Buscar:sadness

‘Maybe I’m Dreaming’ is the latest collection selected by Mikey Young (Total Control, EddyCurrent Suppression Ring) and Keith Abrahamsson (Founder and Head of A&R at AnthologyRecordings), the mangled minds behind the beloved ‘Follow the Sun’, ‘Sad About the Times’,and ‘…Still Sad’ compilations. The twenty tracks of ‘Maybe I’m Dreaming’ make a conscious(and unconscious) detour from its predecessors, sourced entirely from private press releases,spanning new decades and production modes within homespun folk, soft rock and otherwise70s and 80s FM radio adjacent music.  The magic of ‘Maybe I’m Dreaming’ is the untold story of the artists behind these songs; thosewho missed the big time, but whose song craft and unrequited care hit the right notes, bothhigh and low.
Where ‘Follow the Sun’ and ‘Sad About the Times’ introduced us to the fame chasing, ambitioncrashing crooners who missed their shot in the mainstream, ‘Maybe I’m Dreaming’ delvesdeeper into the isolated wilds - a private world where production quirks, late-night tape hiss andone-man studio dreams were not necessarily a choice but the hand that was dealt.
With the parameters set to ‘private press only’, Young and Abrahamsson follow a circuitous trailof invention and emotion, documenting a spirit that’s more homespun, sometimes lonelier andoften a little weirder. The guitars still strum, but the keyboards’ hum is more prevalent andprecious; wistful harmonies brush up against lo-fi drum machines; a bittersweet fog lingeringover even the brightest melodies.
As with their previous collaborations, Young and Abrahamsson weren’t interested inconstructing a museum or drafting a historical survey. ‘Maybe I’m Dreaming’ is a sentimentalmixtape, assembled late at night when the mind wanders and old memories blur with imaginedfutures, those within reach and those far too mysterious to ever encounter. Songs wereunearthed in personal collections, deep YouTube burrows, dilapidated web archives and thedim corners of Discogs, with many selections tied not only to intuition but to personalconnection.  Some tracks arrived via friends - Kelley Stoltz, a frequent guide for Young, tipped him off toboth Peter Kraemer’s lost gem ‘Let the Light Slip’ and Awakening’s revelatory closer - addingan unseen but deeply felt thread of camaraderie to the compilation.
The journey takes in a wide, strange sweep: The Watson Brothers Band’s ‘Just Whistle’ opensthe collection with a sigh and a shrug, a song that feels like it’s been waiting for decades to beheard again. Jim Huxley’s ‘Tessa on a Magazine’, rediscovered after a long and winding searchby Young, shimmers with a distinctly Australian melancholia. The heartbreak of Rick Penta’s‘My Story Changes’ and Twice As Nice’s delicate ‘Thoughts of You’ float easily alongside themore buoyant, radio-dream sheen of Barracuda’s ‘Baby I Love You’ and MAK’s sunshinedappled ‘That’s Life’.
Widening the aperture to the late 1970s and early 1980s allows for a deeper exploration intoevolving production techniques and musical technologies. The Squad’s ‘D.L.M.H.I.M.A.’ andChristoph Spendel Group’s ‘Forever’ crackle with the kind of bedroom synth warmth that couldonly come from the analogue age, while the soulful, yearning undercurrent of Awakening’s‘Gotta Do Somethin / Might As Well Cultivate’ caps the collection with a call for action - ormaybe just acceptance - in an accidental Brian Eno ‘Here Come the Warm Jets’ parroting.
While ‘Maybe I’m Dreaming’ moves away from the ‘sad man with guitar’ archetype that hoveredover its predecessors, it remains tethered to a familiar emotional gravity - a balance of longingand lightness that defines this corner of the musical universe. Each track shuffles gentlybetween resignation and hope, sadness and serenity, as if the artists themselves were chasinga dream just beyond reach, recording not for fame but for the simple act of getting it, thatprimal, creative itch, out into the world.
Available on CD and 2LP, featuring the third eye-opening artwork of Dang Wayne Olsen. Thedouble LP set arrives in an outrageous double-wide spine jacket with printed inners and adream journal entry by Pacific Northwest artifactual authority Josh Lewellen.

Congratulations, Electro connoisseur! You are about to enter the Electrifying Dojo. A place where Sifu pdqb and Sensei Rolando teach a transcendental, one-of-a-kind neo-futuristic martial art that does not use hands but something far more delicate and powerful: MUSIC.

Blending martial discipline with the art of electronic music is something deeper, something that no words can properly describe. The skills you will be taught here are feeling music, embodying it. pdqb and Rolando believe that true harmony comes when the mind, body, and soul are united in the sounds that vibrate through the air.

The sounds of this first lesson are soft at first, almost imperceptible. But then they grow into a delicate, trembling melody that fills the room with an emotion that is difficult to place. It isn’t sadness, nor is it joy, but something in between. The more you listen, the more you will be aware of something strange: tears will fall gently, silently. They are not forced, nor are they out of sorrow - it is simply because the music feels so beautiful. Your deepest emotions will be triggered, every note will carry out an old truth, a secret truth, buried deep in your heart.

Another quality drop from Synaptic Cliffs. 4 dark and beautiful signature-style Electrocognition journeys from pdqb, playful with a modern twist while still remaining loyal to its roots. And on the flipside: two stunning, classic Rolando remixes, each with the potential to be the crowning moment in the club.

Danilo and Liza Farba founded the band Farba Kingdom in Odessa, Ukraine. Like many other old port cities, it has always been a multicultural place – but also one of constant change. It is these rapid changes in living conditions that the duo processes musically – with a penchant for nostalgia as a protective shield for themselves and their audience. What does that sound like? Dark, electronic, and wavy.

In 2020, the band established this musical direction with their debut album "Німб": the desperation of post-punk, along with unsettling, crushing industrial vibes and well-thought-out hypnotic synth sequences. Listening to their music, one immediately conjures up the architecture of their hometown, where the mystical neo-Gothic style alternates with Soviet Constructivism. A visual experience that screams the hopeless sadness of this era to the world.

Danilo and Liza Farba are currently in exile in Romania.

Nach dem explosiven, schnörkellosen, selbstbetitelten Debütalbum aus dem letzten Jahr meldet sich das potente Duo mit ihrem zweiten Album 'Bored Animal' zurück.

Es wurde in weniger als zwei Wochen im Studio von Edwyn Collins in den schottischen Highlands konzipiert und aufgenommen, zusammen mit dem Tontechniker Sean Reed. Abgemischt wurde es von David Wrench (Manic Street Preachers, Let's Eat Grandma, Blur, Baxter Dury). His Lordship entschieden sich, ihren Sound zu straffen: Sie verzichteten auf Harmonien, Rockabilly-Einflüsse und Songs mit einer Länge von mehr als vier Minuten und kümmerten sich nicht darum, die Musik perfekt zu machen.

Das Ergebnis ist ein Album, das eine Vielzahl von Ideen in seine elf prägnanten Songs packt. Und obwohl die Songs von 'Bored Animal' Anleihen beim alten Rock ’n‘ Roll nehmen, ist das Album keineswegs ein Retro-Aufguss oder eine Hommage an die Vergangenheit.

Johnny and Robert began work on the album in the first weeks of the pandemic, wanting to make music that sang of those dangerous, disorienting spring days; when birdsong was brighter –– and the sense of bewilderment more powerful –– than any of us had known before. They drew inspiration in part from The Epic of Gilgamesh, the oldest surviving work of world literature; an epic poem from Ancient Mesopotamia that contains the earliest version of the Flood Myth. To Johnny and Robert, Gilgamesh resonated eerily with the present moment –– and it catalysed their song-writing. For Gilgamesh is a story of friendship, love, loss, grief, bad governance and good dreaming; of natural disaster and environmental crisis. It also contains the first recorded act of human destruction of the natural world: when Gilgamesh and Enkidu travel to the Sacred Cedar Wood, slay the guardian spirit of the forest, and cut down the trees with their axes, thereby bringing catastrophe upon themselves. Johnny and Robert wrote the album between March 2020 and February 2021, during a year in which we all wandered unsure of our path, lost in the cedar wood. The songs were composed in large part as a correspondence, through a back-and-forth of notebook pages, voice-recordings and WhatsApp-messages, at a time when lockdowns made meeting in person impossible. The first eight songs were recorded in an off-grid cottage deep in a Hampshire forest, with the sounds of chainsaws felling trees drifting in through the windows along with the birdsong. The result is an album at once urgent and ancient, which fuses poetry, landscape, myth and music into something unique. These are songs that ring with hope, love and sadness –– and one need not know anything about The Epic of Gilgamesh to be touched by them.

Exclusive vinyl with the singles released by the Watford post-punk band between 1981 and 1983.

"Before I began to write this piece I listened to some of the tracks and I admit there was a small tear or two as I remembered… Pet Sounds Studios, an 8 track reel to reel studio in a basement under a pet shop in Kennington, South London, our first studio experience as fresh faced 20 year olds. Surrey Sounds, a studio above a milk depot where Siouxsie and The Banshees had recorded singles, we got some studio time through the night when The Professionals (ex Sex Pistols) weren’t recording. Silo Studio in Hammersmith, the engineer was stoned, I smoked at least three packets of cigarettes during the session and having arrived at the studio with a song we believed in, we came out disillusioned and slightly underwhelmed; maybe greatness wasn’t destined to descend upon us at that stage of our career. Spaceward in Cambridgeshire, an old school building turned into a professional recording studio, where we recorded our first album Epic Garden Music over a weekend working through the night with about an hour of sleep. We returned there to record our second album, Feeding The Flame which took two months rather than two days. But my moist eyes are not for the broken dreams, the incredible highs or even the camaraderie with fellow band members, all of whom I may add we are still in touch with. My slight sadness is for my lost youth and the courageous optimism of those early days so viscerally evoked by this collection of songs. The glory of the world fades but in reality Sad Lovers & Giants goes from strength to strength, albeit in a very understated English way mainly because that’s the way we like it. So enjoy these songs which were created with passion and energy over forty years ago but still remain vivid and exciting to a new generation of listeners today." From Garce/Simon Allard's exclusive liner notes (October 2024)

An endling is the final member of a species. When an endling dies, the species is extinct. Pakistani-American composer Qasim Naqvi returns with Endling. Written as a modular synth prequel to his 2023 BBC Concert Orchestral work, God Docks at Death Harbor, Endling takes the listener on a 43-minute odyssey through an intense and beautiful landscape, set hundreds of years into the future. On the album"s centrepiece "Power Down the Heart," featuring Moor Mother, our character stumbles upon an A.I. being that is in the final moments of its life. As a kind of last rites, this ancient artificial consciousness describes the beauty, sadness and horror it has observed for hundreds of years. Qasim Naqvi is a percussionist, composer and synthesist. Along with being the drummer of lauded cult minimalist trio, Dawn of Midi, Naqvi is an accomplished solo artist and his passion for multidisciplinary work has brought him into the world of film, dance, installation art, and the stage of orchestral and chamber music. His concert music has been commissioned and performed by The London Contemporary Orchestra, The BBC Concert Orchestra, Crash Ensemble, Bang on a Can All Stars, Jennifer Koh, Stargaze, The Cello Octet of Amsterdam, The Helsinki Chamber Choir and others.

Dark Blue Vinyl. Nina Nastasia's rare gift of a voice is an intimate, winged presence that is able to either freeze or melt your heart; that can powerfully soar and twist, or brush ultra-gently against you, suddenly summoning goose bumps. Released in 2003 by Touch and Go Records (and out of print for almost two decades), Run to Ruin is the third album by Nina Nastasia. It was recorded by Steve Albini at Black Box studio in Noyant-la-Gravoyère, France and at Looking Glass studio in New York. Combined with the prodigious talents of her backing band and the sparse but lush arrangements of the instruments, the songs on Run to Ruin evoke haunting scenes of heartache, passion and a slightly seedy world. Nina's voice is at once delicate and intense, neither sweet nor harsh, i conveys an array of emotion moving between joy and sadness with just a moment's pause.

Nina Nastasia's rare gift of a voice is an intimate, winged presence that is able to either freeze or melt your heart; that can powerfully soar and twist, or brush ultra-gently against you, suddenly summoning goose bumps.
Released in 2003 by Touch and Go Records (and out of print for almost two decades), Run to Ruin is the third album by Nina Nastasia. It was recorded by Steve Albini at Black Box studio in Noyant-la-Gravoyère, France and at Looking Glass studio in New York. Combined with the prodigious talents of her backing band and the sparse but lush arrangements of the instruments, the songs on Run to Ruin evoke haunting scenes of heartache, passion and a slightly seedy world. Nina's voice is at once delicate and intense, neither sweet nor harsh, it conveys an array of emotion moving between joy and sadness with just a moment's pause.

The 1968 debut album from Norwegian guitar legend Terje Rypdal stands as a significant entry in the late 1960s jazz landscape, exemplifying the transition from psychedelic rock to a more intricate, freeform blend of jazz elements. Collaborating with legendary musicians like Jan Garbarek, Rypdal's work on this album showcases his innovative talent.

Recorded during three sessions in Oslo in 1968, Bleak House marks Rypdal’s departure from the psychedelic group The Dream as he ventured into new musical territories. He would go on to become one of the most recognizable instrumentalists in European jazz, with releases on the ECM label filled with his searing, evocative guitar sounds that evoke a future tundra.

Though only 21 at the time, Rypdal was already creating music that was incredibly mature, smooth, and sophisticated. While it undeniably captures the essence of the 60s, it remains enjoyable today. The album, originally released on Polydor, features slight Latin and blues influences, along with big-band arrangements that are both well-crafted and enchantingly loose.

The reissue of Bleak House offers much to unpack. Historically, it represents a bridge in the European transition from jazz-rock to a unique avant-garde/free jazz hybrid. Even at this early point in his career, Rypdal's ability to incorporate post-bop, fusion, and avant-garde elements into a cohesive album was an impressive feat of imagination. Rypdal has always been a bold composer, capable of weaving intoxicatingly discordant melodies, as exemplified in tracks like "Winter Serenade", or evoking an unearthly sadness in his more reflective pieces.
Bleak House is a timeless and important recording, and it is a pleasure to hear it in this 180g virgin vinyl format.
A must-listen for anyone interested in the evolution of modern jazz.

MELODIES” is the first album released on the MOON label. The album was the first album released on the MOON label, and it marked a drastic change
in sound direction from the RCA/AIR era, as a result, the range of their work expanded, and the Christmas classic “Christmas Eve” was born from their work.
The result is a monumental masterpiece that will remain in the history of pop music. Includes “Christmas Eve” “High Air Pressure Girl,” “Merry Go Round”
and more. Includes detailed liner notes by Tatsuro Yamashita himself!

