The heavy metal band Crimson Glory formed in Florida in 1982 and wore metallic silver face masks on-stage, for all photo shoots and public appearances. Front man and vocalist Midnight was an astoundingly powerful vocalist, so in addition to their identifiable look, they were easily identifiable in sound. After the success of their self-titled debut album, they released the follow-up album in 1988, titled Transcendence. It was received with great critical acclaim and is considered to be their finest work. The album features the popular tracks “Lady Of Winter”, “Painted Skies” and “Lonely” amongst others.
Transcendence is available as a limited edition of 1500 individually numbered copies on “Cool Blue” coloured vinyl and includes an insert.
Buscar:re public
Efficient Space publication ENTHUSIASMS revives with Issue #03. 92 pages covering Aotea-roa DIY folk proliferator Maxine Funke, the vocal magick of Cucina Povera, Australian devo-tional jazz mystery Singing Dust, Osaka portal EM Records, unsung dub specialist Sheriff Lin-do and the living practice of e fishpool. View post-punk trailblazers through the lens of Rotter-dam polaroid photographer Peter Graute, while Swiss artist Elise Gagnebin-de Bons exhibits her series of collages purposed for Ghost Riders. The issue also boasts imaginary mixtapes from Gavsborg, Greg Davis and Jefre Cantu-Ledesma, Mikey Young, Sonic Boom and Troth. Perfect bound and illuminated by designer Steele Bonus.
Even in these most turbulent of times, dub musician and fatigued onlooker Elijah Minnelli remains an inexplicable stalwart on the lower rungs of the Breadminster County Council.
His latest record ‘Clams As A Main Meal’ continues his astute siphoning of council funds, this time with help from the Breadminster Board of Abstinence. As a further mark of respect, the original head of the Board, Dr. K'houldoux, graces the cover art in his infamous ‘Looming Moon of Desire’ guise.*
As fine a backdrop as any for Minneli’s off-brand dub experiments, and ‘Clams...’ is the truest representation of his varied wheelhouse yet...
We find vocal appearances from dub goliath Dennis Bovell and Welsh-language singer Carwyn Ellis. A pair of tracks which build on 2024’s acclaimed ‘Perpetual Musket’, a collection of folk songs reworked alongside reggae vocalists, released by FatCat Records. It garnered glowing reviews, with nods from The Guardian and The Quietus concluding with prominent appearances on their respective yearly round-up lists.
Elsewhere, the album finds Minnelli in a more experimental mode, all wheezing contraptions and cockeyed bass, creaking with the weight of creation, a satisfying tactility laid seam-side up.
As well as ‘Perpetual Musket’, the new album follows years of sold out 7" singles, handmade and self-released. Online, the tracks have amassed global streams numbering in the millions. His tracks have found play across an eclectic range of radio mixes and dance floors, most notably the likes of Andrew Weatherall, Batu, Optimo and Zakia Sewell (BBC6Music).
It is perhaps worth mentioning that this everbuilding interest in his work is at great odds with the growing suspicions amongst his fellow townsfolk, who see his Breadminster County Council Music Initiative as nothing more than an empty cash-grab.
Further Reading on the Breadminster Board of Abstinence
In the late 70s, Breadminster was awash with the last vestiges of the hippy era. Though the flared silhouette of the lower leg remained, the utopian ideals that had once flowed merrily around the youth's shaded ankles had begun to wane. LSD and free love had led to a sharp spike in population and a generation of children raised by air-headed psychonauts unprepared for the bleary-eyed strictures of parenthood.
Aware of the crisis, the County Council entrusted Dr. Paulinque K'houldoux to spearhead a pushback, and it was his pro-abstinence movement - a mixture of education initiatives and radical renutrition campaigns - that came to impact Breadminster's census deep into the new millennium.
Being a pseudo-archipelago Breadminster has fundamentally limited resources, however deep-seated ties to distant coastal villages meant that oysters were a regular part of the local diet. K'houldoux pinpointed this as a factor in the town's overpopulation, and believed that simply replacing these with clams (a “lesser mollusk”) would help lower the erotic urges of the people. It was his “anti-aphrodesia” movement that first championed the idea of “Clams As A Main Meal,” and the slogan “Consider Abstinence” carried the message yet further.
