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Moroccan-French power quartet, Bab L’ Bluz, reclaim the blues for North Africa. Fronted by an African-Moroccan woman in a traditionally male role, Bab L’ Bluz are devoted to a revolution in attitude which dovetails with Morocco’s ‘nayda’ youth movement – a new wave of artists and musicians taking their cues from local heritage, singing words of freedom in the Moroccan-Arabic dialect of darija.

It takes one to know one. Which is why jazz drummers have always
been ready to join the queue when assessing Art Blakey's influence,
not only in the field of percussion but in the shaping of his chosen
genre. Max Roach described him as "An original - the only drummer
whose time I recognise immediately. When I first met him on 52nd
Street in 1944, he already had the polyrhythmic thing down. He was
doing it before anybody else." Thelonious Monk Jr concurred: "When
I became a drummer, I learned how to swing from Art Blakey. What
he did with the hi-hat and his roll got pressed into my soul. He had a
primal approach to drums." All of which warmed the ears of Blakey,
who admitted that his aim was to be one of the greatest drummers in
the world- an ambition which he undoubtedly achieved

Something a little different from Athens of the North, Crisrail (Chris Rael) is an almost-LP of mad out there funky post punk from Silver Spring, Maryland, USA. Rated and played this out for some time but it has remained mostly under the radar due to scarcity. I could compare it to The Cure but it's so much more. 500 ONLY

"Playing instruments didn't come naturally to me, but I loved it so much I kept doing it and got better. When I started composing seriously in my early twenties, I didn't have much confidence in my voice or instrumental abilities, but my imagination was on fire and I was determined to create music that sounded like nothing else. I would find my place in the constellation of sound by carving a niche that was so unique, musical virtuosity wouldn't be a factor. I was inspired by Tom Scott of the Muffins, Maryland's legendary progressive jazz quartet, and owner of Black Pond Studios in Rockville, where Game of Music was recorded. It was my first solo release; I played everything except Tom's horn and flute parts. Lacking confidence to perform, I was very much a studio rat and became facile at overdubbing solo tracks. New music reviewers praised it at the time, but its distribution was limited and it's been out of print for decades. Listening now, it's more musically muscular than it felt to me at the time. It's incredibly gratifying that more people can hear it again, thanks to Athens of the North." - Chris Rael

L’Escalier des Aveugles, or The Stairway of the Blind, was commissioned in November 1990 by Spanish National Radio (Radio Nacional de España). Asked for a piece to premiere as part of the European Day of Music, Luc Ferrari returned with a radiophonic concept that organised his anecdotal music into montage form, sequencing short, elusive narratives in a successive way.

The completed composition is formed of thirteen chapters containing a mixture of environmental and synthesised sound, commentary, chatter, and encounters with people and places. Each focuses on a small event within this playbook, and Ferrari notes that each “in addition to being a realistic photograph, will be the subject of a ‘setting to music’: fragments of voice and atmosphere will be sampled and will produce musical matter or a ‘song’.”

The sonic language of Madrid forms the setting to which Ferrari lays out the persistent theme of the piece, that of the composer being guided throughout the city by a young woman. Using a game-like structure (liners for this edition include Ferrari’s “Regles de Jeu”, or “Rules of the Game” which act as a script or score to the piece) the motivation is posed: imagine that one day you are told “I know a place in Madrid that sounds amazing (or bizarre)”, to which you reply “Let’s go to it together.” The recordings toy with the relationships between guide and tourist, translator, director and actress, and masculine and feminine that emerge as Ferrari and the actresses follow this action, documenting the shared experience and connections they make as they visit these places.

Six actresses guide Ferrari (and the listener) through locations simultaneously ordinary and sonically rich: the metro; the El Corte Inglés department store where we hear the gossip from changing rooms set against music emanating from the PA; vagabonds declaiming their political stance in the Conde de Barajas plaza; interactions buying apples in a market; the reverberant and spacious halls of the Prado Museum where one actress gives a moving description of her favourite painting - Goya’s The 3rd of May 1808.

Ferrari replies in French to their comments in Spanish, and there are several self-referential plots, devices, and word games that flirt with the poetics and rhythm of language and sound. A recital of Lorca’s poem "La Casada Infiel" in “Hommage À Lorca” in amongst the location recordings feels striking, and the call and response of “La Nouvelle de L’Escalier”, where one of the actresses descends the staircase of the blind - a long stone stairway in Madrid proposed to Ferrari as an interesting location to visit during the trip by producer José Iges. She replies to Ferrari’s vocal enunciation of the place (and title) in French - L’Escalier des Aveugles - with the place-name in Spanish: La Escalera de los Ciegos.

Using this repeated title and image of the staircase of the blind as a symbolic place, a line is drawn to a situational landscape experienced and diffused through snapshots and allusion rather than holistically overviewed, sound conjuring pictures within the imagination. In the sensorial qualities of Ferrari’s treatment of emotion and language—fortified with electro-acoustic motifs and musical properties—the piece accelerates towards a render that is truthful, beautiful, yet also surreal; somewhere between theatre and reality, a gonzo cinema of the ear.

O YAMA O explores a certain domestic and democratic quality of everyday life, born through associations to folk music of Japan and a folding of myth, tradition, and routine; the non-spectacular and the sublime.

Formed of musician and artist Rie Nakajima and Cafe OTO co-founder Keiko Yamamoto, the group has performed since 2014 at venues and festivals such as noshowspace, Ikon Gallery, Wysing Arts Centre, Supernormal, Borealis Festival, Mayhem, and allEars Festival.

Nakajima’s performance often focuses on the use of found and kinetic objects, using modest items such as rice bowls, toys, clockwork, balloons and small motors as instruments to create a “micro orchestra”. Elements are layered into impressive and immersive atmospheres. Yamamoto alternatively floats and charges through this with body and voice; chanting, incanting, thundering, whispering, stamping on the floor.

Their debut album consolidates their musical conversations into keenly paced studio music, the duo working with additional instrumentation and a resolved focus on melody to provide vivid portraits of folkloric Japan in song.

They move between pop and the philosophical, defined by the overall space afforded to texture and movement. In small, delicate sound an intimate musical climate is established that reflects on life, telling stories of improvised clockwork, whispered dreams, small movements of the hand and the rhythm to be found in the shuffle of a deck of cards.
Grandly theatric and dramatic flourishes add solidity to these illustrations, operas driven by the swooping energy and power of Yamamoto’s voice can be playful or emotionally charged, particularly when the duo arrange themselves in ensemble with violinist Billy Steiger and percussionist Marie Roux. Production by David Cunningham creates the shadowy presence of a leftfield Flying Lizards dubwise depth that adds subtle strangeness to the atmosphere. The result is something raw, full-bodied; full of energy, grace and mystery.

Bélver Yin's soul mining odysseys have been unjustly overlooked for three decades. An anomaly in the Spanish alt-pop scene, their forlorn instrumentals and ethereal romanticism would have struck a chord in the British league of Felt, The Chameleons, Cocteau Twins and Dif Juz, leaving their 1991 debut Luz Bel deserving of reappraisal.

While coining their band name from a Jesús Ferrero novel and quoting Laozi philosophy on album sleeves, Bélver Yin create illuminating textures that unlock a wordless language of memory and adolescent emotion. Formed in Salamanca by self-taught musicians Pedro Ortega Sánchez and José María Martín, the guitar-bass duo spent two years crafting their divine interplay with interim drummers before submitting a demo to Noisex Music, their only attempt at label courting. The phone rang mere days later with owner and producer Bernar Marks (The Dust Sessions) offering to cut an album and the band ventured to Valencia with cloud-touching optimism soon after.

Championed by local press, the release fell short of expectation, fueling the mythology of a vanished band known only to the initiated. Varying lineups would, however, continue to work in the shadows under Pedro's direction, recording two spatially arranged follow-ups at their own pace in 1996 and 2005.

A glorious debut that undeniably set a high watermark, Luz Bel is finally available again, faithfully remastered by Mikey Young and featuring bilingual liner notes from John Gómez, the authoritative ear behind Outro Tempo.

Universal Music are proud to release all hit Queen studio albums sourced from the original master tapes mastered by Bob Ludwig. This 18 vinyl LP box set comes with a lavishly illustrated 12 x 12 inch 108 page hardback book which features introductions to each album, quotes from Queen themselves, hand-written lyrics, rare photograhs, memorabilia, and information on singles and videos. *Re-press

Black Truffle is pleased to announce a new solo album by Eiko Ishibashi, her first for the label, following on from the duo recording Ichida alongside bassist Darin Gray. Hyakki Yagyō (Night Parade of One Hundred Demons) was produced for the ‘Japan Supernatural’ exhibition at The Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney focusing on ghost stories and folklore from the Edo period onwards. As with The Dream My Bones Dream (Drag City, 2018), the album is a response to troubling questions about Japanese history, and the influence of the past upon the present, but finds Ishibashi shifting further away from her earlier piano-led songwriting and showing a deepening interest in electronics and audio collaging.

The two sidelong parts of Hyakki Yagyō feature layered synthesisers, acoustic instrumentation, recited verse and field recordings, at times densely mixed but always with a subtle interplay of changing elements. The influence of European and American forerunners as diverse as Alvin Curran, David Behrman and Strafe Für Rebellion can be traced, yet at the same time Ishibashi evokes the flute and string sounds associated with Japanese storytelling, and draws directly on the subversive literary tradition of Kyoka (‘mad poetry’) with a verse by the 15th-century poet Ikkyū Sōjun repeated throughout the album. Revisiting what has gone before, re-thinking what is possible musically, as a way of articulating what else might be possible in the future.

As Ishibashi’s liner notes make clear, the album reflects an attention to persistent dangers, myths and evasions in Japanese culture – as well as the lurking uncertainties that might threaten positive change. This would seem to be manifested in the emerging melodies soon met by dissonance, erratic collisions and near silence, as well as the eerie manipulation of the double-tracked vocals. Ishibashi’s underlying concerns ring true more widely of course. Hyakki Yagyō is a work of multiplicities, and mystery, a landscape where nothing is as it seems at first, and everything is vulnerable to sudden violent interruptions.

The album was produced with regular collaborators Jim O’Rourke (double bass) and Joe Talia (percussion), and features dancer and choreographer Ryuichi Fujimura performing Ikkyū’s satirical tanka. O’Rourke’s immersive mix creates a three-dimensional effect, with Ishibashi’s various sound sources enmeshing and interacting in captivating ways.

Pressed on coloured vinyl and presented in a deluxe package with an inner sleeve featuring and artist portrait and liner notes from Eiko Ishibashi. Cover and label design by Shuhei Abe.
Back cover design by Lasse Marhaug. Mixed and mastered by Jim O’Rourke.

key selling points:

- Black Truffle is pleased to announce a new solo album by Eiko Ishibashi, her first since her acclaimed 2018 Drag City release The Dream My Bones Dream.

- This album finds Ishibashi shifting further away from her earlier piano-led songwriting and showing a deepening interest in electronics and audio collaging.

- Hyakki Yagyō (Night Parade of One Hundred Demons) was produced for the ‘Japan Supernatural’ exhibition at The Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney focusing on ghost stories and folklore from the Edo period onwards and is a response to troubling questions about Japanese history, and the influence of the past upon the present.

- Produced with regular collaborators Jim O’Rourke (double bass) and Joe Talia (percussion), O’Rourke’s immersive mix creates a three-dimensional effect, with Ishibashi’s various sound sources enmeshing and interacting in captivating ways.

- The two sidelong parts of Hyakki Yagyō feature layered synthesisers, acoustic instrumentation, recited verse and field recordings, at times densely mixed but always with a subtle interplay of changing elements, hinting at an influence of European and American forerunners as diverse as Alvin Curran, David Behrman and Strafe Für Rebellion.

- Pressed on coloured vinyl and presented in a deluxe package with an inner sleeve featuring an artist portrait and liner notes from Eiko Ishibashi. Mixed and mastered by Jim O’Rourke.

Re-release of the record originally released on 2016-02-05!

Remastered and cut by Rashad Becker at D&M Berlin and presented in an exact replica sleeve of the original 1966 release by Stephen O'Malley.

sales information: Black Truffle is honoured to present the first vinyl reissue of the classic debut album from AMM, AMMMusic. Coinciding with the 50th anniversary of its recording in 1966, this reissue makes one of the cornerstones of the experimental music tradition available again in its original form, replete with Keith Rowe's beautiful pop art cover and the terse aphorisms by the group that served as its original liner notes. A testament to the interaction between the experimental avant-garde and the countercultural underground, the album was originally released on Elektra, recorded by Jac Holzman (the label's founder, responsible for signing The Doors, Love, and The Stooges) and produced by DNA, a group that included Pink Floyd's first manager Peter Jenner. (Pink Floyd paid tribute to AMM's influence on their improvisational sensibility with the track 'Flaming' on their debut album, named after the piece that occupies AMMMusic's first side, 'Later During a Flaming Riviera Sunset').