Die Verwandlung von Geschichte in einen Mythos macht persönliche Erfahrungen universell - ein Prozess, der in der Musik der russischen Produzentin Yana Kedrina, bekannt als Kedr Livanskiy, eine zentrale Rolle spielt. Auf ihrem fünften Album, "Myrtus Myth", entwirft sie eine experimentelle Pop-Reise, die von persönlichen und öffentlichen Mythologien inspiriert ist und Esoterik mit erzählerischer Tiefe verbindet. Livanskiys Musik war schon immer von Geheimnissen durchdrungen, von den ätherischen Synthesizern ihres Debüts "January Sun" bis zu den spirituellen Harmonien von "Liminal Soul". Mit "Myrtus Myth" wagt sie sich noch weiter vor und zieht Parallelen zu ihrem zweiten Album "Ariadna", während sie ihre Klangpalette mit dem Produzenten Flaty erweitert, der für seine futuristische, genreübergreifende Arbeit bekannt ist. Gemeinsam gehen sie über die Strukturen von Dance Music hinaus, integrieren Live-Instrumente und Einflüsse von Vaporwave bis Kate Bush. Zu den Höhepunkten des Albums gehören "Anna", eine von Fleetwood Mac inspirierte Pop-Elegie für eine verlorene Freundin, und "Purple Sadness", dessen knackige Synthies an den Cloud-Rap der frühen 2010er Jahre erinnern. Tracks wie "Agata Dreams" erinnern an 90s Electro-Pop, während "Spades on Hearts" ein hymnischer Aufruf zu den Waffen mit marschierenden Trommeln und hochfliegenden Vocals ist. Livanskiys Texte, die auf Russisch verfasst sind, bieten eine Heldenreise über 11 Tracks, die sich auf Mythen wie Orpheus stützen, um die dauerhafte Kraft der Kunst zu erkunden. Obwohl das Album stilistisch vielfältig ist, behält es durch seine mythische Erzählung seinen Zusammenhalt bei. Das eindringliche Schlussstück "Kali-Yuga" beklagt in zarten Harmonien eine verlorene Stadt und lässt den Hörer in einem traumhaften Dunst zurück. "Die letzten Jahre waren für viele schwierig", reflektiert Livanskiy. "Dieses Album erforscht den Schmerz durch das Mythische und Jenseitige." "Myrtus Myth" ist keine Tragödie, sondern eine Geschichte der Unverwüstlichkeit, die den Hörer auffordert, die Menschlichkeit im Mythos zu finden. Während die imaginären Welten verblassen, erinnert uns Livanskiy mit ihrem Werk daran, dass die reale Welt und die Zeit, die wir in ihr verbringen, bestehen bleibt.

Following the hyperactive “Blood Karaoke” (2022, Reading Group), “Performing Belief” builds rhythmic thickets from gathered sounds interwoven with synths, drum machines and other samples. Having built these rhythmic nests, Krivchenia then called on two contemporary mages of the low end: electric bassist and fellow Angeleno Sam Wilkes (Wilkes/Gendel) and double bassist/multi-instrumentalist from Krivchenia’s native Chicago, Joshua Abrams (Natural Information Society). Wilkes and Abrams bring the presence of a grounding human witness to the rhythmic undergrowth, providing a centering and even at times melodic voice to the gathering. This alchemy carries a profoundly fresh sense of time, blurring the edges of the quantized grid and the generic boundaries of electronic music.

The core of the album is a lush, opulent matrix of percussion ranging from the familiar—hand claps and drum machines—to the mysteriously verdant, sampled largely from Krivchenia’s own performed field recorded collection. For years, he would record any and all of his musical encounters with natural objects: performing on a particularly resonant log on a hike, throwing rocks into a pristine pond, tap dancing in the mud. This archive of “natural” sounds became the fertile soil out of which the tracks on “Performing Belief” grew. What is gained in the process is not just a novel set of sounds, but a new rhythmic language. The particular give, the anticipatory rustle, the extra breath of a hollow log when functioning as a kickdrum provides a greenness that overtakes the rhythmic grid, giving this music a peculiar kind of stickiness. This rhythmic language, set in Krivchenia’s long-fermenting electronic musical palate, feels like a revelation, even while it calls back not only to his wonderfully elastic timekeeping behind the kit with his beloved band Big Thief, but also to his prior work in computer music as well as his deep study and love of the vast human archive of drumming. “Performing Belief” is in good company in the rank and file of the legendary Planet Mu label. From the foundational early releases of the likes of Jega and Venetian Snares, to the contemporary envelope-warping work of Jlin and hundreds of brilliant releases in between, Planet Mu has been a beacon of forward-thinking rhythmic music for decades, informing Krivchenia’s own sense of the weird metaphysics of musical time since he was a kid. Krivchenia’s contribution to this history calls to mind the principle of organic danceability that subtends Mu’s whole catalogue, while bending our sense of rhythm in new and gracious dimensions. Krivchenia brings out the loamy complexity of natural rhythms, a clearing as generous as it is inviting. Let the drummer give you some.

Zoe Heselton is a British-born poet and musician based in Strasbourg, France. Alone with her Telecaster guitar, she channels her multiple and influences into flamenco-folk-blues fingerpicking techniques, carrying her voice into the strings as she spits out rhymes about change and desire. For this first album, she gathered her beloved and talented friendships around her to sing from places of tenderness and anger, balancing melodies with the band's arrangements and dissonance. Since her songs are stories, spells, poems and prayers, there additional personalities give a crafted power to regenerate from the limbs, surrounded by caretaking souls and generous love-spreading hearts. These musical gems are sea-shanties for sadness, litanies for survival, spoken word bangers for dancing our way through the darkness.

Machine Head - fierce, relevant and unstoppable!

Very few bands make it to their 11th album. Even fewer do so with the same fire and fury that defined their early years. But Machine Head isn’t just any band. For over three decades, the personification of determination, Founder/Vocalist/Guitarist Robb Flynn, has led Machine Head on an uncompromising path – one fueled by defiance, reinvention, and a relentless pursuit of evolution. Now, with ‘UNATØNED’, they’ve once again sharpened their sound into its most direct and impactful form to date.
Determined to challenge himself, Flynn set strict songwriting parameters for ‘UNATØNED,’ shorter, more focused songs with a decidedly American feel, unconventional key changes, and shifting structures that break expectations. That self-imposed restraint resulted in a lean, unrelenting album that captures Machine Head at their most potent.
The album drips with melancholy melodies, and yet hammers with bludgeoning riffs, soars with anthemic sing-a-longs of love-lost and sadness, to bellowing power and undeniable confidence.
‘UNATØNED’ is Machine Head proving once again that longevity in metal isn’t about comfort – it’s about taking risks, standing firm in conviction, and refusing to stagnate. Eleven albums deep, they remain as fierce, relevant, and unstoppable as ever.

It is with a certain sadness for his fans across mediums that Donald Glover has declared Bando Stone and the New World the last Childish Gambino album. The ostensible soundtrack to a feature-length movie of the same name, the hour-long project includes snippets of dialogue that hint at the film’s apocalyptic subject matter. The fact that the soundtrack is preceding the actual film is part of Glover’s strategy: He wants listeners to work to figure out what they’re listening to. “The soundtrack forces the audience to participate in a way that I don't feel like most things force you to participate,” he says. “It forces you to have an imagination. I already see people being like, 'This is very cinematic, this must be the part that... This feels like a credit sequence.' A lot of stuff feels flat because it's not asking you to participate. Art used to be you had to participate on some level and have some sort of thought process on it. You can't just be like, 'Oh, this is mid.'” Even without the benefit of the full visuals, these 17 tracks make for a satisfying swan song that synthesizes what came before with fresher ideas gleaned from the threshold of finality.

For their second album 'The Foel Tower', Quade holed up in an old stone barn in the cradle of a Welsh mountain valley.
The valley was a stark and windswept backdrop with little daylight, as the band would huddle around crackling fires each evening. “There was very much a feeling of being on the complete fringes of society,” the band says. “The last vestiges of settlement before the unrelenting barren moors that loomed over us.”
It was an environment that would shape the band – a Bristol four piece made up of Barney Matthews, Leo Fini, Matt Griffiths and Tom Connolly – and the record they have made. It’s an album that is as dreamy as it is melancholic, and as quiet and tender as it is forceful and potent – gliding across genres like winds blowing over those wide-spanning Welsh hills – to arrive at something the band half-jokingly, yet somewhat accurately, describe as “doomer sad boy, ambient-dub, folk, experimental post-rock.”

Quade is a band but it’s also a very close-knit group that have been friends since childhood who use this musical vehicle for interpersonal explorations and connections. “We’ve individually experienced a lot of difficulty over the last several years and Quade has represented a space to shelter from these,” the band says. “This means we often communicate extensively with each other about the issues affecting us individually and collectively. These conversations and concerns are central to The Foel Tower.”

In many ways, the making of this record – or any Quade record – goes way deeper than the simple writing, construction and recording of music. It is a profoundly deep and meaningful experience. “A key theme of the album relates to why we connect with specific places in the way that we do,” the group says. “We often remove ourselves to isolated valleys, sheltered from some of the painful personal struggles that we have experienced as a band. These become spaces in which we collectively purge ourselves of some of these difficulties hoping to make Quade a physical and emotional place of solace. This album celebrates these places that we’ve been able to retreat to and recuperate.”

It is a deep, dense record that is stuffed with musical, cinematic and literary influences – from Ursula La Guin and Cormac MacCarthy through to RS Thomas and Yeats – but despite the heavy, introspective and anxious nature of some of the material, it is also a record that is remarkably deft, agile and considered.

Made with producer Jack Ogborne and mixer Larry ‘Bruce’ McCarthy, there is a pleasing duality to the final sound of the record. One that feels fragile and intimate but also powerful and forceful, as introspective as it is expansive, and a record that is as detailed and textured as it is wide open and spacious.

The album title also pays homage to the place that shaped it so greatly. Within this remote Welsh valley stands the Foel Tower, a stone structure filled with valves and cylinders that can raise and lower the level of the reservoir to draw off water. Which it can then send as far as 70 miles to Birmingham. However, in the late 1800s this land was occupied by local farmers and families in the hundreds until the British Government acquired the land, cleared the valleys, and promptly displaced them in order to begin serving the vastly expanding industrial English city. The band dug into the history and politics of this and wove it into the themes they were already thinking about, using what the Foel Tower stands for as something of a contemporary metaphor. “This tension was something that we wanted to explore without the haughty judgement of our more metropolitan lifestyles,” they say. “And to explore how this specifically relates to ourselves: how can we envisage a genuinely ecological future for ourselves – one that is accessible, affordable and in harmony with endangered rural practices.”

What makes The Foel Tower such an incredible record is that it feels born of a time, place and situation that only existed in that very moment. It’s a snapshot of those 10 days spent in rural Wales and all the feelings and anxieties the band were experiencing at that specific time, magically caught on tape. “The album very much feels tied to this valley for us and the conversations and experiences we shared there,” they say. “It brings up a great deal of poignancy for us, an emblem of some fleeting respite from the strains we all have to experience. But there’s also deep sadness knowing how transient these moments are – in fact, there’s just a great deal of sadness in this album. But it’s also a record that while personal, resigned, and emotionally burdened, is ultimately hopeful.”

SYML is the solo venture of artist Brian Fennell. Welsh for “simple”—he makes music that taps into the instincts that drive us to places of sanctuary, whether that be a place or a person. Born and raised in Seattle, Fennell studied piano and became a self-taught producer, programmer, and guitarist. Says Fennell about his album Nobody Lives Here, "We change, the world changes, and there is so much unknown. About a year ago I started writing songs that represent the change that is happening in front of my face, a group that have emerged to become the third SYML album. Many of these songs are about getting older, and the intimate, and sometimes frightening, passing of time. Some are about how getting older revolves around looking forward to things happening, and when they don’t happen, or they feel different than anticipated, we can be left with surprise and sadness. I’m actually reminded of this watching my 2 year old! We learn to live with disappointment. I recorded some of these songs with kids and dogs making noise in the background, and others in silent studios with musicians I’ve listened to and admired for many years. These songs are meant to be pieces of clothing to wear as you need (or I need). Some are bright and bold and others are gentle, but they were all made with a sense of comfort in mind, even when things feel bleak. My wife jokes that when our friends hear some of these songs, they might think we are not “ok”. Thankfully, putting myself inside a sad song is still a good place to feel happy. There's this generally unspoken feeling that musicians don’t listen to their own music. That isn’t true for me. I love living with my songs because their meaning changes as I change. There is as much fear and beauty in the big questions as there is wonder and possibility in the simple, everyday shit we live through.”

2025 cassette edition, originally released in 2023 on 2CD/digital.

Recordings + booklet of the unveiling of »Katharina AW«, a relational artwork by Joris Martens. The unveiling event took place at St. Catharine’s Church in Hoogstraten - a city in the northeast of Belgium - on two Saturdays in May 2021.

While beholding the artwork, a woven tapestry, you listen to organ music by Miaux. Outside the church, you hear the carillon gurgle with music by Lieven Martens and town carillonneur Luc Dockx, prolonging the event into the public space.

Joris Martens created »Katharina AW« for the city hall of Hoogstraten. The tapestry now serves as an informal conversation starter in the conference room. Joris Martens is a multi-disciplinary artist and works in the field where applied arts and fine arts meet.

Miaux played her own compositions on the church organ. The songs appeared on the albums Black Space White Cloud, Hideaway, Dive and Gigi - released by Ultra Eczema, Lal Lal Lal, and Alien Passengers - and were originally written for electronic keyboard. Mia demonstrates that the church organ, which is normally used as an underscore for sadness or compelling thoughts, is a fitting instrument of connection. Through its resonance, we communicate our sounds.

Lieven Martens invented sketches for the carillon—by loading bird sounds into the computer program Melodyne, varying them and converting them to musical notes. As a nod to the religion crazy Olivier Messiaen, who considered the birds to be God’s chosen singers and songstresses. The trifles were translated on the carillon by town carillonneur Luc Dockx. The playing comes into and out of focus. In this way, Lieven creates a dreamscape and breaks with the dreary carillon as an instrument of power.

Luc Dockx studied church music at the Lemmens Institute in Leuven and the carillon at the Royal Carillon School in Mechelen. He is the city carillonneur of Hoogstraten since 2002. Dockx is an active practitioner of the art of improvisation on the carillon.

Capturing phantom drones behind dusty beats and haunted twangs, Ellis Swan and James Schimpl return for their third album as Dead Bandit. Locked into a musical language unique to their collaboration, the duo once again put us out to pasture across broad sonic plains, drums flapping like loose fence panels in the prairie breeze and bass rumbling like distant thunder. True to their previous two records, Swan and Schimpl keep the strung out guitars at the front of what they do, whether playing a naked, desolate strum or running six strings through disruptive effects processing until they're barely recognisable.
But while there are details of disturbance when listening to Dead Bandit's self-titled record up close, the wider impression is a smoother, more direct affair that toys with post-rock complexity and matches it with the emotional weight of melodic simplicity, gentle grooves and conscious arrangements. 'Weeds' offsets its languid fuzz guitar with shimmering sustained notes before settling into a patient, heavy-hearted composition charged with heartbreak leads pealing out in the middle distance.
By comparison, 'Glass' has a smoky, half-hidden backroom quality. Its brushed whisper of a beat, lingering guitar drones and subtle sub bass come on like a dub wise flip of a sad-eyed country ballad. The mood maintains on 'Half Smoked Cigarette', which captures the grey sky sullenness of post-punk and reframes it in the seductive isolation of rural America. While there's a thickness to the sound on these most direct of tracks on the album, there's also fragility inherent to the sound world Dead Bandit have been shaping out over these past few years.
'Buttercup' swaps sadness for sinister undercurrents, once more drawing on fulsome low end to fill out the sparse threads of instrumentation up top. 'Pink' finds a steady momentum for its own brand of brooding mystery, the sharp end of the beat bringing focus to the many-layered approaches to the guitar which roundly define the Dead Bandit sound. There's an even clearer direction mapped out in the vintage drum machine pulse of 'Koyo', all the better to carry swirling effects treatments and moody melodic figures. Even in these ominous climes there's space for plaintive, endearing hooks which land as the most direct phrases in Dead Bandit's musical lexicon to date.
The fundamental sound across this album holds true, but Dead Bandit are never bound to a singular practice. 'Lucien's Bitters' strikes up a pronounced drum machine beat which comes on like 90s downtempo, and it feels like a natural vessel for the heavy, shoegaze tinted lament of the guitars. At every turn, Swan and Schimpl prove their affinity for all kinds of approaches, and yet the end product is a deeply cohesive, immediate listen that shows just how clear their creative vision really is.