The Breadminster Board of Abstinence soon became involved in all cultural happenings in the area, with K'houldoux MCing at prominent festivals and performances, sometimes dressed as the “Looming Moon of Desire” - an idea of his relating to the tide, seafood, menstrual cycles, and his privately held celestial predilections.
It was in 1981 that it was revealed Dr. K'houldoux had never fully qualified as a doctor and was seeking exile in Breadminster due to a series of botched bracelet heists in which he had previously been involved. K'houldoux was subsequently extradited to Basingstoke, where he served 3 of a 12-year sentence, owing to the lunar-oriented prisoner health campaigns he helped implement.
It has been a strange twist of bureaucratic fate that the Breadminster Board of Abstinence has never stopped receiving public funding, despite its lack of clear utility. And while its roots are tied to a rose-tinted past, the Board continues to sponsor cultural events and projects to this day.
An extract from: Eugeniq Schooner's article in Sydney Parishioner: “Clams, Breadminster and Countercultural Abstinence Trends” (2008)
Faitiche welcomes a new artist: Christina Kubisch belongs to the first generation of sound artists. Her practice ranges from performances, concerts, to works with video and visual art, but she is best known for her sound installations and electro-acoustic compositions.
TUNING brings together three pieces by Christina Kubisch from different periods of her oeuvre. What they have in common is the way they transform sound phenomena originally considered “non-music” into compositions.
Jan Jelinek: Gaming in Silence (2024) is the most recent work on this compilation. It’s a collage of electromagnetic waves, voice, and abstract sound textures. How did this combination come about?
Christina Kubisch: Gaming was commissioned as a fixed-media composition for the Sound Dome at ZKM Karlsruhe. Since Resonances: The Electromagnetic Bodies Project (2005), I’ve been making recordings in the old and new server rooms at the ZKM and in their permanent collection of historical computer games. Computer games like Asteroids (Atari, 1979) and Poly-Play (VEB Polytechnik, 1986) have specially generated analogue electromagnetic waves that interest me in particular on account of their density, rhythms and textures. I originally studied painting and to me the work of composition often feels like painting an abstract picture. I alter my source material as little as possible, layering and overlapping until a distinctive sound space emerges. In recent pieces, I sometimes combine magnetic waves with field recordings or live instruments. In Gaming it’s my recording of a Chinese song about silence.
JJ: Two persons walking through a street in Madrid (2004) is a recording from your Electrical Walks series. Here we should give a brief explanation of one of your best known works: participants in an Electrical Walk move through public spaces wearing prepared headphones that allow them to receive electromagnetic waves from their surroundings – for example from security gates, ATMs or neon signs. They discover a situation that normally is inaudible to the human ear and they can actively shape it by choreographing their movements. I really admire this piece, not least because there’s no clear dividing line between participants and artist. What exactly do we hear in Two persons walking through a street in Madrid (2004)?
CK: With this early work, I wanted to understand what is heard by people participating in an Electrical Walk in the same place but moving in different ways. The Spanish composer Miguel Alvarez-Fernàndez and I set off from opposite ends of a major shopping street in Madrid, met briefly in the middle, and then continued to the end. We both recorded our walks and I then layered them over one another. You might call it a work of electromagnetic conceptualism.
JJ: Diapason (2009 version) is an installation that plays a composition based on sounds from fifteen tuning forks. This setting is audible in the recording: there’s no dramatic arc, no beginning or end – instead, it recalls a piece of aleatoric music focussing on the decay phase. How did you come to make this work and could you tell us something about your compositional method?
