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2025 Repress

It's rare that a certain sound is entirely an artist's own. Although undeniably a stew of impeccable influences - from blues to folk to Latin to dusty funk, soul and hip-hop - one cannot hear a Tommy Guerrero song without immediately recognising it as his - and his only.The cult skater from San Francisco is globally renowned as one of the original members of the legendary "Bones Brigade" team. And as an accomplished multi-instrumentalist, his laid-back soul is beloved by all who've basked in its blissful glow.There's something elemental about this music that really stirs the soul. Strikingly beautiful and instantly addictive, it's a kind of funk-fuelled, melody-driven, groove-based magic. There's a serenity and heart in the playing that radiates warmth and splendour, as if crafted for endless sunsets. His albums that surfaced on Mo Wax at the turn of the century have been treasured since their release and it's two of his most vital LPs that we're honoured to reintroduce.The originals were quietly pressed on to a single piece of vinyl so we've worked closely with Tommy this year to bring you these fresh, limited editions. They have been lovingly remastered, cut nice and loud on to heavyweight double vinyl and presented in deluxe gatefold jackets.A Little Bit Of Somethin' is a quietly majestic gem. Brimming with Guerrero's horizontal "loose grooves", these brief but innovative instrumentals demonstrate a rich variety and, as such, comprise an LP that is aptly titled. An enchanting start-to-finish listen, it was instantly regarded as essential upon release via Mo Wax in 2000. It has aged remarkably well.Throughout this inspired collection, simplicity is key. In deploying it, Guerrero presents a beautifully crafted melodic soundscape. The distinctive, mellifluous approach of his guitar style, blending Brazilian, Cuban, Mexican, soul and jazz motifs, is at once startlingly new and tantalisingly familiar. Set against unrushed percussion, the music releases a crystal clear stream of healing frequencies to create a fragile, hypnotic atmosphere.Each track clocks in at around three minutes and, with a lack of studio polish or commitment to traditional song structure, it's a wonder how this enigmatic record demands your attention. However, through its gentle dynamism and impressive playing, it does just that. Whilst resolutely low-key, this lo-fi aesthetic feels genuinely organic and remarkably personal, its powerful intimacy truly connects. It's what makes this album so beloved of those lucky enough to be already familiar with it. From Margaret Kilgallen's truly iconic cover artwork to the music contained within, it's all brilliantly effortless.Guerrero's musical ideas are consistently compelling throughout, making it impossible to select highlights. The album's laconic drift touches upon jazz-fusion workouts and slow-mo hip-hop drums, Tortoise-style experimental post-rock and cinematic sound textures. It's at once hazy, light and bouncy yet sombre and bluesy. The Latin soul of El Chicano blends with the breezy jazz of Grant Green. By employing guitars and drum machines to create a stripped down rhythmic tapestry of spellbinding, addictive songs, there are even traces of The Durutti Column. A little bit of country, a little bit of rock & roll. A Little Bit Of Somethin', indeed.

