sie eine nostalgische Afrobeat-Platte aufnehmen würden. Doch es kam etwas ganz anderes dabei heraus. Die beiden entwickelten schnell eine intuitive Telepathie, die Musik entstand aus Jams und Loops, und die verschiedenen Berührungspunkte - Rock, Funk, Jazz, Dub und mehr - wurden durch die einzigartige Atmosphäre des Aufeinandertreffens zweier Kulturen und kreativer Köpfe ergänzt, deren Ausdruck durch das Musizieren im und für den Moment selbst befreit wurde.

Zusammen mit Tonys regelmäßigen Mitstreitern Vincent Taeger (Schlagzeug), Vincent Turrell (Tasten, Marimba) und Ludovic Bruni (Bass, Gitarre) entstand bei diesem ersten Treffen eine Handvoll fast fertiger Songs, die in einigen nachfolgenden Sessions weiter entwickelt wurden. Aufgrund von Terminproblemen und Corona-Einschränkungen wurden die Aufnahmen jedoch nie abgeschlossen, bevor Tony im April 2020 im Alter von 79 Jahren verstarb.

Yannis fühlte sich zutiefst verpflichtet, das Projekt zu vollenden, nicht nur als bittersüße Art, seinen alten Freund zu ehren und zu feiern, sondern auch, weil Tony so begierig darauf gewesen war, diese Songs mit der Welt zu teilen. Das Ergebnis ist die kommende Fünf-Track-EP 'Lagos Paris London' unter dem Dach von Yannis & The Yaw - ein Projekt, zu dem er in Zukunft zurückkehren möchte, um weitere Kollaborationen mit inspirierenden Musikern aus der ganzen Welt einzugehen.

- Ltd. 12" EP

First ever vinyl edition of Deuce’s only album from 1995 (UK Album Chart #18). Specially
pressed in Dayglo lime green vinyl. The Phil Harding (PWL, East 17, 911, Boyzone) and Ian
Curnow written and produced album contains all of Deuce’s Top 40 singles chart hits ‘Call
It Love’ (UK #11), ‘I Need You’ (UK #10) and ‘On The Bible’ (UK #13) and, for the first time,
also includes, as a bonus track, their fourth and final single ‘No Surrender’ (UK #29) as
produced/mixed by PWL legends Mike Stock and Matt Aitken.
Deuce were the brainchild of pop impresario Tom Watkins (Pet Shop Boys, Bros, East 17,
Electribe 101). Remastered by Kinky Roland.

Die Musik von Ausfahrt entspringt den Erfahrungen der Gitarristin und Komponistin Christina Zurhausen. Ihre eingängigen Songs beschreiben den rauen Alltag ihrer Heimat, dem postindustriellen Ruhrgebiet. Verschiedenste Elemente verschmelzen zu einem Lebensgefühl, zu den wichtigsten gehören die Grungerock-Ästhetik der 90er Jahre und die improvisatorische Energie des Modern Jazz. Es geht um Liebe und Streit, aber auch um philosophische Gedanken: Was hält die Welt im Innersten zusammen?Das eingespielte Quartett aus Köln besteht aus Yaroslav Likhachev am Saxophon mit seinen expressiven und virtuosen Linien, Torben Schug am Bass mit seinem klaren Ton und straight gespielten Riffs und Ramon Keckam Schlagzeug, dem gefühlvollen und verspielten Rhythmuslieferanten. Geleitet wird die Band von Christina Zurhausen, die mit ihrem unverwechselbaren Spiel gekonnt zwischen nachdenklichen Linien und ausgelassenen Sounds wechselt.Die 2015 gegründete Band Ausfahrt versteht es, Stimmungen von Elegie und Inbrunst auszudrücken, und ihre Improvisationen spiegeln die Bandbreite zwischen klagendem Weltschmerz, reißender Wut und versöhnlichen Klängen wider. Ob in streitsuchenden Riffs, verspielten Beats oder emotionalen Soli - Zurhausens Musik wird mit Punk-Attitüde und virtuoser Spielfreude direkt und unverschnörkelt interpretiert.

