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1982 4-Piece Demo' is the first official, fully-licensed and unreleased material to be released under the name Strawberry Switchblade in 30 years. Since disbanding amid major record label acrimony and personal differences in 1986, the already-cult band have since grown in stature and legend. Trailblazers in many ways, the band's mythology justifiably centers around the charismatic duo of Jill Bryson and Rose McDowall, but that isn't a complete picture. Bryson and McDowall's growing friendship, having met some years earlier on the punk scene, became a creative partnership: Bryson's art school background and McDowall's history in avant-punk group The Poets meant Strawberry Switchblade was a band pitted against many established norms. The band's very first incarnation, an all-female 4 piece, recorded one demo at Glasgow's Hellfire Club and played a handful of gigs. Friends Janice Goodlett and Carole McGowan completed the line up on bass and drums respectively. Strawberry Switchblade would eventually pair down to a duo and go on to chart success but it's in these raw, passionate recordings that the songwriting and vocal elements were being hammered out and explored in real time.


Spanish Song' is a previously unreleased song. With Rose McDowall's instantly recognizable lead vocal dovetailing with Bryson's harmonies and lead guitar, it's the first glimpse at an alternative history of Strawberry Switchblade. This incarnation could easily have been featured on a Nuggets compilation or a precursor to the indie-pop revolution that would take over British bedrooms a couple of years later. "Trees & Flowers" is instantly recognizable, a bona fide classic that would earn the band its first record deal. Here it's given a more forceful rhythm section: Goodlett and McGowan's playing is in fact accomplished and doesn't hint at the bands' youth. "Go Away" would also surface later on the band's debut LP but here it is a moody-garage stomper with a psychedelic, haunting refrain. These 3 songs point to a tantalizing future of the band that was never realized.


Remastered and restored by Sean Pennycook from the original cassette, with artwork based on a single photographic contact sheet (the only visual evidence of the band in this form) and with a booklet of photographs and new text. Pa

Crafting another beautiful experience in sensorial delight, fleet.dreams returns to Vinezza with the label’s 3rd offering “A Voice Without Color” - born from an ever-deepening practice of groove-powered depth tech melded with realms of dubwise kineticism, enchanted cognition, and expressive, dreamlike synthesis.

“A Voice Without Color” finds fleet.dreams’ music in its most rave-activated mode yet, crafting 4 pieces of infinitely mixable spectral matter - all part of their own universe beckoning to be heard under the glow of stars in the night sky, or floating amidst the mesmerizing fog & lights pumping out of the system on your favorite dancefloor.

Awash in kaleidoscopic splendor and psychedelic intrigue, “A Voice Without Color” finds kinship in everything from the best of expansive dancefloor kineticism, time dilated wonder, and the vivid reverbations of the natural world floating in the mix. At once quintessential, contemporary, and ubiquitous is fleet.dreams’ own remarkable production technique, each track unfurling in seemingly endless swells of simmering rhythm and hypnotizing atmospherics - new memories of circadian entrancement in their molten essence, designed to blissfully guide you deeper and deeper towards the primordial exhilaration of movement. Undulating with vivid pulsations and clarion calls for the hips and mind echoing across a spiraling gyre, the sprawling waltz of “A Voice Without Color” glides through dazzling chroma and effulgent radiance greater than the sum of its parts.

Painting with bold, prismatic strokes of iridescent friction amidst the listless gray of our increasingly dispassionate timeline, fleet.dreams delivers another EP of style, substance, and vision for the dancers and DJs alike - a future classic of a possible world ready to be activated together.

*words by Kiernan Laveaux

Early support from: Kiernan Laveaux, Daniel Rincón (NAP), Scott Zacharias & Amelia Holt

Gnod's now twenty year journey through spiritual and audial exploration has been driven by relentless curiosity, magpie irreverence and a fierce countercultural imperative, their project has always refused to acknowledge all or any rules and boundaries, internal or external. The latest adventure of this band may never have been intended to celebrate their two-decade anniversary, but in true Gnod fashion by, what began as a trip into a residential studio setup in Hellfire Studios with producer John `Spud' Murphy (Lankum, Black MIDI, Caroline) for six days, resulted in more potent material than anyone bargained for. The end result has been three studio albums to be released over the next year. "This trilogy revealed itself to us in the studio" says Paddy. "We were hoping to get a good album out of the session and lo and behold we got three of the fuckers. It's interesting that we did pretty much capture the full spectrum of the Gnod sound across all three". In fact, this intrepid first instalment of the `Chronicles Of Gnowt' trilogy covers an alarming amount of sonic territory all on its own. Driven as always by the power of repetition as well as Gnod's alchemical marriage of the maximal and the minimal, this album is imbued with a vivid focus that's testimony to the chemistry of the sessions, coupled with a detailed and spacious production from Murphy that brings out the psychedelic sound worlds of the band in vivid colour. This is a travelogue which delves into pastoral tranquillity (as on `Three Trees Parts 1&2') just as adeptly as expansive Earth-tinged riff monoliths (`All Tunnel No Light') and just as formidably as the closing epic `Ekstasis' - a hallucinatory vista where kraut-tinged experimentalism meets Swans-style intensity. Yet all the while, truly sounding like no one but Gnod.

Uncompromising Italian DJ/producer The Southern makes his vinyl debut on Mutual Rytm's sub-label, Spectra, with remixes from Alarico, Temudo and Sciahri. An EP marking an impressive label debut, Carmine Portarulo, aka The Southern, lands on Mutual Rytm’s sub- label Spectra with a powerful showcase of his much-loved sound. With the lead track featuring as one of label head SHDW's most requested IDs of the year so far, and packaged alongside outstanding remixes by close label associates Alarico, Temudo and Sciahri, the EP comes having established himself with a sound rooted in old school value and pure techno, favouring energy and authenticity over hype. The track’s backstory comes from the moment Carmine and his partner found out they were expecting a child and went for their first ultrasound appointment. Overwhelmed by the emotion of the moment and the beauty of what nature is capable of, he returned home and poured those feelings into the music. The result, ‘Ultrasound’, is an anthemic, punchy techno cut with euphoric energy rising up through the synths and its catchy lead melody. Joyful melodies sparkle amid vocal groans, adding a raw emotional pull as the warm, driving drums march on. Berlin-based artist Alarico is the first to remix on his return to the label, and his ‘Sad Mix’ has a more melancholic mood, with dark chords and tightly programmed drums that bring lo-key funk. Hayes Collective founder Temudo also returns and flips the vibe on his ‘Neuro Interpretation’ with a more psyched-out, twisted tune featuring trippy synths and booming drums for peak-time impact. Italo-Iranian Sublunar Records head Sciahri then drops his trance- inducing, hypotonic ‘Tunnel Vision Mix’, followed by two digital bonuses: ‘The Stripped Mix’, a bouncy workout with futuristic melodies, and Temudo’s ‘Neuro Interpretation 2’, which is raw, textured, and dark.

The word ‘Tystnad’ – literally translated – means silence. In this case, the Silence is less that of zen buddhism or that of John Cage, rather the name of the studio where Flowers Must Die – carriers of the torch of Swedish psychedelia for now nearly 20 years – retreated to make their most head-expanding album to date. Located near the Norwegian border in the verdant rural Värmland region, Silence Studios has been a countercultural hub for decades, attaining a legendary status as a residential outpost where bands can retreat to stretch out creatively and focus their psychic powers.
From just such origins, Flowers Must Die have crafted a collection of expansive and incandescent jams that maps out a lysergic trajectory between the idealistic, anything-goes mania of early ‘70s psychedelia and the 21st century. Tystnad is the sound of a band buoyed by the afterglow of their last Rocket release, 2017’s Kompost and its attendant touring, and expanding into extrapolations that marry the wildest free improv with haunting melody.
If Tystnad, as the band claim, is to be their last recording made in one room at the same time, then it displays a formidable escape velocity. Who’s to say whether Flowers Must Die have tapped into a Swedish continuum, one including the like of Pärson Sound, Dungen or Goat. What’s clear is that Tystnad is a timeless treatise, and a potent channeling of spirits –transcending genre in search of enlightenment anew.

Tropical East Asian folk fused with psychedelic electronic rock and noise driven by a winding and jagged Sanshin guitar, shape forming vocals, odd percussion and spacey sounds. A Sgt. Peppers tour through the folklore of Okinawa. Amamikyu is the creation Goddess of the colourful Island of sound visited by Phil MFU ( formerly Vanishing Twin ) on his journeys through expanding his scope of experimental electronic music effortlessly locking style in with master Sanshin player and vocalist Yuko Tsubame to create a psychedelic trippy island of sound, revisiting classic folk songs in a new far out funky light. Amamikyu are a London based band of Phil MFU ( ex Vanishing Twin ) and Okinawan electric Sanshin player and singer Yuko Tsubame, with an expanding group of live musicians.