Auf ,Reflections Vol. 3: Water Poems" bringen Félicia Atkinson und Christina Vantzou ihre Freundschaft und ihre atmosphärische Kunstfertigkeit in einem feierlichen Fokus zusammen. Gesprochene Worte und orchestrale Fantasie fließen wie Nebenflüsse in einen einheitlichen Strom und ergeben eine Sammlung traumhafter Lieder und Klanglandschaften, die im Meer, im Himmel und in den Steinen verankert sind. Mit elektroakustischen Instrumenten, Gesang und Umgebungsgeräuschen lädt Water Poems die Zuhörer in einen unbewussten Raum ein, irgendwo zwischen alltäglicher Intimität und dem Geheimnis des Ozeans, aus dem alles Leben entsteht. Atkinson und Vantzou haben sich 2009 kennengelernt und seitdem immer mal wieder zusammengearbeitet, aber ein Konzert 2019 in der Philharmonie in Paris hat dieses Projekt richtig in Gang gebracht. Da beide jetzt an der Küste leben (Félicia am Ärmelkanal, Christina am Mittelmeer), wurde das Meer natürlich zu ihrer Muse. ,Das Meer wurde nicht als monolithische Postkarte betrachtet", erklärt Atkinson, ,sondern eher als eine Person an sich; eine Energie, ein Geheimnis, ein komplexer Charakter, dem wir als Menschen, die am Meer leben, jeden Tag begegnen." Im Dialog mit dem Land und der Küste nahmen ihre Sprache und ihre Klänge einen sakramentalen Charakter an. ,Ein feierliches Gefühl, ein Gefühl des Dienens, zieht sich tief durch dieses Album", bemerkt Vantzou, ,ich habe das schon einmal gespürt, aber hier, in der Zusammenarbeit mit Félicia, ist es stärker." Stimme, Atem und wässrige Texturen prägen den Ton des maritimen Mysteriums von Water Poems. Neu in Vantzous Praxis und seit langem ein prägendes Merkmal von Atkinsons Werk, gewinnen ihre gesprochenen Worte hier an relationaler Intimität, indem sie sich gegenseitig und die Uferpromenade ansprechen. Die Texte wurden über zwei Jahre hinweg gemeinsam zusammengestellt. Mit radikaler Unschuld lenken sie das Bewusstsein auf die verborgene Auftriebskraft und die unbewussten Strömungen, die durch das Leben fließen: ,Wie kann ein Boot schwimmen? Wie kann ein Flugzeug fliegen? Wie kann ein Körper schwimmen? Wie kann ein Mensch träumen?" Was mit nah aufgenommenen Stimmen und Feldaufnahmen begann, wurde um Synthesizer, Gongs und Metallophone, Klavier, Vibraphon, Rhodes, Gitarren und Mellotron erweitert. Das Gezeitenklavier des Eröffnungstracks ,Film Still / The Sea" zieht uns in die unbewussten Gewässer des Albums. Enthalten sind Feldaufnahmen, die Vantzou in Delphi in der Nähe des legendären Orakels von Pythia aufgenommen hat - ihr griechisches Erbe verleiht diesem Ort der Vorfahren eine zusätzliche Dimension. Dieser Track und ,Water Poems" als Ganzes sind Ausdruck unseres geologischen Erbes und rufen zum Schutz der Küsten und zu einer Vertiefung unserer Beziehung zu unseren Küsten auf. Ein Teil der Einnahmen aus dem Album geht an Arion, ein gemeinnütziges Naturschutzprogramm für das griechische Mittelmeer. Der langjährige Freund und Mitstreiter John Also Bennett hat bei ,Scorpio Purple Skies", dem kosmischen Finale des Albums, mit E-Gitarre, Lap-Steel-Gitarre und Gesang mitgewirkt. Diese üppige Instrumentierung passt super zu den Science-Fiction-Visionen und der feierlichen Atmosphäre des Albums. Water Poems wurde in The Old Carpet Factory, einem Herrenhaus aus dem 18. Jahrhundert auf der griechischen Insel Hydra, in der Villa Medici aus dem 16. Jahrhundert in Rom und in Les Dunes, Atkinsons Heimstudio in der Normandie, aufgenommen. Mehr als das historische Prestige dieser Orte war es die spürbare Geschichte ihrer Landschaft, die die Musik geprägt hat. Atkinson sagt, dass sie sich zu ,Orten mit seltsamer Anziehungskraft" hingezogen fühlten. In der Villa Medici ,haben Steine und Mineralien das gesprochene Wort beeinflusst", bemerkt sie. ,Wir beide legen Wert auf Gefühl, Atmosphäre und Klang", fügt Vantzou hinzu, ,was er hervorruft und was er bewirkt. In unserem Fall konzentrieren wir uns auf die grundlegenden Elemente: Wasser, Luft, Fels, Kosmos - allesamt lebenswichtig.» Von der Insel Kreta aus arbeitete Vantzou den finalen Mix fertig und tauschte dabei Dateien mit Atkinson aus. Immer noch mit der Küste verbunden, verlief der Mixing-Prozess geduldig und wurde von wichtigen Pausen geprägt. Water Poems spiegelt wider, was die Meeresbiologin Rachel Carson uns in Erinnerung ruft: ,Am Rande des Meeres zu stehen bedeutet, Wissen über Dinge zu haben, die so nahezu ewig sind, wie es das irdische Leben nur sein kann." Es zelebriert rituell dieses ozeanische Gefühl als wichtige Quelle der Gelassenheit und Intelligenz. In einer Welt, die von hitzigen Meinungen und ökologischer Vernachlässigung geprägt ist, lenkt Water Poems unsere Aufmerksamkeit auf ,die Quellen der Quellen". Damit schafft es Raum, um uns wieder mit unseren elementaren, animalischen Instinkten zu verbinden und uns auf tiefere Strömungen einzustimmen. Water Poems von Félicia Atkinson und Christina Vantzou ist der dritte Band von Reflections, einer Reihe zeitgenössischer Kollaborationen von RVNG Intl..