Formed in 1965 by three players from the emerging British jazz avant-garde - Keith Rowe and Lou Gare had played with the great progressive big band leader Mike Westbrook and Eddie Prévost played in a post-bop group with Gare - AMM quickly evolved from a free jazz group into something decidedly more difficult to categorise. By the time these recordings were made, two more members had joined the group: another Westbrook associate, Lawrence Sheaf, and the radical composer Cornelius Cardew. Then at work on his masterpiece of graphic notation Treatise, Cardew brought with him extensive experience of the post-serialist and Cageian currents in contemporary composition. Using a combination of conventional instruments and unconventional methods of sound production (most famously Keith Rowe's prepared tabletop guitar, but also prepared piano and transistor radio), the group performed improvised pieces often running for over two hours and ranging from extended periods of silence to terrifying cacophonies.

Evan Parker famously described the improvisational logic of AMM's music as 'laminal', in contrast to the 'atomistic' approach more common among the generation of British improvisers (Bailey, Rutherford, Stevens and co.) to which he himself belonged. AMM improvised in layers: layers of sound subtly rising and falling or abruptly starting and stopping without being propelled by the implied pulse of free jazz improvisation. Rather than a pulse, AMM's music began with the sound of the room in which it was played, the Cageian anarchy of silence. By embracing the non-synchronous simultaneity of layered sound, AMM was able to create a musical container into which nearly anything could be incorporated at any moment: on AMMMusic, long tones sit next to abrasive thuds, the howl of uncontrolled feedback accompanies Cardew's purposeful piano chords, radios beam in snatches of orchestral music (and, on the LP's second side, an extended fragment of 'Mockingbird').

AMM's clearest break with jazz-based improvisation concerned the idea of individuality. Where improvised music has tended to foster the development of idiosyncratic stylists who move freely from one group to another, AMM, initially through an engagement with eastern philosophy and mysticism and later though a politicized communitarianism, sought to develop a collective sonic identity in which individual contributions could barely be discerned. In the performances captured on AMMMusic

the use of numerous auxiliary instruments and devices, including radios played by three members of the group, contribute to the sensation that the music is composed as a single monolithic object with multiple facets, rather than as an interaction between five distinct voices.

- Francis Plagne

Jori Hulkkonen was born and raised in a small town named Kemi with a population of 20,000, in the north of Finland. Since the early 80s, his musical influences have been on the side of electronic music, quite eclectic style for a 10-year-old boy who grew up in this period still marked by the seal of the Cold War. At the end of the 1980s, Jori's passion for electronic music was reinforced when he discovered its most abstract and minimal part: techno from Detroit and House Music from Chicago. Excellent DJ, he played in the best clubs and festivals in Europe. Jori Hulkkonen is an artist well known and extremely respected in the Nordic countries for his pioneering status, with his love of music and his involvement in making it known.

These are the first two songs released from The Jacknife Lee, the new album from Jacknife Lee. "I wanted to work with people i’d been a fan of so I found out their email addresses and sent beats. Open Mike Eagle was the first person i contacted and he came to the studio and we did Made It Weird. The track is built around sample of Francis Lai’s Young Freedom. "I loved Kenyan Message by Muthoni Drummer Queen and dm’d her on instagram. I sent her three beats and she chose this one. Sisa Wabaya is about being a wild badass. Muthoni tours all the time so she recorded her vocal in Switzerland with some friends".

"AVALPBOX4", Limited Edition- 1.000 Copies' 28-Page Hardback-Book: 10" Vinyl, Hand signed Programme, Tour Poster & DVD.

By the time The Beatles travelled to Blackpool for the first time,
they had toured with the legendary American singer, songwriter, Roy Orbison; recorded several BBC radio shows, including Saturday Club, Easy Beat and Pop Go The Beatles; appeared on many, highly popular television programmes; released their debut album, Please Please Me and issued their first three EMI singles, ‘Love Me Do’, ‘Please Please Me’ and ‘From Me To You’.

Their fourth, ‘She Loves You’ had just been recorded and mixed ready for release. It was an exciting time for the band so, when they reached the popular, seaside resort for the first time, on 7th July 1963, optimism was filling the air. This stunning AVA Editions collectors pack contains a 10" Record feat. two appearances made by the Beatles on the ABC television show, Blackpool Night Out; an impressive 28-page book, crammed full of previously unseen colour images of the group and a high-quality reproduction of an original, 1963 concert programme signed by Skiffle legend, Chas McDevitt, who supported the Beatles on several occasions.

Also included is a full colour A3 poster and an exclusive DVD feat. a new, 30-minute interview with him, alongside his previously unseen, candid, colour footage of the group backstage, and in performance at the ABC Theatre in August 1963.

So too is a unique, fully colorized version of their 17-Mins. appearance before the cameras for Blackpool Night Out in August 1965. For Beatles and music fans alike, this pack serves as a wonderful opportunity to own a unique slice of music history.


*** Side A: Recording 19th of July, 1964
*** Side B: Recording 1st August, 1965

With the sole exception of Louis Armstrong, Nat "King" Cole was one of therare black artists to enjoy such celebrity in the Forties and Fifties. He began his career as a pianist, forming a trio in 1937 with guitarist Oscar Moore and bassist Wesley Prince, but he was so successful as a singer that he went on to make many recordings as a vocalist.

Capitol, his record label, was quick to capitalize on Nat Cole's velvet tones. The hits came one after another: Straighten Up and Fly Right (1943) sold a million copies, and Nature Boy (1948) and Mona Lisa (1950) sold over three 3 million each. Some of his other (numerous) popular hits can be found on Side B.

Nat Cole's popular songs, however — some were so sentimental they were even slushy — should never conceal his talents as a pianist and musician, which he displayed with the best jazz orchestras around (Side A), his own trio (Side C) or in outings with Latin rhythms (Side D).

His fame earned him his own NBC television show in 1956, while Presidents Truman andKennedy would consult Nat on complex racial issues. He also appeared in some fifty films, and continued to record profusely (at least a hundred of his titles entered the sales charts). Nat "King" Cole deserved his title: not only did he sell over fifty million albums, but he also belongs to those artists who wrote jazz history.

ANNA HOMLER & ALESSIO CAPOVILLA - VASI COMUNICANTI

Vasi Comunicanti is the oneiric record born from the collaboration between L.A. performer and avant-garde artist Anna Homler and Alessio Capovilla, co-founder of Gang of Ducks.

Alessio Capovilla (1985, Turin, Italy ) is an Italian composer interested in sound modelling.
Imperfect sounds, unpunctual distortion and unsuitable atmospheres are constantly researched by Alessio.
A dialogue between ancient tools and new technologies through synthesis, computer music and field recording, crossing beats and genres towards something not easily definable.
Co-founder of the collective Gang Of Ducks, on which he's published two releases ("NO" and "Eocity") under the moniker of XIII, alter-ego through which he mainly examines the most tactile and digital part of his sound.


Anna Homler is a multy-disciplinary artist working on a blurred line between music, performance, spiritual and visual arts and giving birth to several different projects.
In 1985 she released, in collaboration with composer Steve Moshier, the seminal album "Breadwoman & Other Tales", shamanic and meditative songs brought to life with astonishing live performances.
The record was then re-released in 2016 by NYC label RVNG Intl, bridging the gap with a new generation of listeners, discovering the universal and unique world of Homler.
Capovilla, who was born in the same year of the original release, is one of them. His work focuses on imaginary landscapes and oneiric feelings. He has released two records on Gang of Ducks with his XIII moniker, dedicated to his digital and more computer-oriented sound.
The two of them met for the first time for an improvised live performance in Torino in 2017, after which they decided to spend studio time together exploring where this connection could lead.

The record flows along 5 tracks, with Capovilla taking care of synths, drums programming and audio engineering, and Homler singing in her melodic phonetic language, mixing unique voice and sound effects .

"De'la cocce" moves around on a slow quasi-dub rhythm accompanied by whistle and vocal interventions. In "Ricordo" Anna's voice is more prominent, travelling through a digital dimension made of flutes, Buchla Music Easel sequences and rainsticks.
The B side starts with "Bread Dance", where different layers of vocals and drums repeat themselves in an obsessive and haunting atmosphere.
"Be'ya Sa'di" is an ambient and cinematic piece, which quietly introduces "Mem", the most emotionally and intense song of the collection, transporting the listener into a different dimension.

The whole record creates a world with no geographical coordinates, where humans meet their primary feelings in a suspended time, escaping the present and the intelligible world.

The second release from Wax Ninja, a Moscow-based record-shop-turned-record-label, is the longed-for gem cut by Artem Xio, the humble leading light of the local underground scene. Can't Stop Now EP is a universal musical weapon, perfect for a DJ bag in which a variety of genres - from hip-hop and jungle to garage house and techno - coexist peacefully. Each side reflects Xio's stages of formation: not only as a collector, DJ and artist, but primarily as a an educated listener with a sensitive ear. The title track Can't Stop Now was written in 2010 to be rethought 10 years after and become a house banger powered by emotionally charged vocals. The dramatic opus that is Crucial Moment pleases with its Detroit-style anguish, while the U Took My Love, an ode to electric organ, gives out some proper Jersey house vibe. Raw and heavy, True School was born out of an unreleased remix for the local rap group, and finally Now U Know takes you back to the beginning of 00s thanks to Cream Soda d'n'b rework. In other words, this "unstoppable" EP is a true delight both for nostalgic old school heads and for those who expect some quality time on the dancefloor.

DJ Feedbacks: (please find all feedbacks in the pdf sheet)
Laurent Garnier: “GREAT EP -- Love the whole thing”
Tensnake: “can't stop now is big thanks”
Robert Owens: ''cool tracks!"
Ka§par: "“For me the house tracks are fun and all, but it's the
Cream Soda jungle mix that's got me into this release,
thanks!”
Anja Schneider: “Great thx .”
Portable: “Wonderful summer vibes post lockdown!”
Black Madonna: “Nice!”
Moodsetter: “Damn Yeaaah !!!
This is classic New York underground sound...
what a vibe !!!
I just L. O. V. E. I. T !!!

Night Gaunt Recordings is pleased to announce “Ambitions of Guilt”, the newest offering from Brighton, UK based producer L/F/D/M. L/F/D/M is Richard Smith who first emerged in 2013 and has been steadily cranking out the hits ever since. Following his stellar release on Cititrax titled “Dream Bleeds”, Richard Smith is back with a new batch of misshapen heaters. A master of blending fucked up rhythms with chiseled body music that’s both danceable yet also makes you question humanity. Every track crafted to hit deep in the bowels of any warehouse, “Ambitions of Guilt” seeps with acid, techno, noise, and anything in between. With sleazy dance hitters that bring to mind midwest acid/techno, such as Gene Hunt, and also taking from British and Japanese industrialists by the likes early Richard H. Kirk and Sympathy Nervous, Smith creates a feeling that’s both familiar yet still wildly unnerving. L/F/D/M consistently seems to know how to explore emotions in this sphere of cold, repetitive machines, creating an exciting soundtrack to a contorted world.

About a year ago Leroy Se Meurt delivered a simply hard-hitting and smashing debut EP… which quickly sold out at the ET HQ… the mixed background of this duo from Paris in electronic music and in punk-rock shapes the distinctive sound of Leroy Se Meurt… you can call it synth-punk or elektropunk… or simply post-punk for that matter… Not only their debut EP did have impact… possibly even more did their live shows… their live performance is wild and in your face…

Now there is the follow up to that acclaimed debut EP… this time Leroy Se Meurt takes a little step back from the totally in your face attitude… the sound is a bit darker and aims less on a direct confrontation but works to crawl under your skin… the energy and tension is still there but is building up gradually… and has a bigger impact that way… Don’t miss out on this next step in the campaign of Leroy Se Meurt!

In 1976, seven Cabo Verdean musicians going by the name Voz Di Sanicolau gathered in a small recording studio in Rotterdam where they laid down an album of fearsome coladeira songs inspired by the music of their home island of Sao Nicolau.

The album took only a few days to record, which may explain the unexpected urgency that fires each track. Treble-soaked electric guitar lines snake back and forth through percussion-and-cavaquinho driven rhythms rooted in the sound of the islands established by the previous generation of Cabo Verdean emigres; subtle keyboards wash through the background, and the vocals, traded between Joana Do Rosario and To-Ze, alternately push the music forward and soar above it. The resulting album is both deeply felt and fiercely executed, and in its grooves one hears the sound of some of the finest Cabo Verdean musicians of their era locked in complete unity of purpose.

It should have been the beginning of something extraordinary; but the pressures of making ends meet forced the musicians back to their day jobs, and Voz Di Sanicolau vanished as quickly as they had appeared, leaving their lone album, Fundo de Mare Palinha, as sole proof of their existence. Forty-four years later the album sounds as fresh as it did the day it was recorded. It is unknown if dutch sound engineer Frans Rolland, who oversaw the recordings, knew he was helping to make history: during these sessions, Joana Do Rosario, whose majestic vocals were crucial to the sound of Voz Di Sanicolau, became the first Cabo Verdean woman ever to appear on a long playing record.

Five years ago, Cute Heels brought his unique blend to Schrödinger’s Box with Nepotism. The Colombian now returns to the Glasgow label, this time with a mini-LP packed to the rim with stone cold quality.