CK: Diapason is part of a series of three pieces that deal with “non-instruments” or instruments that no longer exist: electrical mine bells used to send signals to the workers underground; a historical glass harmonica originally used for medicinal purposes; and tuning forks that were used by doctors to test people’s hearing. All of these methods are no longer in use. The sound of the tuning forks, audible only if held close to the ear, was recorded at the electronic studio at Berlin’s Technical University in such a way that even their decay remained audible. The frequencies range between 64 and 2048 Hertz and they can be adjusted at micro-intervals using small movable weights. The sequence and the duration of the pauses are dictated by chance and were not defined in advance. The 2009 version was created for an installation in the historic Holy Cross Church (Korskirken) in Bergen. Visitors could enter and leave the space at any time, deciding for themselves where and for how long they wished to listen to the sounds played back over an array of small loudspeakers placed on the floor of the apse.
Credits:
Gaming in Silence: commission of the ZKM/Hertzlab, Karlsruhe 2023
elektronic sound processing: Tom Thiel
sound engineering and mixing: Eckehard Güther
Diapason: produced at Elektronisches Studio of TU Berlin
rearrangement: Eckehard Güther
Christina Kubisch, published by Edition Christina Kubisch / Random Musick Publishing
image front: Transitionen 2021 by C. Kubisch, sonagrams of electronic waves (courtesy: Galerie Mazzoli Berlin)
image back: Diapason Tuning Fork, property of Folkmar Hein, Photo: Archiv Christina Kubisch
design by Tim Tetzner
mastered by Giuseppe Ielasi
Thanks to Miguel Álvarez-Fernández, Folkmar Hein, Dominik Kautz and Mario Mazzoli
There's a tendency in metal to mistake aggression for honesty, volume for depth. To confuse the performance of darkness with its actual weight. Hidden Fires Burn Hottest, the new album from San Francisco-based post-black metal band Bosse-de-Nage, sidesteps this entirely. It’s the group’s most fully realized work yet, precisely because it refuses to be pinned down.
Bosse-de-Nage have been working with The Flenser for over fifteen years. They were one of the first bands the label ever partnered with and have the longest active relationship in the label's history. But unlike most bands who build momentum through constant touring and visibility, Bosse-de-Nage has largely existed apart from the music world's usual machinery. They've evolved on their own terms, in relative isolation, allowing the work to develop without outside pressure or influence. What began rooted in black metal anonymity has mutated into something that actively defies categorization. The aggression is still there, but it's no longer the point. Hidden Fires Burn Hottest finds the band treating emotions like physical objects, feelings with spatial properties. “No Such Place"" describes a space that can't exist but does anyway, somewhere between thought and location. ""Immortality Project"" examines infinite possibility not as promise but as problem, endless options collapsing under their own weight. These songs don't use metaphor to describe emotion. They make emotion into something you could theoretically touch.
Tracked by Jack Shirley (Deafheaven, Oathbreaker) at Atomic Garden East and mixed and mastered by Richard Chowenhill of Agriculture, Hidden Fires Burn Hottest was years in development, with some tracks beginning in 2018.
The long writing process offered time that most records don't get. Time to live with ideas, revise endlessly, to let structures settle. For the first time, lyricist Bryan Manning wrote everything in advance, creating a surplus to pull from rather than working under deadline pressure. The difference shows.
Coming off Further Still, an album built on constraint and economy, Bosse-de-Nage sought the opposite: sprawl, strangeness, fewer rules. Space for ideas to develop without rushing them. Dynamics that move through quiet as much as noise. Presence earned through atmosphere instead of volume. The record even includes ""Mementos,"" which might be considered the first love song the band has ever written.
Nothing here coheres into a theme. These are pieces pulled from low moments and private feelings made public through sound. The band has never been interested in positivity, in music that resolves cleanly or offers comfort. But bleakness doesn't mean humorlessness. There's something darkly funny running through much of it, even when it shouldn't be.
Hidden Fires Burn Hottest doesn't explain itself. It just insists: what you feel is as real as what you can see."