Das fünfte Soloalbum von Jim James, dem Frontmann von My Morning Jacket, beschäftigt sich mit den psychischen Folgen des digitalen Zeitalters. Nachdem er ein umfangreiches Archiv mit Musikstücken entdeckt hatte, die er Anfang der 2010er Jahre für zwei große Film-Soundtrack-Projekte komponiert hatte, erlebte James einen plötzlichen Inspirationsschub und verwandelte diese Fragmente in ein fesselndes Werk voller gefühlvoller Psychedelia. „Wowed Out“, sein erstes neues Soloalbum seit acht Jahren, ist ein visionäres neues Werk von einem der experimentierfreudigsten Künstler der Rockmusik des 21. Jahrhunderts.

Kosuke Mine’s electric album, with a strong rock and funk flavor, is set for reissue as part of "Spin This Now!" Vol. 9. This classic album shines with the outstanding combination of Mine’s saxophone with a wah-wah pedal and Mikio Masuda’s psychedelic keyboards.

East Wind was a groundbreaking jazz label established in 1974 through the full cooperation of Ai Music, as it was then known, and Nippon Phonogram, as it was then known. Over a period of about five years, the label produced albums not only by Japanese musicians such as Masabumi Kikuchi, Sadao Watanabe, and Terumasa Hino, but also by musicians who were engaged in creative activity on the global jazz scene at the time. In addition to the quality of the performances, the artwork, created with leading designers and photographers, brought a fresh new image to jazz albums and had a major influence on later record production.

Life Creates Itself is the new album by Bill Baird, releasing September 25th, 2026 on Royal Oakie Records. After years of restless wandering that took him from the Bay Area to India to Abbey Road and back again, Baird has returned home to San Antonio, Texas. Inspired by Lone Star legends Doug Sahm and Roky Erickson, the album inhabits a world where outsider country, avant-garde pop, and psychedelic folk dissolve into one.


Produced by longtime collaborator Jasper Leach (Tony Molina, Color Green) and mastered by indie-rock legend KRAMER (Galaxie 500, Daniel Johnston, Will Oldham), Life Creates Itself was recorded at Sear Sound in New York City in a single remarkable day — fitting for an album as indebted to Arthur Russell and Captain Beefheart as it is to Sir Douglas Quintet and Townes Van Zandt. The sessions brought together a constellation of collaborators around Baird and Leach, including Pedrum Siadatian (Allah-Las, PAINT), Phil Carluzzo, Austin Day, Oliver O'Haver, Jordan Johns, Michael Vattuone, Clara Kennedy, and Carluzzo’s dog Ernie.


Lead single "Yanaguana" — the original Payaya name for San Antonio, meaning either "land of many waters" or simply "where I am right now" — serves as a thesis statement for the album, a restless soul reckoning with what it means to finally come home. Meanwhile, "Karma Loan" is a fuzzy, sprawling psych track that spilled out of Baird during a deep immersion in Bach that features cello by Clara Kennedy and closes with a sound collage of spiritual gurus hawking easy paths to enlightenment. Then there's "Horse Moon" — built around pedal steel that shimmers like rays of moonlight, drifting through vignettes from a late night walk across New York City, with Pedrum Siadatian's lead guitar lending the whole thing an unhurried, dreaming quality. The night they tracked it, Baird climbed to the roof of Sear Sound and watched a full moon wash the city in a warm glow.


Baird has never sounded more at home, and Life Creates Itself may be his most cohesive record yet – a songwriter record through and through that stands apart from the rest of his discography. Royal Oakie Records is proud to release Life Creates Itself on September 25th, 2026, available on vinyl LP, CD, and digital download/streaming worldwide.

L’Eclisse is the third studio album by Garden City Movement. Drawing from psychedelia, alternative R&B, leftfield electronic music and lo-fi indie songcraft, the album weaves together guitars, synthesizers, layered vocal arrangements and groove driven rhythms into a richly detailed collection of songs. Bringing together different facets of the band's sound into a cohesive body of work, the album reflects a decade of musical exploration while further developing Garden City Movement's distinctive musical language.

Garden City Movement are the duo of Roy Avital and Johnny Sharoni. Over the past decade, they have built an international audience through a distinctive blend of dream pop, electronic music and immersive production. Their releases have received support from Pitchfork, The FADER, Clash, Stereogum and KCRW, while their music has appeared in FIFA 22 and major television productions. Alongside extensive international touring, the band has performed at festivals including Glastonbury, Primavera Sound, Pukkelpop and Lollapalooza India, and shared stages with artists such as Alt J, RÜFÜS DU SOL, SOHN and Cults.

Rochester, NY's The Jet Black Berries existed at the strange and fertile intersection of post-punk restlessness, roots-rock mythology, psychedelic revival, and science-fiction dread. Emerging from the band’s earlier incarnation as New Math, the group refocused in the mid-1980s with a new name, a new vision, and a sound that moved beyond the limits of punk rock and new wave. What followed was darker, stranger, and more ambitious: country-rock ghosts, rockabilly swing, western balladry, psych-punk atmosphere, and beat-inspired storytelling fused into one singular vision. After feeling stymied in their previous form, the renewed band set its sights on breaking out to other countries and, conceptually, other planets.

Recorded in two days in August of 1984, Sundown on Venus was originally released by Enigma/Pink Dust after the newly reconfigured band signed with Enigma. The original 1985 release, however, arrived with complications. Enigma wanted additional material included, so the album was packaged with a bonus 12-inch featuring extra tracks, including a song written for the film The Return of the Living Dead, ill-chosen cover songs, and re-recordings of older New Math material.

Now, the Sundown on Venus Definitive Edition restores the album to what the band originally envisioned it in 1985. Released on CD for the first time with 12 songs newly remastered & re-presented with focus, this "Definitive Edition" brings attention back to the album’s dark narrative arc & unusual genre chemistry. Though the original album received press coverage on both sides of the Atlantic in outlets including Cash Box, Billboard, CMJ, Interview, and the UK’s SOUNDS, Sundown on Venus never found the commercial audience its ambition deserved. What once slipped through the cracks of underground rock history now stands as a missing link between cowpunk, psych revival, rockabilly, goth, post-punk, Americana, & cinematic sci-fi storytelling.

Live at Café Oto is a journey into Ainu music as ancient vocal chants move into intense mouth-harp acapellas as meditative solo tonkori pieces morph into psychedelic dub-heavy work-outs.

The album follows the critical acclaim for Tonkori in the Moonlight,Mais Um's 2022 compilation of OKI's early work that was chosen as one of the best folk albums of 2022 by The Guardian.

Live at Café Oto features mostly unheard repertoire from OKI and family, recorded in Mais Um's favourite venue in London on a sold out night as part of a captivating European tour - when we heard the recording we knew we had to release it.

Shaped in the shadows and sounds of the legendary Topanga Canyon, California. The debut album from Biita Houdei is buoyed by a magic that feels wildly and beautifully untamed; wild-hearted sentiments that are shaped by the world around it, fascinated by the enchantment of it all, and delivered via a collective (harmony layered) voice that understands the complex nature of what it means to be alive in the here and now.

Produced by Haley Heynderickx, 'This Bed Was Made For Me' is a striking collection of stirring, signature folk songs animated by subtle instrumentation and orchestral flourishes. It feels lived in: vocals weave together in a beautiful harmonic dance, seasons shift, sunshine appears and bold psychedelic colours warm the horizon.

In the early stages of making her debut album, Biita Houdei knew two things: that she wanted the recordings to feel distinctly and palpably warm, and that she would sew a unique patch for every song on the album. The first of those things is subjective, though brightness pours in from all corners of This Bed Was Made For Me. The second became a laborious task she undertook throughout the process, the completion of which is testament to the slow process of it all, to the physical commitment and patience required to make a full work of art.

The patches she crafted during the making of This Bed Was Made For Me became a full quilt, one that now adorns the album’s front cover. Beneath it sits a striking collection of Houdei’s stirring, signature folk songs, brought into fruition with the help of fellow songwriter Haley Heynderickx, in her first lead production role, and the album’s producer/engineer Sahil Ansari. It’s also the first release Biita (pronounced “bee-tah”) is releasing under her newly-taken name, one that was gifted to her by her auntie and means "unique" in the Farsi language. “I proudly take this name,” Biita says of the change. “It makes me feel that much closer to my Persian heritage.”