This re-issue of the Cocteau Twins' 1993 album has been remastered by Robin Guthrie and is pressed onto high quality 140g vinyl . Cocteau Twins vocalist Elizabeth Fraser, guitarist Robin Guthrie, and bassist Simon Raymonde formed in Grangemouth, Scotland in the late 70s. The brainchild of Guthrie and original bassist Will Heggie, by 1981 they had added Fraser and the following year signed to 4AD, one of the most illustrious of the indie labels. With Raymonde replacing Heggie in 1983, the trio went on to create some of the most unique and otherworldly music of the 80s, built around Guthrie's chiming guitar and Fraser's unmistakable soprano. By the early 90s, the group had just released their most successful album, the commercial Heaven or Las Vegas, but the relationship with 4AD was coming to an end. Mercury imprint Fontana was going through something of a purple patch, signing former underground bands, and by 1992, Cocteau Twins had joined The Fall and the House Of Love. The group's debut album for Fontana, Four-Calendar Cafe, was released in October 1993. Its gossamer melodies and largely upbeat pop bely the turmoil the group were going through. Barney Hoskyns, writing in Mojo, said that Four-Calendar Caf was "the most poignant, heartrending Cocteaus record of all, an album of naked confession and raw beauty . . . Sadness never sounded so luscious." Simon Raymonde agreed: "I think in time people will realise what a great album Four-Calendar Caf is. Because I think it's beautiful." Led by the single Evangeline, the reached No 13 in the UK album chart and is much-loved by fans.

2025 Repress
Singing black-lit liturgies of bog bodies caked in mud, entranced by nocturnal landscapes flickering in the moonglow and powered by queer enchantment, Tristwch y Fenywod are a Welsh-language gothic avant-rock powercoven. Exhumed from the depths of Leeds’
experimental underground, the trio consist of Gwretsien Ferch Lisbeth (Guttersnipe, The Ephemeron Loop), Leila Lygad (Hawthonn) and Sidni Sarffwraig (Slaylor Moon, The Courtneys).
Stark, striking and bewitching, Tristwch y Fenywod’s self-titled album is their debut studio recording, following just 10 gigs and a live demo. Formed in 2022, Tristwch y Fenywod ("The Sadness of Women”) record exclusively in the Welsh language, conjuring an eldritch, subterranean, alien folk music played on dual zither, electronic drums and bass guitar. With towering, siren-like vocals curling around the Welsh consonants, accompanied by stark, martial rhythms and swirling claw-plucked strings, Tristwch y Fenywod feels like an early 4AD recording dredged from the waters of an Anglesey swamp. The effect is simultaneously chilling and stirring.
The eight tracks on the record constitute what feels like a recently rediscovered, unholy grail of edgy, atmospheric, occult feminist goth emissions. Gwretsien’s dual-zither playing scatters melodic fragments and spirals of harmony around the decimated space opened up by the lugubrious bass playing and pounding, brooding drum pads.
Coupled with the Welsh vocal, Tristwch y Fenywod embody a new, unique Celtic darkwave sound, equal part Pornography-era The Cure, Svitlana Nianio’s haunted hammered string-work and the dark beauty of Dead Can Dance or This Mortal Coil. Opener Blodyn Gwyrdd feels like the last ride of Princess Ukok, with lumbering bass and 6/8 rhythms in procession to the event horizon with an entreating, impassioned vocal and surprising lyrical theme. The doomed dancing of the zither provides the mysterious melodic bedrock throughout the album, particularly on Ferch Gyda’r Llygaid Du’s heavy funereal swa and the slowly building, paroxysmal banshee breakdown of Awen: an astonishing swell of thrilling chaos.
The album was recorded and produced by Ross Halden and the band at Hohm Studio, Bradford, Summer 2023.

"Buena Muerte" is a concatenated anthem that explores death as a central theme, highlighting its benevolence towards a human being who cries out in all ways for its inevitable extinction. "Buena Muerte" is, in turn, an experiment in resurgent creativity where a vibe of the 70s, metal and chaos converge, on the dilapidating base of the heavy and crushing doom stoner that OCULTUM sacredly cultivates. Submerge yourself into a pool of acid joy and find the subaquatic tomb where all gone souls dance. Sadness and drugs builds character.

Violet vinyl, limited to 350 copies. "Buena Muerte" is a concatenated anthem that explores death as a central theme, highlighting its benevolence towards a human being who cries out in all ways for its inevitable extinction. "Buena Muerte" is, in turn, an experiment in resurgent creativity where a vibe of the 70s, metal and chaos converge, on the dilapidating base of the heavy and crushing doom stoner that OCULTUM sacredly cultivates. Submerge yourself into a pool of acid joy and find the subaquatic tomb where all gone souls dance. Sadness and drugs builds character.

It’s written in the Agreement Terms. There’s no getting out alive in Life. And yet, mankind keeps striving for eternal life; through art, through power, through cryogenics, through singularity. In that misguided quest against the inevitable, we all fall into the category of lost travellers. No one is exempt. In that understanding, Confucius MC and producer Bastien Keb offer no misgivings about the destination on the somber “Time Will Come”: Time will come for all of us / try to take your time.

Songs For Lost Travellers is a collaborative album by Con and Bastien Keb that merges unexplored pathways between rap, folk, and jazz into a spiritual triumvirate. Each genre is a balancing force within the record. The result is an album unlike either artist have made previously, possibly unlike any record in existence. Songs For Lost Travellers opens with bedtime stories and fairytales. Both “Tell Me Lies” and “Fairytale” present the creature comforts that trick us into forgetting the truth. Con’s first words spoken are “tell me lies ‘til I swear I can’t remember” over Keb’s lo-fi plucking that feels like it was lifted from a handheld recorder capturing a nursery mobile above a crib. Third track “Time Will Come” resets the album after acknowledging on “Fairytale” there’s “no nourishment in half-truths / no sustenance in eating lies.”

Honest and direct, Con and Keb imbue Songs For Lost Travellers with knowledge and truth from their lived experiences. There is grief hidden in the notes, an inherent sadness that is balanced with an awareness that grief is a protest against the social machinery of remaining numb. The record lingers in a meditative state, unafraid of restlessness and embracing solitude, with the expectation that peace is just as imminent as death.

The production contains a complimentary authenticity. Neither Con nor Keb bothered much with the professional studio in making Songs For Lost Travellers. Instead they opted for the raw state of their home recordings and first takes, matching the intimacy of being alone and reflective in their creative energies. Room static on “Tell Me Lies” makes it feel like you’ve entered their apartments. The immediacy continues on “Gutters,” as Keb plays guitar while watching the tele and Con hums along to the vocal melody in search of the proper pocket for his verse. Someone snaps their finger to mark a cue, but the snap never returns to the mix to keep time.

More drawn to Keb’s recent folk recordings on the Songs For Lilla EP than his funk roots circa Dinking In The Shadows of Zizou or the cinematic soul of The Killing of Eugene Peeps, Con leaned into the spacial freedom he heard in Keb’s lo-fi production cobbled from field recordings and voice notes. Both artists placed their families into the tableau. Con wrote “Little Man” for his son, hoping to add a positive contribution to the canon of parental rap songs. Later, his son appears at the end of “Paramount” to deliver a passage from Kahlil Gibran’s The Prophet. Keb secretly recorded his mum playing saxophone and sampled his cousin playing sax as well. The result is a near-drumless album (save for “Toulouse” and light tapping on “It Would Speak”) in which Keb’s raw production (plus a few sessions with Kofi Flexxx) gave Con a liminal zone, unencumbered by beats per minute, to craft melodies that turn his philosophical rhymes into mantras.

Perhaps there’s a message in the presence of family? It would be one of many. Con and Keb’s reflective, somber approach to Songs For Lost Travellers does not wallow in the mire. Music is action and it’s taking them through a portal to the other side of grief. We are welcome to join (which is also in the fine print of the Agreement Terms), but first there’s a password in the final song, a single request to answer: Tell me what you care about.

Biography by Blake Gillespie
credits

Brand new album by BLC MIRROR CLB in glorious transparent LP.
The band brings you 10 indie rock songs focusing on love in all its forms: deception, happiness, sadness, conclusion or redemption.
But don't misunderstand it, these are not cheesy love songs. They are factual situations where everybody can wander and find echo of life.

Mit bezaubernden Streichern, verzückten Bildern, klassizistischen Melodien und verträumten Harmonien ist es ein Album der orchestralen Pop-Romantik in ihrer erhabensten Form: ein Album, das von Herzen kommt und von einem tiefen Schmerz der ständigen Sehnsucht erwärmt wird.
Auf Alluvium aus dem Jahr 2022 hatte Chris seine breit gefächerten Geschichten als fruchtbaren Boden für eine Platte mit vielschichtigen Tönen und Stilen genutzt. It’s Only a Love Song kommt einer Song-Suite näher, die makellos sequenziert, aufwendig arrangiert und in persönlichen Liebeserfahrungen und Verlusten verankert ist.

Sein neues Album ist sein nächster großer Schritt nach vorne, eine herzergreifende Liebeserklärung an die Romantik, die den Himmel berührt und die Kinosäle füllt. Zu seinen erklärten Einflüssen gehören neben den Carpenters und Scott Walker auch Michel Legrand, Bernsteins West Side Story und die Filme von Jacques Demy, dessen Die Regenschirme von Cherbourg mit Musik aufwartet, die Herzen zum Singen bringt. „Es ist fast schon hyperromantisch, was ich liebe“, erklärt Chris: ‚So in der Musik, wo man an einen Punkt kommt, an dem das Herz eigentlich nicht mehr kann.‘ Strahlend und verzückt bringt einen It’s Only a Love Song genau dorthin.

Lucero lead singer Ben Nichols and keyboardist Rick Steff spent a day at Grammy Award winning engineer Matt Ross-Spang's Southern Grooves Studio in Memphis, TN recording acoustic versions of Lucero songs. Spanning the band's career, the songs range from some of Lucero's most popular crowd favorites to more obscure rarities and were all recorded live in the studio featuring grand piano and acoustic guitar. The double album, Lucero Unplugged, presents 20 stripped down tracks that offer fresh takes on the band's exceptional catalogue.

In memory of a long lost friend, Patas comes forth with a relic of a vinyl release in the name of that loved one, featuring one dreamy side in memoriam of the flesh, and one bouncy side for the spirit.

Title track starts it out in a lush and vibrant synthworld pairing up with a dubby techno groove, whole track foaming over with saudade, an emotional concoction of joy interlaced with melancholic sadness, one part looking back in tears, the other going forward with a subtle smile.

ILU 2 MUCH takes a bit too much sweet emotions stuff and turns it into a restless standstill.

Flip the record over and you get two certified dancefloor scorchers in different trajectories. Bontelabo is a deep and trippy broken beat keepsake using only sampled guitar for its harmonic and melodic content.

Og Sa ? is a fresh take on the techno tool, constantly flipping and changing up the material around some good ol machine funk, a tune for all the serious clowns looking to get down.

The music of the Asgard season embodies an epic spirit reminiscent of Norse mythology, intertwining gods and legends.

Hyôga answers Saori's call, alarmed by an imminent danger. Before he can act, however, Saori is attacked by a divine warrior from Asgard, acting under the orders of Hilda of Polaris. Athena then travels to Asgard, setting the stage for a confrontation. To save humanity, she halts the melting of the ice, but only for half a day. During this brief window, Seiya and his companions face off against the seven divine warriors of Asgard to retrieve the Odin sapphires and free Hilda from the Nibelungen ring.

This vinyl adapts the second arc of the series, the Asgard arc, which is original to the anime and does not appear in the manga.
Melancholy, suspense, menace, sadness, hope, epicness—these are just some of the words that could describe the myriad sensations and emotions evoked by the great Seiji Yokoyama's music, enough to give chills to the most devoted fans of the series.

New single with echoes of Slowdive, Lush and the Cocteau Twins. Limited edition 7-inch on Precious Recordings of London comes with free badge – plus an exclusive B-side. Download card also included – with a bonus 'Popkiss version' of the title track.

Blueboy continue their extraordinary re-emergence after 20 years of separation with a magnificent new single that hits you in the solar plexus and then forces you to sing along.

At various times, their guitar-led sound has been described as having echoes of bands like The Smiths, Slowdive, Lush and The Cocteau Twins.

Darkness, light and shade, melancholy and euphoria, sadness and joy are Blueboy's natural territory; in ‘Deux’, an anthemic chorus is juxtaposed with quietly spoken verses, mood and emotion driven by
ever-present guitar.

The thread of you, through everything, pulls me upwards … Could it be I'm not one; we are deux?



Blueboy first got together in the early 1990s and went on to build a global following, touring Europe and Japan and featuring regularly in the UK independent charts with a series of acclaimed singles and well

regarded albums.



Having reformed in 2024, founder member Paul Stewart was joined by Gemma Malley (now on vocals) to play in London, Cologne and Paris; their comeback single ‘One’ was launched at a triumphant full

band show in London where drummer Martin Rose and bassist Mark Cousens rejoined the team from the 1990s line-up.



Later this month, Blueboy will play to 45,000 people at the Joyland Festival in Jakarta along with Bombay Bicycle Club, St Vincent and Air

Following on from the release of their highly-praised 2020 LP ‘Darkness Brings Wonders Home’, which was applauded by the likes of Mojo, Clash Magazine, Q and many more, alt-folk duo Smoke Fairies return once again to announce the details behind their sixth studio album ‘Carried In Sound’, previewed by the wondrous new single “Vanishing Line”.

Continuing to pursue more of that warm and ethereal aesthetic the pair have cultivated since their earliest beginnings, “Vanishing Line” makes for a wonderfully warm and emotive introduction to their next full-length release. Accompanied by a cinematic video, the new offering tackles the difficult and intimate feelings loss and grief can have on a person and those around them.

A sense of inner strength dominates the new record. In keeping with the times that bore it, ‘Carried In Sound’ isn’t afraid to discuss darkness – but everywhere there is a longing for light. “Although the album has themes of sadness on there, it’s looking at those things from a place of strength,” says Jessica.

2024 Repress
Transparent Blue Vinyl

Little Dragon - die bahnbrechende schwedische Band um die rätselhafte Sängerin Yukimi Nagano, den Multiinstrumentalisten Håkan Wirenstarnd und Fredrik Wallin an Keyboard und Bass und Erik Bodin an Schlagzeug und Perkussion - kehren mit ihrem sechsten Studioalbum „New Me, Same Us“ zurück.