Steady kicks give way to juddering bass and epic strings in the dynamic changeling that is “Beyond The War.” Shadows are cast by the EBM stained “Er Ist Nitch Du” and the smoky “Present Images” under the alias of Syndikat Komando Klub 98. Yet, despite these darker shades, the 12” is filled with brighter tones also. As Victor M Lenis R, “Breath of Freedom” beams with synth-disco laden lines. “Strange Forces” takes a similar path, chords shimmering against aquatic pads that bask in warmth. An italo streak enters with the playful melody and sun- soaked keys of “The Awake (Mexico City Mix), radiant notes countered by strong pulsing percussion.

Beyond The War is a record as diverse as its creator. Traversing a spread of styles, Cute Heels has created a 12” that blurs perceived genres whilst maintaining the energy and zeal of the club.

1970s soul group established after the legendary producers and songwriters Holland, Dozier, Holland left Motown Records to start their own label group

1970’s Invictus Records album features the distinctive vocals of General Johnson and this is the last album with
the original quartet. Highlights include.

Album highlights include ‘Hanging onto a Memory’, ‘Patches’, ‘Everything’s Tuesday’

Reissued on 140g classic black vinyl with original artwork and printed inner sleeve

First track is a pure jewel of dark acid pumpin style... that risin newskool awaking the Okupe kick for a new sound exploration... On da way to the Olschool sounds !

2LP: Gatefold with colored vinyl, Side AB: translucent Purple / Side CD: translucent Green. 12x24 inch fold out insert

Velvet is Adam Lambert's ode to 70's, guitar driven rock and funk music done with a modern twist and accentuated by his distinct and incredible voice. Best known as an international superstar who blew the world away on the eighth season of American Idol. Since then he's gone on to have a fully-fledged solo career, and tour the world with Queen. In addition to his musical achievements, he became the first openly gay artist to chart with a number one album in the US and Canada.

Nightports is based on a simple but unbreakable rule of restriction: only sounds produced by the featured musician can be used. Nothing else. These sounds can be transformed, distorted, translated, processed and reprocessed, stretched, cut, ordered and reordered without limitation.

Nightports is about amplifying the characteristics of the musician – celebrating what’s particular about them, finding sounds that nobody else can make, constructing a complex sonic weave that, however radical the transformations, still bears the watermarks of its origin.



“Within the depths of the drum takes, we found hidden melodies, chords, structures and bass lines which we distilled and exaggerated to realise this album,” Slater explains. “On the one hand, this album is fully improvised in that all drum performances were spontaneous, intuitive and responsive; however, they were then subjected to editing and manipulation to arrive at a sound that is neither purely improvised nor constructed.”



Nightports w/ Betamax will be released on CD, digital and limited edition vinyl LP. As with the prev-

ious album, the vinyl is packaged in an intricate die-cut sleeve, designed by Split.



Recorded in one day in February 2018 with The Comet Is Coming’s Betamax at Malcolm Catto’s Qu-

atermass Sound Lab studio.



The Comet Is Coming continue their stratospheric trajectory, this record follows 2019’s Trust In The Lifeforce of the Deep Mystery.

Fusing dexterous hand-percussion, hypnotic guitar riffs & soaring melodies, Waaju rise from London’s rich cultural palette with their latest album ‘Grown’, proving UK Jazz doesn’t have to sound the way we expect it to. Led by drummer and percussionist Ben Brown (Alfa Mist, Dizraeli, Ashley Henry), the band comprises percussionist Ernesto Marichales (Jordan Rakei, Sigala), guitarist Tal Janes (Nubiyan Twist, Bahla), Sam Rapley (Fabled, Maria Chiara Argiro) and Joe Downard (China Moses, Judi Jackson), each with their own strong presence on the UK’s extensive music scene. Waaju’s refined and divergent sound connects the dots between the likes of Ali Farka Touré, Alain Peters, Los Muñequitos de Matanzas, Oscar D’Leon and Beth Carvalho. Waaju formed as a means of exploring music’s hidden connections, from trance-inducing Moroccan Gnawa to Caribbean carnival music, and embracing them to reflect different shades of London’s own musical culture. It was the band’s love for Mali’s folk music – and Ali Farka Touré’s stylistic prowess in particular – that first set the project in motion. London’s Jazz Cafe invited Waaju to reinterpret classic tracks from Farka Touré’s catalogue to sold-out audiences in 2018 and 2019. According to Brown: “Ali’s one of the best. He has such a unique sound. His playing is so gnarly. His spirit and attitude are things I always think of when making music.” Waaju (meaning ‘to urge, inspire or influence to take action’ in Malian language Bambara) blends pulsing Latin polyrhythms, psychedelic Malian blues licks and cinematic textures. Following the group’s 2018 self-titled debut record, Grown presents a group more unified and distinctive-sounding than ever with six fresh, bold compositions. The record begins with Moleman, a potent reminder of the intricacy and energy Waaju’s become known for. Gritty, clattering metal defines the landscape for sizzling builds, hinting at rave culture styles like Bashment and Jungle. Listening Glasses follows and it’s clear why this is the album’s lead single – its Afrobeat-like energy and joyful interplay between guitar and tenor sax lies somewhere between Tony Allen’s grooves, Chimurenga guitar and Headhunters’ funk. On late night jam Rollando, Joe Downard’s skulking bass frequencies rule and wonkiness reaches new heights as heavy dub grooves almost tear themselves apart. Time’s Got a Hold was co-written by Waaju and Jordan Rakei for a show together in November 2018. Kicking off side B, this version features special guest vocalist Will Heard over bouncing triplets evocative of 1970’s Sega from La Reunion. A kind of looseness found only at night, the quiet drive of Wassoulou is sparse yet purposeful. Pulling back the tempo and dimming the lights, cavernous percussion fills each corner of the room, springing back as spectral reverbs. The title and final track shows the many dynamic sides of the outfit’s far-reaching sound, with its expansive harmonies and explosive psychedelia, spanning Yoruba Andabo to Hendrix, signing off an exciting and energetic second LP from Waaju at their most scintillating.

Produziert und aufgenommen von Arca, definiert KiCk i eine neue Ära in der Multiplex-Welt der venezolanischen Künstlerin, Sängerin, DJ, Performerin und Komponistin. Mit Björk, Rosalía, Shygirl und SOPHIE hat Arca zum ersten Mal Kollaborateure in ihre Welt eingeladen. Zuvor produzierte sie für Björk, Kayne West und FKA twigs, komponierte Musik für das MoMA, erschuf gewaltige Noise-Skulpturen oder legte bei Festivals als DJ auf. Mit KiCk i wird nicht nur die Freude gefeiert, die Arca in ihrem Leben finden konnte, sondern auch der manchmal beschwerliche Weg, den sie dafür zurücklegen musste. Ihre Bemühungen, ihr venezolanisches Erbe und ihre trans-lateinamerikanische Identität zu versöhnen, entpuppen sich als Reggaetón und spanischem Pop. Aber KiCk i ist nicht nur eine Pop-Platte oder eine experimentelle Platte, oder auch nur eine Mischung aus beiden, sondern alles auf einmal - und noch so viel mehr. Je nachdem, wo man die Nadel aufsetzt, findet man Bubblegum, raue Geräusche, elektronische Psychedelia, Balladen, Knaller, Gelächter, Tränen, Leidenschaft und Glaubensäußerungen - Klänge und Ideen, die nicht einfach miteinander verschmelzen, sondern gleichzeitig in einer Quantenüberlagerung koexistieren. "Ich möchte nicht an ein Genre gebunden sein", erklärt Arca. "Ich will nicht als eine Sache abgestempelt werden." Wo sie jetzt ist, endet das Nicht-Binärsein nicht mit ihrer geschlechtlichen Identität. Es ist zu einer Denkweise geworden, bei der keine eine Sache nur eine Sache sein muss, bei der mehrere Bedeutungen, mehrere Realitäten in überlagertem Gleichgewicht koexistieren können. In diesem Raum zwischen den Staaten, in dem das eine Ding das andere ist, hat Arca ein riesiges Feld unerschlossener kreativer Kraft entdeckt.

Black Vinyl Edition

The Log and the Leeway follows a 6 year journey of personal exploration and drastic change for Bram Bosteels and his singular Kaboom Karavan universe. What entails is a sound-curiosity of rare format, following a metamorphosis that goes beyond the musical.

Early in the process, Bram was struck by the word/concept of a Leeway : the gradual departure from an intented course due to external influences. Following a boyish fascination for explorers travel journals, logbooks and the far fetched corners of the world, he could not have forseen how fitting of a title he had chosen. Drastically all of a sudden one day, completely unexpectedly, Bram experienced his own father dying in front of him from a rare disease. Shocked and confused by this intense encounter, his perspectives and musical course departed from its original path. But at the same time it was an enlightenment and a necessary influence for him to realise the initial idea and finish this album, started over half a decade before.

The ones familiar with Kaboom Karavan already know that nothing really sounds quite like it. Bram’s musical (and non-musical) universe is of the rare breed that seems to be entirely his own. Self-contained, but never opaque. Quite the opposite actually. Bram never pushes us away, instead, by listening to his music we are given view to a synesthetic wunderkammer of images, places, objects and possibilities. Distant but magnetic, alien but intimately familiar, Kaboom is folk music from another dimension. Listening to The Log and the Leeway is like waking up next to a bonfire in the middle of a swamp wearing somebody else’s clothes: You may not know how you got here, but whatever is happening seems to very directly involve YOU. What will happen?

Note from Erik K Skodvin (Miasmah): All the sounds, fabrics, instrumentation and stories that binds The Log and the Leeway together go far beyond what can be touched up in this simple writeup. As someone who have followed this journey since the beginning, and seen it shift from lighthearted fun to the most crepuscular personal experience, heard the stories behind (almost) every field recording and gone through boundless amounts of clips, visual details, notes, and inspirations – I can only say that it is with great pleasure and certain nostalgia I can present this record in full through Miasmah and close this quite extraordinary chapter. Bram is without doubt the most fascinating person I know. Like I told him in April 2020 during a trying time: “If everything fails, we´ll open a Kaboom Karavan museum” - an idea that might not be as far-fetched as it sounds.

Featuring: Cover painting by John Lurie. 16 page booklet of Musical illustration / collagés by Walter Dhoogh & Erik K Skodvin that more or less connects (or confuses) the dots between the music and stories behind. Mastered by Lupo at Loop-O

Motown soul artist David Ruffin had one of the finest voices of the 60s and 70s, primarily as lead singer of The Temptations. He also recorded as a solo artist across three decades, and while still at Motown in 1977 recorded an album “In My Stride” with writers/arrangers/producers Van McCoy and Charles Kipps. Both the sides on this 7” release come from the album and are among the most enduring recordings by David the solo artist. “I Can’t Stop The Rain” has become increasingly more collectable on 7”, while “Questions” has never previously been available on 45.

Searching for new languages beyond the bitter and nihilist dialect of punk, bands like Gaz Nevada, Litfiba, CCCP, Diaframma, Neon, and many others, began spreading their message all along the Italian peninsula during the early eighties and many of the members of these bands are now some of the best musicians/producers in the Italian independent music panorama (Giovanni Lindo Ferretti, Piero Pelù/Litfiba, Bisca, etc.). 16 tracks by 16 Italian underground bands from 1982-1984: bands who faded into oblivion before ever releasing anything of their own on vinyl. It should, however, be stated that if these sixteen bands had been found on an album, EP or single, they certainly would not have lowered the average quality of albums in that genre…not even in terms of sound quality, which has actually been improved upon here (considering that the original tapes had been lying around collecting dust for at least a quarter of a century) by careful restoration.

DJ Support and positive Feedback by the likes of
Laurent Garnier, Dixon, Ame, Adriatique, Ian Pooley, Timo Maas, Trikk, Frankey & Sandrino, Sacha, The Drifter, Severino (Horse Meet Disco), Alex Dallas (Zukunft Zürich),
Yør Kultura, Lehar, Denis Horvat, BOG, Echonomist, Fred Everything, Luca Bachetti, Karotte, Roberto Rodriguez…

We're happy to announce the fourth chapter of our sought-after Outbound series which also marks Lossless' second release in 2020. After two extended chapters of Outbound, fully showcasing our labels artist roster, Outbound.4 is a crisp double A-Side affair - featuring two killer Techno workouts courtesy of our French stalwart Anthony George Patrice followed up by two Deep/Dub House delights delivered by Son Dos.

Without a doubt, Berlin based frenchman Anthony George Patrice steadily adjusted and developed his sound to a higher level over the last years. His contribution on Side A - "DBZU (Eine Brücke Zum Übermenschen)" and "Crowned Eagle" exposing new artistic shades and Anthony's ability to take you on a sonic journey and soak you into his rich and driving deeper Techno soundscapes.

Side AA belongs to Son Dos - a creative power plant by two Sweden born men: Barcelona based Marco Gegenheimer and Tapia J. Arriagada living in Malta. The duo already caused a stir with their debut "Children Of Almost" on Outcast Oddity. Marco also released some great music on Studio Barnhus as one half of MLiR!
On our Outbound.4 the guys showcase two amazing cuts originated from fruitful studio jams.

The beautiful "Cala" is hypnotizing us in deep, meditative balearic territories while her powerful brother "Maffio" might have had a little testosterone injection along the way and moves us straight onto the dancefloor. Both tunes are capable to unveil their power outdoors just as much as they will in a sweaty basement!