Recorded across ten back-to-back and full days, the album touches on themes of love and heritage, of taking chances, the preciousness of time and the impact we all have on the world around us. A number of the songs were written in Topanga, California, while Biita settled into a new home as wild fires raged, and as she adjusted to a life which no longer held distinct seasonal changes, far from the Ozark Mountain home she felt so attached to. Such themes reveal themselves in a variety of ways across the album’s fourteen songs, that key sense of warmth retained in the bones of the album whether they are stepping into darkness or seeking out light.

The album feels lived in and alive; dust swirls, seasons shift, sunshine appears and is held. Biita calls it ‘psychedelic’ and there is indeed a sense of that in the world building, in the way the bold colours are always shifting. Formed of fourteen songs, and filling nearly forty-five minutes, This Bed Was Made For Me not only builds a whole world for listeners to inhabit but also implores you to stay a while. This was deliberate, indeed it’s Biita’s wish that listeners give the album dedicated time; to learn its shape, to explore it fully, away from the instant grab of playlists and skewed algorithms.

“Many of my favourite albums didn’t reveal themselves instantly to me,” Biita, now based in the Catskill Mountains of New York, explains. “Some did, of course, but I had to work to understand the full scope of the piece as a whole. I encourage people to dive deeper into everything that they choose to consume. It is not my intention to sound pretentious, but instead, I am trying harder to explain the gratitude I have for being able to craft every part of this album— using my hands, my brain, my voice, my visions. To me, it is an all encompassing work of art,” she continues. “Making the quilt was laborious. Taking the cover photo was laborious. No shortcuts, but rather a manual and tangible approach. I am thankful for the time it took.”

Pioneering Ghanaian musician King Ayisobareturns September 4, 2026 with his forthcoming seventh album Pure Confusion, recorded and produced by On-U-Sound’s Adrian Sherwood.

Ayisoba is one of Ghana’s most distinctive musical voices. The world’s foremost player of the kologo - a homemade two-string lute fashioned from a calabash and covered in goatskin - he delivers fiercely political and socially observant songs using three different voices, including the voice of his grandfather that possessed him as a child. Sherwood meanwhile is the pioneering British producer and founder of On-U Sound whose hugely influential career has connected dub, post-punk, industrial, hip hop and experimental music through collaborations with artists including Lee “Scratch” Perry, Mark Stewart, Horace Andy, Sinéad O’Connor, Nine Inch Nails and Depeche Mode.

Ayisoba and Sherwood first collaborated during a BBC Radio 3 Late Junction session at Maida Vale in 2017, organised by Ayisoba’s long-time collaborator Arnold de Boer/Zea of The Ex. The pair immediately connected, and during the pandemic, when Adrian’s long-time African Head Charge collaborator Bonjo Iyabinghi Noah was in Ghana looking for musicians to collaborate with Sherwood suggested Ayisoba, who eventually featured on two tracks on African Head Charge’s 2023 album A Trip To Bolgatanga (Bolgantanga is the region Ayisoba is from). Ayisoba then returned to the UK in late 2024 and travelled to Sherwood’s Ramsgate studio where the pair laid down the songs that would become Pure Confusion: “All the songs were already in my head,” says Ayisoba. “This album is all recorded live, over one afternoon. Adrian only plays live, and I like that. And he works hard - he doesn’t sleep. I woke up in the night and he was still working.”

“In my role producing it, I just let it roll to make a good vibe,” says Sherwood. “We recorded it completely live, did some programming and processing on some tracks, using dub techniques live on the mixing desk and adding some slick touches. We wanted the colours on the album to swing off what Ayisoba was doing, so we invited some friends to participate. Doug Wimbish (Sugar Hill Gang) arrived from America and lent his services playing bass on a couple of tracks; the wonderful Ivan Hussey (Celloman) played bass, keyboards and cello - cello is not really featured on African recordings so we thought it would be really cool to try it. I'd been working with Alex White (Fat White Family/Primal Scream) on my album (The Collapse of Everything) and so he added sax to a few tracks and I brought Alan Glenn down especially - Alan was in Little Axe but also Nine Below Zero and played in the Yardbirds – to add some mouth organ; Mark Bandola added a bit of flavour with his Juno, Ayisoba’s long-time Ghanian collaborator Ayuune Sule added some percussion and vocals and Matt Smith did some programming.”

“King Ayisoba is quite amazing, so unique,” Sherwood continues. “He’s got his own handmade instrument and three different voices - when you’re listening you think it’s three different people. He’s a breath of fresh air, full of love for the music which he wants to share with everybody. Some tracks we kept very straight and others we experimented with - adding dubby psychedelic little touches to trip you out a bit. The added production we did at On-U has given it a shine while still keeping it vibrant, live and spontaneous. I’m really proud of this record”.

On Pure Confusion, Ayisoba documents the anxieties, contradictions and changing social realities of contemporary Ghana. “Land is a problem for everyone,” says Ayisoba of the opening track “Property”. “If you don’t build on your land they will take it away. Plenty corruption in Ghana, plenty confusion. They sell the land to two, three, four people and then everybody fights.”

Elsewhere Ayisoba explores illness, spirituality and social stigma on “Bemba”, warning against hiding sickness out of shame or fear of “bad juju”: “People hide their sickness and the sickness kills them.” “Tewigiloge” reflects on cultural difference and open-mindedness encountered through world travel: “We will tour the whole world and we will see many things we may not like or understand… your eyes will see, but don’t talk - you have to be open-minded.”

Spirituality runs deeply throughout the album. Ayisoba’s grandfather was a respected spiritual healer whose presence the musician says still guides him today. “The grandparents’ spirits are the ones you can contact,” he explains of the spiritual chant “Nkaase”. “This song talks about the forefathers.” The closing track “Leeda-Mampanga (It’s Not My Strength)” acts as a statement of humility and gratitude: “You have to be humble, even if you have talent. God gives you the power.”

For more than two decades, King Ayisoba has been one of Africa’s most distinctive musical innovators, transforming northern Ghanaian kologo traditions into a bold contemporary sound rooted in hypnotic rhythms, social commentary and spiritual intensity. Since the breakthrough success of 2006’s Modern Ghanaians, Ayisoba has built an international following through acclaimed albums, relentless touring and collaborations with artists including Lee “Scratch” Perry, Orlando Julius and African Head Charge. Performances at Roskilde, WOMAD, Le Guess Who? and the Barbican have further cemented his reputation as a singular live performer and cultural force.

Come Over Reshapes works because it never tries to smooth JdB's debut into something safe. It features seven artists from LA and the Midwest all taking his source material somewhere different as brooding, minimal jungle rubs up against dubbed-out weight and drifting psychedelic ambient. Despite the variety, the whole thing plays like a continuous narrative rather than a scattered remix comp. Some cuts are clearly built for the floor, others for the comedown room, and the sequencing respects both. Steffan Betke's mastering keeps everything sounding cohesive and like a thoughtful tribute record that expands on the original rather than just repackaging it.

The Rascals are a British indie rock trio formed in 2006 by Miles Kane (guitar and vocals), Joe Edwards (bass) and Greg Mighall (drums), hailing from The Wirral on Merseyside. Before becoming The Rascals, all three members spent their formative years playing together in The Little Flames, gaining valuable experience touring with prominent contemporaries such as The Coral, The Zutons and, most significantly, Arctic Monkeys. It was while supporting Arctic Monkeys—drawing inspiration from their fiercely independent, DIY ethos and refusal to compromise—that the trio decided to trust their instincts and strike out on their own.

In September 2006, Kane, Edwards and Mighall began writing and jamming as a three-piece, giving birth to The Rascals. The band quickly developed a sound rooted in strong pop melodies and psychedelic flourishes, but distinguished by a darker, more introspective undercurrent. Influenced by artists such as Scott Walker, their music carries a sweeping, epic quality, while their lyrics often evoke a David Lynch–like atmosphere. As Kane explains, The Rascals were never content with skimming the surface, instead preferring to explore subtler, shadowy themes that reveal themselves over time.
Released on Deltasonic Records, Rascalize showcases clear influences from labelmates and peers such as The Coral, as well as echoes of bands like The Inspiral Carpets. Standout tracks including “The Glorified Collector,” “Does Your Husband Know That You’re On The Run?” and lead single “Freakbeat Phantom” highlight the band’s knack for catchy hooks, layered guitar effects and driving rhythms.