- 1: El Vaticano Va A Arder
- 2: Matar Jipis En Las Cies
- 3: Las Tetas De Mi Novia
At the genesis of one of the most essential bands in Spanish pop-rock of the 1980s, this rarity presents early versions of what would later become some of the most chanted songs in Siniestro Total's repertoire: 'Matar jipis en las Cíes' and 'Las tetas de mi novia,' along with Germán Coppini's original composition 'El Vaticano va a arder.' With limited resources but plenty of energy and humor, a three-song demo was recorded in August 1981, now available here on vinyl for the first time. The songs came first, and only later did the band take a name-initially Mari Cruz Soriano y los que afinan su piano, and shortly after, Siniestro Total. 'Matar jipis en las Cíes' is an original composition by the band's founding members Alberto Torrado, Julián Hernández, and Miguel Costas, while 'Las tetas de mi novia' is a loose version of the song 'I'm a Rocket' by the Dutch band Gruppo Sportivo. 'El Vaticano va a arder' was contributed by Germán Coppini, the mysterious fourth member of this singular lineup, inspired by 'Religion,' the anti-religious rant included on Public Image Limited's debut album. This single is an essential document for both Siniestro Total fans and Spanish-language punk enthusiasts. First-ever vinyl edition.
Box Set[110,71 €]
Metaphon is pleased to present this première edition, which brings together a near-complete collection of the acousmatic works of Liliane Donskoy, recorded in the 1970s and 1980s.
Liliane Donskoy (*1933) is a French, classically trained pianist, music teacher, and composer of both instrumental and acousmatic music. She began her musical training at an early age, undertaking private piano studies with Yves Nat at the age of thirteen, shortly after the Second World War. During the 1960s and 1970s, she pursued advanced studies with prominent figures of twentieth-century music, including Darius Milhaud, Olivier Messiaen, Pierre Schaeffer, and Guy Reibel, and participated in courses led by Karlheinz Stockhausen, Luciano Berio, György Ligeti, and Iannis Xenakis.
Despite this extensive and diverse training, Donskoy encountered limited institutional and professional opportunities to fully realize her artistic vision. A decisive turning point occurred in 1977, when she gained access to the facilities of the Institute of Psychoacoustics and Electronic Music (IPEM) in Ghent. There, she realized and completed the majority of her acousmatic compositions.
Donskoy’s oeuvre is characterized by a high degree of structural complexity, precision, and expressive intensity. Her work reflects a pronounced and distinctive artistic temperament, manifested through a rigorous exploration of sound material and form. Notwithstanding its artistic significance, her music has remained largely unknown, as her compositions were neither widely circulated nor formally released, leading to their relative obscurity until the present publication.
slipcase edition[63,24 €]
Metaphon is pleased to present this première edition, which brings together a near-complete collection of the acousmatic works of Liliane Donskoy, recorded in the 1970s and 1980s.
Liliane Donskoy (*1933) is a French, classically trained pianist, music teacher, and composer of both instrumental and acousmatic music. She began her musical training at an early age, undertaking private piano studies with Yves Nat at the age of thirteen, shortly after the Second World War. During the 1960s and 1970s, she pursued advanced studies with prominent figures of twentieth-century music, including Darius Milhaud, Olivier Messiaen, Pierre Schaeffer, and Guy Reibel, and participated in courses led by Karlheinz Stockhausen, Luciano Berio, György Ligeti, and Iannis Xenakis.
Despite this extensive and diverse training, Donskoy encountered limited institutional and professional opportunities to fully realize her artistic vision. A decisive turning point occurred in 1977, when she gained access to the facilities of the Institute of Psychoacoustics and Electronic Music (IPEM) in Ghent. There, she realized and completed the majority of her acousmatic compositions.
Donskoy’s oeuvre is characterized by a high degree of structural complexity, precision, and expressive intensity. Her work reflects a pronounced and distinctive artistic temperament, manifested through a rigorous exploration of sound material and form. Notwithstanding its artistic significance, her music has remained largely unknown, as her compositions were neither widely circulated nor formally released, leading to their relative obscurity until the present publication.
This limited edition of 100 white label 12” vinyls presented by the BLACK INDUSTRIAL RESEARCH GROUP is released to coincide with shows at London’s Ormside (November 19), Bristol’s Arnolfini (November 21) and Cardiff’s Chapter (November 29), ahead of the 2026 publication of the project’s extensive vinyl boxset. One-sided and hand-stamped with hidden reverse insert, the record features an original composition by DUBMORPHOLOGY (TREVOR MATHISON + GARY STEWART) reworking the words of JOHN AKOMFRAH (from an interview by APPAU JNR BOAKYE-YIADOM and OLIVER FUKE).