Für eine Band, die stolz darauf ist, abseits gängiger Hörgewohnheiten zu stehen und die sich mit aller Entschlossenheit dafür einsetzt, die Dinge zu ihren eigenen Bedingungen zu verwirklichen, haben sie bislang nicht gerade wenig Anerkennung im Mainstream bekommen. Mit dem Grammy für ihr Album „Nabuma Rubberband“ im Jahr 2014 nominiert, gelten Little Dragon seit langem als eine der gefragtesten Gruppen für Kollaborationen. Im Laufe der Jahre ist eine beneidenswerte Liste an Künstlerinnen und Künstlern zusammengekommen, mit denen sie zusammengearbeitet haben, darunter bspw. BADBADNOTGOOD, Gorillaz, SBTRKT, Flying Lotus, Flume, Kaytranada, Big Boi, De La Soul, DJ Shadow, Tinashe, Mac Miller, Future, Raphael Saadiq oder Faith Evans. Ihre berühmt-berüchtigte Live-Performance hat eine mittlerweile zehnjährige Tourneekarriere nach sich gezogen, in dessen Verlauf sie kürzlich gemeinsam mit Flying Lotus als Co-Headliner eine Show im Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles gespielt haben, sowie auf einigen der weltweit angesehensten Festivals wie Coachella, Glastonbury, Bestival, Lollapalooza, Melt!, Dour, Sónar und dem Festival von Tyler, The Creator, „Camp Flog Gnaw“, aufgetreten sind.

Vollkommen alleine und ohne Unterstützung von außen im langjährigen und selbstgebauten Heim-Studio in Göteborg produziert und aufgenommen, repräsentiert „New Me, Same Us“ ein weiteres Kapitel in der kontinuierlichen Entwicklung von Little Dragon. Mit ihrem einzigartigen Stil finden sie eine neue Richtung von gemächlichem, unkonventionellem R'n'B, Pop und Elektronik und klingen damit so verjüngt und energiegeladen wie eh und je. Die Platte zeugt auch von einer reflektierenden Stimmung, mit Yukimis unverwechselbarer Stimme, die von Übergängen im Leben, Sehnsüchten und Abschieden sinniert.

The long-awaited second full-length from San Francisco band Girls is spontaneous and stripped-down in a gorgeous, largely minor-key record. Father, Son, Holy Ghost is enlivened by flashes of innocent pop and given depth by its wealth of influences and will to face sadness. Peaking at Billboard #37 after its release in 2011 and claiming #82 on Pitchfork’s “200 Best Albums of the 2010s,” Father, Son, Holy Ghost both comes alive and cements its legacy with the timbre of Christopher Owen’s voice.

The long-awaited second full-length from San Francisco band Girls is spontaneous and stripped-down in a gorgeous, largely minor-key record. Father, Son, Holy Ghost is enlivened by flashes of innocent pop and given depth by its wealth of influences and will to face sadness. Peaking at Billboard #37 after its release in 2011 and claiming #82 on Pitchfork’s “200 Best Albums of the 2010s,” Father, Son, Holy Ghost both comes alive and cements its legacy with the timbre of Christopher Owen’s voice.

lim. to 200 180Gr Vinyl!

Schnieke is rich and fruitful, yet carries a sadness within. A 5-string violin charts its melodious journey from Istanbul to Belin, accompanied by electronics, breakbeats, live drums and percussions. An authentic oriental funky mood keeps you in a trance or gets your body moving tribally…

This is Schnieke, a.k.a. Özgür Akgül, with his first studio album Hediye, or Gift. The album is intended as a gift to Özgür's grandmother, Hadiye, who was very important to him and to whom he dedicates a song. But his debut album will also come as a gift to anyone interested in how a sophisticated musical sensibility brings together electronic elements with stringed instruments of all kinds. Özgür plays the violins himself, as well as the analogue synths and drum machines. Guest musicians include Hasan Gözetlik (trumpet and trombone), Göksun Çavdar (saxophone), Korhan Erol (electric guitar and bass), Burhan Hasdemir and Baris Güney (live percussion), Zafer Tunç Resuloglu (live drums), John Gürtler (church organ) and the Istanbul Strings, Turkey’s most vibrant string ensemble.

Their diverse influences create a wide emotional range on Hediye - sometimes dark and melancholic, sometimes wild, groovy and danceable, somewhere between jazz, dub and electro, each song surprising in its own way. Despite the variety of the individual songs, a captivating pulse runs like a thread through Schnieke's first album. Incidentally, Özgür came up with the band name during a night out in a bar, when a friend explained to him what Berlin slang he absolutely had to know. He liked the sound of the word ‘schnieke’ – it means something approximating ‘snazzy’ - and perhaps he secretly also wanted to flatter himself a little! Well, shouldn't we all do that much more often?

Hediye consists of eight tracks, three of which are traditional: Aman Doktor comes from Istanbul, Özgür's birthplace, and is a homage to his own origins. Kadioglu comes from the Aegean region and features the zeybek dance form which, despite its ‘standardisation’ in recent times, still summons up the ecstasy, inspired improvisation and musical finesse of its historical roots. The other five tracks are Özgür's own compositions, with Pasali providing the soundtrack for the 2010 Turkish feature film Memleket Meselesi. Creating compositions for film has been Özgür’s primary passion since his time as a student at the Filmakademie Baden-Württemberg. You can hear that in his music, because on his debut album Özgür does completely without vocal support, the instrumental depth stands for itself, and, in the style of The Cinematic Orchestra, space is created for us to develop our own images while listening – it is a soundtrack for the film we want to make of it.

Lily Seabird is a perceptive songwriter who can channel moments when everything feels raw and overwhelming into something healing and galvanizing. With Alas, the Burlington, VT-based artist's sophomore album, she confronts grief with palpable clarity on tracks that careen from delicate folk to blistering indie rock. While it's her second LP, it serves as a proper introduction to an undeniable and idiosyncratic voice. "Alas, sounds way more like me," she says. "This is the album I wanted to make in the first place." Though Seabird is now known as a solo artist and collaborator in Burlington's vibrant music community as the bassist for Greg Freeman and other acts, her journey started in Pennsylvania when she picked up the saxophone as a kid. At 14, she learned guitar and started performing as Lily Seabird. After a brief stint in New York City playing in bands, she moved to Vermont, which has been her home since 2018. "When I came to Vermont, I was playing solo a lot but then I started a band with Greg Freeman," she says. "Since 2018, it's been me and Greg and a bunch of different casts of characters have been in the band since then it's an ever-evolving thing. It's just us playing my songs."The songs on Alas, came from a particularly unmoored period for Seabird. "I wrote this album in 2021 and 2022 on the road, trying to figure out who I am," she says. "A lot of them also deal with the time when my close friend passed away. The title Alas, meant a lot to her." Even if the songs don't always directly tackle this specific loss, there's a sense of mourning in how relationships change and dissolve. Take "Grace," a reflection on female friendship, which features the lines, "I hope she's happy now she should be 25 / She taught me something that I thought I'd always hide." Elsewhere, the knotty and unpredictable "Dirge" finds her singing, "I don't know if I believe in god / I don't know if I know how to go on." Seabird and Benny Yurco produced Alas, which was recorded at Burlington's Little Jamaica Studios with Freeman and drummer Zack James (Benny Yurco). It's a quietly expansive album full of subdued, organic textures and moods. Songs like "Cavity" are lush and inviting with silky guitar and Seabird's expressive saxophone playing. The 10 songs on Alas, stretch out and leave space for introspection and deep listening with some tracks taking nearly seven minutes to mesmerizingly unfold. It's a remarkably assured and vital statement from one of the most promising new songwriters alongside peers Merce Lemon, Squirrel Flower, and Allegra Krieger."The album is about loss, coming of age, and sadness but there are also all these moments where happiness takes over," says Seabird. "It can be two things at once: life isn't just pain and sadness, there's also joy. They can all exist at the same time. Alas, is an expression of grief but it's also for letting go."

Transcendental poetry meets Southern Nightmare Jazz on the third album by Alabama-based artist Johnny Coley Mister Sweet Whisper is the meeting of poet & artist Johnny Coley and the band Worst Spills, led by guitarist & arranger Joel Nelson. (Imagine "King Tubbys Meets Rockers Uptown," but more like "William Burroughs Meets Lounge Lizards in Ghost Swamp"). Joined by vibraphone player and recordist of the group, Jasper Lee, Mister Sweet Whisper centers Coley as a gifted writer and unique elder voice, supported by an eclectic cast of friends & collaborators. Tapping into French surrealism and transgressive American poets such as John Ashbery, the songs in Mister Sweet Whisper evolve, cinema-like, with Coley as an uninhibited, almost mystical, narrator. Textural, jazz-like playing complements Coley's decadent landscapes, which glide by like cigarette-inspired invocations. Echoing, and at times, dissonant notes of saxophone, crystalline tones of vibraphone, and jagged guitar arrangements punctuate Coley's dreamlike visions, populated by ballet dancers, haunting nightclubs, and ghostly car drivers. Wistful and expansive, the songs in Mister Sweet Whisper speak of Coley's talent and natural ability to channel his poetic world into songs. A remarkable follow-up to Coley's first two albums_Antique Sadness, from 2021, and Landscape Man, from 2022_which were praised as "exquisitely haunting, sublime, hilarious" and falling "somewhere between Robert Ashley, David Wojnarowicz, and Intersystems," Mister Sweet Whisper arrives in full form: unpredictable and brilliant. LP comes with a 4-page booklet featuring artwork and writing by Johnny. Pressed in black vinyl.

Emerging from the UK’s vibrant electronic music scene of the early 1990’s, DEFSET has gained recognition for his unique ability to merge elements of dub, ambient, techno, and experimental music, whilst drawing on the acid house, hardcore and jungle of his early career, crafting immersive soundscapes that resonate with listeners on both an emotional and intellectual level.
Following on from his debut album in 2021, DEFSET has spent time developing his sound and on sophomore album ‘Ok, Accept, Continue’ there is more of an organic tone. Blending trip-hop, Gambian kora music and sound system culture through collaborations from MC Spyda and Jally Kebba Susso, DEFSET adds a layer of humanity to the album and attempts to embody the human experience of loss and recovery and it’s accompanying feelings of sadness, anger, and self-medication, as a form of creative expression from grief’s intensity.
DEFSET is the musical moniker of Leo Neelands, a multi-talented artist known for his work in both electronic music and the visual effects industry. With a background in creating stunning visual effects for major Blockbuster films, Neelands brings a cinematic flair to his music, crafting immersive soundscapes that blend atmospheric electronic and techno influences. In addition to his work in music, DEFSET’S background as a VFX Supervisor has allowed him to infuse his music with a distinctive, visual storytelling quality, making him a compelling force in the electronic music landscape.

Grief, sadness, goodbye. With "Shook", Rico Friebe returns to the purest form of acoustic intimacy - just his voice and the guitar after the Requiem introduction. Being in daily grief and torment for almost 500 days, he melodized a funeral procession, burying an agony, being the sole attendant, shining a light in darkest night...

Back in print, on white & purple splatter vinyl!

Hailing from Buffalo, NY, Head North has used their indie-influenced pop-punk to break out of the local scene and demand the attention of a national audience. Packing in sentiments as big as their sound, the band hits home with walls of guitar lines, frenetic punk rock drums and an emotional complexity anchored behind their lyrics. Singer Brent Martone hits raspy notes of anger and sadness, knowing when to shriek and when to soften, adding a layer of versatile energy to back up his passion.

RIYL: The Dangerous Summer, Brand New, Have Mercy

Blending elements of post-hardcore, emo and Southern-tinged indie rock, Microwave balance frankness with a penchant for wit, allowing for seemingly standard personal confessions to make a significant and striking impact. While often tipping into the heavier side of resonant punk, the band shines brightest in soft reservation. Their self-released debut album Stovall feels like a snapshot in time, bringing to mind that same unforgettable feeling that albums like Jimmy Eat World’s Bleed American, Manchester Orchestra’s I’m Like A Virgin Losing A Child and Taking Back Sunday’s Tell All Your Friends did years ago.

RIYL: Manchester Orchestra, All Get Out, Taking Back Sunday"

"“There are times in life when you’re so present, so fully immersed in the moment that you can catch a glimpse of another universe, of a realm beyond our own,” says Louisa Stancioff. “It might last for a second or an hour, it might come in the midst of bliss or sadness, you might be alone or with a lover, but when it happens, there’s nothing quite like it.”

When We Were Looking, Stancioff’s stunning Yep Roc debut, is full of those moments. Written and recorded through a period of deep heartbreak and uncertainty, the collection is the raw and unflinching work of a nomadic soul who spent stints living in Alaska, California, New York, and North Carolina before returning home to her native Maine, one that holds nothing back in its bittersweet reckonings with pain, healing, acceptance, and growth. Stancioff writes with a cinematic eye here, conjuring up richly detailed stagings for her emotionally-charged character studies, and the guitar-and-synth-focused arrangements are immersive and nuanced to match, thanks in part to the evocative sonic landscaping of producer/keyboardist Sam Kassirer (Josh Ritter, Craig Finn), who proves to be an ideal creative foil on the record. Add it all up and you’ve got a dreamy, nostalgic Polaroid of an album that blurs the lines between indie stoicism and folk sincerity, a lush, cathartic work that hints at everything from Phoebe Bridgers and Arlo Parks to Big Thief and Waxahatchee as it learns to find the beauty in grief and rebirth."

Fohn brings connection, displacement and new identities into the moment, on pastoral debut album Seanteach - informed by island life, marine folklore and musical tradition.

Connection to the land, the severing of earthly ties, explorations of environment, mythos and generational memory: under the moniker of Fohn, English violinist and producer Tom Connolly (Quade, AD93) takes to the fiddle on which he learned his craft as a child. Forging new bonds with his family’s island home off the coastal west of Ireland, their story is retold in Seanteach (Irish for ‘old house’), released on Odda Recordings.

“Seanteach explores the nature of my relationship with Ireland, and Connemara in particular, where my dad’s family is from,” explains Connolly, speaking on a long-form work that blends new compositions on traditional Irish fiddle with ambient electronics and evocative field recordings.

“It explores how the island of Maighinis became an almost mythological space for me, growing up in England - we would spend every summer there, but it felt equally present for me when we were back in the UK, a sort of mental solace that I found through music especially.”

Each track on the album is a reflection of aspects of that relationship to island life - where physical features intersect with mythology. Such as, ‘Boreen’, named after a colloquial term for rural byroads sometimes shared with otherworldly neighbours. ‘Aisling at Sea’ draws on the primal, unstoppable momentum of the water, while the folklore of ‘Immram’ reflects on generationally-kept tales of marine bravery and supernatural accomplishment.

“The compositions often sit at the fraying edges of memories I’ve inherited from my own experiences, that of family lore, or from stories that I have come across. I wanted the compositions to tread the space between documentation and fantasy that feels so reflective of my relationship with this place.”

Tying these worlds together is the presence and memory of Connolly’s ‘Mamó’ (Irish for grandmother), Bríd. Despite passing during Connolly’s childhood, this “larger-than-life character” shaped his imagination with anecdotes and stories, representing both a familiar figure, and the poignancies of potential and regret.