Previously Unreleased Recording. Limited to 1200 copies on transparent cherry vinyl. Tip-on jacket, Download code. Insert featuring LP sized original art by Grungie O'Muck. Includes the original recording of Richard Tucker's "Are You Leaving For The Country", later covered by Karen Dalton, and the only song co-written by Karen & Richard, "Sleeping In The Garden". "Richard, Cam & Bert seem to have grasped The Great Harmony. That is, ensemble singing that is at once sweet, precise, funky and a bit sardonic..." -Mike Jahn / New York Times (1970) "For a few years in the late sixties and early seventies Richard Cam & Bert ruled MacDougal St. walking a fine line between the increasingly commercialized demands created by groups like Crosby Stills and Nash and the fierce integrity of earlier folk performers, the generation to which Richard belonged. They managed this with great aplomb, producing original tunes of great integrity and obvious folkloric origins, as well as those which expressed the anarchic omnipresent psychedelia of the moment. They also never abandoned the idea of including some traditional material in their performances. But for the usual random application of luck they could have been very big." - Grungie O'Muck / Artist, Bluesman, Cover artist for their first album and contributor to this one. Richard Tucker, Campbell Bruce, and Bert Lee coalesced as a trio in the spring of 1968, and by the end of that year had become regular performers at fabled Greenwich Village nightspots - The Gaslight, The Bag I'm In, Cafe Feenjon, among others. But mostly they were street singers, busking regularly in Central Park. Their only LP, Limited Edition, was released in 1970, and sold mainly at gigs and on the street. Somewhere in The Stars compiles earlier, previously unreleased recordings, when all three members were signed with Peer-Southern Music publishers as writers and began using their studio to make demos and experiment musically. Beautifully recorded by house engineer Charlie Mack (supervised by Jimmy Ienner), the demos capture a back room casualness and rustic, homespun quality. For me, listening to their songs and harmonies is like entering a world you always hoped existed but had never experienced. Some of the songs were re-recorded the following year for Limited Edition, but many are heard here for the first time. Among them is the original demo for Richard Tucker's song, "Are You Leaving For The Country", which Karen Dalton covered on her seminal 1971 release, In My Own Time. Richard and Karen were husband and wife for much of the 1960s, performing as a duo (initially as a trio with Tim Hardin), and navigating their time on the Village scene while alternating living in a small mining town outside Boulder, Co. before splitting up in 1967. Also making its debut, is the only song Richard and Karen ever wrote together, the haunting "Sleeping In The Garden". Also contains two epic songs by Cam "One Of These First Nights", and "Stockholm") not on their LP, but staples of their live performances, and noted in a gig review by The New York Times, and in a column by future A&R hero, Karin Berg, who was an early champion. Another rarity is the only cover of "Sweet Mama" by Fred Neil we've ever heard. Campell Bruce came to New York in 1967 as lead singer with a band from Washington, DC, The Natty Bumpo. They'd recently signed a record deal with Phillips, but were falling apart. Cam landed in the Village with an acoustic guitar and first started playing and singing in the basket houses, and shortly thereafter at The Gaslight, as the "Cam Bruce Trio" (which included Collin Walcott). After opening for Mose Allison, Cam's hero, the trio went their separate ways, and Cam returned to regular solo gigs at The Flamenco, and the basket houses on Bleecker. Richard and Cam met up on that scene and quickly found a musical kinship as well as becoming best pals. Bert Lee arrived in New York as a runaway the following winter, and began playing and sleeping wherever he could. His sometime accompanist, Ron Price, introduced Bert to Richard and Cam just as Bert's own songs were garnering attention from publishers. According to Bert, "I arrived on the New York scene during a time of great change, and it was the notion of change that influenced me. All around me I saw there were two sorts of songwriters, on the one hand dedicated to the traditions that had inspired them, folk, jazz, the American songbook. On the other hand were songwriters influenced by the wave of experimentation that The Beatles were the perfect example of. Mixing genres, writing lyrics that weren't just about ordinary love and loss. Richard Tucker was a country blues player, with a relaxed and melodic approach to the craft. Cam wrote something more akin to soul songs, with a hint of jazz in the changes. I was writing tunes that sometimes drew on classical structures with a tendency toward what I suppose would be known as prog-rock. But I was rather adamant about not being pinned down stylistically, and so I would write, for example, a song based on some complex classical chord structure, and then go right ahead and write a simple folk song, like Evelyn. Our band was popular locally, and it was this variety that made it distinct." Delmore is excited to present this unearthed treasure, fifteen years in the making. In the words of Richard Tucker, "Tap on your knee, roll on the floor; if you aint free, what's it all for?" "The trio's singing, playing, and writing have all withstood the test of time. Believe me, because I was there. In 1969 R,C&B, myself, Charles John Quarto, David Bromberg, Ron Price, and Keith Sykes were just a few of that year's crop of song-slingers. We were young turks back then, out on the prowl in New York's Greenwich Village for record deals, gigs, and beautiful young women to sleep with and maybe even write a song about. I've lost the names and numbers of those lovelies and I'm not sure what happened to Ron Price, but Richard, Cam, and Bert are back! - Loudon Wainwright lll