2026 Repress
The Architects of Shadows explores the volatile undercurrents shaping today's polarized world, where extremes on all sides vie for influence and control. Against a backdrop of rising nationalism, digital echo chambers, and deepening distrust, each track captures a stage in the gradual radicalization of society. Through dark, immersive soundscapes, the album delves into how unseen architects exploit fear, amplify division, and pull the strings of public sentiment, leading society toward ideological extremes. The Architects of Shadows invites listeners to confront the forces behind the fracturing of Western societies in an era marked by profound political and cultural polarization.
XKatedral Anthology I is the first in a series of archival releases dedicated to presenting music by XKatedral affiliated composers working within the realm of slowly evolving harmonic and timbral music. This double-vinyl set contains an array of pieces dating from 2010 - 2020. Four of the works included here were originally released on cassette tape early on in the label's history, while the two remaining pieces are presented by the label for the first time.
"The works Ir Himinn, Grooenn by Kristoffer Svensson, Disquiet (Heart) by Marta Forsberg and Lamé by Isak Edberg were first released on the compilation XKatedral Volume II in 2016. Svenssons piece from 2014 combines justly tuned gamelan percussion and prepared piano intricately interwoven in a way that obscures the boundaries between the two instrument groups. Forsberg and Edbergs pieces both use a monolithic form to explore the timbral and harmonic spaces provided by the Düben Baroque organ situated in Tyska Kyrkan in the oldest part of Stockholm. While similar in terms of instrumentation the two works differ formally - Edbergs Lamé composed in 2010 uses the registers of the organ to articulate a seamless spectral transformation while Forsbergs Disquiet (Heart) from 2014 deals in blocks of sound with a varying degree of opacity, saturation and intensity.
Glory for two electric guitars by Caterina Barbieri and Kali Malone was composed and recorded in Tempo Reale in Florence, Italy, and was originally released on the cassette compilation XKatedral Volume III in 2016. This music takes the form of an ever-evolving hypnotic pattern shared by the two instruments articulated through an additive and subtractive canon. Dissolving Ceremony, composed in 2012 by Edberg/Erlandsson/Lisinski, was first presented publicly on the self-released record Stratum. The music contained in that release was formed from a collection of gamelan percussion instruments augmented by two sets of live-electronic instruments tuned to the harmonic framework formed by the partials of the metal percussion. Originally positioned in the center of the record running order between two long monolithic process-based pieces, Dissolving Ceremony now stands on its own as a memory of a time and methodology from the not so distant past.
The newest piece in this set is Shipwrecks by Daniel M Karlsson. While this work is a recent one Karlsson should be considered one of the forerunners of the musical expression contained within this record set. Active within new music for two decades his strongly articulated musical ideas and constantly evolving craftsmanship has resulted in an enormous body of work, and has served as an inspiration for many of his fellow composers. This piece is a celebration of transposition and its immense capacity for timbral transformation using a vast array of instruments performed, recorded and electronically treated by the composer to form a liquid uncanny topography where a deeply personal harmonic language constantly shifts, slides and shivers."
Acclaimed producer, DJ, and dancefloor healer Octo Octa (Maya Bouldry-Morrison) announces her fourth full-length album, Sigils For Survival. Following 2013's Between Two Selves, 2017's Where Are We Going?, and 2019's Resonant Body, the new record marks a decade since Maya publicly came out as transgender in November 2015. ''As an autobiographical artist, I set out to write an album that would be a milestone for this past decade of joy and sorrow,'' Maya explains. ''Sigils For Survival is my attempt to encapsulate the intentions and techniques that I used to move through life into a spell.'' For each of the record's eight tracks, Maya drew a sigil. Each is a personal symbol intended to ''bind magic to the song and seal its intention.'' These drawings appear throughout the physical edition's design. Maya's sister, New York artist Hope Morrison, incorporated each sigil into her original paintings, which comprise the album's vivid artwork. Hope Morrison, whose imagery translates the sigils' energy into vivid form; the layout was designed by Jo?o Ervedosa. Created entirely on hardware instruments and later mixed in Logic, Sigils For Survival captures the tactile immediacy of live performance. Maya preserved the feel of MIDI-clock drift and off-grid recording, letting her machines interact in the rhythmic pocket, rather than confirming them to a click. Alongside her signature deep, ecstatic electronics, the album features hand-played dulcimer, hand-pan, and recorder. Her voice also returns, carrying spells of love, protection, and transformation. Across Sigils For Survival, Octo Octa channels the ecstatic house lineage into an intimate ritual space. The music speaks of immediacy, play, and communion -- of magic as method, love as survival, and sound as spellcraft. Sigils For Survival is both a document of ten years lived fully and an invocation for the next chapter -- a glowing testament to music's power to protect, transform, and set the spirit free.