“Even at a young age I sensed a sadness emanating from her. Through a series of unfortunate and fortunate circumstances, she found herself leaving Ireland and settling in Boston like so many others. Under the impression she was an illegal immigrant in the US she didn’t return to Ireland for decades.”

‘Between the Shoreline and the Gorse’ channels her early childhood, born to a large Catholic family in the island’s ‘Seanteach’, and cast adrift from her old life - a severance of ties that Connolly attempts to make ethereal amends for, with the album named for her family home.

“It’s something that feels so visibly prominent in Connemara with its landscapes charcoaled with deserted ruins. It’s a feeling I also experience, despite never having lived in Ireland, which prompted me to want to explore the idea of longing for something/somewhere ‘un-experienced’, and to a certain extent, fictionalised.”

'We're excited to be able to bring you the latest wonderful album from Chester's boycalledcrow, after a series of superb releases for labels such as Mortality Tables, Waxing Crescent Records and Subexotic Records, including the wonderful Kullu from earlier this year.

Knott's music doesn't sit easily in any pre-existing genres, being at once strange and experimental, yet melodic and somehow comforting. His music is intimate and evocative, deeply personal, and manages to be both bucolic and yet totally 21st century, like Kraftwerk's robots dreaming of sheep.

The songs and sounds on “eyetrees” are inspired by a rich family life and the wonderful times spent with his wife and kids, both at home and out in nature.'

Knott said of the album and its inspirations:
“We enjoy spending time in the woods with our young children, creating stories about the "eye tree”. This tree, with thousands of eyes, watches over us and cares for us like family. We make fox medicine and cherish these blissful moments. The music reflects these times, seen through the colors of an old, fuzzy reel—orange, red, and yellow with blurred edges, like an old photo scorched by the sun.

I feel a deep spiritual connection to the countryside; the hands of Arcadia cradle me when I feel sad. Some of the album was created during times of sadness when I felt death was close and the lines between worlds were blurred. This feeling—that anything can happen and that life is delicate and can be taken away in a flash—permeates the music.

The song titles are stories and memories of my family, filled with hazy pinks, yellows, reds, and oranges.

Wonky acoustic guitar, broken electronics, and a warm, otherworldly space."

"A Seamless Symphony of Harmonious Electronica" - Jazziz

Emerging from over a year of creative hibernation following their debut album, Stavroz's upcoming EP "Kick Up the Dust" jolts them back into action. The EP flows gently, yet the overall mood of the journey isn’t always easy to pinpoint. There’s a certain vagueness to Stavroz’ sound which allows for bizarre experiments to seep through without interrupting the course. “We like to keep it lightly twisted, like a wink with a frown,” says the band.



In the title track however, Stavroz boldly steers towards the heart of the dance floor: efficient, remorseless, powerful, intense and most of all... elegant. Guiding you harmoniously through the club is a delightful duet of trumpet and saxophone, timed perfectly to heal you where it hurts most.



"Her Eyes Were Red" does what it says on the cover. There's melancholy - without sadness. Power - without force. Love - without lust. Stavroz's music possesses a distinct power that feels both natural and organic, never resorting to brute force or aggression. In their own way, the Belgian quartet offers an astonishing journey of saxophone & duduk, supported by broken beats and chopped vocals.



In Dae-El, a track featuring the Brussels-based producer and sound designer Poltrock, ethereal-sounding synths and duduk are combined with ghostly high-pitch distortions. Despite a backbone of muffled beats, the tune has vaporous qualities, reverberations that wobble and tinkle into space – it’s an easy listening experience but in a trippy, spaced-out way. “We’re trying to go for the sweet spot between the couch and the club”.



Adding further depth to their EP, Stavroz collaborates with Brazilian singer and composer Castello Branco in "Valente." Here, intimate Sade-like vocals harmonize with rubbery scratches, acoustic guitar, and horn segments, crafting a lush lounge piece that seamlessly balances both relaxation and empowerment, transparency and provocation. It's a testament to Stavroz's versatility and their knack for creating music that defies easy definition, leaving listeners eagerly anticipating the next twist and turn in their captivating musical journey.

Tamil Rogeon, the Melbourne based multifaceted jazz, classical and electronic violin & viola player firmly cemented his reputation with the critical success of his 2021 album Son Of Nyx which was released on Soul Bank Music, Impressive Collective head honcho Greg Boraman's previous label. Lauded as a modal and spiritual jazz fusion opus, Son Of Nyx found favour with Gilles Peterson, Laurent Garnier, Rebecca Vasmant, BBC6 Music's' Cerys Matthews and Deb Grant, was a Jazz FM’ Album of the Week. Building upon that highly original sound concept, Wave Theory draws from the jazz fusion movements of the 70s and 80s and conjures up textured soundscapes rich with cosmic synths, soaring vocals and deep jazz funk, and sees Tamil once again joining forces with Son of Nyx contributors Rita Satch and Daniel Mougerman, plus new collaborators and special guests including Lance Ferguson and celebrated trumpeter, friend Audrey Powne. Listeners can expect the same modal experiments, driving percussion and cosmic synths of Son of Nyx as well as new and exhilarating experiments in electric string instrumentation. Across all 6 tracks the highlights are numerous, but of particular note are the album opener "Ascend it!"; a fusion masterpiece that seamlessly blends psychedelic elements, funk grooves, intricate melodies, and improvisation. When "Doom Date" takes flight we are transported to Mahavishnu Orchestra-like territory, before finishing with an angular melody that is pure jazz-fusion inventiveness. The irresistibly funky 'Gift Of The Gab” is built upon a hypnotic bass line over drum and percussion. Laden with synth and retro keyboards reminiscent of the deep funk of Herbie Hancock’s late 70s period. "Mountain Bug' alternates between minor and major keys, a hallucinatory violin solo is followed by a dazzling trumpet improvisation. A restatement of the melody accompanied by the gunfire of the drum set and percussion. Tamil says of Wave Theory “Sometimes themes reveal themselves through creative encounters and through life experience. I wrote and recorded the album in six months. A lot happened to me and my friends during that time so, for me, ‘Wave Theory’ is like a musical snapshot of life’s relentless ebbs and flows. It’s about the sadness and thrills of endless transformation and the power of creative connection".

See You At The Maypole, the sixth full-length album in Half Waif"s prolific catalog, is a recognition of personal sadness, and a call to ecstatic togetherness. It"s gathering the colors of our spirit, in all its shades, and making something intricate and remarkable. The ceremonial folk dance performed around a maypole is filled with fauna and flora, with ribbons woven into complex braids incapable of unraveling; these dances are survivals of ancient ritual, honoring the living trees, and the return of Spring and fertility. These patterns -- this dance -- cannot be completed alone, and so, Half Waif welcomes others to join her, a collective of bleeding color. "We are so much stronger for the colorful experiences we go through," she says. "That"s where we find our humanity and find each other." While the seclusion of grief feels infinite, Rose brought the songs to her trusted friend and longtime collaborator of the past decade, Zubin Hensler. The pair worked away from others for Mythopoetics, carefully crafting each note and flourish themselves but something else was needed for See You At The Maypole. To that end, Hensler and Rose welcomed a wealth of players and friends into the world of the record: Jason Burger and Zack Levine on drums and percussion; Josh Marre (Blue Ranger) on guitar; Hannah Epperson and Elena Moon Park on violin; Kristina Teuschler on clarinet; Willem de Koch on trombone; Rebecca El-Saleh on harp; and Spencer Zahn on upright bass. Andrew Sarlo (Big Thief, Bon Iver) lent his deft mixing skills to many of the tracks, including lead single "Figurine." "This wasn"t just my story, I wanted to say. It was every story of loss-the loss of a life, the loss of a dream, the loss of trust and hope and faith. A story of finding a way back again," Rose explains. "My own avenue back to the land of the living was through my relationships with people and with the natural world. It only seemed right that these songs would invite those people in to build the very heart of the sound."

CECILIA is a nomadic soul. Like in an existentialist epic that traverses different ages on a phantom thread of love, spirituality, desire and rage. She inhabits different bodies, inserts herself in a whole array of different characters. Some are fictional, some are as real as the artists that inspired her, and whose influence appears in CHOEUR under the guise of tiny fragments, direct quotes, dedications and spectral presences. Cecilia channels the poetry of different lives that might have been her own or might have only existed in dreams, and does so within a collection of songs that twist the path of traditional French and Italian songwriting into the inmost recesses of electronic mysticism. The composition of CHOEUR took place mostly around January 2023, a pretty precarious time in the artist life, and happened in a spontaneous and ritualistic manner that could appear as somewhat odd in the realm of electronic music production. Birthing out of ego-free solo jams in hyphened states of consciousness and audience-less performances, these moments of do-or-die energy intake served to funnel the wilderness of her emotions into extremely tight arrangements, ultimately allowing a dramaturgy of fierce and beautiful songs into existence. Striving for the sublime, CECILIA trained her whole body for a paradoxical procedure of disconnection and reconnection. A crucial pin in Melissa Gagné’s system of 7-year creative cycles, CHOEUR marks her debut on Haunter Record as much as the first step towards the possibility of a new artistic identity. A labour of love if there ever was one. CHOEUR is made of Awe, Chants and Ravishment, of Pain until Vision. CHOEUR prays Earth, Water, Stars, Sea. CHOEUR feels Spirits, Lightning, Thunder, Dawn, Dusk, Blood, Flowers. CHOEUR invokes a Return, to Grace. CHOEUR loves Mud and longs to Play. CHOEUR lives in a Dream created by a Dream. CHOEUR lives in a Body created by Love. CHOEUR is about a broken heart, open and ecstatic, about the beauty and the sadness that all is not what could be, about wandering and wondering why were the stars made so beautiful?

For Dutch artist Stefan Vincent, the feeling of melancholy also offers the opportunity for beauty to be found. “Decay and loneliness can serve a purpose. Depression can teach you things. To feel deep sadness also means the ability to feel profound
emotions.” he says. With this in mind, his debut album on MUSAR Recordings, “Post- Melancholy”, unpacks the twists and turns of grappling with this emotion, drawing from breaks, electro and IDM to make his most intricate work to date, after previous releases on Token, Dynamic Reflection, Symbolism, and Non-Series. Throughout “Post-Melancholy” Vincent traces the wave of melancholy and how it moves through the body, which allows for lighter moments alongside darker moods. Perhaps the lightest track on the album is its acidic-breaks opener, “Eyes Unclouded”, with its soaring acid lines and dazzling synths, which acts as a false pretense for the rest of the album. Tracks like “Poise”, “Arpeggino” and the meditative “Yonghegong Lama Temple Exit F” also break up the intensity. However, nestled between the more pacey, bass-weighted tracks on the album, these lighter openings still feel like tear-jerkers.

The more common associations of melancholy show up on tracks like “Another Skin To Wear” and “You Know This Isn’t Going To End Well”, which all create a more ominous feel via IDM and the polyrhythmic structures of drum’n’bass. Particularly on “Another Skin To Wear”, which borrows its name from a Radiohead lyric, the track's swooping motion feels realistic to melancholy’s chaotic and often unpredictable path. But, like all great storytellers, Vincent leaves the most poignant moment of the album for last with the rolling “8AM on the Train… (For Maarten)” devoted to his dear friend, Maarten, who sadly passed away at the young age of 36. This LP is dedicated to Maarten de Vries (1986-2022)

Tanukichan, the musical project of Oakland, CA’s Hannah van Loon, has been a prominent figure in modern shoegaze music since 2016, when she first collaborated with Chaz Bear of Toro y Moi. Together, they released an EP and two full-length albums under Bear's Company Records, culminating in 2023's GIZMO. With her new EP Circles, out September 20th, 2024, via Carpark Records, van Loon ventures into new territory by teaming up with a new producer for the first time – Franco Reid.

The genesis of their partnership dates back to the GIZMO campaign, when Reid noticed van Loon wearing an Incubus shirt in a press photo on Instagram. Intrigued by whether or not van Loon was a genuine fan, he sent her a DM. Their shared musical interest sparked a dialogue that eventually led to the creation of the single "NPC" in 2023.

Lead single “City Bus,” offers a reflection on van Loon's childhood bus rides in San Francisco, evoking the stop-and-go rhythm of commuter life through hard-hitting drums and heavy guitar feedback phasing in and out of the mix. Themes of self-reflection and societal belonging permeate the track, echoing van Loon's ongoing personal journey.

While much of Circles delves into internal struggles, “It Gets Easier” takes on a more celebratory tone as van Loon realizes she’s developed a heightened sense of maturity when dealing with hardship. “It feels easier to let go of situations or people that don’t serve me,” reflects van Loon, “Or if they can’t be avoided, at least I don’t have to dwell on the sadness or discomfort I feel when letting someone down.” Introduced by Reid, nu-gaze sensation Wisp, contributes a verse in her similarly ethereal vocal style.

There is a notable shift on Circles when you consider the first three Tanukichan releases were produced by a pioneer of the chillwave genre. With van Loon’s consistently dreamy songwriting and Reid at the helm, Tanukichan enters new sonic territory that feels larger, arena-ready, and more like a highspeed night drive than the hazy summer dream of its predecessors.

German Powerhouse Labels Public Possession and Running Back Team up to bring you a nostalgic tribute to 80s Disco-Synth-Pop and Balkan Self-Pity. In a blend of cultural nostalgia and contemporary resonance, be-friended artists Krystal Klear and La Raf are set to release their first collaborative record titled "Boli Boli" (It hurts, it hurts) this autumn. The record is a steamy homage to the 80s disco-synth-pop. La Raf’s vocals equipped with Krystal Klear’s sound remind us of the bittersweet memories of the bygone yet still beloved music-era from former Yugoslavia.
The song came to life during a spontaneous creative outburst when Krystal and Raf reunited in a studio in London last year. Singer La Raf, a Croatian native based in Berlin, channeled the raw emotions of a not so recent break-up regret into the lyrics of "Boli Boli."
Infused with Balkan self-pity, the song delivers a very personal experience of pain and regret, not as mere sorrow but as a confident, joyful indulgence in one's own grief. This emotional depth finds a perfect counterpart in Krystal Klear’s talent for crafting melodies
that evoke both happiness and melancholia. Together, they have created a track that is as introspective as it is danceable, offering its listeners a glimpse into a world where sadness is embraced with a sense of pride and joy, capturing the cultural tapestry of the Balkan region.

Limited

Unsere Resident Evil Vinyl-Serie wird mit dem actiongeladenen Remake von Resident Evil 3 fortgesetzt, in dem Jill Valentine in HD von der furchterregenden Nemesis gejagt wird.
24 Tracks wurden speziell für Vinyl gemastert und auf traditionelle schwarze Heavyweight-Platten gepresst. Diese befinden sich in einer Deluxe-Gatefold-Hülle mit einem Cover-Artwork von Capcom. Unter der Leitung des langjährigen Resident Evil-Mitarbeiters Masami Ueda gehören Kota Suzuki, Takayasu Sodeoka, Azusa Kato, Ryo Koike, Takumi Saito und Saori Maeda zum Kompositionsteam des Spiels. Der Score schwelgt in der unheimlichen, atmosphärischen Spannung, die nur Resident Evil-Titel erzeugen können. Dazu kommen pulsierende Actionszenen, die das Herz höher schlagen lassen, und einige nostalgische Themen aus dem Jahr 1999.