Following a stunning introduction to the world with her 'Sometimes I Forget You're Human Too' EP release in early 2021, Bored At My Grandmas House (AKA Amber Strawbridge) is back with the compelling new single Detox.

It's a tale of navigating change with Amber explaining it’s about “feeling alienated, not knowing who you can and can’t trust, and figuring out how to be yourself whilst also discovering who you are”. “The lyrics represent exactly how I felt in that current moment, numb, confused to who I was and overwhelmed by all the changes I was starting to encounter”.

While Detox retains a lot of the indie and shoegaze elements prevalent in Amber's debut EP, it also shows growth and maturity in sound, with more contemplative lyrics asking questions of the listener. It's a stunning synth-laden track which broods and swells.

Lyrically, there is a deep introspection and a philosophical desire to question and understand human nature, culminating in the "I think we need to Detox" hook.

The track will be released on a limited edition 7" vinyl via Clue Records with a bottle green vinyl available from the artist and label and a toxic yellow version available at all good indie record shops. Following the first 2 pressings of Amber's debut EP selling out ahead of release date, these will be highly sought after.

The track was recorded by Amber at home in Cumbria before being sent to Alex Greaves (bdrmm, Working Mens Club) to add some elements and mix the track. Amber and Alex worked closely together on the final revisions.

The origins of 21 year-old Amber Strawbridge's bedroom shoegaze project Bored at My Grandma's House are perhaps unsurprising given the name. Facing an extended stay with relatives after a trip to Cambodia, Amber used the spare time to start making beats on her phone with Garageband. Fast forward to 2022, the home set up's more than evolved, she's released her debut EP 'Sometimes I Forget You're Human Too' to critical acclaim ,and now steps back into the light with new single Detox.

Vinyl Packaging: Full color jacket featuring original artwork by Callum Rooney. Can I Communicate With the Unknown? is the new album from Go By Ocean, moniker of Northern California based singer / songwriter / producer Ryan McCaffrey. Co-produced alongside Tim Bluhm (The Mother Hips) and David Glasebrook, the album features contributions from a wide cast of characters, ranging from the tight knit community of Phil Lesh’s much loved Terrapin Crossroads to the wider West Coast indie-rock scene, including members of The Mother Hips, Sugar Candy Mountain, ALO, Tea Leaf Green, and more. Building upon McCaffrey’s catalog of songs, the new album finds inspiration in the down-to-earth music of 1970’s Marin County, when songwriters like Michael Hurley and Jesse Colin Young lived out in Olema and Point Reyes, the kind of places where songs blow in on the breeze from the Pacific Ocean. Lyrically, the album traces a hero’s journey as the narrator struggles with addiction, eventually finding peace and freedom in a tumultuous world, wrestling with metaphysical and spiritual ideas along the way. Highly anticipated new album from Go By Ocean, co-produced by Tim Bluhm of The Mother Hips. Press coverage includes reviews and features in Austin Town Hall, Glide Magazine, Psychedelic Baby Magazine, and more. UK/EU Publicity handled by Chris Carr & Mal Smith. “...washed with breezy beachy vibes…” - Glide Magazine // “...marries the bright guitar arrangement of The Byrds with an updated indie appeal.” - The Wild Is Calling // “...you can almost feel the hope over the hills waiting for you with open arms.” - Austin Town Hall // “‘...satisfyingly artful and I would venture to guess you’ve never heard anything quite like it.” - Ear To the Ground Music // “We will be spinning the hell out of this record for the rest of the summer.” - Up To Hear Music // “...it’s not hard to imagine some of these songs floating in on the coastal fog, ascending ghosts indeed.” - Psychedelic Baby Magazine