Official reissue of a German under-the-radar disco tune. The original from 1979 is a bubbling dancefloor stomper with freewheeling synth lines. For the flipside of this 7" Korkut Elbay created a spaced out balearic dub rework. Picture sleeve with a funky painting by Holger Kurt Jäger that picks up on the original.
The melody of 'Butterfly Dance' came to Dieter Bührig's mind as a butterfly floated through the recording studio during a session break. The resulting track landed on a compilation with mostly cover versions of disco hits. Now, more than 45 years later, the tune found its well-deserved single release on funkscapes.
Korkut Elbay is a fixture of Cologne's electronic music scene for over 20 years. He's part of the Cómeme camp and with remixes and edits for labels like Permanent Vacation or funkscapes he prooves his sensitive feel for the dancefloor. So does he on this rework, giving the orginal space to breathe and calm down without leaving the dancefloor.
Dieter Bührig studied electrical engineering and sound recording in Berlin. Afterwards he worked several years as a sound engineer for the music industry and as a producer. Later on he worked as a teacher for physics and music, trained trainee teachers for secondary schools and wrote articles and publications on musical education, choir and band arrangements. Nowadays he's writing, among other things, musical crime stories.
"K8A a.k.a. Kaethe Hostetter is a New York–based violinist. composer, and bandleader, whose work grew out of eleven years living and collaborating in Ethiopia. As a founding member of Debo Band and QWANQWA, Hostetter has been performing Ethiopian music for over two decades, and her solo debut, Woradj Alle, builds on this legacy by reimagining Ethiopian songs through live-looped violin and electronics.
"The album unfolds as a hypnotic, ritual-like performance that expands the instrument into an immersive sonic landscape, that refracts Ethiopian classics through dub, psych rock, and avant improvisation. It is not fusion, but transmission - music that blurs memory, place, and time.
"This collection of musical vignettes is based on my time in Ethiopia, the place I called home for 11 years", Kaethe explains. "The phrase 'Woradj Alle' is one of the first colloquial expressions I learned upon arriving in Addis Ababa, used on public transportation, simply meaning 'let me off right around here'. In choosing this name, I invite you to join me on the rickety minibus journey through my time in Ethiopia, and step off 'the bus' into scenarios, atmospheres, and soundscapes that describe moments I experienced, people I met, and other lasting impressions, striking and mundane."
- A1: Poltergeist Party
- A2: Music Box Concerto
- A3: Rain Forest Rap Session
- A4: A Love Theme For Gargoyles
- A5: Bridge Of Promises
- A6: Exasperated Frog
- A7: Take Me To Your Leader
- A8: Deserted Palace
- A9: Pogo Rock
- B1: Wind Swept Canyon
- B2: The Abominable Snowman
- B3: Iraqi Hitch-Hiker
- B4: Free Floating Anxiety
- B5: Synthetic Jungle
- B6: Bee Factory
Transversales Disques proudly presents the first official LP reissue of "Deserted Palace", studio album written & performed by Jean Michel Jarre in 1972, during his work experience at G.R.M. (Groupe de Recherches Musicales).
In 1971, an order was placed with producer Francis Dreyfus to provide sound for public places such as airports and libraries. He decided to pass the project on to Jean-Michel, who had recently been signed by his record company.