Northern Earth is Dean McPhee's sixth full-length album and the second release on his own label, Bass Ritual. Expanding on the low-end focus of 2024's Astral Gold and last year's The Bradford Boar on the Folklore Tapes label, Northern Earth integrates overdriven guitar, a wooden snare drum pedal and a powerful 18-inch subwoofer, pushing his sound further beyond the sparse fingerpicked solo guitar of his earlier releases. Drawing on influences from psychedelic rock, British folk, dub and underground electronic music, the album's three expansive compositions - including the side-long title track - were honed through live performance and recorded live with no overdubs at McPhee's home in Bradford. His solo setup - stacked valve amps, subwoofer, guitar, percussion pedals and expansive pedalboard - now functions as a single self-contained instrument, layering hypnotic basslines, ritualistic loops and fluid melodies with physical weight and a deep sense of space.

“At this point in his career, each new Dean McPhee release feels like a legitimate event” – Brainwashed

“There’s really no one else who can create (and sustain) the darkly seductive mood that’s embedded within his work.” - Aquarium Drunkard

“Dean McPhee stands out as a true one-off in a crowded field.” - Loud & Quiet

Brighton’s Moon Attendant team up with Go! Team's leader and drummer Ian Parton for new LP ‘Dum Evol’. Following their debut ‘One Last Summer’ with this incendiary, heart-pounding, drum-led masterwork full of untutored surf-guitar, Scarlet Rivera style fiddle, psychedelic orchestration and sharp-playful lyrics, all within just over 30 thrilling minutes.Since their debut, Paul Blewett and Nick Holton had been knee-deep in experimental music and needed something or someone to smash the shit out of the new songs. Instead of making heavier music, the result left lofty but wobbly structures teetering on fractured Giacometti-like frames, exposed, more arresting. Paring back the Musical palette from previous wash of synths and reverb to surf guitars, Moog, and violin, leaving Blewett's vocal (often compared to Colin Bunstone) leaning into an unvarnished, direct sound like Jimmy Campbell. Thematically, Dum Evol turns inward. Where their debut asked questions, this record sits with the answers, exploring love, conflict, and growth as experiences that must be lived first hand - “It’s such dumb evolution, you still have to learn the hard way”. Their lyrics get under the skin and under The Establishment in a wistful worm like way. Nudging at the truths. Smiling but always ready to bare some fangs.The fantastic instinctive violinist, Roger Proctor, joined as fourth member, bringing raw fragile beauty to ‘Look The Other Way’ & ‘Difficult Ifficult’, blending swooping string lines with the monster-surfing-Sonic Youth racket elsewhere. They explain - “We kept to a first take policy generally as it keeps everything just fresh and daisy like.” Dum Evol’s restraint allows the band’s more experimental instincts to land with greater weight. Musically, the record occupies a space somewhere between the slacker-rock nonchalance of Pavement and the gypsy swagger of Dylan - 'Desire' through a lens that is consciously, almost defiantly, English. It’s a sound that channels the 60's pastoral folk tradition alongside the sharp-edge of The Auteurs, an honest version of England, one to be proud of, existing in stark contrast to the hollow jingoistic nationalism of flag-shaggers climbing lamp posts. Jagged, lived-in, and entirely vital, Dum Evol is a record that feels fully realised, yet remains dangerously built to unravel in a hair's breadth.“Psychelelic grungy synth-pop - Moon Attendant marry analogue electronics to a lovely burbling pop sound, like Felt exploring the recesses of krautrock. Trippy, ramshackle and a cult in waiting.” Shindig!

Brighton’s Moon Attendant team up with Go! Team's leader and drummer Ian Parton for new LP ‘Dum Evol’. Following their debut ‘One Last Summer’ with this incendiary, heart-pounding, drum-led masterwork full of untutored surf-guitar, Scarlet Rivera style fiddle, psychedelic orchestration and sharp-playful lyrics, all within just over 30 thrilling minutes.Since their debut, Paul Blewett and Nick Holton had been knee-deep in experimental music and needed something or someone to smash the shit out of the new songs. Instead of making heavier music, the result left lofty but wobbly structures teetering on fractured Giacometti-like frames, exposed, more arresting. Paring back the Musical palette from previous wash of synths and reverb to surf guitars, Moog, and violin, leaving Blewett's vocal (often compared to Colin Bunstone) leaning into an unvarnished, direct sound like Jimmy Campbell. Thematically, Dum Evol turns inward. Where their debut asked questions, this record sits with the answers, exploring love, conflict, and growth as experiences that must be lived first hand - “It’s such dumb evolution, you still have to learn the hard way”. Their lyrics get under the skin and under The Establishment in a wistful worm like way. Nudging at the truths. Smiling but always ready to bare some fangs.The fantastic instinctive violinist, Roger Proctor, joined as fourth member, bringing raw fragile beauty to ‘Look The Other Way’ & ‘Difficult Ifficult’, blending swooping string lines with the monster-surfing-Sonic Youth racket elsewhere. They explain - “We kept to a first take policy generally as it keeps everything just fresh and daisy like.” Dum Evol’s restraint allows the band’s more experimental instincts to land with greater weight. Musically, the record occupies a space somewhere between the slacker-rock nonchalance of Pavement and the gypsy swagger of Dylan - 'Desire' through a lens that is consciously, almost defiantly, English. It’s a sound that channels the 60's pastoral folk tradition alongside the sharp-edge of The Auteurs, an honest version of England, one to be proud of, existing in stark contrast to the hollow jingoistic nationalism of flag-shaggers climbing lamp posts. Jagged, lived-in, and entirely vital, Dum Evol is a record that feels fully realised, yet remains dangerously built to unravel in a hair's breadth.“Psychelelic grungy synth-pop - Moon Attendant marry analogue electronics to a lovely burbling pop sound, like Felt exploring the recesses of krautrock. Trippy, ramshackle and a cult in waiting.” Shindig!

Two tracks extending towards the 10 minute marker, very much in the unique style of Robert Mononom which was already being refined throughout his previous 3 EPs, now culminating in 2 excursions throughout deep hypnotic/psychedelic machine made sounds. A side is built on an aggressive triple and double beat kick drum with a very dubby "big room" presence upon which waves of other nuances in noise get overlayed slowly transforming the 165+ BPM experience throughout what sounds like an extended live mix. B side goes in more spacial/atmospheric direction where hi hats take control over the kick, capturing the witness in a whirlwind of dubbed out overlaying rhythmic patterns. A sound so raw and pure in its introspection, clearly showing Robert's capacity of developing an aesthetic of his own.

After making waves in the underground with their first release, psychedelic techno explorations from Winkles, A Sky Full Of Numbers head to the shoreline with a five tracker of misty electronica from Japan’s The Rituals, the new collaboration between Tasoko and DOLTZ. Across acclaimed releases on Explore, Bitta, and Delsin, the duo have separately explored deep techno, ambient, acid house and IDM, showcasing innovative sound design and spacious, understated grooves. For AFSON, the duo apply their unique point of view at a lower tempo, pulling away from the peak time to deliver a shadowy journey through dewy electronics.
Opening transmission 503M feels like tuning into a damaged frequency somewhere beyond the cloud line. Misty lead synths slither through blown circuitry while buzzing sequences and short-circuiting percussion crackle against purring bass pressure below.
There’s an eerie electricity in the atmosphere, as if the track’s been exposed to too much heat and left glowing softly in the dark. From the opening bars, The Rituals instantly establish their ability to make techno feel both mechanical and hallucinatory.
Ugan sees the duo descend deeper into the haze. Reverb-drenched synth motifs hover like distant lights through thick fog while a propulsive dub bassline locks into loose electro-funk rhythms beneath. There are echoes of hauntological electronics and early IDM experiments here, but The Rituals avoid nostalgia entirely, steering the track instead towards something crepuscular and alive.
Stepping out of the shadows, Broken Frog Lamp pushes forward on a rolling rhythmic framework as melodies slowly force their way through layers of sea mist and static interference. Atmospheric without losing momentum, the track balances submerged emotional weight with hypnotic forward motion.
The mood softens but never dissipates on Salty Air, a damp and dewy excursion into dubbed-out psychedelia. Rainfall ambience, skittering stone percussion and swelling pads fold around sliding sub bass and filtered stabs, while jazzy cymbals and syncopated hats gently pull the track forward, as the condensation clings to the hardware.
Closing cut “Night, Castle, Reflection” drifts into darker territories, where redlining drums and pulsing low-end pressure throb beneath thick layers of saturated texture. Woozy synth work smears against tightly controlled rhythms, creating an immersive and slightly uneasy atmosphere that closes the EP at its most introspective point.
Taken as a whole, the EP transports you into the midnight hour, when the comforting embrace of stillness can easily nudge you towards hallucination, dissolving the boundaries between dream state and dancefloor hypnosis.