Two years after releasing the acclaimed Crash Recoil, Anthony Child aka Surgeon returns to Tresor with new LP, Shell~Wave. Retaining the minimal equipment list and studio-version-of-live-show-sets approach of the previous album in order to focus on the work itself, Shell~Wave is a deeply personal document of both where Surgeon is and has been, converging three decades of experience with a continued curiosity in the untested.
“To make this project, I had to dig really deep in terms of what my relationship was to techno; I’ve been involved with it for a really long time and there’s a lot about it I feel dislocated from, so I had to really think hard about what techno is to me. I often get asked “what is techno to you?” but I can’t answer that with words; this album is the answer.” From the complex, twisting track Infinite Eye to the caustic Soul Fire, the eight tracks that make up the body of the album are single-take explorations of the vast, hard yet minimal techno Child is synonymous with.
Neatly dividing the record in two, the emotional centre of the record comes in the form of Dying, a vibrating, beatless piece that with a mantra-like vocal loop steeped in reverberating effects. Further echoes of dub production appear throughout the record as tracks like Divine Shadow, and Empty Cloud have an almost ever-present mist of reverberation, driven by the appearance of a new delay unit in the equipment list; while much of the philosophy of Crash Recoil’s creation is present, the process and the instruments have changed as Child again switches up his approach to studio work.
This insistence on trying novel techniques doesn’t preclude returning to old ones, as this use of modern digital machines with live, hands-on takes that are as inspired by 60s producer Joe Meek and 70s reggae as they are by this year’s synthesiser expos.
“For me, it’s an interesting experience returning to old techniques again after 30 years. I’m always exploring and finding myself back at the beginning. Connecting the present with the past.”
This philosophy of ‘time travel’ is inherent to the music itself as the synchronised loops repeat while the delay and effects branch out, forming unique eddies; distinct quantum moments within the circular whole; the future leaking through the spaces between the sounds. All of the concepts on the album are perfectly communicated through the painting by Taiwanese artist Jazz Szu-Ying Chen which suggests the movement of water, sound waves, and the chitinous shells of sea creatures.

Man-of-the-minute Jorg Kuning returns to Facta & K-LONE’s Wisdom Teeth imprint with ‘Elvers Pass’: a new 6-track exposition of his singular sound, and his most accomplished and comprehensive work to date. By now, the Jorg Kuning trademark is well established. Cherrypicking influences from the wiggiest ends of tech house, electro and bass music, his music is instantly set apart by his totally unique sound palette.

In fact, it’s hard to think of another club artist who has emerged with such a distinct and recognisable voice in recent years. Bubbling and funky with that unmistakable dose of wonk, you can tell a Jorg Kuning tune the minute it enters the mix. Since last appearing on Wisdom Teeth with 2022’s ‘Chosta-del-sol’ EP, the Welshpool-based artist has become a cult name on the global club and festival circuit - his must-see live set turning heads wherever he pitches up. Anybody who frequents the summer circuits around Freerotation, Love International, Gottwood and Dimensions will know exactly what we’re talking about. Along the way he has picked up a number of ardent and outspoken fans, including Lukas Wigflex and Koreless - the latter of whom tapped Jorg for a stellar remix on last year’s ‘Deceltica’ EP on Young. On ‘Elvers Pass’, Jorg manages to ring an exceptionally rich diversity of life from the circuitry of his modular machines.

The record’s melodies flutter and swirl like deep-sea creatures, and his synths ooze as if dredged from some primordial swamp. More so than ever, a host of otherworldly voices have begun to creep into his music: ‘Mercedes’ centres around a fluttering chorus of disembodied vocal chops, while ‘Synthetic Squashies’ rocks back and forth on a looping dialog between two AI chatbots. Across the record, synths mimic animal vocal tones, from the belching bass licks on ‘Skudde’ to the amphibious synth groans on ‘Teen Frogue’. Playful, oddball and in a class of its own, ‘Elvers Pass’ is a welcome New Year offering for ravers and club adventurers worldwide.