Onimikìg Algonquin: (n. an.)- thunder Timothy Archambault's unaccompanied flute pieces for this album have been inspired by Indigenous brontomancy (divination by thunder). Each piece highlights a different extended flute technique metaphorically related to types of thunder sounds: claps, peals, rolls, rumbles, inversions, and CG (cloud-to-ground). An important document of new music meets contemporary musicological research via Stephen O'Malley of SUNN O)))'s Ideologic Organ. The Indigenous flute used in this recording is made of cedar respective to the traditional woods used by the Kichesipirini and other tribes who live along the Ottawa & Saint Lawrence Rivers. To the Algonquin the flute (Pibigwan) is the wind maker or essence of the wind. Unlike other tribal nations whom the majority used the flute as a courting instrument, the Algonquin generally utilized the flute for more contemplative singular usage to mimic the sounds of nature or as a signaling device during times of conflict. When love songs were required, they were usually more plaintive in character expressing sadness, loneliness, or concerning the departure of a lover. The album intro begins with the shaking of a necklace of otter penis bone, fish spine, bear claw, elk teeth and deer hide, gifted from Algonquin Elder Ajawajawesi. It is meant to focus the listener's attention before the flute pieces begin. The warble or multi-phonic oscillation prevalent in all the pieces traditionally represented the "throat rattling" vocalization of the tonic note, sometimes known as the horizon of which the melody floats from. Due to the repetition of multi-phonic oscillation the performer will breathe erratically creating an altered state correlating with similar traditional ceremonial practices.

UNSURPASSED SPACIOUSNESS, IMAGING, AND TRANSPARENCY: MASTERED FROM THE ORIGINAL TAPES, MUSIC EMERGES WITH NEW DETAILS AND TONES
1/2" / 30 IPS analogue master - Plangent Processed - to DXD to analogue console to lathe

Love Over Gold is all about contrast, tension, and crafty composition. Dire Straits' fourth album finds the band continuing to evolve by welcoming increasingly bold arrangements and exploring moody variations. Parts edgy and sharp, and part seductive and relaxed, the five lengthy songs on Love Over Gold sprawl out like a long, winding road cutting through a pastoral landscape. The addition of a new rhythm guitarist, Hal Lindes, encourages deeper atmospheric interplay while the presence of engineer Neil Dorfsman – his first appearance in what would be a long string of collaborations with Mark Knopfler – ensures stunning sonic properties that now come to life like never before.

Mastered from the original master tapes and pressed at RTI, Mobile Fidelity's 180g 45RPM 2LP version of Love Over Gold teems with superb balances, front-to-back soundstages, and crystalline purity. The dead-quiet surfaces and extra-wide grooves bring forward previously obscured details, extra information, and mastering-studio-quality transients. The distinctive textures of a host of instruments – marimbas, acoustic and electric guitars, vibes, synthesizers – further enhance the ambitiousness of the 1982 album.

On this audiophile pressing, everything Knopfler does seemingly turn to gold. Gearheads will hear the unique characteristics afforded by his use of a Mesa Boogie Mark II guitar amplifier (soon again employed on Brothers in Arms) and carefully chosen selection of Schecter Stratocasters, 1937 National steel guitar, and Ovation six- and twelve-string models. Reference-level separation and lifelike imaging place Knopfler and company in your room, while tube-like warmth, spaciousness, and airiness causes the music to breathe anew. This LP will be in your rotation for months.

It doesn't take long to realize Love Over Gold is like no other Dire Straits album – and a staunch proclamation of independence from a band that continued to take longer creative strides with each successive project. Fearlessly extending over metaphoric hills, valleys, and plains for nearly 14-and-a-half minutes, the opening "Telegraph Road" is a guitar hero's dream and exhilarating showcase for Lindes' give-and-take capabilities. In tandem with keyboardist Alan Clark, Lindes provides the ideal foil for not only Knopfler but the long-time rhythm section of bassist John Illsley and drummer Pick Withers.

Taking its time to arrive at destinations, the quintet paints evocative musical and lyrical portraits steeped in patience, drama, and, often times, sadness. Desolate emotions colour the sweeping "Telegraph Road" and barren "Private Investigations," which finds Knopfler in the role of a tired private eye contemplating the emptiness and scars of his profession. Vocally, the Dire Straits leader remains in top form throughout, his whiskey-coated rasp conveying romantic ache, ongoing frustration, and what Rolling Stone beautifully deemed "wracking schizophrenia between the heart and the heartless, the loving and the pain."

Called Dire Straits' prog-rock statement, Love Over Gold is a classic that defies labelling and avoids ageing.

The Slovak trio Berlin Manson was formed as a so-called apartment band in the dark days of Corona lockdowns. The founders Patrik Nagy and Adam Dragun compensated for the lack of cultural activities by creating new and original music, where Patrik provided D.I.Y. made electronic beats with live guitar playing and Adam provided his lyrics full of irony and criticism of the scene and society.

After the first successful concerts and singles, the cloud around the name Berlin Manson is steadily growing. It wasn't until a track and music video titled I'm not dancing I'm nodding my head that catapulted them into the limelight of the alternative scene, heralding their debut EP Life Ends When You're Thirteen (2022). Later, the original duo were joined by drummer Tomáš Tabiš, who is also in the band 52 Hertz Whale, whose album was also released under the Weltschmerzen label. Their concert performances have gained more momentum and their drive has made them one of the most popular club and festival line-ups in Slovakia and the Czech Republic.

After a successful collaboration on the 2023 single Hotel Kyjev with Pisht Kralovic a.k.a. FVLCRVM, the band is releasing their first full-length album Poor but Sexy, with which they are moving under the Weltschmerzen roof. The fusion with roots in electronica, punk, pustpunk, rave and HC is once again complemented by Adam Dragun's great lyrics, which alternate social engagement with sarcasm, irony and cynicism, or nostalgia and sadness. On the current release we can also hear collaborations with guests such as Katarzia, Edúv Syn, Fvck Kvlt, Temný Rudo, Dušan Vlk or Paris.

Das mit Spannung erwartete vierte Studioalbum ”Death or Glory” des aus Los Angeles stammenden Trios
Palaye Royale. ”Death or Glory” bietet einen faszinierenden Einblick in eine transformative und grandiose
musikalische Reise. Als Hymne an die Widerstandsfähigkeit und Selbstfindung verkörpert das Album die
künstlerische Entwicklung und das Engagement der Band, die Grenzen von Glam-Rock, Art-Punk und
Brit-Pop zu einem unverwechselbaren Sound zu verschieben.
Nach der Veröffentlichung der Doppel-EPs „Sextape“ und „Songs For Sadness“ und dem Alternative Radio
Smash ”Dead To Me” kehren Palaye Royale mit ihrem brandneuen Studioalbum „Death Or Glory“ zurück,
begleitet von einer weltweiten Headlinertour im Sommer!

Originally released in 1996 as a limited fan-club pressing for Rockathon, Guided By Voices’ Tonics And Twisted Chasers has always existed as an anomaly in Robert Pollard’s vast discography. In many ways, the album serves as the tail of a creative comet that in just two years included the “classic line-up” trilogy of Bee Thousand, Alien Lanes, Under the Bushes, Under the Stars and countless singles that crammed endless hooks in their grooves. In the intervening space, Tonics And Twisted Chasers has taken on a mythic status. It’s arguably Pollard’s strangest, gnarliest, most enlightened record and also the fans first chance to see the stitches that bind his galaxy of songs. It’s like peering at the caliber inside a watch, responsible for making the whole enterprise tick. This nineteen-song collaboration with guitarist Tobin Sprout could be interpreted as spontaneous sketches, late-night improvisations, ideas that blossomed later in the timeline (“Knock ’Em Flyin’” and “Key Losers”), but as with anything in Pollard’s orbit, its intention is clear when heard as a cohesive whole. The Pollard tenet that “less is more” is on full display here. The songs rarely creep past ninety seconds and coalesce much like Pollard’s collage-styled visual art. Arena anthems in miniature (“158 Years Of Beautiful Sex”) bash up against eerie piano laments (“Universal Nurse Finger”) without any time to breathe, acoustic lullabies that sound like a Midwestern summer’s twilight (“Look It’s Baseball”) segue into monochromatic post-rock (“Maxwell Jump”). The euphoric joy and obtuse melancholy in Pollard’s voice is so palpable on the album’s standout, “Dayton, Ohio 19 Something & 5” (which has since become a live staple), that it’s impossible to find a more autobiographical yarn in his catalog. The album’s closest analog is 1993’s Vampire On Titus, as it contains that album’s prickly, dark and shimmering obfuscation that only reveals its beauty after repeated listens. Tonics And Twisted Chasers maintains the lore because the melodies are so strong. Using a primitive drum machine, Radio Shack effects, minimal instrumentation and the DIY spirit that guided them in the first place, Pollard and Sprout constructed a masterpiece of pop that could only come from a basement in north Dayton, Ohio. Anyone in that hallowed era who happened upon it, kept it as a secret.

Originally released in 1996 as a limited fan-club pressing for Rockathon, Guided By Voices’ Tonics And Twisted Chasers has always existed as an anomaly in Robert Pollard’s vast discography. In many ways, the album serves as the tail of a creative comet that in just two years included the “classic line-up” trilogy of Bee Thousand, Alien Lanes, Under the Bushes, Under the Stars and countless singles that crammed endless hooks in their grooves. In the intervening space, Tonics And Twisted Chasers has taken on a mythic status. It’s arguably Pollard’s strangest, gnarliest, most enlightened record and also the fans first chance to see the stitches that bind his galaxy of songs. It’s like peering at the caliber inside a watch, responsible for making the whole enterprise tick. This nineteen-song collaboration with guitarist Tobin Sprout could be interpreted as spontaneous sketches, late-night improvisations, ideas that blossomed later in the timeline (“Knock ’Em Flyin’” and “Key Losers”), but as with anything in Pollard’s orbit, its intention is clear when heard as a cohesive whole. The Pollard tenet that “less is more” is on full display here. The songs rarely creep past ninety seconds and coalesce much like Pollard’s collage-styled visual art. Arena anthems in miniature (“158 Years Of Beautiful Sex”) bash up against eerie piano laments (“Universal Nurse Finger”) without any time to breathe, acoustic lullabies that sound like a Midwestern summer’s twilight (“Look It’s Baseball”) segue into monochromatic post-rock (“Maxwell Jump”). The euphoric joy and obtuse melancholy in Pollard’s voice is so palpable on the album’s standout, “Dayton, Ohio 19 Something & 5” (which has since become a live staple), that it’s impossible to find a more autobiographical yarn in his catalog. The album’s closest analog is 1993’s Vampire On Titus, as it contains that album’s prickly, dark and shimmering obfuscation that only reveals its beauty after repeated listens. Tonics And Twisted Chasers maintains the lore because the melodies are so strong. Using a primitive drum machine, Radio Shack effects, minimal instrumentation and the DIY spirit that guided them in the first place, Pollard and Sprout constructed a masterpiece of pop that could only come from a basement in north Dayton, Ohio. Anyone in that hallowed era who happened upon it, kept it as a secret.

The Circus is a place of lights and colors, but also of shadows, even darkness. Admittedly, it delights children and makes adults laugh. But you only need one rainy autumn evening near a circus tent and the smell of fodder to think of the sadness of the clowns, the endless training of the animals and the freaks who are hidden in some caravan... cinema, the essence of the circus – movement, light, danger and burlesque – will have been admirably rendered in Notes on the circus by Jonas Mekas (1966), one of the inventors of the filmed diary. With Cirque, Michèle Bokanowski does similar work, entirely dedicated to spinning, in the musical field.

She distinguished herself in particular in the composition of musique concrète, among others Tabou and Trois chambres d'inquiétudes, after having studied with Pierre Schaeffer and Éliane Radigue. The latter, great lady of drone and minimalism, fell under the spell of Cirque and wrote the booklet for the piece as a poem.

The piece, divided into five movements, is based on the handling and editing of recordings captured within one or more circuses (this is not specified and is of no importance) between 1988 and 1993. The initial allegro reveals the gallop of a horse joined gradually by other images. The idea of the circular space of the circus tent is immediatly and magnificently rendered and will be constantly recalled by an insistent use of the loop technique. Children's laughter, applause and drum rolls are thus sheared, repeated before being brutally interrupted. Accordion interludes and the distortion of sounds create a dreamlike atmosphere. This beautiful nightmare reminds us, to quote Éliane Radigue, the "Magic of childhood still living in the heart of man even beyond its abrupt end."

Words by Alexandre Galand, from the book “Field Recording – L’usage sonore du monde en 100 albums” (ed. Le mot et le reste, 2012)

Major member of the french musique concrète scene, Michèle Bokanowski was born on August 9, 1943 in Cannes, FR, to a musician mother and a writer father. She now lives and works in Paris.
Music lover since adolescence, it was relatively late, at the age of 22, that Michèle Bokanowski decided to study composition. Reading In Search of a Concrete Music by Pierre Schaeffer was decisive. After classical training on harmony, she met Michel Puig, a student of René Leibowitz, who taught her writing and analysis based on the Treatise of Schönberg. In September 1970 she began a two-year internship in the ORTF Research Department under the direction of Pierre Schaeffer. She takes part in the same time in a research group on sound synthesis, studies musical computing at the Faculty of Vincennes and electronic music with Éliane Radigue.
Her main works are intended for concert: Pour un pianiste, Trois chambres d’inquiétude, Tabou, Phone Variations, Cirque, L’étoile Absinthe, Chant d’Ombre, Enfance, Rhapsodia, Cadence, Elsewhere. She has also composed for theater (with Catherine Dasté), dance (with choreographers Hideyuki Yano, Marceline Lartigue, Bernardo Montet) and cinema: music for the short films of Patrick Bokanowski and his two feature films L'Ange ( 1982) and A Solar Dream (2016).

Mr. B is the album recorded in 1983 by Chet Baker and is considered one of the best from that period. Baker plays compositions from “Dolphin Dance” (Herbie Hancock), “Strollin” (Horace Silver) and “In Your Own Sweet Way” (Dave Brubeck). The sadness of the songs is felt throughout, in a lazy sometimes slow and sluggish tempo. The album includes two bonus tracks “White Blues” and “Father X-mas” and band members include Michel Graillier (piano) and Ricardo Del Fra (bass).

Mr. B is available as a limited edition of 1000 individually numbered copies on translucent red coloured vinyl. The album sleeve contains liner notes by Wim van Eyle.