Italian-Iranian DJ/producer Sciahri lays down a deeply hypnotic seven- track EP on return to Mutual Rytm. Heading up the agenda-setting Sublunar label, which is one of Mutual Rytm boss SHDW's personal favourites, Sciahri has been deep in the scene for more than a decade ever since he turned heads with a debut on Ilian Tape in 2014. Well respected for his carefully balanced love of the classic sound with new school influences, always delivering cuts with a refined and personal touch, highlighted and showcased via his widely-loved ‘Pareidolia’ release series. Returning on the label following his appearance on the ‘Federation of Rytm IV’ compilation, he lands with a freshly evolved EP that kicks off with the much hyped ID, ‘Moonwake’. That cut is built on robust, rumbling drums and layered up with flashy synths that bring stark futurism to the dance floor. ‘Liminal’ follows a similar linear path with musical drums and synths that twist and twitch, firing your synapses while your body is locked to the rhythm, before ‘Night Sentinel’ transports you to a more eerie world of anxiousness and tension - the synths are spooky, and the sonar pulses keep you on edge as immersive drums race nonstop. ‘Unmoved’ lands heavy, the bulky kick drums coming on like a storm with howling synth winds adding to the all-consuming atmosphere. ‘Too Much Time’ closes out with a wall-rattling groove and subtle synth motifs that creep in the shadows. As always with the label, digital cuts ‘Silent Frontier’ - which gets dancers on their toes with a backlit synth glow - and ‘Louisiana’ - which brings a more psychedelic energy and hard, hammering groove, rounding out a stylish, meticulously produced offering.

The darkest, filthiest alleys of old Philadelphia, DEVIL MASTER arise once more to corrupt the children of light. Between tours and festival appearances, the masters of devilry wrote their third full-length, Bloody Dreams. Punkier, with a psychedelic lean, yet festooned with a feral black metal aura, the album gleams from the abyss. Engineered by Davis M. Shubs and Grammy-nominated engineer Eric Bogacz, Bloody Dreams dances darkly. Tracks “You Worms' Vain Delusions” to “Death Anthem,” “Sex with Succubus,” and the decaying bonnet of “Farewell Waltz to Unfortune's Palace” lead the charge, while guests include Mirai Kawashima (Sigh), former drummer Chris Ulsh (Power Trip), and Ur Èmdr Œrvn (Arkha Sva) enhance DEVIL MASTER's supernatural power. There is no shadow without light...Bloody Dreams invites you into and out of the abyss. Short: The darkest, filthiest alleys of old Philadelphia, DEVIL MASTER arise once more to corrupt the children of light with their new album, Bloody Dreams. FFO: Venom, GISM, Celtic Frost, Midnight, Discharge, Christian Death

For fans of Signs of The Swarm, Thy Art is Murder and Lorna Shore The devastating new full length from one of Australia’s household names in the Deathcore genre. ‘The Darkest Side Of Humanity’ is a sprawling, hellish journey into the psyche of mankind, drawing influences from every colour of the heavy spectrum. ANIT have always been a razor sharp prospect, but with this album they seem to have found a powerful amalgamation of everything that made them so fun to listen to. The fat is trimmed, the concept is focused…the songs are HEAVY.

Fresh off of their 2020 offering Adult Themes, El Michels Affair is back with a new full-length release. Titled Yeti Season, this newest album has everything we've come to expect from EMA's patented cinematic style of instrumental soul music. Where Adult Themes inspired a soundtrack to an imaginary film, Yeti Season brings us to a different place in time_with new inspirations. Taken with Turkish-styled funk and an almost Mumbai-esque take on soul, El Michels Affair offers us a different kind of drama and imagination with Yeti Season. If you've been following along, this shouldn't be viewed as too far a departure for El Michels Affair. The first single off of Yeti Season showed their hand back in 2018. A double-sided banger, that release brought the musical textures to the fore that dominate this record. The first song, titled "Unathi," is fully realized with the beautifully haunting-yet-hopeful vocals of Piya Malik, formally of 79.5_another Big Crown artist. Singing in Hindi, Piya's ethereal voice is telling us to work and strive together toward progress. Even if you don't understand her language, you can still hear the urgency of purpose, creating a lasting vibe that sits on top of it all. Leon Michels explains that Piya had a vital influence on this record: "When Piya started singing in Hindi, she had a different voice, a different tone. I knew we had to do something together." And so Piya appears on three other songs on Yeti Season: "Zaharila," "Murkit Gem," and "Dhuaan." Each providing particular signatures to the album. "Zaharila" is a building and changing love song punctuated by blaring trumpets, driving drums, and Piya's pleading lyrics. While the more upbeat "Murkit Gem" opens with a fuzzed out, Wu-Tang-esque baseline that buoys Piya's stylings. The psychedelic guitar and Piya's changing tones and textures singing about an all-consuming love are what pushed "Dhuaan" on to the second single from Yeti Season. There is also a vocal appearance from Shannon Wise of The Shacks, yet another Big Crown artist. Her song called "Sha Na Na," lies more in the familiar EMA vein: melodic, hypnotic, soulfully visual. But between Shannon's airy singing, the jumpy baseline, moody vibes, the active drum lines, it sounds like a pensive walk home after a strangely dramatic night. So what is Yeti Season? It could be more of a feeling than an actual place or time of year. It's a heavy album_as evidenced by the signature musicianship and dramatic vocal expressions. But it's also a hopeful record, with phrasings, textures, and chord changes that hint at something better_or fuller_coming our way. You hear it in songs like "Ala Vida," with its stabby, pulsing chords laying a bedrock for EMA's bright, atmospheric horn lines. Or even in "Fazed Out," which leaves you with a feeling of determination, a striving for resolution even though the driving, march-like song structure should accompany some conquering army. This persistence has to come from the fact that Leon Michels and company finished this record during the lockdown. It was a tough and troublesome time. But look at what has come of it: Yeti Season_a record of high and heavy drama, but also one of hope and promise. It may take a year like 2020 behind us to find hope in a winter big footed creature like a Yeti, but that's where we are.

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.’

BABON is a psychedelic instrumental band from Indonesia, formed in 2023 by Wahyudi T. Raupp, Rayi Raditia, and guitarist Rori Jiwa Putra. Their music blends traditional Indonesian genres such as Keroncong and Dangdut with global influences like Middle Eastern grooves, Latin rhythms, Spaghetti Western motifs, and Afro-funk, creating a sound they call "Tropical Desert" music. Their debut album, Tropical Desert, follows the 2024 release of the singles "Desert Rose" and "TNT" on London-based label Batov Records. Beyond their genre-bending sound, BABON is deeply rooted in environmental advocacy, using instrumental music and visual storytelling to address ecological issues. They are currently producing a live session featuring four tracks from the album, set against cinematic footage highlighting Indonesia's natural landscapes and environmental challenges.

BABON's distinctive sound has earned them strong international recognition, with radio play from major stations including BBC Radio 3 and Soho Radio (UK), RBB Radioeins and Byte FM (Germany), CBC Radio One (Canada), Triple R and 2SER (Australia), and WYEP and KALX (USA). Their 7-inch vinyl release was nearly sold out, further signaling their growing global appeal. The album's cover and packaging were created by Indonesian retro surrealist Christian Candra, contributing to the band's cohesive artistic vision. BABON is represented worldwide by PR and radio agency Only Good Stuff, helping to amplify their message and music to audiences across the globe.