These fifteen tracks are made with only two synthesizers (EMS VCS3 & Farfisa organ) in an experimental and very minimal style.
"It was a crazy album, totally homemade, with rhythms that I made in my student room, with a minimum of equipment and at the same time electronic sounds that I stole from the GRM where I went at night after stealing the keys to the studios. It is a pirate record, in every sense of the word, in which we find what I did afterwards.” JMJ
Audio restored & remastered
Including cuesheet poster/ Limited edition of 500 copies
Transmitting from deep in the Finnish underground, Nazar sends out a signal of mysterious, synthetic auras and shadowy, skittering sequences. From smoky outsider techno to rainy-day electro abstraction, the label’s emphasis is on expression and intrigue as each release reaches across the energetic spectrum of moody machine music.
The first release on Nazar presents a cast of protagonists from the Helsinki scene who share precisely the kind of nocturnal tendencies the label is seeking out. Seasoned duo General Electrix open up the A side with ‘Redshifter’, a silken web of 606-powered electro and warmly haunted synth work that nods to the early years of Autechre. Making an early step out into the public domain, Asyx follows up swiftly with the exquisitely detailed machine funk of ‘kVelorum ‘, where a vivid tapestry of noise, squelch and bleep techno gets smartly woven between airy pad tones and a rock-solid rhythm section.
On the B side, Helsinki mainstay Kaiunta brings a dramatic flourish to mid tempo creeper ‘Phantasm’, matching a densely packed rumble of live drums with sweeps of nervy atmospherics and a murky inversion of the classic gated trance lead. 53X rounds out the Nazar mission towards broad BPMs and fresh ideas with a crunchy swerve towards sample-heavy downtempo laced with a generous dose of psychedelics and angular noise.
NAZAR001 is the kind of record that yields surprises and slots into unexpected moments depending on when and where the needle drops, providing versatile moments for adventurous selectors and continuing the fine tradition of outsider electro and techno from Finland.
Hidden Spheres is a Rhythm Section mainstay for a reason: having released 3 EPs on the label, he has
developed his sound and fully emerged into a flow state. His residency at Public Records has enabled him to mould an EP perfect for any dancefloor, perfecting a Detroit indebted House style with influences from early Kerri Chandler and Ron Trent perfect for those heads down, hands-up moments.
Delivering 5 tracks that master dancefloor tension, it's difficult to pick a stand out. “Come On, Yeh” harks
back to the New Jersey House sound with dubby organ chord stabs and punchy 909 drums and a sublime bongo loop. “Don’t You Wanna” welcomes the house dancers, with a low-slung, heavily swung groove, resampled pads, and a deep spoken refrain that gives the track its title. Kicking off the B-side “Get Down” hits the subs, with unmistakably phat bass, moody strings and broad use of the iconic M1 organ bass patch “Organ2”. Followed by “I Feel Good” brings police sirens, 808s and swirling pads, to a glorious Deep House tune with a top chime motif that keeps the party moving. The final track of the B side, “You Don’t Know”, takes things down a notch, but maintaining the sublime tension with classic house piano chords and another wicked percussive loop.