Son Dos quoting on Anthony George Patrice's tracks:
"These songs sound like a Movie score to us, a soundtrack taking you further and further into an unexplored forest: ...you are on a mission ... chugging drums, haunting strings and rolling percussion guide you... your heartbeat intensifies, with each step that you take...
all of a sudden, the floor underneath you turns into flowing geometrical patterns and you start falling...
a voice tells you "Happiness Is A Miisunderstanding", and the fear you had leaves your mind...you connect yourself with a higher power and realise why you started this mission in the first place"

Anthony George Patrice quoting on Son Dos tracks:
"Lovely balearic yet powerful atmosphere on "Cala"… Head flies and shoes get used. All that you wish for!" ...
"Hands in the air for "Maffio"! Here comes the peaktime booming system. Simple, efficient yet super interesting and deeply rooted dance floor killer. This is ace!

Cascade Symmetry is the culmination of an intense and transformative year-long period. It is an ode to new beginnings and the disintegration of the past.

Recorded and mixed September - October 2017 in San Jose, CA; additional recordings and field recordings taken September 2017 in South Korea.

Gear used: Eurorack modular synthesizer (Mutable Instruments, Make Noise, Orthogonal Devices, Intellijel, TipTop, Ladik, Malekko Heavy Industry, Mannequins, Qu-Bit Electronix, Doepfer), Novation Peak, Korg Electribe 2, Elektron Analog Heat, Strymon El Capistan, Hosa Technology Cables

Initially released on tape and digital through the artist on November 6, 2017.

Italian producer Clap! Clap! returns to Bristol's Black Acre with his third album, ‘Liquid Portraits’. Born and bred in Florence, Cristiano
Crisci’s musical career extends back to the mid-90s where he started out as a rapper, before picking up a saxophone and exploring
both jazz and jazz/punk fusion with Trio Cane, and then returning to his electronic roots with A Smile For Timbuctu project - a
collaborative effort that released four albums and performed across Europe. By 2008, Crisci decided to strike it out on his own as Digi
G’Alessio, channeling the same hip-hop meets electronic music energies as those animating the nascent Los Angeles beat scene for a
string of EPs and albums. Soon Crisci hit upon a new formula when he started combining samples from the African continent with
energetic drum programming. The results led to the birth of Clap! Clap! in 2013, which has since been recognised and supported by the
likes of Paul Simon and Gilles Peterson. The stripped-back, high-energy yet inventive sound caught the attention of Black Acre with
whom Crisci has been working with ever since, including his first and second albums ‘Tayi Bebba’ and ‘A Thousand Skies’. Returning
to Black Acre, Clap! Clap!’s third album once again deploys his inimitable technique in fine style, however with new eyes as this new
project signifies a definite shift in his work having spent the last few years learning the art of mixing which has lead to some
breakthroughs: “In recent years I’ve spent a lot of time studying essential mixing techniques. I then built an acoustic-treated room and
set up my new studio. I started to convert digital into analogue and vice versa with good converters and achieved sounds that I’ve
never heard before from my speakers. This had a huge positive impact on my mixes and result on my music.” Entitled ‘Liquid Portraits’, the album - as the name suggests - is a collection of sonic paintings, an attempt at capturing furtive, subconscious memories through sound. The tracks reference trips Crisci took and people he met – from southern Italy to Hokkaido via the Kif Mountains of Morocco – as well as more abstract ideas of loss, calmness, and childhood. Having been approached by Paul Simon to work on his 2016 album ‘Stranger To Stranger’ after Simon discovered ‘Tayi Bebba’ through his son, Clap! Clap! is no stranger to collaborations and this album features a small cast of talents, such as south Italy percussionist Domenico Candellori (‘Southern Dub’), Belgian artist Martha Da’ro (‘Moving On’) and harpist Kety Fusco (‘Rising Fire’)

As a long-time admirer of his work, R&S/Apollo boss Renaat has signed up Italian craftsman Nuel for a stunning concept album that finds the artist becoming "my own imaginary band" after ten years of personal growth and exploration. Nuel has been revered in underground techno circles for many years. He is a meticulous sonic sculptor who has made some of the most meditative and hypnotic electronic grooves of the last decade on labels like Semantica, Kontra-Musik and Sublunar. He also put out cult classic and highly sought after album 'Trance Mutation', which found him playing all the sounds himself on a wide array of instruments. 'Fantasia' is physical, dance-able music but crafted from unfamiliar sound sources that make it as suited to a campfire gathering as an experimental club setting. It's expertly assembled and utterly unique.

Gwendoline is the project from Micka (a.k.a. Mikoune) and Pierre (a.k.a. Daniel). Based in Rennes, musically influenced by the classic cold wave which originated in their country, precarious and aimless, they shape Gwendoline to their own image. Pure DIY ethics, quick recordings at their home studio. Dark lyrics, self- mockery, criticism, sarcasm derived from the world’s mediocrity.

“Après c’est gobelet!” is their first album. Melodic but dark, ironic but direct, sophisticated but absolutely minimalistic. A testimony of today’s world viewed under a grey prism of sarcasm and wrapped around beautiful melodies and rhythms.

We are really happy to present you this very special record on a limited, hand numbered edition of 140 copies, housed in a matt finish sleeve and including a download code. The digital download includes two bonus tracks.

Decha’s Hielo Boca LP was released in early 2019 and quickly was embraced by many as an exceptional experi- mental yet very personal and soulful piece of art. Artist Viktoria Wehrmeister (half of renowned duo Toresch along- side fellow Düsseldorfian Tolouse Low Trax) is already working constantly on her sophomore album for Malka Tuti that will come some time in the near future. In the meantime, longtime fans of Viktoria, many friends of the label asked to participate in the remix project that fol- lowed Hielo Boca. On this record we will present 4 remixes that are as imag- intive, inspirational and clever as the original composition. Tapan, Eva Geist, Khidja & Philipp Otterbach took upon themselves to reconstruct Viktoria’s ideas in very surpris- ing, intriguing and “out of the box” ways.

Commodo returns to Black Acre for the first time in over two years with surprise new three-track EP, ‘Loan Shark’. Slated for release on May 22, ‘Loan Shark’ will land as his third release with the label, following 2018 standout ‘Dyrge’ and 2016’s blistering debut album, ‘How What Time’. A quietly elusive producer, Commodo’s recent work for Deep Medi, Bandulu and Black Acre has seen him established as one of UK bass music’s contemporary frontrunners, who continues to influence the wider landscape through the strength and imagination of his output alone. His latest EP continues this theme apace, melding together supreme bass weight, texture and meticulous sampling (‘Loan Shark’, ‘Hot Pursuit’) and vivid, sepia-tone melodies (‘Contraband’) across a record that, as the track titles suggest, plays out like a filmic, magnum-plated car chase.Tracklist : A1/Commodo - Loan Shark B1/Commodo – Contraband B2/Commodo - Hot Pursuit

Very very limited please aware

QC Records presents a record by our dear friend Dj Balduin. 3
tracks with just the right mix of dreaminess and quirkiness,
that have been part of our sets for a long time.

AD and Worldline deliver Toy Opulent’s third release - and it’s first vinyl imprint.

Soft Serve Angel projects a clear and present sense of techno drive and a delightful symphony of melodic synths. The beginning is minimal and evolves into a full cacophony of beauty and craftsmanship, layered with the vocals of the mysterious Crisis Luxury. Here, meanderings of childhood tones echo from an East L.A. ice cream truck. From the hailed vehicle emerges the soft serve angel - with a vanilla cake cone prepared, just for you, on a sunny California day. This track is incredibly versatile.


A Soft Serve Angel remix is presented to us by a master of his art, Persuader. He shows us, once again, that minimal drive that we can all count on to provoke thought and movement with modern engineering skills and a familiar old school flair.


Bubble Gum Eyes is minimal perfectly pitched protocol of TR-909 love with a morphing bassline and epic-scale science-synth work. The track addresses both a question and an answer.


Rocket POP! I mean, who don’t love a good rocket pop? This dubby dub dub mix contains fragments of the entire release that sums it up, and finishes it off perfectly - the cherry on top of the soft-serve angel.

"On this seven track album we hear MinaeMinae (alias Bastian Epple) playfully scurry through his dense soundscapes on a tightrope. The sounds lying somewhere on the crossroads of psychedelic trance, exotica, ambient and melodic dance music – veering further off orbit with nontypical rhythms and dystopian percussive patterns.

MinaeMinae understands musical material similar to documentary footage which he would cut up, repitch, and rearrange freely. Most of his tracks are a mix of analog, synthetic sounds and recordings of ethnic percussion and guitar. Recently Bastian began experimenting with modular synthesis and self made tape echoes - seeking a more reduced and minimal composition style compared to his earlier quite whimsical tunes.

Growing up in a small village in southern Germany, Bastian was never interested in kitschy folk sounds that everyone would mindlessly clap and sing along to, rather he took solace in the time he would spend delving into patterns and repetitions that pleased him. His guitar strumming and what sounded to his mother like a young Philip Glass on a cheap Casio keyboard encouraged little Epple to continue on this self-taught path of developing his musical language. He then started to experiment with a tape recorder and layering sounds with non-musical samples, which his former village friends found too weird – then to eventually working with a small freeware DAW. Bastian went on to study Media Art at the Center for Art and Media (ZKM) in Karlsruhe – initially enrolled in music but the frustration and doubt of not being able to produce the music he wanted led him into film and documentary media. During his studies, Bastian was living with Florian Meyers (Don’t DJ) for several years where they would philosophize life and music into the wee hours – he encouraged Bastian to start sharing what he’s been quietly working on all these years and slowly emerge from this anonymity which eventually led to his first release on Human Pitch last fall.

Disproportionate forms, color changes, backdrops weaved into the foreground, all lay the dense earth for Gestrüpp through Benjamin Kilchhofer’s artwork."

Tropical psych outfit, Lola’s Dice, return with an exhilarating double AA side 45 on “Cacri 'e Playa” b/w “Señor Cartujo” . Venezuelan strains of Caribbean rhythms blend with South American grit and humour; aided and abetted by studio maverick and renown bandleader Alex Figueira ( Fumaça Preta, Conjunto Papa Upa).

Lola’s Dice, an ensemble born and battle-tested by years of punk and hard rock before fusing into its current form, a consolidated tropical-psych quartet. The band’s evolution has resulted in music that is a pure body-moving delight — a fuzzy blend of guitars, synths and musical sabor that is very much rooted in the percussive sounds of Latin America, where all band members hail from, yet still comfortable in its punk-ethos.

One such fusion of sounds took place at the Barracão Sound studio in Amsterdam where they first asked rhythm sensei Alex Figueira (who currently joins them on stage whenever his agenda allows him) to help them twist their sound and bring it into the incendiary tropical realm his production work was known for.

Together they vandalized all sorts of rhythmic traditions. The resulting 4-track EP, “Viaje al Centro de Ritmo”, was a perfect match of genre-defying psychedelic madness and Caribbean cool and was duly signed and released by on-the-pulse NY based Names You Can Trust label.

After two years and a plethora of stages Lola’s Dice returned to Figueira's Barracão Sound for another dose of experimentation, diving deeper into their Caribbean roots and twisting them even further. The first fruits are now offered for release jointly by Names You Can Trust (later this year) and Figueira’s own Music With Soul.

The African Caribbean vibrations of “Cacri 'e Playa” tell a story of a stray dog whose sole habitat consists of the beach. A common phenomenon all across the Caribbean coastline shared by Venezuela and Colombia. Wonky synths and surf guitars interplay over a stomping extra syncopated drum beat. All things collide towards the end into a 1970’s style Salsa street party, the relentless cowbell driving everyone forward.

On the flip, “Señor Cartujo” contains a humorous tale about the most popular brand of anise liquor in Venezuela ("Cartujo") and a shameless ode to the glory days of "Techno Merengue", when Latino rappers in the US started making Dominican Merengue with hip hop influenced vocals and house production techniques and equipment. Lola’s Dice, however, take a more psychedelic approach to this merengue, oozing with funky guitars and percussion.

Limited edition 180gram premium vinyl pressing and 3 bonus tracks. Released in June 1958, this album (originally issued under the title Little Girl Blue on Bethlehem BCP-6028) was Nina Simone’s first studio recording ever.

Made when she was 25-years old, the album was a huge success and led to a tremendous career that would yield over 80 studio sessions. It was originally issued on the Bethlehem label and features the singer/pianist backed by bassist Jimmy Bond (who had been a member of the Chet Baker Quartet among other groups) and drummer Albert “Tootie” Heath (one of the celebrated Heath brothers, along with saxophonist Jimmy Heath, and bassist Percy Heath). Many of the tracks from this LP would become true classics, among them her perennial versions of “My Baby Just Cares for Me” and “I Loves You, Porgy”. Simone’s piano is well featured throughout the LP, but “Central Park Blues” and “Good Bait” are the only purely instrumental tracks.