Layers of fog, hazy synths, solid percussion, and liquid basslines – Esaïa's debut album Mindscapes invites listeners into a dreamlike soundscape. A sonic experience where Berlin’s Berghain meets the vibrant streets of Kingston, Jamaica.

With its cinematic chiaroscuro lined with sub-bass, the album blurs the boundaries between genres. Inspired by the pioneers of dub, Esaïa seamlessly blends hybridisation and experimentation, pushing musical limits to carve out her own sonic space.

An album designed for both the dance floor and introspective listening, 4-to-the-floor techno-driven beats fuse with blissful instrumental flows. Paired with Madame Ipsum’s luminescent visuals, Esaïa’s work creates a multi-sensory experience that sparks the synapses.

RARE & PREV. UNRELEASED PSYCH-FUNK AND GARAGE ROCK !!!

Say hello to Down & Wired Vol. 7 as Perfect Toy Records unleashes yet another instalment in its long-running compilation series! Once more, the label provides a delectable selection of obscure funk and soul-influenced psychedelic and garage rock tracks to delight even hardcore collectors of both genres.

And make no mistake, there is plenty to discover among these eleven tracks. At the funkiest end of things, Function's Free Style morphs from West Coast psychedelia to country funk to swamp rock and back again in its sub-three minute length, Dandy King provide psychedelic funky-soul and The Whiz Kids take a heavy dose of funkiness with them into psych-rock territory – sample fiends watch out for the fat twenty-second drum break towards the end of the latter! Purer psychedelia can be found in the offering from Third Stone while Würzburg band Prisma provide all-out epic psych-rock carnage. And if rock carnage is your thing, you'll be feeling the dirty garage rock onslaught of The Comin' Generation and a previously unreleased cut by Synod - soon to be a 45 single on Perfect Toy. That just leaves The General Store, The Soul Society, The Vestells and another unreleased cut from The Villagers (from whom the label will be dropping more unreleased material soon!), to close the circle by adding a heavy dose of garage soul.

A worthy successor to the previous volumes, Down & Wired Vol. 7 is once again accompanied by an insert containing detailed information and photos of the bands and a download code is also included with every vinyl LP.

The moons of Saturn are the inspiration for this brooding, often soaring and searching odyssey of dark electronica.

The second largest planet in the solar system after Jupiter, and the sixth planet from the sun, Saturn is orbited by 53 confirmed moons, with another 29 that are unnamed and still being studied.

Saturnian is a suite of thirteen choral tracks taking their names from some of Saturn's known moons; Dione, Daphnis, Phoebe, Prometheus, Rhea, Janus, Titan, Enceladus, Tethys, Telesto, Mimas, Hyperion and Iapetus, all named after figures from Greek and Roman mythology, each loaded with their own turbulent back stories. It is the debut release by Holmes + atten Ash, written, recorded and produced remotely in Edinburgh and Bristol by the duo Simon Holmes and Paul Nash.

Their project began during the 2020 lockdown. For Simon, time was spent exploring the Pentland Hills south of Edinburgh. For Paul, the Mendip Hills, south of Bristol. Both would experience the darker side of our human impact on the environment. Simon observed the wilderness as a wasteland, finding discarded, rusting metal littering the Pentland Hills while Paul witnessed the decimation of the ancient woodland of the Mendips' King's Wood due to the destructive tree fungus ash dieback.

These field trips fuelled a desire to navigate not just the landscape, but the duo's emotional place within it. Their collaboration led to a concept album that explores the outer reaches of the solar system, while simultaneously grounding them in a specific place. Looking inwards as much as outwards, theycreated soundscapes based on deeply imagined and felt connections to their surroundings.

After Simon had created a choral piece to accompany Luke Jerram's enormous, world touring artwork Museum of the Moon, Saturnian was a natural progression. When Simon was sent an initial score for the ethereal track Enceladus, composed by Paul in Bristol, he added choral arrangements recorded in Edinburgh. Their shimmering, tense opus continued to evolve from there. Just as the discarded bed springs and abandoned car parts that Simon stumbled upon in the Pentland Hills seemed to him at once "horrible but also oddly beautiful", Saturnian melds together melancholy and levity, fusing moments of dark angst with a celestial calm.