LIMITED EDITION FIRST PRESS OF 300 COPIES ON TRANSPARENT RED VINYL WITH JAPANESE STYLE OBI. NON-RETURNABLE.
Osaka quartet HIBUSHIBIRE return this August with their fifth studio album ‘Phantom Fuzzy Exotica‘.
Phantom Fuzzy Exotica continues to find the band exploring their own little universe, where psychedelia, 70’s hard rock and folk rock influences collide. You’ve got the short punchy riff heavy songs, the mellow time-out bits, and of course the epic psych jams and more vocals then previously. It’s all here, and as always they deliver the goods.
Phantom Fuzzy Exotica … in the bands own words
The initial image behind this album was “phantoms”- things that seem to exist, yet somehow don’t. Another thing that sets this album apart from our previous releases is that four of the five tracks feature vocals. The only instrumental is “Invocation and Ritual Dance of the Electric Nonsense.” We didn’t consciously plan it that way; it just happened naturally. After finishing last year’s tour, we didn’t have much time, but everyone’s ideas came together, and I think we’ve created an album we’re truly satisfied with.
Mandrake Oracle: The opening track of the album.Built around a single guitar riff by changchang, while the other instruments and electronics keep pushing the music forward. Personally, I imagined Deep Purple playing a Pink Floyd song while writing this one.
Minagoroshi Western: Imagined as the soundtrack to a fictional spaghetti western. In the end … everybody dies.
Daydream Rendezvous: A piece of daydream acid psychedelic folk.
Invocation and Ritual Dance of the Electric Nonsense: Hard psychedelic jazz rock. The title is a little nod to Frank Zappa.
Ai Vist Lo Lop (Cover): I’ve always loved Ai Vist Lo Lop by the wonderful Occitan traditional band Mont-Jòia, and I’d wanted to cover it someday. We especially enjoyed creating the a cappella section and finding the right sound for the main melody.
We sincerely hope you enjoy listening to this album as much as we enjoyed making it. — changchang
The Phantom Fuzzy Exotica European Tour 2026
AUGUST
19th Archive, Liverpool (UK) , 20th Ivory Blacks, Glasgow (UK), 21st The Golden Lion, Todmorden (UK), 22nd The Bunkhouse, Swansea (UK), 23rd Beautiful Days, Devon (UK), 25th The Peer Hat, Manchester (UK), 26th Le Pub, Newport (UK), 27th Strongroom Bar, London (UK) with Black Helium, 28th The Holloway, Norwich (UK), 29th The Sunflower Lounge, Birmingham (UK), 30th The Piper, St Leonards (UK) with Black Helium
SEPTEMBER
1st DND, Dunkirk (FR), 3rd Pilsen Busking Fest, Pilsen (CZ), 4th Pilsen Busking Fest, Pilsen (CZ), 6th Riff, Budapest (HU), 7th Végállomás Klub, Szombathely (HU), 8th A Beton, Győr (HU), 9th Chemiefabrik, Dresden (DE), 10th Bar Neun, Berlin (DE), 11th Subsol, Dusseldorf (DE), 12th Magasin 4, Brussels (BE), 13th De Onderbroek, Nijmegen (NL), 14th La Bulle Café, Lille (FR)
HIBUSHIBIRE are
Changchang (Guitar/Vocal/Bouzouki/Electronics/Melting Eye Spectacle), Tetsuji Toyoda (Bass/Vocal/Mermaid Mountain), AOI HAMA (Drums/Vocal/Cat Tongue Queen), Kohei Katsuma (Conga/Vocal/Theremin/Percussion/God Dog Family)

Die Deluxe-Vinyl-Edition des letzten Albums von TBF. Enthält die zwei LPs (Horrorful Heights) plus eine weitere LP (Horrorful Offal) in einem schönen Schuber mit Stanzung sowie eine Download-Karte. Diese besondere Deluxe-Ausgabe vereint "Horrorful Heights" mit dem begleitenden Bonus-Album "Horrorful Offal" (11-Song-Extra-Album mit Outtakes und Sessiontracks). Horrorful Heights markiert ein beeindruckendes neues Kapitel im umfangreichen Werk von The Bevis Frond und zeigt die anhaltende Kreativität des Songwriters, Gitarristen und Frontmanns Nick Saloman, der nun in ein weiteres Jahrzehnt als Musiker startet. Seit langem als eine der markantesten Stimmen des britischen Underground-Rock etabliert, verfeinert Saloman weiterhin die Qualitäten der Band aus melodischer Psychedelia, drahtigen Gitarrenepen und Songwriter-Kunst. Einer der zugänglichsten Einstiege in die Bevis Frond Welt, welcher alle Stärken zu einem zusammenhängenden, lebendigen Ganzen vereint. Das Album bewegt sich fließend zwischen klirrendem Psych-Pop, schweren Gitarrenriffs und pastoralen Träumereien. Die Bandbreite des Albums ist groß, aber klar definiert. "Draining The Bad Blood" erinnert an den klassischen Bevis-Frond-Stil melodisch inspirierten Gitarrenpops der 60er Jahre, "Space Age Eyes", eine prägnante neunminütige Odyssee, verweist auf die transzendentalen Erkundungen des elektrischen Miles Davis der 70er Jahre. Der mit Sitar untermalte Titeltrack driftet durch rauchige Psychedelia mit mehrstimmigem Gesang und geschichteten Tablas - ein liebevolles Echo der Headshop-Mystik, mit der Saloman während der gesamten Bandgeschichte gespielt hat. An anderer Stelle verbindet "Mossback's Dream" lysergische Leads mit der treibenden Energie des amerikanischen Hardcore der 80er Jahre und schafft so einen Hybrid, der sowohl zeitlos als auch völlig eigenständig wirkt. Weitere Höhepunkte sind das von den Byrds beeinflusste "Buffaloed", das wirbelnde "Silver Insects" und "That's Your Lot", ein rasantes Feuerwerk melancholischer Euphorie und einer der unmittelbarsten Songs des Albums. Obwohl eklektisch anmutend, ist es ein fokussiertes Porträt von The Bevis Frond im Jahr 2025 - vital, melodisch und frei von Nostalgie. Saloman beschreibt die Sammlung ganz einfach: die besten Songs, die er in den letzten Jahren geschrieben hat, entstanden ohne Zwang und ganz instinktiv. Das Ergebnis ist ein Höhepunkt aus der Spätphase einer der stillsten einflussreichen Underground-Bands Großbritanniens.

A long-overdue return to one of the most singular moments in Nurse With Wound's sprawling discography. Originally issued in 1994, Rock 'n' Roll Station marked a turning point - the album where Steven Stapleton's decades-long engagement with collage, musique concrète, and the outer limits of post-industrial sound first met the hypnotic, rhythm-driven studio sensibility of Colin Potter. What began as a request to rework some of the more percussive sections of 1992's Thunder Perfect Mind mutated, under Potter's hand, into something else entirely: an hour of swivelling grooves, warped exotica, and looping psychedelia, channelling the ghosts of Pérez Prado, Graham Bond, Joe Meek, and Jacques Berrocal into the most rhythm-conscious work the group had ever made. Three decades on, it remains one of the most beloved entries in the NWW catalogue. Issued by United Dirter as a limited LP, this new VIP edition reframes the album through four extended remixes and reworkings, each running close to or beyond ten minutes - a deep re-engagement with the source material by the extended Nurse With Wound family. Joining the usual suspects of Colin Potter, Matt Waldron, Andrew Liles, and Diarmuid MacDiarmada is an unexpected and historically significant presence: Jean-Jacques Birgé, the French composer, filmmaker, and co-founder of Un Drame Musical Instantané, whose GRRR imprint (founded 1975) famously appeared on the original Nurse With Wound List nearly half a century ago. A quiet circle, closing. The LP arrives as forerunner to a more ambitious project still to come: The Iron Lung Gives Way To The Surgical Stocking, a 5CD set due later in 2026, of which these reworks offer a first glimpse. Housed in striking new full-colour artwork by Babs Santini - Stapleton's longstanding visual alter ego. 500 ww copies in black & orange vinyl. Genre/Style: Electronic / Dark Ambient / Experimental / Drone

Following the cult success of the first 2 EPs, Common Saints presents the debut album "Cinema 3000", the theme continues, blending soul, funk, and psychedelic influences with the organic sound and rich instrumentation that Common Saints has become known for Conceived in 2020 by writer / producer Charlie J Perry the production approach for Commons Saints consists of him playing and recording real instruments in his London home studio. One mike for the drums, his beloved piano and amps up loud! The album encapsulates the old school recording approach and musicianship the discerning ear craves but with a more modern punch - a true sonic bath for all the connoisseurs out there. Think, UK"s equivalent to Tame Impala and Khruangbin.

¡Hola amigos! ¡Dieciséis guarniciones de chile picante, peyote loco y tequila helado! ¡Hermoso!
If there's one thing I'm good at it's finding records. It doesn't matter where in the world I am, I find records, the best records, the rarest records. And always in Mint condition. I have a knack for it. One place I like to hunt for records is South of the Border, in Mexico. You can find great records there, way out in those pequeños pueblos del desierto. Another great thing you can find is cactus.
Mexico is famous for cactus. You got your Ariocarpus, your Turbinicarpus, your Mammillaria. You got cactus of all kinds, big and small. Little ones like Eplithelantha, psychedelic ones like the peyote Lophophora, and rare ones like Aztekium. But my favourite is Mammillaria humboldtii. Now this one is very hard to find. The villagers over in Hidalgo know where it is, and they go high up in the mountains to look for it.