RIVAL CONSOLES IS 21-YEAR OLD ELECTRO ACID-SMITH RYAN LEE WEST FROM LEICESTER. INFLUENCED BY IMPRESSIONISTS LIKE CLAUDE DEBUSSY AND MODERN ELECTRONIC ARTISTS SUCH AS AUTECHRE AND SQUAREPUSHER, HE CREATED HIS UNIQUE SIGNATURE. A PLAYFUL AND BRUTAL MIX OF IDM ACID BEATS AND WARM, EMOTIVE SYNTH STRING ARRANGEMENTS. IN FEBRUARY HE RELEASED AND TOURED THE MORE QUIRKY "VEMEER EP" UNDER HIS SECOND MUSICAL ALIAS APARATEC, WHICH SOLD LIKE HOT CAKES AND EARNED HIM A LOT OF FANS. RYAN RECENTLY REPRESENTED ERASED TAPES RECORDS AT THE BRITISH MUSIC WEEK 2007 IN COLOGNE, GERMANY AND CRAFTED REMIXES FOR UPCOMING LABEL COMRADE AND PRODUCER JUSTIN LOCKEY (YOURCODENAMEIS:MILO). "THE DECADENT EP" WILL HIT THE UK SHOPS AS A FUSION OF TRADITIONAL AND CONTEMPORARY FORMATS - A 10" VINYL RECORD WITH A DOWNLOAD CODE, THAT ALLOWS THE PURCHASER TO BE ABLE TO GET THE ENTIRE EP PLUS BONUS TRACK DIGITALLY FOR NO EXTRA COST.

Like many electronic artists, Ryan Lee West aka Rival Consoles spent his early years experimenting with IDM, glitch and dance, but one consistent element in his musical journey has been his desire to create a more organic, humanised sound. Through these experimentations he has found a process of producing electronic music that feels close to this urge. Restricting himself to a small selection of analogue equipment, West engages his hands directly with instruments and is very selective about what he then records into the computer. He reduces musical parts even further, leaving enough space around the sound for it to breath.

‘Odyssey’ is a reflection of West’s quest to create atmosphere and space from minimal arrangements. ‘I don’t like music to sound overly laboured, so I restrict how much is going on. I’m kind of obsessed with the idea of reduction.’ The new 5-track EP was mastered by Naweed and will be released worldwide on October 21 in the form of a 12" Vinyl and Download via Erased Tapes.

‘Odyssey’ and ‘Voyager’ are both incredibly stripped down and have a great sense of space throughout them. It's all about using the right ingredients at the right points in time. A lot of these ingredients are short recordings, such as ice cracking, mechanical clicks, clicks from synth errors, sounds of debris, guitar plucks etc., which interact with the simple arrangements and create little hints of rhythm. I also love the technique of swelling in music, but I realised that hardly anyone has done that in electronic music. So when I first got the synth to swell in and out with the opening chords of ‘Philip’, it was a great moment. Because it creates a human mood in a matter of seconds, which is very difficult to do with electronic sounds. That track is very important to me, and I think it will influence how I make music in the future.’ – Ryan Lee West

West will perform alongside his contemporary composer mates Ólafur Arnalds and Nils Frahm for a special electronic Erased Tapes night as part of London’s The Hydra series on October 18. The same day will also see a special in-store event at Phonica Records, where West will showcase the ‘Odyssey’ EP amongst other tracks on his beloved analogue gear, joined by South London artist Supermundane creating a live art piece in the shop window.

Following January’s acclaimed vinyl debut from Exterior and summer’s much-loved Kota Motomura EP, Edinburgh’s Hobbes Music label ends 2019 with its first album release, also a debut, from GAMING, a fresh new braindance electronica project straight outta Glasgow, from producer and musician Alan Bryden.

GAMING is a new solo outing that brings together a lifelong love of music and technology and creating left field, rhythmic electronica. It’s the sound of IDM, nineties techno and mensch maschine computer music that is as spontaneous as it is programmed.

“Scenes From A Deserted City is a collection of tracks that started as a set of riffs, loops, rhythms and grooves and unfurled around a sense of growing unease about the future of the urban environment around me.
It’s an album that started out as sound…and ended up as a way of telling stories about the age of anxiety we live in, how our world is changing, and how we find a way through that.
This is DIY electronica from Glasgow – it was made on a growing collection of digital and analogue synths and FX units, including a bunch of modular racks, each with its own idiosyncrasies and character that belies the assumption of the binary.
The studio where it was recorded – an abandoned, and often very cold, school building reclaimed by the community some twenty years ago – offered up stories of resilience, even when all seems lost. (I’m not sure what the mice contributed but they definitely climbed in and out of some synths).
This album is ultimately about my changing relationship with Glasgow, a city I’ve lived in for more than 25 years. It’s about how I feel now about the increasing sense of urban decay and how the city can be a very isolating place. It’s about how I reflect on my younger creative self trying to find a direction but mainly feeling a sense of dislocation and not fitting in. And it’s about the questions I have about how that relationship is changing, how it will be forced to move forward.
The result is a soundtrack for walking home on your own, in that headphone bubble when it’s just you focusing on that music that makes sense to you alone. It’s for early in the morning, after the night before, or going to work with the memories of that slipping and sliding inside your head. It’s about how it feels to be both elated and lonely, to be lost in the familiar, despairingly hopeful.”
ALAN BRYDEN (Glasgow, August ‘19)

Swiss jazz bliss! We Release Jazz is very, very, VERY happy to present its sixth release (following Ryo Fukui’s Scenery and Mellow Dream, Le Cercle Rouge’s soundtrack by Eric Demarsan, Stuff Combe 5 + Percussion, and Marc Moulin’s Placebo Live 1971) coming straight from its beloved hometown of Geneva. Boillat Thérace Quintet’s self-titled album is available for the first time since its original limited private pressing in 1974 and comes as a vinyl LP as well as a digipack CD* (with 3 never-heard bonus songs). Full of prolific and inspired local clusters and boosted by the recently launched Montreux Jazz Festival, the Swiss jazz scene was vibrant and inventive in the 1970s, notably in the region surrounding Lake Geneva. This is precisely where jazz activist and brilliant pianist Jean-François Boillat and wind instrument master Raymond Thérace formed their quintet whose dazzling debut album was recorded in 1974. An absolute Lemanic gem of the soul-jazz/modal kind, the self-titled album includes superb covers of Freddie Hubbard’s “Straight Life”, Keith Jarrett’s “In Your Quiet Place”, and Rahsaan Roland Kirk’s “Sweet Fire”, plus groovy original compositions from the Boillat-Thérace crew. Helvetian fun facts: the velvety “1224” is dedicated to Geneva’s public transport line Tram 12, and one exquisitely funky track on the album is named after the famed yet elusive (and locally legendary) Swiss Marmite: “Cenovis”! This is reissued in conjunction with Boillat Thérace Quintet’s My Greatest Love featuring Benny Bailey (1975), also available via We Release Jazz. *The CD version includes 3 bonus tracks (Herbie Hancock, Wayne Shorter, and Claude Engel covers), never released before.

Ju/Na is a collaborative project between Juri Corrado and Nathan Dawidowicz and was borne in Berlin where both of them live. It's a conjunction of free verse and analog soundscapes - which could be described as 'analog poetry'

This debut album 'Haiku' is an exploration of contemporary narcisism which unfolds against a backdrop of different facets of contemporary life in imaginary/imagined or concrete urban spaces. Each side of the record contains three tracks - reflecting the three phrases of Japanese Haiku poetry. With a surreal language and quotes from mythology, the opus potrays the dreamy delirium of the Ego, from Love to disenchantment.

More Swiss jazz bliss! We Release Jazz (Ryo Fukui’s Scenery and Mellow Dream, Marc Moulin’s Placebo Live 1971…) is madly happy to unleash another reissue from Geneva’s very own Boillat Thérace Quintet. The My Greatest Love album features none other than bebop and hard-bop legend Benny Bailey and is available for the first time since 1975 on vinyl LP as well as digipack CD. Galvanized by the creation of the Montreux Jazz Festival in the late 60s and lively local scenes, jazz music was healthy and booming in Switzerland in the 1970s. One band that beautifully captured this energy was Jean-François Boillat and Raymond Thérace’s Boillat Thérace Quintet whose self-titled debut and impressive Montreux appearance set the tone for quality Helvetic jazz in 1974. Following this first excellent impression, the Boillat-Thérace ensemble connected with American trumpeter Benny Bailey and recorded the magnificent My Greatest Love in May and June of 1975. The modal, hard bop and soul-jazz gem includes first-class takes on Freddie Hubbard’s “Gibraltar”, Kenny Dorham’s “Blue Bossa”, and Jimmy Heath’s “Gemini”, plus deliciously funky originals from the Geneva crew, including the upbeat “Le Colin” and the swaying fan-favorite “Prompt” and its thrilling solos. Bailey is on trumpet and flugelhorn, Boillat on Fender Rhodes and piano, Thérace on saxophone and flute, Roger Vaucher on Fender bass, Eric Wespi on drums, and Rogelio Garcia on percussion and tenor saxophone…heavy sessions and deep vibes! This is reissued in conjunction with Boillat Thérace Quintet’s self-titled debut album (1974), also available via We Release Jazz.

All sounds recorded at various locations in Europe, South America and at EMS, Stockholm using the Buchla 200 modular synthesizer.

soar, all sounds recorded with Klara Lewis in Montreal 2018


Mastered by Russell Haswell. January 2020

Cut at Schnittstelle, Berlin by Andreas Kauffelt, January 2020


Image : Mark Hogben

Layout: Nik Void

The last two years have seen me maintaining an association with an unusual bedfellow, death. The loss of Mika Vainio, as well as three members of my own family, has had a profound effect on me and spurred a lengthy reflection on life, death, and everything in between.

Parallelly, while studying the philosophy of science, I came across shadow photons:


"Tangible photons are the ones we can see or detect with instruments whereas shadow photons are intangible (invisible) detectable only indirectly through the interference effects on the tangible photons.

There is no intrinsic difference between tangible and shadow photons: each photon is tangible in one universe and intangible in all the other parallel universes.

They travel at the speed of light, bounce off mirrors, are refracted by lenses, and are stopped by opaque barriers or filters of the wrong colour. Yet, they do not trigger even the most sensitive detectors. The only thing in the universe that a shadow photon can be observed to affect is the tangible photon that it accompanies. This is the phenomenon of interference.

Shadow photons would go entirely unnoticed, were it not for this phenomenon and the strange pattern of shadows by which we observe it.

Thus the existence of a seething, prodigiously complicated hidden world of shadow photons has been inferred."*


I have drawn a parallel between shadow photons and death. The interference phenomena, parallel universes, and how shadow photons affect tangible photons they accompany, offer, in my opinion, similarities, an unknown universe which is death and how we, remaining tangible human beings, are affected. This quest has led me to be more willing to accept chaos in my life and to conclude that Death is perfection, everything else is relative.

A stunning 17-minute-drumming-trip from feathery spheres through bold grooves to a dense thundery finish by Simon Popp and Sebastian Wolfgruber, the two drummers known for channeling World Music, Afrobeat and Jazz drumming in solo projects and with Munich-based Jazz quintet Fazer.
The B-side holds a rework by fellow Munich producers Zenker Brothers. The Ilian Tape heads and notorious audiophiles put their drum machines aside and weaved the recordings with layers of mystic synths into a tingling organic IDM tune.

Saturday Night is the debut LP by old friends and collaborators Alex Twomey, Matthew Sullivan, and Sean McCann. Recorded over numerous evenings at the artists’ homes, and completed just before the birth of Matthew’s daughter, Flora. The album became an excuse to spend time with one another as well as perform. As the trio ordered take-out, drank scotch, smoked on patios, laughing off the weight of reality–they stumbled into moments of musical focus.

This album has a prism of fidelities. High and low resolutions press together as the environment blows through the instruments. The woozy, side-long titular track of hesitant cello and pianos opens the record. Quiet music with blemishes and inebriated pauses, breathing an alleviated air. Phrases with failing propellers, teetering between melodic and apathetic. The true speed of their Saturday nights.

Side two opens with “London On My Mind.” Reflecting the other pole, manic cassette treatments duel over Twomey’s placid keyboard, ultimately breaking into a little joke on the piano. “Collection” features guitar by Sullivan, remembered for his thick fog of work under the alias Earn. With Sullivan’s return to the instrument, he is joined by Twomey on upright piano and McCann processing the room in real-time. The brief final work, “Bird,” recalls the style of the group's private press cassettes, The Bird and Charlotte’s Office: poorly-played pleasant-hearted music.

Each edition of the record includes a 20-page photo booklet of stills documenting the recording process.

The Humans were Toyah, her musical director Chris Wong and multi-instrumentalist the late Bill Rieflin (drummer for King Crimson and latter-day REM, as well as Ministry, the Revolting Cocks, Lard, KMFDM, Pigface, Swans, Chris Connelly, and Nine Inch Nails). Originally released in 2009 and issued on vinyl for the first time, this first album features “Noise In Your Head”, “Quicksilver” and “Is It Wrong”.