• 180 GRAM AUDIOPHILE VINYL
• SLEEVE PRINTED ON HEAVY CARDBOARD WITH LINEN LAMINATE FINISH, CONTAINING LINER NOTES BY WIM VAN EYLE
• CHET BAKER PLAYS COMPOSITIONS FROM HERBIE HANCOCK “DOLPHIN DANCE”, HORACE SILVER
“STROLLIN”, DAVE BRUBECK “IN YOUR OWN SWEET WAY” PLUS 2 BONUS TRACKS “WHITE BLUES” AND “FATHER X-MAS”
• LIMITED EDITION OF 1000 INDIVIDUALLY NUMBERED COPIES ON TRANSLUCENT RED COLOURED VINYL

Mr. B recorded by Chet Baker with his trio, is considered one of the best from that period. Baker plays compositions from “Dolphin Dance” (Herbie Hancock), “Strollin” (Horace Silver) and “In Your Own Sweet Way” (Dave Brubeck). The sadness of the songs is felt throughout, in a lazy sometimes slow and sluggish tempo. The album includes two bonus tracks “White Blues” and “Father X-mas” and band members include Michel Graillier (piano) and Ricardo Del Fra (bass). Mr. B celebrates its 40th anniversary and is available as a limited edition on translucent blue coloured vinyl. The album sleeve contains liner notes by Wim van Eyle.

After promising to release only five studio albums under his own name, Simpson marks the beginning of a new era with Johnny Blue Skies and the release of Passage Du Desir. Out July 12 on his own independent label, High Top Mountain Records, the album includes eight songs produced by Johnny Blue Skies and David Ferguson and recorded at Clement House Recording Studio in Nashville, TN and Abbey Road Studios in London, England.

A truly one-of-a-kind artist, Kaitlin Butts has a deep affinity for country music’s more theatrical side: the extravagant storytelling, dazzling showmanship, songs embedded with both unbridled emotion and quick-fire humor. After discovering her passion for performing as a little girl, the Tulsa native later brought her boundless energy and radiant voice to her own unapologetic yet soulful songwriting. When it came time to create her third album, the Nashville-based musician leaned into her lifelong love of musical theater and dreamed up a modern-day reimagining of the soundtrack to her all-time favorite musical, Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Oklahoma! The result: a high-concept but candidly autobiographical LP called Roadrunner!, whose 17 powerhouse songs show the full force and extraordinary depth of Butts’ artistry for the very first time. Produced by Oran Thornton (Brent Cobb, Logan Brill), Roadrunner! marks a major tonal shift from Butts’ 2022 sophomore LP what else can she do, a character-driven exploration of complex matters like addiction, domestic violence, and generational trauma. “With the last album I wanted to write about the struggles I’d seen people go through or experienced myself, so a lot of the songs had a sadness or darkness to them,” she says. “I feel like Roadrunner! is much closer to what I’m like onstage, where there’s real emotion and truth but also humor and a tendency to poke fun. It’s all those different versions of me at once.”

Hometown to Come' is the second full-length album by Minhwi Lee from Seoul, South Korea. The eight tracks were written over a period of seven years after Lee's first album and loosely form a single story, contemplating how people who have lost their hometown can return.

“What I had imagined from the title, Hometown to Come, was something forever delayed yet constantly approaching; however, upon repeated listens, it takes on a different meaning—a promise of hospitality being realized every day. Even if our places to meet disappear, ‘the song we sing today’ will remain. We will continue to grow, cross paths again, venture far away, and encounter more faces. And when time has passed and you, having forgotten me, ask about my smile or sadness, I will hum ‘the same song,’ cherishing it as a keepsake.” (morceau j. woo, sound designer)

Lossapardo's new album "If I Were To Paint It" releases on May 17th. Known for blending art and music, Lossapardo has caught the eye of big names like The New York Times Magazine or Netflix and building a strong artist community around him (FKJ, Luidji, Bas, Joseph Solomon, Montell Fish, Olivia Dean…).

His music, filled with feelings of wonder and a bit of sadness, tells stories that connect with people everywhere. From painting to composing music, every piece of his work is a journey into emotions. His album invites listeners into a world where every note and color creates a vivid picture of life's ups and downs. Lossapardo crafts experiences that speak to the soul, promising an album that continues to share his unique vision with the world.

Joe Pernice has been writing for a long time—most of his life, in fact—and has crafted a remarkable catalog that boldly reinterprets and recasts classic American pop. Who Will You Believe may be his most moving and nuanced album yet; it’s certainly his timeliest. “These songs were all written during the same time period,” he says, “and they all seemed to tap into a mood I was in at the time. I go through spells where I’m a certain way for three or four months. I might be more reticent than usual, or more outgoing. With all of my records—and especially with this one—the songs all feel like they belong together, probably because they all arrived during the same stretch of time.”

In a single six-month stretch he was left reeling from the deaths of three close friends, including David Berman, poet and songwriter for Silver Jews and Purple Mountains, and Gary Stewart, the Rhino Records co-founder and tireless Pernice Brothers supporter since their first album in 1998. “That was such a bad patch when David and Gary both took their own lives. And my cousin Joe Harvard, who started Fort Apache Studios in Boston and was like a brother to me—he died, too. It was such a tough year. I was thinking about them a lot and watching how divided America had become. I was doing my best to try and take nothing for granted.”

Pernice has been releasing albums for over 25 years. And with age comes a greater patience and an immense appreciation for the act of creation. Who Will You Believe showcases a beautiful balance between such sadness and moments of solemnity with warm humor and camaraderie.

Una Magnum Special Per Tony Saitta (aka. Blazing Magnum: Strange Shadows In An Empty Room)> is a cop movie directed in year 1976 by Alberto De Martino and starring Stuart Whitman, Martin Landau, Tisa Farrow, and Gayle Hunnicutt. It was co-produced by Italy and Canada. An Ottawa police captain searches for the person who poisoned his sister, who was attending the university in Montreal. Later on, he desperately starts to use his own brutal methods to find the killer, but the truth turns out to be something different than what he had expected.

Trovajoli has composed and conducted a score that elegantly occupies a place of all respect in the Cops/Giallo movies’ scoring. The score alternates between action-driven funky music to nostalgic/romantic music in a reflection of the two dimensions of the protagonist: his cop job full of tasks and his private life full of sadness, but he becomes the superhero of the story by taking vengeance against those who hurt him by killing his beloved sister, and ultimately discovering the unexpected truth. For this vinyl album the original record master in stereo sound was used, restored and remastered to the highest quality. More or less the music in the movie is featured on this album, prepared for release by the composer himself for a very fine listening experience. Enjoy a half-hour with Armando Trovajoli and his cool sound!

"Androids may not yet dream of electric sheep, but maybe computers do sing sad songs."

In 2013, Tzoukmanis released ‘Hope Is The Sister Of Despair’, issued here for the first time on vinyl with 4 previously unreleased tracks.
The album was made following the end of a relationship and the happy/sad feeling is everywhere in this music. Sequences twinkle and nag, soft pads pour balm on tired ears and when drums do appear they provide an intimate framework rather than a call to the dance floor. The album taps into a rich vein of sequencer romanticism, from Tangerine Dream-obsessed-‘Berlin School’ daydreamers to the whole nebula of music inspired by Warp’s Artificial Intelligence series. It also looks forward, prefiguring the return today, in troubled times, to the comforting inner space of ‘90s-worshipping ambient techno.

The German word ‘weltschmerz’, roughly translating as ‘world sadness’, fits this music well. The melancholy it inspires feels collective, almost heartening. Sorrow might be said to infuse the technology’s basic building blocks – Leibniz’s binary ‘one’ bereft of its ‘zero’, its presence twinned with absence. But there is hope, too, in the network of actions and decisions that have been fashioned here into melody and rhythm.

Nach 30 Jahren wird EDGE OF SANITYs bahnbrechendes viertes Album "Purgatory Afterglow" nun remastert und sogar von Songwriter/Frontmann/Produzent Dan Swanö (Opeth, Dissection, Katatonia, etc) neu abgemischt. Die Wiederveröffentlichung des 1994 erstmals erschienenen Albums ist nun endlich wieder als Limited Deluxe 2CD Jewelcase mit O-Card (mit der "Until Eternity Ends" 4-Track EP als Bonus) und auf verschiedenen 180g-Vinyl-Editionen erhältlich. Mit dem eingängigen "Twilight", dem fulminanten "Of Darksome Origin", dem langsamen "Velvet Dreams" und EDGE OF SANITYs Durchbruchshit "Black Tears" ist "Purgatory Afterglow" ein Triumph des modernen Death Metal. Diese 30th Anniversary Edition enthält den Original-Mix/Master und als Bonus einen Total Mix Rework des Albums, den Swanö als "lebendig und frisch" bezeichnet. Entdecke EDGE OF SANITYs "Purgatory Afterglow" neu, bevor X-Machines uns alle auslöschen!

The new album from Lebanese-American musician Solpara, Melancholy Sabotage, marks his full length debut and return to Nicolas Jaar's Other People label. While it was recorded over Covid lockdowns, Jaar had been talking about wanting to back a Solpara full-length since he put out Swing. The album came to life while Solpara was living alone in a Brooklyn loft, collecting unemployment checks and viewing ample free time as the artist residency he'd dreamed of; he'd previously been forced to make music in odd windows between numerous jobs and the unmerciful pace of city life. Free from obligations, he would wake up early to take Arabic lessons online, read Tracey Thorn's autobiography, and skateboard the deserted streets, then come home and design sounds until he had a track that felt like it needed to be released. While this easy going lifestyle was peaceful in many ways, Solpara found more complex inspiration in the emotion that stemmed from participation in Black Lives Matter protests and the 2020 Beirut Port explosion, which rocked all of his extended family members in Lebanon.

Melancholy Sabotage explores the theme of sabotaging melancholy. Echoing sounds from the post-punk, trip-hop, and ambient genres, it is about sabotaging the cycle of melancholy and looking at this process without ignoring the sources that put it into motion. It may be compared to a rattling breaking free from retention, reaching states of dreamy euphoria while simultaneously acknowledging the sources of retention, viewed from above. The sources can be personal, political, or socio-economic. They are to be apprehended post-melancholy, after the sabotaging of the initial cycle of melancholy. In other words, it is about transcending melancholy and understanding where it came from with some distance. It may be beautiful and healthy to feel for a while, but how may one sabotage this cycle when it becomes paralyzing? Ultimately, this album is about feeling melancholy but also resisting it and naming the sources that initiated it.

"Time To Hold Better" points to neglect on both personal and group levels. "This Time Last Year" is a personal time capsule. "We Keep Us Safe" is about solidarity, autonomy, and care witnessed within protest groups. "Melancholy Sabotage" is a sonic exploration of the album concept illustrating anger and sadness, but finally, resistance and liberation from these feelings. "Measures" is a more fluid exploration of the latter after the initial storm has passed. "We Don't Owe" points to bigger bodies inflicting harm on populations that we owe nothing to. "Breaking Points" harkens the times that we may lose focus while pushing to transcend melancholy. "Eviction" is about being pushed out of a space unwillingly while simultaneously being forced to move forward.

Melancholy Sabotage pulls from a range of genres, uniting electronic sounds under the same post-punky glow. It pulls from complex, heavy themes including damage and injustice, presenting Solpara's most moving body of work to date. It highlights the poignance that has always been at the heart of his fluid sound, which caters to dancefloors and avant-garde spaces in equal measure. Working with a mix of dissonant guitars, distorted drum machines, and distant, reverb-washed vocals, Melancholy Sabotage is Solpara's uneasiest outing to date. The record pinpoints the duality at the heart of Solpara's sound, which is as plaintive as it is searing.

Joanna Gemma Auguri releases her new album "Hiraeth" on 28th June via Duchess Box Records Joanna Gemma Auguri is a Berlin musician, songwriter and actress. In the various stages ofher musical solo and band projects, she incorporates influences from folk, ambient andavant-garde music.Being five years old she escaped with her parents from Poland, which was under martial law,and had to learn at an early age what uprooting means. This experience is reflected in her music as an expression of personal sadness, compassion, but also despair about the state of the world.2021 she released her solo debut "11" on her own label Lavender Music. It was mainly characterized by accordion, zitherand her vocals. Her new album "Hiraeth" was recorded at Candy Bomber Studios in Berlin by Ingo Krauss, with a large number of musicians. Besides choir, double bass, lap steel guitar, drums, cello, horns , different organs and keyboards her original instruments accordion and zither still shine through from time to time. Joanna's voice sits unmistakable on top of the majestic,nearly monumental compositions which despite their richness always stay basic and delicate. "Hiraeth" is an untranslatable Welsh word that describes the longing for a home, a place or a feeling that no longer exists or never existed.The album will be released June 2024 on Duchess Box from Berlin.

* Sounds like a mix of Thom Yorke, Burial, Nils Frahm, all swirled together in a colorful yet creamy mix;

* A blend of Emikas neoclassical descending melodies, signature breathy, female vocals, icey pianos, heavy sub-bass vibrations and layered Hazy beats.

* Sat between her life in moving-boxes, wedged between them surrounding her upright piano in an unfurnished empty-sounding room in her in-laws house. Haze was made with voice-memo recordings of her piano and voice on her phone, edited and mixed on her laptop in headphones. Little loops in Ableton, lyrics, sadness and melodies, just like Emika’s real-life in boxes.

* Emika is set to launch a new event series, inspired by her memories of early Dubstep in the legendary Black Swan venue in Bristol (now closed) she saw her friend Mala play, with one table-lamp, it was all about this new sound, and meditating on the bass-weight. Something she plans to continue in her Haze Nights, where each guest will be gifted a little Haze Light with their ticket.

Pål Waaktaar-Savoy has explained that much of the atmosphere and the lyrical themes of Savoy’s seventh album “Under” are drawn from his move with his fellow songwriter and wife Lauren Savoy to Los Angeles, where they found themselves surrounded by loneliness.

Waaktaar-Savoy is one of the most prolific and impressive songwriters of the twentieth century and beyond, and having been working at the very top of the music industry for as long as he has, it is no surprise that the record is well-crafted. The production is good, with careful arrangements and instrumentation. Every instrument’s voice is given room and there is space in the mix. Only occasionally does this slip over into over-production, as with the treated strings on the opening track “Lonely Surfer” or the treatment of Lauren’s vocals, which sound overly processed.

It is also true that the record exhibits a fair measure of melancholy. The chords and melody lines are dark in places, and there is a hint of sadness in the lyrics, many of which have a retrospective quality, describing moments in the past. However, beyond this, the understated feel of the record is just that – understated. Many of songs feel a few RPM too slow and the delivery of the vocal lines too underplayed to give them any emotional authority. At times, it also seems like the arrangement has to step in to bolster the songwriting or lyrics, by filling space with strings or brass, or the counterpoint of the instrumentation on “Camden Palace Chronicles” which distracts from some fairly mediocre words. It is important to emphasise that this is a joint songwriting exercise for Pål and Lauren, so we should not compare the output to the work of a-ha, but still, the themes lean in the direction of suburban banality, far from Pål’s more oblique or allegorical writing.

There are other moments of real quality beyond the production and arrangement. The title track has an excellent Bowie-esque chorus (and there are echoes of his work and sound throughout, along with Beatles and Beck), “The Life and Times of a Wannabe” has some first-rate guitar work on it, edgy riffs and some good textures. Likewise, “Coming Down”, which also exemplifies Frode Unneland’s drumming on the record, which is generally prominent in the mix, and with good reason, as it carries the record along well.