Now these guys, they take their time. But when they come down from those mountains, they bring back the most beautiful specimens. I really mean it, they're beautiful. They're like clumps of fluffy white golf balls, and they have these cute little pink flowers. Beautiful I tell ya. I pay precio alto for a good specimen of Mammillaria humboldtii.

In the years after independence, Tunisia made an unlikely bet: tourism. Beach resorts rose along the coast, each one trying to outshine the next, and each one needing a band to entertain their guests. A whole generation of musicians grew up on those hotel stages - sharing bills with James Brown, Claude François and the Mingus Dynasty - and what came out of it was a small revolution. Funk played on Tunisian instruments. Disco with an oud in it. Reggae carried back from the island of Kerkennah. A "Third Language" the press didn't quite know what to do with.

Tunis Hotel Stereo gathers nine of those records. Most of them were pressed in tiny quantities, sold to tourists as souvenirs, censored before reaching the radio, or quietly slipped onto a 45 between two hotel sets. Some of these artists filled the Carthage amphitheatre. Some topped the Maghreb hit-parades. Most have been waiting, for forty years, for someone to play their music again.

This compilation is the result of years of work - collating memories, hunting down records, sitting with the artists who made them, and with the people who once danced to them. It is the third release on Shakshouka Records, and the first compilation of Tunisian music ever curated by Tunisians, in Tunisia.

SIDE A

The mysterious Les 4 Dés, who turned the national anthem into psychedelic pop on Ya Tounes - and then nearly vanished. Peace Band, hard rockers turned hotel professionals, recording as Omnya at Hammamet's legendary Topkapi club. Ridha Zalila, the eternal shape-shifter, in a rare instrumental of Tiou Tiou Tiou. And Sadok Gharbi's Noujoum - pulled from his sabotaged, near-lost masterpiece Souar.

SIDE B

Carthago, the impossible big band that married the elite of Tunisian jazz-rock with the stars of tourist entertainment, with the original Dhikrayet. Khaled Mellef, one of the great UFOs of his generation, with Wait Till the Morning Dew, recorded in the Netherlands. Marhaba Band's Baba Bahri, originally pressed only for hotel guests and now a cult artefact. Corniche Band's Dance, cut in Milan during a technical stop on a cruise ship. And Jomaa Bouzrara, the "Bob Marley of the Maghreb," with Now That, drawn from his landmark 1983 debut Sunset.

These weren't rebels without a cause. They were musicians who understood that modernity and heritage are not opposites - that a Tunisian could play funk and still be deeply, irreducibly Tunisian. They drew from every direction at once, and built something that belonged to none of those worlds entirely, and to all of them at the same time.

This compilation is one small act of remembering. The music does the rest.

BBE Music’s celebrated J Jazz compilation series reaches its fifth and final volume in early 2026, culminating in a track list that maintains the exceptionally high standard first set with volume one back in 2018. This final volume features a selection of tracks that is as diverse as it is deep, reflecting the rich and varied Japanese jazz scene that spanned from the late 1960s to the late 1980s, a golden era of innovation and creativity. J Jazz volume 5 sees compilers Tony Higgins and Mike Peden dig ever deeper into their respective record collections to reveal tracks that encompass myriad styles including white hot jazz funk fusion from Toshiyuki Honda (Eastern Legacy) and Mikio Masuda (Sonic Barrier), super rare ethnic jazz crossover by Christal Zone - their one-off 45 promo release from 1971, Rai Rai, a deconstructed and abstract jazz classic by Yasuhiro Kohno with his solo piano rendition of My Favourite Things, and Mile and Half’s skin-tearing, shredding freak-out from their mega rare private press album.

A track that is so relentless, it leaves the listener in need of oxygen and a Valium. These hand-picked selections sit alongside other specially chosen numbers that embrace hard-driving samba (Seiichi Nakumura’s Judy’s Samba), epic head-nodding soul jazz (Masaru Imada’s World Line), psychedelic private press fusion (Aoyama Gakuin 101’s Fervor), angular post-bop tear-ups (Akira Miyazawa’s Nijimasu), intense and insistent fusion (Motohiko Hino’s Olive Step), serene cinematic pianism (Hideo Ichikawa’s On the Trade Wind) and tripped-out hallucinogenic tribal funky jazz (Masahiko Sato’s Garandoh’s Africa to Africa). Most of the tracks on this collection are being reissued for the first time, many of them only available previously on extremely limited and mega-rare private press or independent releases. J Jazz volume 5 is a fitting end to a compilation series that helped create a new audience and appreciation of Japanese jazz Some of the albums the tracks are drawn from are featured in the large format book J Jazz: Modern and Free Jazz from Japan 1954-1988, by Tony Higgins and Mike Peden, published by BBE Music in 2024. With almost 7000 words of extensive sleeve notes, J Jazz volume 5 comes in a triple 180g vinyl set inside a deluxe gatefold sleeve with obi strip, and comes with a 4-page insert, with photographs from the renowned Tokyo Jazz Joints project. It is also available as a double CD and digital download. Mastered at the Grammy-nominated Carvery Studio by Frank Merritt, this latest collection is a worthy successor to the preceding four volumes that set the bar so high. The J Jazz series is curated for BBE Music by Tony Higgins and Mike Peden.

Beefheart & McQuinn is the new project from UK artist Moby Beefheart aka William Murray (formerly of UK outfit Fur) and Melbourne / Naarm musician Winter McQuinn (Sunfruits, jade imagine). Coming together after a chanced coffee meetup, the musical connection between the two artists is palpable. Sharing a love for the folk and rock sounds of yesteryear without pastiche obsession, Beefheart & McQuinn make contemporary psychedelic folk / soft rock, a rich sonic tapestry of vocal harmony blends and deft musicianship / production.

Midtown Downtime is a debut album which explores the tensions of time and productivity in late-stage capitalism. The album is a collection of 10 songs that explore the genres of contemporary psychedelic folk / soft rock, with stacked harmonies over syncopated guitars and occasional synth / drum outbursts.

The album has a sound that is familiar yet unique, harkening to both Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young and Luke Temple/Carol King. Lyrically the album covers a lot of ground with songs about the squeeze of capitalism coupled with the feeling of isolation and anxiety that the modern world’s political landscape can engender, alongside songs of love, friendship and nostalgia.

There’s a high energy feeling that runs through the 27-minute album's core, an energy that goes hand in hand with the modern era's ever-changing focus & diminishing attention spans, the record asks you to sit down and listen to it all in one go.

Power Electronics, for the most part, stays within its lanes of transgressive misanthropy, with a blackened explosiveness of tortured psyches and nightmarish reflections for the darkest facets of the human condition. Since Whitehouse introduced the phrase, concept, and framework to Power Electronics, its authorship has been primarily male. But within the past decade or so, a diverse web of voices - female, feminist, non-binary, queer - has thrust the PE aesthetic beyond that of the tortured male artist. As such, the notion that Power Electronics is synonymous with true crime worship, political ugliness, degraded sexual fantasies, and misogynistic perspectives has been somewhat dispelled (though many still pursue such ignoble agendas).

Enter Ester Kärkkäinen. For close to a decade now, she has developed her own voice, tread her own path, and exorcised her own demons in her unique take on Power Electronics, recording as Himukalt. A Power Electronics album based on the collapse of a relationship is probably not as uncommon as one might think. The sexual violence portrayed through Power Electronics may very well have had its origins in the heartbroken, scorned, or otherwise romantically mistreated. Kärkkäinen gives us two very different perspectives on these themes through two rather different sounding records. There is Last Wish from the plague year of 2020, and there is Torn Asunder: The Half Girl, recorded in 2019. Where the 2020 record is a long-form fever dream of the erotic gone horribly wrong and turned morally questionable, Torn Asunder is the more fractured, yet more concise extrapolation of Kärkkäinen's anger, horror, confusion, and depression from the end of a sexless relationship. She nakedly reveals a psyche that has been shattered, scarred, and broken as she alternates between deadpanned proclamations and barked sermons amidst the harrowing articulation of heavy industrial electronics, laced with shrill feedback tones, disjointed rhythms, and harsh noise outbursts. Torn Asunder stands as a significant milestone in Himukalt's catalogue, but remains one her most rarely heard documents given it was originally published as part of Helen Scarsdale's instantly out of print, 10 cassette On Corrosion boxset. With this vinyl reissue, Torn Asunder can get a proper re-evaluation as one of her strongest works.