Hanagasumi - hazy curtain of flowers, cherry blossoms appearing from a far like a white mist - this phenomenon can be seen during the sakura blossom in Japan. The mysterious musician Shine Grooves inspired by Japanese culture is launching a label of the same name. Shine Grooves owns the underground Quadrat label, his tracks were released on the labels such as Kimochi, Rough House Rosie, Udacha, etc. Hanagasumi's first release is a mix of abstract rhythms with an influence of ambient tracks of the 90s. Each track is filled with magical synth chords with a cozy mood. Compositions with a smooth, atmospheric rhythm prevail on the first side of the vinyl, while the tracks on the second side will make you to get lost in zero gravity.

All tracks written and produced by Andrey Kurokhtin at 2019.
Mastered by Shine Grooves.
Limited 12" hand stamped vinyl, 150 copies, vinyl only.

French synth-pop talent Lucien & The Kimono Orchestra unveils his new solo piano album, a journey into cinematic soundscapes

Alone at the piano, Lucien takes us on a very personal album in a deep and quiet reverie. We spend a soft winter morning in his company, reminiscing about tender childhood memories.

Between previously unreleased tracks and revisited Kimono Orchestra pieces, "Piano Matinée" concludes a trilogy of recordings which have barely been released, while paving the way for a wider future. Universal, sensitive, cinematographic, the piano language spoken here by Lucien opens us to his musical world in a light that is both more authentic and accessible.

The album also tells us a personal story. That of a grandfather - an exceptional pianist but forced to give up his career when the Second World War broke out - who passed on to him a taste for music in his early childhood, before passing away.

Many years later, Lucien came across old cassette recordings of his eldest son, soon afterwards having a disturbing dream in which he swore he had had a dialogue with him and decided to go his own way. The self-taught musician spent a whole year honing his piano skills before deciding to freeze his performance in the summer of 2019 at the legendary Steinway at the Studios Saint-Germain.

Drawing freely on all his influences - jazz, funk, classical, cinema - Lucien's "Piano Matinée" is a special object, as intimate as it is melodious.

The Humans were Toyah, her musical director Chris Wong and multi-instrumentalist the late Bill Rieflin (drummer for King Crimson and latter-day REM, as well as Ministry, the Revolting Cocks, Lard, KMFDM, Pigface, Swans, Chris Connelly, and Nine Inch Nails).
Recorded in 2010 at London’s Scala theatre, and issued in its entirety for the first time, the concert features Guest Human throughout, Robert Fripp. The set list includes Humans favourites “Labyrinth”, “Sugar Rush” and “Demigod”, as well the two encore tunes, covers
of Nancy Sinatra’s “These Boots Are Made For Walkin’” and Jimi Hendrix’s “Purple Haze”.

Black Truffle’s documentation of the prolific recent work of legendary American composer Alvin Lucier continues with Works for the Ever Present Orchestra. This is a very special release for the composer, as it presents pieces written for the thirteen-member Ever Present Orchestra, formed in 2016 exclusively to perform Lucier’s works. At the heart of the ensemble are four electric guitars, an instrument Lucier began composing for in 2013 with Criss-Cross (recorded by two core members of the Ever Present Orchestra, Oren Ambarchi and Stephen O’Malley, for whom it was composed, on Black Truffle 033). Through the use of e-bows, the guitars take on a role akin to the slow sweep pure wave oscillators heard in many of Lucier’s works since the early 1980s, but with added harmonic richness. Like much of Lucier’s instrumental music, the pieces recorded here focus on acoustic phenomena, especially beating patterns, produced by the interference between closely tuned pitches. The work presented here is some of the richest and most inviting that Lucier has composed. Though all of the pieces clearly belong to the same continuing exploration of the behaviour of sound in physical space and make use of related compositional devices, each takes on a strikingly different character. Titled Arc, for the full ensemble of four guitars, four saxophones, four violins, piano and bowed glockenspiel inhabits a world of sliding, uneasy tones, punctuated by a single piano note. Where Double Helix, for four guitars, rests on a pillow of warm, low hum, EPO-5, for two guitars, saxophone, violin, and glockenspiel possess a limpid, crystalline quality. Accompanying the four new compositions are two adaptations of existing pieces for radically different instrumentation, demonstrating Lucier’s excitement about the new possibilities suggested by this dedicated ensemble. Works for the Ever Present Orchestra is an essential document of the current state of Lucier’s continuing exploration, as well as offering a seductive entry-point for anyone who might yet be unacquainted with his singular body of work.

Presented in a deluxe gatefold sleeve with cover artwork and liner notes from Alvin Lucier. Includes a download code featuring hi-res vesions of the LP material. The download code also includes the bonus Adaptions for the Ever Present Orchestra featuring two pieces (“Two Circles” and “Braid”) that are not included on the LP version. Mastered by Rashad Becker. Design by Lasse Marhaug.

Das italienische Acid Duo ist zu unserer Freude mit der „Vax Of Love“ EP zurück bei BPitch, die beiden veröffentlichten hier 2019 die „909 Therapy“ EP und davor schon das erfolgreiche „Drops In Heaven“, damals ihr Debut bei BPitch. Sie setzen ihre Experimente mit industriellem Sound und der quirligen, zeitlosen Roland TR-303 fort. Was wir hier hören ist der Sound Turins einer der italienischen „Motor Cities“, der Geist verlassener Fabriken ist in jedem Beat und jeder Bass- und Acid-line präsent.

Kieron Ifill aka K15 has been releasing neck breaking music for quite a while now, wether on his own Esencia imprint or on established stables like Wild Oats, Eglo, Apron, Black Focus, WotNot and more recently Neroli. With the monikers K15 and Culross Close he has been honing his craft for years delivering a unique mixture of eclectic dancefloor grooves always infused with jazz elements, which clearly show his huge level of musical awareness. “Volume 1” is the first collaboration between Esencia and Mother Tongue, and prooves once again Kieron’s extreme sensibility and visionary approach with the songs ‘Elemental’ and ‘Intrinsic Value’. A jewel of a record and an instant classic so fitting for these trying times!

‘Hypnosis’ was one of Drumcode’s most vital under-the-radar releases of 2019. Its creator, Veerus, returns to the mothership for another top-shelf offering.

The Italian’s career is a brilliant slow burner, releasing EPs sparingly over the course of his 14-year career. There’s a narrative quality to each track too, the artist reveling in a drama-laden call-and-response dynamic. All three cuts from his latest ‘System’ EP are made for big moments.

The title track was created with Amsterdam’s holy rave cauldron the Gashouder in mind, and was completed by Veerus just a few days before ADE last year. Balancing on a knife’s edge between tension and euphoria, the track’s twisted synth lines sent an energy surge through the iconic venue.

‘Year’ is a deadly one-two combo of synapse-searing synths and sharp drums as jagged waves of sound throb with panoramic effect. It was a captivating highlight of Beyer’s set at Amnesia in Milan in February, the final session before the lockdown. ‘Pyramid’ was debuted at Beyer’s Cercle performance last September, sound tracking a blissful post-sunset moment at the Théâtre antique de Lugdunum in Lyon.

The #1 Best Selling Track for 2019 in Electronica / Downtempo genre on Beatport, Namito - 'Stone Flower' sees a new vinyl release featuring a previously unreleased, and vinyl only, remix by Satori. It also serves as a teaser for Satori's upcoming full length album on Sol Selectas Records.

Iranian artist Namito, who has made quite a name for himself over the years in the Techno scene of Berlin, diverges from this tip for 'Stone Flower', putting a new twist on a Persian classic. Creating a hypnotic deep house groove, with ethereal uplifting lyrics, listeners and dancers alike are taken on a journey to a time when Persian culture was at its peak of creativity and freedom.

Namito heard this traditional song at a family gathering in Iran, sung by his 2 sisters Mojgan and Marjan, and was instantly moved by its beauty. He invited his sisters into the studio the very next day to record their vocals, and the result is 'Stone Flower', which pays homage to the Persian tradition, while embracing the modern edge of electronic music at the same time.

For this special vinyl only remix, Satori winds his way deeper down into the electronic abyss, with a reinterpretation that maintains the original Persian vocals, but also blends in elements of an old Afghan interpretation of the same classic song, creating a tougher, club-leaning version.

The artwork by Helia Jamali, also of Persian decent, takes us into the mystical world of ancient scared geometry and displays the beauty of her home country Iran.

Creole Soul!" Two words are enough for David Walters to qualify his music. The exclamation point to support radicalism and faith in its purpose.
A lapidary definition behind the doors of which hides the maze of a culture that crosses the oceans, connects continents and islands by an invisible but powerful thread. A deeply ingrained bond that allows Africa, America, Europe, and the Caribbean to converse with each other with a language as universal as music, dance, carnivals, or ceremonies.

Spread on the globe; the different creole cultures find a point of convergence where they are all represented: New York.
In this city, where motivated by his friend photographer JR, he once gave a concert in the street, David Walters decided to set the scene for his new album.

After five years of traveling the world, meeting musicians for the TV show “The New Explorers” (Canal +), it is around this hyperactive city that he chose to shine his Créole Sun. To imbue his music with the state of mind and aesthetics that reigned in the 70s and 80s.
While in 2018, he soloes produced Nola Is Calling (an album recorded in New Orleans with the Creole community of Black Indians, selected by Gilles Peterson in the best of 2019 on BBC 6). That’s with the essential contribution of the musical mastermind Bruno “Patchworks” Hovart (Mr. President, Voilààà Sound System, Da Break ...) that David produced Soleil Kreyol.

More than a musical partner, Patchworks turned out to be the sound engineer David was looking for. The second part of an ideal pair, the one with whom, set on the same frequencies, he wrote, composed, recorded, played all the instruments. Thought all the arrangements, tweaked the details as carried by a continuous breath. Or rather a light. The “Soleil Kréyol” (Creole Sun).

The voice comes from a radio, protests in a country far away. Under the rising sun, cranes stalk the horizon, building more towers for the super -rich. Was it a dream, or did you hear sirens in the night? Qui volé? Who stole?

The rhythm, the battle, the call, a warning. The siren, the street, the horns. The bugs, the birds, the bees. And sounds stolen from your dreams. The last chapter in the Vertigo Inc odd-ysee. Hypnotic, pulsing late - late night leftfield house jams and junkyard rave constructions. On the flip, Flabberghast (Guillaume Coutu Dumont and Vincent Lemieux) massage a jiggling, whooping club dub from the track’s nervous skeleton

Classically trained experimentalist Aarp releases his compositionally expansive and pointedly political debut album via InFiné. ‘Propaganda’ is an album that rewards repeat listens and inspires research, pushing listeners to look for the truth beyond the headlines. The title ‘Propaganda’ is inspired in part by the death of a young man in Nantes who drowned following a police altercation at “Fête de la Musique” in 2019. Despite the fact that he was only dancing and there was clear evidence of negligence, the media campaign that followed cleared all involved and disinformation spread, distorting the truth and allowing French authorities to evade any consequence. This blatant and very recent example of press propaganda lead Aarp to explore a multitude of moments in history, each one informing a single track from his new record. Each song title is a direct quote taken from different examples of these moments, from George W. Bush to Margret Thatcher and French philosopher Gilles Deleuze to the infamous Oxycontin commercial by Purdue Pharma.

Belgian psychedelic jazz collective Compro Oro are pleased to announce a new collaboration with Murat Ertel, co-founder and frontman of Istanbul's cult psychedelic folk band BaBa ZuLa and his singer partner Esma Ertel. Entitled 'Simurg', the album is set for release on the 19th June via Sdban Ultra and follows Compro Oro's critically acclaimed sophomore album 'Suburban Exotica', released last year.

Compro Oro's introduction to Turkish psychedelics came off the back of a live performance between guitarist Bart Vervaeck and Murat Ertel at Istanbul Express in 2016. Connecting both musically and spiritually, they headed into the studio and under the watchful eye of producer and multi-instrumentalist Dijf Sanders, Compro Oro and Murat recorded several tracks during an intense recording session that would make up 'Simurg'. "The new music is entirely based on improvisation. In contrast to 'Suburban Exotica', which is built more from song structures and where there was more overdubs," explains frontman Wim Segers.

The story of Simurg is a story of attraction, existential research, purification and rebirth. In a mysterious search for fulfilment, millions of birds embark on a journey, crossing several valleys, each representing a human characteristic. While some yield to the attractions of love, ego or grow ignorant and faithless, others remain curious and continue their expedition. Slowly but surely this murmuration of birds thins out and a selection of 30 birds reach Mountain Kaf and the nest of the Simurg. There and then they become one, they are reborn and reincarnated in an almighty and omniscient phoenix.

The strength of Simurg as a result of its power to resurrect from its own ashes reflects the resilience of every human being. We all have the power to strengthen and improve ourselves, not in the least in our contact with others, and this is exactly what this project is about: a spontaneous dialogue, a quest for new musical horizons, a gathering of liberal spirits to reach for the unknown. From the Anatolian rhythms and reverb-smothered funk rock of 'Ben', to the mystical atmospherics of 'Ignorance Is Bliss (Valley Of Ignorance)' and the dark, dub-infused grooves of 'Valley Of Disbelief', 'Simurg' is an allegory about the noise that you can create as a person.

Circoloco resident Luca Cazal teams up with Italian talent Andrea Fiorito as the pair deliver their ‘What Is Music’ EP on Infuse this June, backed by a remix from Mariano Mateljan.