Sunk in quicksand, doused in prosecco and soundwaves of glitches and Croatian choons, Bolka

is stuck in the raw state of desire. This love came into being under the sad ceilings, bearing traces
of fantastically naive melodies shredded by claws of intruding noises of the artist's debut EP.
And yet, radical sensitivity and optimism on the new EP do not remain just on the beach.
Žiadzasamy (loosely translated as Yearningforus) include love songs about love read in cards,
about overcoming insecurity, about scratching up the slippery walls of reality towards the dream
source of warmth that only SHE possesses.
Syrupy pop tunes in "nech sa ti páčim" ("i hope you like me") are led by a nursery rhyme about
the complex embrace of infatuation, from the head down to the shoulders, knees and toes of the
desired person. The sound wizard of peculiarities goes by the motto "let anything I wish for
come true", whether it's his white buttocks shining in the dark sea or him sweeping past barefoot
in search of seafood delicacies, and the same is heard in his music where euphoric and childish
moods sink arbitrarily to the depths of corroded and distorted rhythms of anxiety. "A smutek
utek" ("and the sadness is gone"), though, sets a new direction for the Bolka's musical piece;
after a slow mo deflation of the balloon of hopes, after wallowing in oozy and sticky blend of
delirious melodies, Bolka gets to spin the wheel of the real Balkan soap opera.

"More, mám ťa veľmi rád" ("sea/man, i like you very much") is the pinnacle of absolute
infiltration and absorption with infatuation and suddenly, the amusing nods to stereotypical
Croatian hits make it clear that all the joy and high spirits do not stem from holiday idleness. In
žiadzasamy, Bolka indulges in the ideal notion of love that is closer to reality with each passing
kilometer, impatiently speeding up the Latin tempo in the hyper-pop escalation in order to
venture into the most radical decision – that all will end well.
Žiadzasamy is hedonism injected right into one's vein, an ashtray always aglow with a lit
cigarette and a musical burst of new-born love that sets the Bolka's sound world on a single
course: from siesta to fiesta, and so on and on.




[d] 04: Žiadzasamy (Remix) [feat. Viktor Jenčuš]

THE 1968 ALBUM ON WHICH JOHNNY CASH BECAME A LEGEND: AT FOLSOM PRISON AMONG THE MOST IMPORTANT AND POTENT STATEMENTS OF THE 20TH CENTURY


Johnny Cash already knew his way around Folsom Prison when he and his band stepped inside the institution’s forbidding walls on the morning of January 13, 1968 to record At Folsom Prison. He’d played there two years prior. But this time was different.

Cash took the stage that day for two shows amid a darkening sociopolitical atmosphere and a raging war in Vietnam, as well as the knowledge his career and health hung on by a thread. The Arkansas native shared many of the long odds and abject failures of the inmates for which he performed. The songs he chose, and the conviction with which he delivered them, say as much. The point at which Cash transformed from a country star into a legendary artist, and a bold statement about the American prison state and its commitment to rehabilitation, the triple-platinum At Folsom Prison remains one the most important, potent, and fabled records of the 20th century.

You can hear it echo off the walls of the room; pulse through the itchiness of the Tennessee Three’s acoustic-based boom-chick rhythms; crackle in the announcements conveyed over the intercom; ring in the comedy of the off-cuff remarks and pair of novelty tunes; sense it in palpable energy that wells up within Cash and his audience. And you can experience it like never before via Cash’s knockout singing. The bedrock foundation of all his music, the singer’s baritone resonates with profound degrees of depth, pliability, and passion that underscore how much this appearance meant to him — and the extent he was living the narratives.

Indeed, every song on At Folsom Prison serves a purpose and speaks to the conditions — mental, emotional, physical, geographical, legal, social — the inmates confronted on a daily basis. Beginning with the explicit messages of the opening “Folsom Prison Blues,” Cash makes it clear he understands and shares many of their plights. Not for nothing did the myth of Cash having done hard time persist for decades once this record hit the streets. That’s how real it is, and how dedicated Cash remains to conveying every note with the same truth he invests in the impromptu comments he makes between and amid songs.

Listen to the sorrow, regret, pity, and loneliness of Merle Travis’ “Dark as the Dungeon,” Cash pulling syllables til they threaten to break and inhabiting the mood of bleak phrases such as “pleasures are few” and “the sun never shines.” Witness the isolation, dejection, and sadness punctuating the walking-blues “I Still Miss Someone,” matched in gravity by a solemn reading of “The Long Black Veil” — a traditional dirge that involves murder, cheating, and deception. Cash cuts even deeper on a heartbreaking solo rendition of “Send a Picture of Mother” and plainspoken version of Harlan Howard’s “The Wall,” detailing a suicide disguised as jailbreak through cliched-jaw deliveries that softly curse the impossible situation.

In chronicling temptations, mistakes, mortality, punishment, and life “inside” — for better or worse, the stories of the disenfranchised, forgotten, written-off, and unrepentant — At Folsom Prison also has a blast playing the outlaw role. Cash captures wild-eyed craziness and out-of-control mayhem on a revved-up take of “Cocaine Blues,” taking extra satisfaction in its dastardly tales by way of voice that shifts into character for the sheriff and judge. The gallows humor and racing drama of “25 Minutes to Go”; quicksilver accents and resigned acceptance of “I Got Stripes”; train-whistle blare and twangy locomotion of “Folsom Prison Blues” — all fight the law only to see the law win.

Cash remains deeply committed at every moment, and inseparably connected with the tortured souls removed from the goings-on of the outside world. No wonder all but two songs here stem from the day’s first performance that saw Cash, Luther Perkins, Marshall Grant, and company give everything. As does the Man in Black’s soon-to-be-wife, June Carter. The couple’s fiery duet on “Jackson” scorches; their combination of surrender and fortitude “Give My Love to Rose” puts us in the dying protagonist’s shoes.

And with the closing “Greystone Chapel,” famously penned by convict Glen Sherley, who watched it all happen under the watchful eye of guards, Cash separates the corporeal from the spiritual, relaying lessons about salvation and survival. Heady themes to which he’d return for the remainder of his illustrious career.

DJ Support: Gilles Peterson, Sean Johnston, Jaye Ward, Max Essa and Francois K

Limited to 300 copies

Having been long-time admirers of one another from afar, Hell Yeah and Michele Mininni finally come together for Pop Archetypes. It is a multifaceted debut album that collides broken beats, worldly rhythms, jazz, eastern melodies, live drums and much more into one thrilling 15-track opus that arrives on May 31st.

Italian artist Mininni has always had a leftfield take on electronic music and imbued it with rhythms, melodies and instruments from around the globe. He has released it on cult labels like R&S, Optimo Trax, Internasjonal and Curle Recordings but has saved his magnificent debut album for Hell Yeah. It is much more than a collection of sounds he has already explored and instead finds him heading off into all new territory without losing his signature sense of inventive and beguiling rhythm and melody. It is a multicultural journey that takes in heterogeneous styles and diverse influences but distills them all into one cohesive album with its own unique storyline.

Says Mininni of the record, 'I wanted each track to be like pieces of a unique, multifaceted picture, like walking through train cars or progressing through the levels of a video game, all filtered through my own vision and concentrated into 36 minutes. I wanted a pop album rooted in the extraordinary richness of popular music and projected into the future, a continuum where pieces communicate with each other and are received by the ears in symbiotic balance.'

Despite that concept, the album is a spontaneous listen full of surprises, left turns and original ideas that all hold together in thrilling fashion. It kicks off with the tumbling jazz drums and swirling synths of 'Spinning Around Cotton Candy', takes in mellifluous melodic layers and broken beats on 'Golden Room' and 'Slipped Air' casts you adrift amongst gorgeous piano keys and refracted vocals on the suspensory 'Vertigo'. There are jungle interludes with Eastern string melodies like 'Bangkok Tempo', lavish fusions of organic and synthetic sounds on 'Kundalini' and more charming Far Eastern rhythms on 'Muting Cat'. 'Congoflash' brings electrifying cosmic rays to busy hand drum patterns, 'The Magic Of Synesthesia' combines dark amen breaks and bright and uplifting flutes while 'Carousel Of Tears' douses you in watery melodies and celestial pads that awaken the soul.

Pop Archetypes is an adventurous work packed with meticulous and infinite details but all with an overarching narrative that makes it far more than the sum of its parts.

Pål Waaktaar-Savoy has explained that much of the atmosphere and the lyrical themes of Savoy’s seventh album “Under” are drawn from his move with his fellow songwriter and wife Lauren Savoy to Los Angeles, where they found themselves surrounded by loneliness.

Waaktaar-Savoy is one of the most prolific and impressive songwriters of the twentieth century and beyond, and having been working at the very top of the music industry for as long as he has, it is no surprise that the record is well-crafted. The production is good, with careful arrangements and instrumentation. Every instrument’s voice is given room and there is space in the mix. Only occasionally does this slip over into over-production, as with the treated strings on the opening track “Lonely Surfer” or the treatment of Lauren’s vocals, which sound overly processed.

It is also true that the record exhibits a fair measure of melancholy. The chords and melody lines are dark in places, and there is a hint of sadness in the lyrics, many of which have a retrospective quality, describing moments in the past. However, beyond this, the understated feel of the record is just that – understated. Many of songs feel a few RPM too slow and the delivery of the vocal lines too underplayed to give them any emotional authority. At times, it also seems like the arrangement has to step in to bolster the songwriting or lyrics, by filling space with strings or brass, or the counterpoint of the instrumentation on “Camden Palace Chronicles” which distracts from some fairly mediocre words. It is important to emphasise that this is a joint songwriting exercise for Pål and Lauren, so we should not compare the output to the work of a-ha, but still, the themes lean in the direction of suburban banality, far from Pål’s more oblique or allegorical writing.

There are other moments of real quality beyond the production and arrangement. The title track has an excellent Bowie-esque chorus (and there are echoes of his work and sound throughout, along with Beatles and Beck), “The Life and Times of a Wannabe” has some first-rate guitar work on it, edgy riffs and some good textures. Likewise, “Coming Down”, which also exemplifies Frode Unneland’s drumming on the record, which is generally prominent in the mix, and with good reason, as it carries the record along well.

Pål Waaktaar-Savoy has explained that much of the atmosphere and the lyrical themes of Savoy’s seventh album “Under” are drawn from his move with his fellow songwriter and wife Lauren Savoy to Los Angeles, where they found themselves surrounded by loneliness.

Waaktaar-Savoy is one of the most prolific and impressive songwriters of the twentieth century and beyond, and having been working at the very top of the music industry for as long as he has, it is no surprise that the record is well-crafted. The production is good, with careful arrangements and instrumentation. Every instrument’s voice is given room and there is space in the mix. Only occasionally does this slip over into over-production, as with the treated strings on the opening track “Lonely Surfer” or the treatment of Lauren’s vocals, which sound overly processed.

It is also true that the record exhibits a fair measure of melancholy. The chords and melody lines are dark in places, and there is a hint of sadness in the lyrics, many of which have a retrospective quality, describing moments in the past. However, beyond this, the understated feel of the record is just that – understated. Many of songs feel a few RPM too slow and the delivery of the vocal lines too underplayed to give them any emotional authority. At times, it also seems like the arrangement has to step in to bolster the songwriting or lyrics, by filling space with strings or brass, or the counterpoint of the instrumentation on “Camden Palace Chronicles” which distracts from some fairly mediocre words. It is important to emphasise that this is a joint songwriting exercise for Pål and Lauren, so we should not compare the output to the work of a-ha, but still, the themes lean in the direction of suburban banality, far from Pål’s more oblique or allegorical writing.

There are other moments of real quality beyond the production and arrangement. The title track has an excellent Bowie-esque chorus (and there are echoes of his work and sound throughout, along with Beatles and Beck), “The Life and Times of a Wannabe” has some first-rate guitar work on it, edgy riffs and some good textures. Likewise, “Coming Down”, which also exemplifies Frode Unneland’s drumming on the record, which is generally prominent in the mix, and with good reason, as it carries the record along well.

London-based four-piece Adult Jazz announce their first full-length album in a decade, So Sorry So Slow, out 26 April 2024 via Spare Thought. Alongside the announcement comes lovesick new single ‘Suffer One’ featuring Owen Pallett, a cautious excavation of self and sexuality, clambering across a gorgeously shapeshifting, filmic five-minutes.

Containing some of the band’s most abrasive but gentle, beautiful and melismatic work to date, So Sorry So Slow has many defining characteristics: romance, panic, devotion and remorse, threaded together by an intentionally laser-focused love. It’s deeply personal, bruised and candid in its expressions of tenderness, and deeply pained in its concurrent reflections of ecological regret. Across its hour-long runtime, a delicate, frenetic energy and glacial heaviness coexist, the band pitting those paces against one another. In their richly experimental timbre, dancing strings and fluttering falsettos prang against a bed of brass drones like a wounded bird.

“We started writing in 2017 and began recording in 2018,” says vocalist Harry Burgess. “We genuinely thought it might be finished in 2018! But things kept developing and, having resolutely not struck while the iron was hot, there was no real external push to rush things after that, so we just kept letting things shift and unfold until it felt right. Listening back to my voice notes it’s nice to notice that there are fragments of ideas from the whole period 2017-2023 which have shaped the record.”

Recorded in bursts at studios across London and in the band members’ flats, at Konk, on the Isle of Wight and in Sussex, So Sorry is unambiguous in its evolution. Sonically, there are sparks of the arrhythmic brightness that afforded the band’s critically acclaimed debut album Gist Is its cult adoration, for fans of Arthur Russell and Meredith Monk, but with a blossoming, melancholic darkness often overhead. Piano sprees and luscious string sections appear like low-hanging stars on a night-time drive, whilst plunging vocal distortions and humming brass loops resurrect heavy limbs in a bad dream.

“I usually have objects as kind of totems for ideas,” explains Burgess. “The album initially started out to do with performance… the totem was a head mic, one of the subtle skin-tone ones, discreet on the forehead of a West End star. A number of the first songs in their original forms were almost musical theatre piano ballads. I think that was really a device to write about my life as the ‘main character’ (pre internet-speak reframing): regrets about romance, relationships - unsustainable relationships with the self and others.”

“However, once we started writing, the ideas about unsustainable personal relationships, loving unevenly and heartbreak conflated with a more expressly ecological regret. Like contending with big feelings of loss, endings, beauty, desolation, and with how much joy the earth contains in it. Feeling so much gratitude bound up in waves of sadness. Maybe witnessing a slow-motion goodbye to all that, or its last gasps. I love the earth and the life it supports so much. I love how ecosystems fit together - even the brutal stuff. It may be basic to say, but now is the time to be laser focused on that love. I was thinking about human centrality on earth, us as the ‘main character’, the way that is served by faith and romanticism, and the subsequent disingenuous understandings of our position in the ecosystem, as only stewards somehow, rather than subjects. The totems at this point: a herald’s horn, lorry inner tubes, archaeological tools. I guess from doom, industry, history respectively.”

“Now I would say the record is about gripping. Totems being: crampons, rope, drips, desalination equipment, accruing various survival tech. I think gripping sums up both of the threads. There’s the emotionally correct clinging to the earth that is the substrate of everything we value, or the delusional clinging to our imagined dominant position. But also the practical, technological aspects of creating a sustainable relationship, of remaining here. Then I think of romance again.”

So Sorry So Slow comes out 26th April 2024 on Spare Thought, mixed by Fabian Prynn at 4AD Studios and mastered by Alex Wharton at Abbey Road.

Adult Jazz is Harry Burgess, Tim Slater, Steven Wells and Tom Howe.