Hailing from Las Vegas, Himukalt began in 2016 as a vehicle for Kärkkäinen's noise constructs and crude programming that found references to Puce Mary, Anenzephalia, and Atrax Morgue’s Mörder Machine. Since then, she has maintained a manic schedule with releases for Tesco Organisation, Cloister Recordings, Old Europa Cafe and her own EK Verlag. With the release of Torn Asunder, Helen Scarsdale terminates the mission for the On Corrosion reissue campaign.

Within the broad church of metal and its many offshoots – rock, doom, stoner and all the rest – it remains a minor thrill to stumble across a group who seem to exist at a slight tangent to everything else. Crumbling Ghost is one such anomaly. Crumbling Ghost are not newcomers. They've been operating for some time, releasing records sporadically, Four' is in fact their fourth release. Along the way they've accumulated a fervent coterie of followers, not to mention the occasional nod of approval from tastemakers such as Stuart Maconie, Stewart Lee and Tom Ravenscroft. And though they've appeared at Roadburn, shared stages with Hawkwind and even Damo Suzuki, they remain (possibly by design) curiously under the radar.
The group's core idea is deceptively simple: traditional folk material refracted through the haze and heft of heavy, fuzzy stoner rock with a chunk of psyche and a smattering of doom. But crucially, this is done without the costumery and theatrical tics that often accompany such collisions. No mock pagan pageantry, no graveyard cosplay, no cartoon Satanism.
What Crumbling Ghost latch onto is not folk as a museum piece, but as a lived experience, the dramas rooted in the culture, stories, and daily lives of ordinary people, the folklore, the tales of love and death, murder and adultery, freedom and oppression. Singer Katie Harnett says. "Doting mothers, possessive, violent partners, vulnerable women, seasonal workers and Royal scandals this album is our representation of the trials and tribulations of human existence and universal experiences that still feel relevant today.

Guitarist John adds. "Themes of murder, betrayal, loss, jealousy, and love are found across the record. In particular, the songs of Martin Carthy have been a particular source of inspiration".
The result is a set of murder ballads, supernatural reckonings and cautionary tales, all wrapped in slabs of heavy, thumping fuzz and atmospheric sonics. Harnett's voice sits at the centre: unmistakably folk rooted, but shorn of prettification, melodic yet capable of real bite.

The album opener 'Bows Of London' is a murder ballad of sisterly hatred and grim sibling rivalry, centred on a haunted fiddle fashioned from a dead sister's bones. The loping relentless, hypnotic backing chillingly and perfectly accompanies the narrative. Of course, the story doesn't end well. 'Bill Norrie' follows, a hooky melody propelled by an insistent bassline and a haunting psych tinged haze punctured with sheets of noise.. The story of young Bill Norrie who sends a token to a married woman, whose jealous husband beheads him, without knowing he was his wife's son from an earlier affair. An instrumental palate cleanser arrives in the shape of 'Valtz Efter Tor Lohne' a Norwegian traditional the band jokingly describe as a "banger".
Then we have 'Lovely Joan' which offers a rare note of sly triumph: a quick witted woman outmanoeuvres a predatory nobleman, escaping with his ring and his horse. Muscular riffs give this tale of empowerment a welcome sense of teeth. 'Gower Wassail' is a traditional Welsh folk tune that captures the raucous spirit of communal ritual, noise making and drink fuelled hope for a good harvest. Captured perfectly here by CG complete with wah wah guitar and a drunken groove catching the song's celebratory chaos. Then we have a little gem in 'Last Of All Sleep' , an original band composition and a genuine highlight: a heavy lidded, shoegaze tinged folk reverie, equal parts distortion and delicacy. It's a drop-dead gorgeous shoegaze-tastic psychedelic grunge mini epic. The album closer 'The Unquiet Grave' is a very apt place to finish. It's about a young man whose constant grief at the death of his true love disturbs her eternal sleep so she cannot rest. Even though the playout on this track, complete with a demonic repeated riff and feedback feels suitably bleak, even this song allows a glimmer of release ... we think.
And there we have it, 7 songs, 7 worlds, all honed to perfection by producer Wayne Adams (Green Lung/Big Lad) that will reward every repeated listen.

Folk and metal/heavy rock do have a connection of course, just look at Green Lung and their 'folk horror' infused musical universe, but Crumbling Ghost are a very different beast.
'Four' amply and beautifully demonstrates that when it comes to 'folk horror' there's nothing quite as horrible as folk ... Here, the horror such as it is, and it must be said, the moments of light, comes not from theatrics, but from the songs themselves – which, after all, is where it's always lived.
Crumbling Ghost are John Mosley – Guitar / Donny Hopkins – Guitar / Ruth O’Loughlin – Bass / Katie Harnett – Vocals / Matthew Atkins- Drums.

“Released on Joe Boyd’s Hannibal label here was a band rooted in Thompson/Swarbrick Fairport but also a snatch of the Velvet Underground and a sprig of The Byrds. The Eighteenth Day Of May evoked a legendary era, and now they are a justifiably legendary band too.” – KLOF Mag

Beginning life as a trio in London, 2003, the original line-up consisted of Allison Brice (vocals, flute), Richard Olson (acoustic guitar) and Ben Phillipson (guitar, mandolin) before expanding the following year to include the rhythm section of Mark Nicholas (bass) and Karl Sabino (drums, autoharp) and finally Alison Cotton (viola).
This being the mid zeros, the independent music scene in the UK was reluctant to embrace a sun-dazed folk band but this, their sole album, has gradually feathered a bed of affection amongst international folk fans. Twenty years on, the album is now rightfully seen as a trailblazer for the myriad alternative/psych folk bands that emerged in its wake.
Andy Childs who signed the band originally takes up the story. “I first heard their music on a cover mounted CD with the much missed Comes With A Smile magazine and as far as I could tell no-one was making music like this anymore, certainly not with such panache and confidence. To my jaded ears it all sounded so uninhibited - old weird folk songs, Americana, original psych-folk, minimalist drones. Great melodies and all six of them could sing! A joyous, unfettered sound that could in one moment conjure up flashes of The Byrds and then effortlessly the spirit of Velvet Underground would drift through. They even covered a Spacemen 3 song. I loved the fact that they had the aplomb to tackle traditional folk songs like Lady Margaret and Flowers In The Forest and not be afraid to stamp their own identity on them.
Signing them to the Hannibal label was straightforward. If anything the album somehow sounds fresh and undated, even better than it did in the day when perhaps eclecticism was out of synch with the times; its subtleties have become more apparent.”
“Their rendition of Lady Margaret builds to a headswirling crescendo that challenges anyone who claims Shirley Collins, Buffy Sainte-Marie or Trees have recorded the definitive version and the hallucinatory The Waterman’s Song To His Daughter raises an already brilliant album to an unholy level” - IT’S PSYCHEDELIC, BABY Magazine

Sophomore album by Brighton based multi-instrumentalist and vocalist, Marlon Bianco. Concept album with the A-side sticking firmly to terra firma and the flip blasting off into outta space. Psychedelic spacetronics mixed with soulful vocals and soundtrack sounds. Marlon is helped along his journey by his clones including SFJ's Oscar 'Sholto' Robertson, David Bardon (who both also produced it) and a host of other talented musicians: Dante Notar, Jonathan Chung, Laura Gallon and Federico Bersano.







[g] 07: Roboland (SFJ) [feat. SFJ]

BABON is a psychedelic instrumental band from Indonesia, formed in 2023 by Wahyudi T. Raupp, Rayi Raditia, and guitarist Rori Jiwa Putra. Their music blends traditional Indonesian genres such as Keroncong and Dangdut with global influences like Middle Eastern grooves, Latin rhythms, Spaghetti Western motifs, and Afro-funk, creating a sound they call "Tropical Desert" music. Their debut album, Tropical Desert, follows the 2024 release of the singles "Desert Rose" and "TNT" on London-based label Batov Records. Beyond their genre-bending sound, BABON is deeply rooted in environmental advocacy, using instrumental music and visual storytelling to address ecological issues. They are currently producing a live session featuring four tracks from the album, set against cinematic footage highlighting Indonesia's natural landscapes and environmental challenges.

BABON's distinctive sound has earned them strong international recognition, with radio play from major stations including BBC Radio 3 and Soho Radio (UK), RBB Radioeins and Byte FM (Germany), CBC Radio One (Canada), Triple R and 2SER (Australia), and WYEP and KALX (USA). Their 7-inch vinyl release was nearly sold out, further signaling their growing global appeal. The album's cover and packaging were created by Indonesian retro surrealist Christian Candra, contributing to the band's cohesive artistic vision. BABON is represented worldwide by PR and radio agency Only Good Stuff, helping to amplify their message and music to audiences across the globe.