Opening with the glistening, hopeful brightness of Dione, increasingly urgent rhythms give way to digital, otherworldly calls from what might be rainforest creatures chirping into life with robotic squawks and delicate keyboard lines on Phoebe, followed by slowed down, monastic song on Rhea. Tethys is a hypnotic blur of synthesiser and soft chanting, while Rhea is a mysterious, echoing chasm, lifted by melodic, gentle male vocals. Janus has a glowing, effervescent energy, swiftly followed by a sense of tension on Titan, which throbs with driving percussive unease.

The album artwork is a pencil drawing created by Edinburgh artist Simon Kirby. It was made by a robot drawing machine, using custom algorithms that bring to life recordings of the sound of magnetic waves near Saturn's icy moon, Enceladus. The lines in the centre of the drawing are distorted by sound captured by the Cassini spacecraft which studied Saturn for over a decade.

Much like Saturn and its frozen, rocky moons, this debut album from Holmes + atten Ash is mysterious and beguiling, with a hint of foreboding in the depths of its powerful beauty and epic scale.

Welcome to BM-18 the biokinetic realm created by Dana Kuehr, a lush audio environment where organic and synthesized matter coalesce. As we float disembodied above this verdant pixel plain, Dana offers us shifting repetitions and sequences in disguise, each track a landscape within a world created in the utmost detail, from the minute bleeps and chirps to the enveloping and bumping bouncy basslines. Flickering drums explode like dandelion seeds in a breeze, searching for a place to lay, grow, and flourish. Sounds are captured (fingers tapping, rain patter, Belgian parakeets released from a '70s zoo, vocal oohs and ahhs) and hybridized with patterns, samples, and musical manoeuvres (jungle breaks, west coast hip hop, layered drums, IDM crunch and twinkle, reverb, delay, '90s R&B, underwater video game soundscapes). As in any imaginary sphere, there are characters who exchange and converse: rivers, coasts, clouds, lakes, echoes of dolphins, and peaceful frogs. Amidst their complex chatter, the sounds of BM-18 extend an invitation to dance, to feel our bodies alive and present, to acknowledge the impulse of movement and the pulsing heartbeats of each track. An ode to the Taoist consideration that all creatures live together in mystic unity, co-evolving and feeding each other, Dana brings together cloud ethereal with earth pounding, and like an orca's tail upon a restless sea, it slaps!!! All tracks written and produced by Dana Kuehr between April 2020 and November 2021 in Brussels, and mixed by Dan Piu at Checkpoint Charly Studio in Zurich between November 2021 and March 2022. Mastered and cut by Stefan Betke at Scape in Berlin. Original artworks by Camiflage and text by Ailsa Cavers. A1 was first digitally released on Ojoo Music. Dana thanks Michiel, George, Jakob, Camiel, Ailsa, Tania, Victor, Jill, Karen, Daphne, Arne, Oscar, Joe, and Gwenan for the love and inspiration. True voyage is return!

London quartet The Leaf Library return with their bold new album After The Rain, Strange Seeds. A luminous collection of pastoral indiepop, drawing inspiration from suburban isolation, unreliable memories and the surreality of the weather. Their most immediate and melodic work to date, the richly evocative songs brim with chiming guitars, buzzing organs and warm, dulcet strings, evoking Yo La Tengo’s more contemplative moments, The Clientele’s autumnal jangle pop and early Stereolab’s motorik melodicism. The sound of the album is defined by mixer John McEntire, whose work with Stereolab and Yo La Tengo (as well as a member of Tortoise/The Sea And Cake) have been major inspirations to the band.
The album explores themes of memory and place, albeit through an abstract haze – returning again and again to specific moments frozen in time: midsummer bright hot days in the Chilterns (“Sun In My Room”), meteorology and the strange movement of the weather (“Colour Chant”), red kites circling over suburban motorways (“Some Circling”), and the uncanny feeling of dusk and nighttime creatures on “The Reader’s Lamp” (titled by celebrated film director Peter Strickland). The lyrics are vivid yet elliptical, strung with abstract ideas and imagery, conjuring a gently unsettling, though never unwelcoming atmosphere. Not quite trusting your own recollection of things, while marvelling at the oddness of the natural world, the album’s title a good summation of the mix of strangeness and hope contained within.