An Ibiza mainstay, with regular appearances at DC-10 for Paradise and his long-standing global Circoloco residency, See Double boss Luca Cazal has established himself as a quality and consistent force within the minimal house scene and beyond. An avid digger with an innate ability within the studio, Cazal’s career has also welcomed sets at internationally renowned institutions including fabric and Club der Vissionare, with late June now welcoming a debut appearance on Infuse alongside fellow Italian Andrea Fiorito. An artist driven by idealism, with a sound palette that takes in influences and productions from experimental techno through to lighter more delicate and orchestral sonics, Bari-based Fiorito has himself served up material via the likes of Housewax, Broquade, Get Physical and Cynosure to date, and here we see the two talents combine for the very first time to offer up ‘What Is Music’, accompanied by Infuse talent Mariano Mateljan on remix duties.

A-side opener ‘Tornado Girl’ is a groove-fulled rolling production armed with slinking hats, evolving basslines and warping lead synths, whilst on the flip, title cut ‘What Is Music’ delves deeper into darker, more paired back afterhours aesthetics with slinking organic percussion and sci-fi electronics throughout. To close, Croatian favourite Mateljan’s lively interpretation welcomes sharp kicks, distorted vocal hooks and haunting melodies, punctuating the package in impressive fashion.

Multidisciplinary NYC artist Gavilán Rayna Russom launches her own label Voluminous Arts, dedicated to highlight electronic and experimental artists whose work challenges fixed categories of genre and categorization. Her aim is to create a platform for multidisciplinary work and events. The inaugural release being her second solo album as Gavilán Rayna Russom 'Secret Passage', following up last years 'The Envoy, an homage to the East Side Rail Tunnel in Providence, Rhode Island, and the friendships she made there.

In Rayna’s words:
“I grew up in Providence, Rhode Island in the 1970’s and 80’s. The booming jewelry and textile industries of the previous decades had pulled out by that point. The Italian mob ran most details of the day to day operations of the city. As kids coming up in that environment, before the internet, me and the people I hung out with didn’t know anything else and we worked with what we had to entertain ourselves. We found places that had been forgotten by market interests and made them spaces of creative community building. One of the most special of these places was the East Side Rail Tunnel. Running for almost exactly one mile beneath the city’s streets, the tunnel and nearby Crook Point Bridge were unsupervised autonomous zones where I tasted the possibilities of a world without surveilance. The tunnel was particularly important in my creative development because not only was it a marginal zone apart from monetized spaces of creative consumption, but it also had specific experiential properties. It had a bend in it which meant that when you got to the middle of it you were in complete darkness, and I learned quickly that when you spend enough time in complete darkness you start to hallucinate, which I liked. The acoustics were also remarkable; long natural delays and harmonic-reinforcing reverberances. Making any sound in there added layers of acoustic effects which made noises physical and fluid and, combined with the complete darkness, absolutely dissolved boundaries between internal and external experience. I started hanging out there when I was 14 and continued to return there regularly until development, gentrification and policing eventually made it inaccessible. By the mid ‘90s it was sealed off with progressively more impenetrable barriers. Nowadays it looks very different. This music is about some of the significant experiences I had in this beautifully neglected place and the people I had them with.”

ALTER presents a remastered edition of Cremation Lily’s second album, on vinyl for the first time. Recorded whilst living in Hastings and originally released as a double cassette on his Strange Rules label in 2017, The Processes… forms a trilogy of albums in the CL canon that were influenced by the life and atmospheres within British coastal towns. Composed using a rudimentary set-up of synth, drum machine and two modified walkmans, CL draws upon a broad range of influences from the underground electronic music spectrum. Noise, tape music and ambient techno are all referenced and align to form a cohesive collection of tracks, flowing fluidly in sequence. Melancholic synth pads and deep kick drums intersect with crude field recordings and occasional bursts of feedback, evoking a claustrophobic uncertainty that feels more like being pulled under than carried above.

Features additional piano and violin by Theodore Cale Schafer.
Remastered by John Hannon.

Fresh from their release on John Digweed's Bedrock Records under their more covert Techno guise 'Cypherpunx' the Brighton based duo Flip Fantazia unleash their debut album ‘The Trip’.
Touching on influences from Air to Bonobo, The xx to DJ Shadow, ‘The Trip’ guides you down a road less travelled meandering through Downtempo, Electronica & Trip Hop with a few Jazzy twists & turns.
Essentially Flip Fantazia is a meeting of two minds,
four hands, several synths, quite a few guitars, some very clever computer software with a variety of drum machines. The prolific duo spend most of their time writing, recording, producing, mixing & mastering original music down in an old bank vault in Brighton... well, Hove actually! Their real names… Douglas Horner & Tim Belcher.
Born from a project focussed mainly on music for Sync, writing for Ninja Tune PM, Cavendish Music, Delimusic, BMG PM & Deep East + more this is their first artist album to be commercially released.
Their first brief for Ninja Tune’s Production Music company was to create an authentic 60s sounding Samba song and a Boogaloo / Salsa, both of which appear on the Ninja Tune Latin Excursions album.
Along with a contemporary breaks / glitch remix of the classical masterpiece Flight Of The Bumblebee and a piece of funk with a foodie flavour for two other Ninja Tune production music albums. Another brief came in for some Australian influenced Beach House from delimusic to be used on the BBC Commonwealth Games Gold Coast 2018 coverage, so out came the Didgeridoo and five new tracks were born. Writing to brief is a delight & an adventure for Flip Fantazia covering many genres from authentic Samba to electro disco new-wave post modern cosmic soul funk afro-boogie punk alt+indie dance crossover and everything in between! So it was tough to narrow The Trip down to 10 original tracks which best illustrate the authentic Flip Fantazia sound.

yellow marbled vinyl / vinyl only

After a long wait we are happy to finally share the next release on Sleepless Musik and welcome Canarian artist Moises to our family!

A1. Circular
The title track is a dancefloor bomb, bursting with groove. You'll find it aptly placed on the A side, along with a remix from Sakro. The deep, rolling bassline of Circular takes similar form to previous Moises releases, a fast pace dance between low and high notes. Eery breakdowns signalled by spiralling synths accentuate the mysterious melody that dominates the track, before rave like chords creep to the forefront. Then with a cheeky hi-hat flick, the bass is back. The energy emanating from this one is enough to have a crowd going wild at peak-time.

A2. Circular (Sakro Remix)
The remix is a little more subtle, yet equally as suited for late into the night. The percussion overtakes this one with a deeper bassline. It becomes clouded with minimalistic growling and an echoing vocal, injecting the dreary trip we've got quite used to hearing in Sakro's productions.

B1. Homecoming
Flip the record over and the four-tracker becomes complete with two more of Moises' own productions, both of which retain that signature groove. Homecoming pulsates repetitive rhythms laced with chattering patter and choppy voice. A sweet layer to house the jabbing synth that follows for another dance worthy beat.

B2. Inside Out
Inside Out completes the set, representing a different approach. This feel good finale ditches the darkness and is instead full of dreamy high notes and percussive swing, making it the uplifting one of the bunch. It's fun, playful and full of life, perfect for celebrating those moments at the afters when the sun is up and so are the people.

Reemerging from the threshold of the cosmic vortex, Black Lodge returns with another sonic artifact that is charged with vigorous chaotic energy, known as EXPERIMENT_ZERO. Accounts of the radiant object's origin are as mysterious as the raw energy that utters from its core. Following a close study, the guardians of the portal suspect that "Experiment Zero" was a primordial experiment rooted in the slam jack pits and DIY warehouse rituals of ages passed. A sonic dialog constructed of various languages, spanning from roots-house jak to bare-knuckled electro are revealed across the artifact - a revolutionary tale that surpasses the constructs of ephemerality, with a refusal to be ignored. Across the release the listener is confronted with fearless acid lines that are underscored by a tone of revolution, and sets the stage for a human voice that switches between modes of a sharp and mutated presence. The power of such sonic objects are both celebrated and rejected by various tribal societies. It is all dependent on the belief structures and traditional histories of its members. Those that belong to the cult of Ron Hardy, Mad Mike Banks, Traxx, and JTC will welcomingly be drenched in its riotous energies. It is for the dedicated, not the light-hearted. After further research it has been discovered that, Experiment Zero is the product of Dona, aka Dj Plant Texture and Mike Tansella Jr. of Son of Traders, both products of the ancient mercantile city of Bari in Southern Italy. Previous works from these artists have been featured on Creme Organization, Gravitational Waves, Unknown to Unknown, and Illian Tapes. All sonic experimentation was recorded in one take to capture the raw energy of instantaneous collaborative sound craft operating in flux. Black Lodge's 4th release is sure to find a space in the music collections of those seeking to travel within the uncanny portals that unforgivingly defy the status quo. Mastered by: Alex J Michalski Label design: Kosmik Pressing: Deepgrooves (NL)

2x12"

Parisian label Another Moon are pleased to announce the imminent release of the second collaborative album by Scott Monteith aka Deadbeat and Paul St Hilaire aka Tikiman entitled 4 Quarters of Love and Modern Lash. When asked about about the album's motivations and production process, Monteith had the following to say: “I first heard Paul's voice back in 1996 when I stumbled upon the first Burial Mix 10 inch in a local shop, and it would be no exaggeration to say it has echoed in my mind ever since. We began working together in 2008, and it's fair to say the experience of performing and learning from him has left an indelible mark on my artistic process and my outlook on life in general. He is possessed of a truly electrifying spirit. I’ve had a folder on my hard drive called “For Tiki” for 14 years now, for those more often than not late night studio moments when I stumble upon a rhythmic or musical phrase and hear that unmistakable voice bubbling up in my mind. When that folder fills up with enough of those little magic moments I know it's time to call him, though strangely enough, he more often than not ends up calling me around those times. Such is his deep universal awareness.” “I wrote the initial sketches for what would eventually become this new album over the course of last year to a large extent as a way of trying to process what I perceived as a creeping darkness and sickness in both my own life and the world in general that desperately needed exorcising. When I received his initial responses I nearly fell off my chair. It goes without saying that Paul is a lyricist and poet second to none, and anyone familiar with his enormous body of work can attest to that. And yet, there was something in these latest pieces that hammered the proverbial nail clean through the wood. They perfectly captured this sense of rising tension, of a world that was getting almost psychedelically weirder and darker by the day, and both held a mirror up to this and offered some much needed release. Little did we know, nor could we possibly have imagined, that by the time the record actually hit the shelves, things would get exponentially weirder and darker still.” “It is my great hope that at some point in the coming months we will be able to get back on the road and share these new pieces with people in a live setting, as performing with Tiki is truly one of my greatest joys, and I think it’s where the fire in our work together truly burns brightest. In the meantime, it is my great hope that these 4 long form meditations might provide a little solace for people in their isolation, be it quietly, eyes closed lying on the coach, or cranked up, full on raving in their living rooms.”

After some quiet, comes a new storm. Fresh on the heels of his first solo album, 6th Floor or Basement, which just came out on Key Vinyl, Dimi Angelis is set tot release a new EP on his own imprint. ANLGS 009 features three fine tracks.

Fifty Fifty is a whizzing powerhouse, its syncopated arpeggios driving it along. Eastern Phantasy takes the listener across a dark and revolving landscape of sound. Mysterious and alluring at the same time. Final track Magnetik is the odd one out on this EP. In terms of sound design, certainly not in terms of impact. Repetitive, industrial stabs interlaced with a subtle driving synth make for a compelling whole.

Smooth acid injected edgy house cuts on this new Klasse Wrecks! For the last 3 years SJ Tequilla (Naota Matsuda) and Aaty Matoba have been a regular but hidden fixture in Berlin's underground music scene. You may have caught them at their regular spot in a dark tunnel next to the sprawling Ostkreuz station in Kreuzberg, lucky to sneak a quick listen before the cops came in and shut things down yet again. Armed only with an electrical generator, a 606, 303 and various dub echo delay units the pair have slowly been refining their Teknobusker project into quite a special thing. Proving that creativity blooms best when using a limited set of tools, the SJ Teknobuskers music is gritty and dark but also retains an important sense of humour. WRECKS029 was recorded between the years 2018-2019 and does a deft job in capturing a flavour of the rhythms, tones and squelches that echoed down the tunnels during Berlin's endless summers.