Hidden Spheres has returned to his unadulterated House roots, with an EP that stays true to the classic sound. He has shaped an awesome body of work with character from deep spoken word samples, perfect use of dub sirens and grooves that can give any club a reason to invest in bigger
The long-overdue recognition of a songwriting genius The lyrics of Dan Treacy"s band Television Personalities transport listeners to a parallel universe consisting of unique mixtures of euphoric Sixties references and harsh social realism: brightly coloured, psychedelic worlds in which Syd Barrett, Salvador Dalí, Andy Warhol and the young Woody Allen meet, or a dreariness of marital crises, unpaid bills, loneliness and depression. Nuances: rather rare, and when they do occur, so subtle that they take the listener"s breath away. Admired by Kurt Cobain and Pavement, praised by Alan McGee, covered by the Tindersticks and musically immortalised by MGMT ("Song for Dan Treacy"); the Television Personalities are one of, if not the reference band of indie pop, which - the world has never been fair - was denied major chart success. "If I Could Write Poetry" now brings together for the first time the lyrics of 100 of Dan Treacy"s most important songs. But this book is much more than a collection of lyrics; it also contains very personal impressions, anecdotes and tributes from around 50 musicians, friends and fans. Contributors from the German-speaking world include artists such as Carsten Friedrich (Superpunk, Die Liga der gewöhnlichen Gentlemen), Bachmann Prize winner Tex Rubinowitz, and musicians Phillip Boa and Klaus Cornfield (Throw that Beat in the Garbagecan). The book is published and edited by Gregor Kessler, who emphasises that he found it difficult to maintain his professional neutrality towards Dan Treacy, as he has been an avid listener of Television Personalities records for four decades now. An English-language publication
Jess Sah Bi is well-known as half of the legendary duo Jess Sah Bi & Peter One who brought homegrown Country-Americana to the West African masses with their smash debut Our Garden Needs Its Flowers in the mid-1980s. Touring stadiums and reaching listeners worldwide, their music has racked up millions of spins on YouTube and remains imprinted in the hearts of Ivorians of a certain age. ATFA reissued their album in 2018, garnering critical acclaim from publications including Pitchfork and Rolling Stone and reaching a new generation of listeners outside Ivory Coast (Cote d'Ivoire). Sometime in the early 90s, Die Sahbi - or Jesse, as he known to friends-became gravely ill with an unknown ailment and almost died. He visited various doctors and all kinds of religious healers and nothing helped. One day he went down to an Evangelical Christian revival in his neighborhood. They prayed over him and he was delivered. He says, "Their prayers helped chase out whatever demons and unhealthy spirits were inside me. After that my illness went away. When I went to the United States a few months later on an exchange program I wanted to make music to thank God because I was saved." He recorded an album of music praising God in order to honor a promise he made to himself at the depths of his desperation in the hospital. The album Jesus-Christ Ne Deçoit Pas Jesus Christ Does Not Let Us Down came out in 1991 and sold around 3000 cassettes in Ivory Coast. The master tape was lost along the way so the recording has never been on digital platforms until now. Jesse didn't have much time to record while visiting South Carolina, hence the relatively short album, 6 songs including two reprises for filler. A local pastor connected him with a studio and some American musicians (Robert Fortner and Gary Davis) to help. They added acoustic guitar, percussion and keyboard accompaniment to Jesse's soaring French and Gouro vocals, harmonica and finger-picked acoustic. The resulting recording is deeply soothing and contemplative music that perfectly compliments the songs already embraced by millions. But he had to find the rest of the studio expenses-$600 total-which he secured drawing cartoons for UNICEF. Jesse is Ivory Coast's first political cartoonist, a vocation for which he was widely celebrated at the time. It also made him a few enemies which lead to him leaving the country permanently a few years later. Jesus-Christ Ne Deçoit Pas is Jess Sah Bi's first and only gospel album. Fortunately, fans responded with enthusiasm: widespread radio airplay and concerts followed, along with a growing solo profile in the country. The first big gospel artists in Ivory Coast were the duo Mathieu et Constance, who emerged in 1989. There was a bigger gospel music movement in English-speaking counties like Ghana and Nigeria (Christians make up roughly 40% of the population in Ivory Coast, slightly less than Muslims). Jesse didn't have any intention of working in Christian music but he realized, "You don't make music to make money-you want to send a message." In the years since Jesus-Christ's release, gospel music in Ivory Coast has grown to become a key part of music culture in the country. Spiritual music appears in community actives across the public and private spectrum from religious gatherings and parties to television broadcasts and music festivals. And, as it has evolved and indigenized locally, gospel music has picked up elements of traditional Ivorian music, reggae and soul. The album ultimately precipitated the demise of the duo, who were soon separated geographically as Peter One relocated to Nashville. He went on to become a nurse and release a successful solo album on Verve following the ATFA collaboration. Nowadays Jesse lives in the Bay Area and continues to record and perform music wherever and whenever he has the chance. He is publishing a new book of humorous cartoons in 2025 and his most recent album Never Give Up came out in 2020




