As on past albums the band - founded by singer Kate Gibson and ex-Saloon guitarist Matt Ashton in the mid 2000s, and now completed by drummer Lewis Young and bassist Gareth Jones - have involved their extended musical family, including guitarist Mike Cranny (of fellow drone pop travellers Firestations) and keyboardist Irina Shtreis, both members of the Leaf Library live band. The album also sees the return of James Underwood’s Iskra Strings, a quartet that features on 4 tracks, with sumptuous arrangements by Daniel Fordham, as well as regular contributor Melinda Bronstein on vocals and Will Twynham (Dimorphodons) on harpsichord. They also welcomed Paddy Milner (on Hammond organ) and Scott McKeon (guitar) – both current members of Tom Jones’ band – for a startlingly delicate rolling crescendo to closing track “There Was Always A Golden Age”.
After The Rain, Strange Seeds is their 4th studio album. The result is The Leaf Library’s most accomplished and affecting work, John McEntire’s mix bringing a bold clarity to the band’s meticulous arrangements – closer to how they sound live than anything they’ve done before.

Laurel Halo returns with an album of original soundtrack music, composed for the film Midnight Zone by visual artist Julian Charrière. Following the path of a drifting Fresnel lighthouse lens as it descends through the Clarion-Clipperton Fracture Zone — a remote abyssal plain in the Pacific Ocean, rich in rare metals and increasingly targeted for deep-sea mining — the film traces a descent into one of Earth’s last untouched ecosystems.


Charrière’s film reveals the deep not as void, but as a luminous biome teeming with fragile life: bioluminescent creatures, swirling schools of fish, and elusive predators. The suspended lens becomes an abyssal campfire, attracting species caught in the tides of uncertainty, their futures hanging in the balance.


Echoing this tension, Halo’s compositions evoke a sensory freefall, where gravity falters and light and sound flicker in uncertain rhythms. Midnight Zone is a sonic drift through the space between what we seek to extract, fail to understand, and must protect.


Halo’s score evokes the life that exists beyond our physical airbound capacity. The material features long, subtle passages of electro-acoustic ambient, drone and sound design, slowly flowing and unfolding with rich detail. The music, composed largely on a Montage 8 synthesizer and Yamaha TransAcoustic piano at the Yamaha studios in New York City, possesses an uncanny quality: that of synthetic waveforms being amplified and sung through the stringboard of the physical body of the TransAcoustic piano. Combined with stacks of violin and viol da gamba, the music on Midnight Zone possesses trace elements of a human hand in an otherwise sunken landscape. Patient, submerged, and alive. The album will be the third on Halo’s imprint, Awe.


The film is central to Charrière’s current solo exhibition Midnight Zone. The exhibition engages with underwater ecologies, exploring the complexity of water as an elemental medium affected by anthropogenic degradation. Reflecting upon its flow and materiality, profundity and politics, its mundane and sacral dimensions, the solo show acts as a kaleidoscope, inviting us to dive deep.

Inner Creatures was the sophomore album from Irish producer and bass player Peter Vogelaar and now some of its key cuts have been remixed. The seasoned Charles Webster flips 'Mindless Youth' into a simmering piece of deep and organic house with wintery melodies that have already been getting support from big names like Black Coffee and Kolsch. As well as his dub, the Get Down Edits crew offer up some lush, gentle disco delights on their rework of 'Stole' and 'Inpulses' brings more layered harmonics and elegant strings before a new edit of 'Fantasy Lines' ends on a warm, cuddly vibe.

Once upon a time, a Romanian man named Bogdan crossed the mountains into Switzerland in search of something, though even he couldn’t quite name it. By chance, he settled near a young record store, Legram Vinyl Garden, where he stumbled upon exactly what he never knew he was missing.

Between long digs and countless unforgettable gatherings, the Bogdan sound began to take shape, growing into an almost untameable yet undeniably magnificent beast.

This EP gathers our favourite Bogdan tunes from a lost but never forgotten time, now preserved both in plastic and in our memories. A timeless collection of raw, flavourful creatures, each one alive in its own way.