Re-Issue on Extreme Eating. Housed in a gatefold sleeve designed by Steve Lippert, mastered by Matt Colton at Alchemy. Everything else was done by Sleaford Mods. From Original Press Release 2015 "Key Markets was a large supermarket bang in the centre of Grantham from the early 1970's up until around 1980," explains Jason Williamson. "My mum would take me there and I'd always have a large coke in a plastic orange cup surrounded by varnished wood trimmings and big lamp shades with flowers on them. Beige bricks with bright yellow points of sale and large black foam letters surrounded you and this is why we called the album 'Key Markets'. It's the continuation of the day to day and how we see it, the un-incredible landscape." "The album was recorded in various periods between summer 2014 through to October of that year. We worked fast as we normally do, the method was the same as the other albums and like the other two, the sound has naturally moved itself along. 'Key Markets' is in places quite abstract but it still deals heavily with the disorientation of modern existence. It still touches on character assassination, the delusion of grandeur and the pointlessness of government politics. It's a classic. Fuck em." 1/Live Tonight 2/No One's Bothered 3/Bronx in a Six 4/Silly Me 5/Cunt Make It Up 6/Face To Faces 7/Arabia 8/In Quiet Streets 9/Tarantula Deadly Cargo 10/Rupert Trousers 11/Giddy on the Ciggies 12/The Blob

Die erste Neuauflage vom offiziellen "Die Ärzte" Debut seit vielen Jahren in guter Austattung ( LP, black, 180 gram + DLC )

Gitarre, Schlagzeug, Bass. Drei junge Menschen, die eben noch im Besetzereck ihr erstes Konzert gegeben haben. die Ärzte sind aus Berlin (aus Berlin!). Viele, die BelaFarinRod in letzter Zeit im kleinen Club ihres Vertrauens live gesehen haben, schwören darauf, dass wir hier das Nächste Große Ding haben. Quasi die Beste Band der Welt in the making: Spontan, unberechenbar, witzig, aus Versehen tiefsinnig an den richtigen Stellen und auch sonst ganz einfach wahnsinnig. Nur halt in gut. Acht Tage waren sie im Studio, die dreizehn Tracks ihres Debütalbums klingen standesgemäß rau, laut und so unkonventionell frisch als hätten wir gerade 1984. Mit potenziellen Klassikern wie „Mädchen“ oder „Zu spät“, zukünftigen Lieblingsliedern à la „Schlaflied“ und „Roter Minirock“ sowie einem ganzen Haufen weiterer Songperlen, die man sich auch in dreißig oder vierzig Jahren noch ganz unpeinlich berührt wird anhören können. Und mit „Claudia hat ’nen Schäferhund“. „Debil“ erscheint nun als Vinylalbum (mit Downloadcode)!

The Cranberries – Dreams

The Cranberries – Dolores O’Riordan, Noel Hogan, Michael Hogan and Fergal Lawler – quietly became one of the world’s most successful bands in the 1990's. With O’Riordan’s remarkable voice and their unforgettable melodies, the group scored a string of UK and US Top 10 albums and singles. This stunning collection brings together 11 of their best-known tracks, including their unforgettable calling cards, Linger and Zombie.

This compilation brings to vinyl the incredibly successful CD title which has so far sold over 100k units in the UK alone.

Black Sheep – and their 1991 ‘A Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing’ album - were definitely an outlier in the Native Tongues fold. They were raunchier and more playful than their peers which, given that those peers were A Tribe Called Quest, De La Soul and Jungle Brothers, is really saying something.

‘Strobelite Honey’ catches that difference perfectly, leaning heavily on a pair of 1980 disco samples rather than the jazz of their brethren, and taking a somewhat less chivalrous approach to women. ‘Strobelite’s slender but fun narrative sees rapper Dres up in the club and fooled by the lights – approaching a girl he likes the look off but backing off when they reveal she’s not what he expected. Charmed, we’re sure.

Dres and his partner Mr. Lawnge were always willing to push boundaries, and that extends to the often confusing labelling of the various remixes of this choice single. 12”s dropped with the ‘No We Didn’t Mix’, ‘Yes We Did Mix’ and ‘Maybe We Did Mix’ (not to mention a separate 12” of House mixes).

The last and best of these accompanied the original version on the now-rare 1991 7”, as it does here. The ‘Maybe We Did Mix’ adds urgent horns - almost like the buzzing of a bee - and a new beat to completely reconfigure the sound into something much more of its era. It’s a reminder of when remixes were about much more than the same beat with different rappers.

Melvin Bliss’ iconic ‘Synthetic Substitution’ (1973) has been sampled hundreds of times. Gracing records from Naughty by Nature’s ‘O.P.P’ to Public Enemy’s ‘Don’t Believe the Hype’, it’s one of the foundations of hip-hop. However, there’s a school of thought that says the sample could have been retired forever after Ced Gee used it for ‘Ego Tripping’. It was the first song to use those wonderful Bernard Purdie drums, and arguably the best.

Their first release on Next Plateau Records, this instant 1986 classic slams from the first bar, that hard-as-hell beat underpinned by stabs and the breathy ‘ultra-magnetic-magnetic’ chant beneath. Meanwhile, Ced and future legend Kool Keith go to town with pseudo-science and a thinly veiled diss of Run DMC – ‘Say what, Peter Piper, to hell with childish rhymes’. It’s a song shot through with promise they’d more than fulfil on their debut album, 1988’s landmark ‘Critical Beatdown’.

The flip, ‘Funky Potion’, doesn’t coalesce with quite the same genius but is still more than a curio, with the MC’s doubling down on their futuristic nonsense approach to lyricism. Rufus Thomas’ ‘Do the Funky Penguin’ is the base for yet more stabs, discordant scratches and a kitchen-sink approach that shows just innovative the group were prepared to be.

Never before released before on 7”, this undeniable hip-hop classic comes complete with bespoke hype stickers incorporating one of the great rap logos of all time.

The late engineer and producer Paul C’s fingerprints are all over this single from Ultramagnetic MC’s, perhaps the defining release of their career. While earlier records gave notice of their strange and unique talents, they were loveably messy affairs. This, however, is the real deal, as polished as their early sound would ever be.

‘Give the Drummer Some’ grabs a fistful of different elements – from James Brown, Dee Felice Trio and James Brown – but bends them to its own purpose. This is a song with a momentum of its own and endlessly quotable lyrics. One of which, of course, was sampled by The Prodigy – huge hip-hop fans – for ‘Smack My Bitch Up’ in 1997. The now hugely rare 7” of ‘Give the Drummer Some’ edits this out to make it more radio-friendly, but this reissue reverses that cut, giving you the original lyrics. If anyone knows why Kool Keith also changes the word ‘rappers’ to ‘monkeys’ for that edit, answers on a postcard…

The brilliant B-side harks back to the time when every group had a song dedicated to their DJ. ‘Moe Luv’s Theme’ sees Kool Keith at his most straightforward, singing the praises of the turntable skills of Moe Luv. It would be throwaway were it not for the effortless repurposing of Jackie Robinson’s oft-sampled ‘Pussyfooter’. That – and the presence of one of the world’s great MC’s at the height of his powers – elevates it far above a footnote.

The Bees are a textbook case of the chew and spit cycle that was the late 80’s South African music industry. Although their unknown story is likely unique, it is just as likely that it is no different to that of many other young artists who dreamed of getting their music heard at the time.

By 1988, the independent record label was no longer as uncommon as it had been at the beginning of the decade. As the 80s went on, more seasoned A&R reps and Producers that had gained experience and connections from their work under major labels would be trying to cash in on a market they helped create. Without the need of big rooms or expensive recording equipment, the digital advancements allowed many Producers to open or work in smaller studios and promote unknown artists under their own imprints. They would then have their catalogs marketed and distributed by the same major labels they had been working for just years prior. This would open up the possibility of a new era of stars as potential talent no longer had to be pitched to major labels in hopes of them taking a chance on a new signee over their already established artists. With the market growing and a struggle to keep up with the demand for new sounds this agreement would allow the major labels to put new emerging artists or groups on their catalog with little investment and high reward if it happened to be a hit.

ON Records was just one of the independent players at the time. Ronnie Robot had just signed the unlikely trio The Bees in hopes of adding a hit group to his label roster that consisted of solo acts. Despite the debut’s fresh house inspired sound, it failed to catch on was outsold by the bubblegum disco the label was known for. Over the years unsold back stock and promos would build up with the distributor. Luckily this allowed sealed copies from the label’s catalog to survive into the 90s when the distributor’s stock was unloaded and picked up by legendary Johannesburg jazz shop Kohinoor. Here sealed copies of the Bees first attempt sat under appreciated for over 20 years before becoming a hot title after they started circulating online and became club staples. This is how the first album of an unknown group with no success was able to become a collectors item and earn a reissue over 25 years later.

With their first record behind them The Bees were ready move forward and get back into the studio. A suggestion from producers had the trio change camps and go work with the newly formed Creative Sound Recordings, the label that promised “Music for the Future” and ended up being an essential studio in the early years of Kwaito. They would work with producer Chris Ghelakis and guitarist George Vardas, while a young Marvin Moses sat behind the desk. Musically the sophomore album was as good as a follow up as you could get. Building on the first album, Mashonisa delivers catchy melodies backed by heavy drum programming that would score points with any Pantsula. The Black Box inspired “ Never Give Up” was one of two tracks chosen to be pressed as the promo for the album, hoping to trick listeners with their catchy version of the hit( A year later the label would release their first volume of Black Box covers sang by neo soul diva BB, it would be a great seller). The label printed up an unknown amount of these in a last attempt to push the release in Shabeens and on Radio. The cheaper route of flooding the market with promo copies would only pay off 25 years later when unplayed copies started being rediscovered and had survived the years in a quantity that original run of the full album could not. Once again it was clear that with no mainstream appeal, the quality of the music on its own was not enough to garner any success at the time. The album flopped worse than their first and failed to make it past it’s initial run, making it one of the harder titles to get from the CSR catalog.

Mashonisa would be the last attempt from the Bees. They would disappear from the scene as quickly as they appeared. Of the three members it is only known that lead Singer Solomon Phiri continued in music fronting a wave dance group before he mysteriously vanished in 1993, never to be heard from again. Through a combination of luck and circumstance the group, which is unknown in South Africa to even the most plugged in musicians, producers and radio hosts of the time, managed to finally get some of the recognition they deserved 30 years later. Unfortunately this small blip of fame would happen with none of the band members present to give their side of the story, or even aware of how their two albums became popular enough to be printed on different continents in a new millennia. The Bees suffered the same fate as countless other artists of the time, who thanks to emerging independent labels and willing producers were given an opportunity to have a short career, only to be replaced by the meat grinder of the music industry when they failed to produce a hit.

House Of EFUNK Records returns with a vinyl only offering of floor focused club jams from Tom Flynn, the UK based producer who’s seen outings on Planet E, Vega Records & Dirtybird to name a few.

Highlighted by “Fifty Ways”, a polyrhythmic feast for the ears featuring Grammy nominated NYC legend Luisito Quintero on percussion... The original rides a pulsating afro-feel, while the deep mix envelops us in tense foggy atmospheres fit for those late night / early mornings. Detroit heavyweight, Shigeto supplies a remix that pumps the tempo and injects that Motor City jazz he’s so known for.

Rounding it out... "Catching Stars" brings us down gently, capturing the coastal breeze & warmth of a late summer day... Touché concludes the story, riding a bubbling bassline & playful melodies, it’s a track perfectly fit for the sunrise.

Theresa Stroetges has and always will be a traveler. Under the name Golden Diskó Ship or as a member of bands like Soft Grid or the improv collective Epiphany Now!, the Berlin-based multi-instrumentalist has continuously been moving through the fringes of experimental music, but also extensively explored the possibilities of tried and tested formulas - whether folk, rock, techno or pop. With her fourth solo album, her first for the Karaoke Kalk label, the Golden Diskó Ship is yet again venturing into unknown territory. »Araceae« is inspired by environmental changes and the eerie feelings that arise when faced with natural beauty - when everything seems perfect on the surface but something feels off underneath it all. As a whole, it is notably more focused on electronic grooves that provide the foundation for Stroetges’s poetic long-form storytelling.

Partially conceived during a residency in India, »Araceae« is the first Golden Diskó Ship record to feature two guest musicians. For »Wildly Floral, Slightly Damp,« Stroetges collaborated with percussionist Dripta Samajder who with his Sri Khol contributes complex rhythms to a driving beat that wouldn’t be out of place in the record bags of daring DJs. Sophia Trollmann takes over saxophone duties for »Ortolan,« a riveting coming-together of intricate, IDM-flavoured techno and jazz-inspired improvisation. Both are integral standout tracks on an album that clearly follows a holistic plan. Already the opener »Clouds of Neon Limelight« dips into anthemic synth pop territory, but unfolds into a great saga full of ominous undertones and Stroetges’s trademark: layered vocals that at once evoke feelings of uncanniness and intimacy.

It’s a juxtaposition that runs throughout »Araceae,« thus enforcing the album’s overall themes of sensual experience and alienation. »Game of Biryani« for example lends some of its musical structures from pop music, calling into question traditional songwriting conventions which here reappear as irritating echo effects rather than recycled old tropes. With the lush »Limping over the Prairies« and the adventurous »Glow-in-the-Dark Gloves,« Stroetges further challenges her audience by applying noise and a heavy dose of autotune respectively to disorientating effect.

The couple makes for an impressive finale of an album that scrutinises our ideas of what is natural - whether in music or the world around us. »Araceae« was inspired by the travels of its creator, but also sets out to ascertain what lies beyond everything that eyes or ears can perceive.

Swedish titan, Eric Prydz, drops two brand new tracks, ‘Valborg’ and ‘The Raid’ under his highly acclaimed techno-focussed moniker Cirez D, via his own Mouseville Records.

Having teased new material at the likes of Tomorrowland and Creamfields last year, many have been eagerly awaiting this 12” and quite rightly too. A double header of big room, synth heavy Cirez D slammers, that take listeners on a hard-hitting techno exploration.