Fin Greenalls introspektives, philosophisches und sanft euphorisches Songwriting wurde mit den langjährigen Bandkollegen Tim Thornton (drums/git) und Guy Whittaker (bass) in völliger Abgeschiedenheit aufgenommen. Der gebürtige, in Berliner lebende Cornwaller suchte die Einsamkeit und Bodenständigkeit des kleinen Dorfes Zennor an der malerischen Atlantikküste Cornwalls, wo die Band das neu errichtete Studio des Produzenten Sam Okell einweihte, des Grammy-prämierten Tontechnikers/Mixers der Beatles-Alben "Get Back" und "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band - 50th Anniversary Release".

In der Vorstellung, dass so ein klassisch-englisches Lo-Fi-Folk-Album entstehen könnte, trieb die gemeinsame kreative Unruhe der Band und Okells "Beauty In Your Wake" stattdessen in die weitläufigen Gefilde von FINKs kommerziell erfolgreichen Alben der 2000-2010er Jahre und ist eine Rückkehr zu sich selbst. Die Musik von FINK war schon immer in ein breiteres globales Geflecht eingebettet, nicht zuletzt, weil sie in zahllosen Film/TV-Soundtracks wie "Better Call Saul", "The Walking Dead" und der neuesten Staffel von "True Detective" und "Ava du Vernays Origin" zu hören war, für die Greenall einen exklusiven Song schrieb.

Greenalls wurde 1997 bei Ninja Tune unter Vertrag genommen. Die neu formierte, klassische FINK-Besetzung ist dieselbe, mit der die Band ihr erstes Album "Biscuits For Breakfast" (2006) aufnahm, das sich als Sprungbrett für internationale Touren erwies. Nach drei weiteren Alben wurde die Band immer experimenteller, live und auf Platte. Mit der jungen Amy Winehouse unterhielt sich Greenall über seine Songwriter-Sessions und arbeitete mit so unterschiedlichen Künstlern wie Mahalia, Banks, Ben Howard und Pino Palladino im Studio und auf der Bühne zusammen. Zu seinen Auszeichnungen gehören drei BMI Songwriting Awards für die Arbeit mit John Legend an dessen "Evolver"-Album, der Nr.1-Single "Green Light" und dessen Soundtrack zu "12 Years A Slave".

Fin Greenalls introspektives, philosophisches und sanft euphorisches Songwriting wurde mit den langjährigen Bandkollegen Tim Thornton (drums/git) und Guy Whittaker (bass) in völliger Abgeschiedenheit aufgenommen. Der gebürtige, in Berliner lebende Cornwaller suchte die Einsamkeit und Bodenständigkeit des kleinen Dorfes Zennor an der malerischen Atlantikküste Cornwalls, wo die Band das neu errichtete Studio des Produzenten Sam Okell einweihte, des Grammy-prämierten Tontechnikers/Mixers der Beatles-Alben "Get Back" und "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band - 50th Anniversary Release".

In der Vorstellung, dass so ein klassisch-englisches Lo-Fi-Folk-Album entstehen könnte, trieb die gemeinsame kreative Unruhe der Band und Okells "Beauty In Your Wake" stattdessen in die weitläufigen Gefilde von FINKs kommerziell erfolgreichen Alben der 2000-2010er Jahre und ist eine Rückkehr zu sich selbst. Die Musik von FINK war schon immer in ein breiteres globales Geflecht eingebettet, nicht zuletzt, weil sie in zahllosen Film/TV-Soundtracks wie "Better Call Saul", "The Walking Dead" und der neuesten Staffel von "True Detective" und "Ava du Vernays Origin" zu hören war, für die Greenall einen exklusiven Song schrieb.

Greenalls wurde 1997 bei Ninja Tune unter Vertrag genommen. Die neu formierte, klassische FINK-Besetzung ist dieselbe, mit der die Band ihr erstes Album "Biscuits For Breakfast" (2006) aufnahm, das sich als Sprungbrett für internationale Touren erwies. Nach drei weiteren Alben wurde die Band immer experimenteller, live und auf Platte. Mit der jungen Amy Winehouse unterhielt sich Greenall über seine Songwriter-Sessions und arbeitete mit so unterschiedlichen Künstlern wie Mahalia, Banks, Ben Howard und Pino Palladino im Studio und auf der Bühne zusammen. Zu seinen Auszeichnungen gehören drei BMI Songwriting Awards für die Arbeit mit John Legend an dessen "Evolver"-Album, der Nr.1-Single "Green Light" und dessen Soundtrack zu "12 Years A Slave".

Philly heavy-weight OT The Real has been steadily building up his reputation in the game over the last few years, projects with Heatmakerz and DJ Green Lantern have been solidifying his name in the world of underground hip-hop, and this brand new collaboration with veteran Boston native producer Statik Selektah is yet another proof of his relentless work ethic and growth. Featuring guest appearances by Freeway, Merkules and Wallo among others, "Maxed Out" is yet another step up in OT's catalog, setting his path on the way up!

In many ways, the music of Writhing Squares could have only originated in Philadelphia; the city itself a microcosm of creatives, go-getters, freaks & weirdos that have coalesced into a supportive & boundary-pushing crew. Former Purling Hiss bassist Daniel Provenzano & Ecstatic Vision sax-player & vocalist Kevin Nickles' first musical missive was shot forth in 2013 (the self-released CDR "Live In Space") & various singles, split releases, albums (and a double-album) later we arrive at the duo's fourth full-length "Mythology", their third for Chicago-based Trouble In Mind Records. "Mythology" picks up the pieces left shattered by their previous double-album "Chart For The Solution" and reconnects the broken shards together like Kintsugi, the ancient Japanese technique for mending broken ceramics, infusing the breaks with powdered gold. The Squares themselves are like mad-scientists, taking the ruined detritus populating junk shops & surplus outlets & constructing their own sonic laboratories in their New Jersey basements to record, mix & tweak "Mythology"s eight tracks. Their new location allowed the band to regroup, reassess & reconstruct their sound from the ground up, shearing away the cosmic excess of 2021's "Chart For The Solution" to a sharper point. Tracks like `Barbarians' & `LEM' are classic Squares; brutal, aggressive, unwavering assault of Motorhead/Stooges-inflected sci-fi punk scree, while others like `Chromatophage's mutant funk & `Cerberus's techno-slink owe a serious debt to electric-era Miles Davis or Herbie Hancock & show that the group has more to offer than bludgeoning you with sonic force. Provenzano's bass & electronics are like a tank rolling across the terrain - a gnarly construct of Hawkwind-ian headiness & `Vincebus Eruptum's snarl - uncaring of what gets in the way. Nickles' brass vacillates between Stooges-influenced sleaze, jazzy no-wave stabs, & cacophonous sonic storms, strafing the listener into oblivion. The duo are joined on "Mythology" by drummer John Schoemaker - who contributed drums to "Chart For The Solution"s epic closing track `Epilogue' - whose percussive pulse adds an organic swing to The Square's sonics, particularly on album closer "The Damned Thing"s cosmic strut. "Mythology" tackles a multitude of themes, from fantastical tales of hellhound `Cerberus' or the comic-inspired "Eternity " to `Chromatophage's colorful/evil yarn about animals that eat colors (or a Magic: The Gathering card) to the true-life influenced `Acid Rain' that deals with the uncertainty of consuming drinking water after a chemical spill in the Delaware River. Elsewhere, `Ferrell' is an homage to the late, great Ferrell "Pharaoh" Sanders & `The Damned Thing' by a short horror story penned by Ambrose Bierce about an animal whose coloring is invisible to the naked eye. Writhing Squares are in a transitional phase, mapping out a new sonic mythology for themselves after crossing the event horizon into unknown space. "Mythology" is streaming on most DSPs & released on black vinyl & limited fluorescent green vinyl (while supplies last) on April 26th, 2024.