Final LP of a productive year for Feral Child is an absolute cracker. The latest of a long line of superb full lengths from Stephen James Buckley's incendiary Polypores project. This one is arguably his most adventurous outing to date, the undeniably psychedelic “Hungry Vortex”. Four extended pieces exploring polyrhythmic fixations and cosmic jazz-prog freak-outs. Percussion-heavy opener ‘The Body Is The Spaceship’ is a fine example of the sort of seamless organic growth we tend to see in Polypores’ music, with slewed synth blips and rolling polyrhythms gradually twisting into unrecognisable strands of melody and unconventional groove before your very ears.

The prog-heavy ‘Wizards!’ sees Buckley’s trademarked playful use of time-signature changes, providing such a wealth of emotional and stylistic variance and immeasurable enjoyment without changing key once (honestly, who needs keys). It’s brilliantly evocative too and could indeed perfectly soundtrack a mushroom-trip wizard march. As we flip the record over, the flutey flourishes and minimalist clicks of the title track draw the listener into a trancelike state, repeated movements spiralling like myriad creatures crawling over a candy-coloured horizon, echoing forth into an inviting sonic oblivion. It’s ostensibly electronic, yet somehow more natural organism than machine, with little concern for the grid, or indeed, the rules. Finally, we end on something a little more subdued - the reassuring classicism of the beautiful ‘Void High’, with washes of warm noise and wobbly delay lines whirring and twinkling away, closing the record with an experience that is undeniably emotional, spiritual and as always, uniquely Polypores. This is a wonderful record with which to close the year out, it comes in a magnificent, spot varnished Jake Blanchard sleeve. A superb record released as a one time only vinyl pressing.

Known to fans simply as The Blue Album, Adolescents' self-titled debut album captured the raw pulse of Southern California's teenage rebellion at a time when hardcore was beginning to take shape yet still holding onto the infectious urgency of punk's first wave. Few records from the American punk underground have echoed as far and wide-or as enduringly-as the Adolescents' self-titled debut, first released by Frontier Records in 1981. Formed in Fullerton, California, Adolescents brought together members of earlier OC punk outfits like Social Distortion and Agent Orange, fusing their varied influences into something uniquely their own. With songs like 'Amoeba,' 'Kids of the Black Hole,' and 'No Way,' the album offered more than just speed and volume-it spoke directly to suburban alienation, youthful frustration, and the search for identity in a world that felt increasingly hostile and conformist. This new edition offers longtime listeners and new fans alike a chance to revisit-or discover-an album that helped define the West Coast punk sound. From its striking blue cover to its mix of melody, defiance, and urgency, "Adolescents" remains a vital listen, as relevant today as it was over four decades ago. It's an album that didn't just reflect its moment-it shaped what punk could be: loud, smart, emotional, and unflinchingly real. Reissued with care and respect for its original spirit, The Blue Album stands not only as a milestone in punk history, but as a testament to the enduring power of youth in revolt. This reissue includes a repro of the original insert and poster.

Cambridge’s acclaimed psych-folk quintet Fuzzy Lights return with their fifth album ‘Fen Creatures’. Following on from 2021’s critically lauded ‘Burials’ the band have created their most conceptually focussed work to date – a mediation on environmental crises that uses the folklore and history of East Anglia as a lens to examine humanity’s fractured relationship with the natural world.

The album operates across multiple historical timelines, from Iron Age hill forts to medieval plague houses, from Byron's Romantic-era environmental warnings to the immediate threat of rising sea levels, creating a temporal tapestry that weaves ancient stories with contemporary concerns.

Musically, the quintet, Rachel Watkins (vocals/violin), Xavier Watkins (guitar/electronics), Chris Rogers (guitar), Daniel Carney (bass), and Mark Blay (drums), have pushed deeper into experimental drone territories while maintaining the crystalline folk sensibilities that have become their signature.

Lead track ‘Greenteeth transforms the traditional cautionary tale of Jenny Greenteeth, the water spirit who lures children to their deaths. "When I read this story to my daughter, she was instantly drawn into it," Watkins notes. "There's something timeless about these tales and the way they speak to fundamental fears and connections that span generations."

Elsewhere, 'War Ditches' imagines the Iron Age dead of a Cambridge hill fort keeping watch over the land, their vigil ending as modern people lose connection with the earth. 'The Promise' creates an imaginary encounter with the ghosts of Landbeach village across multiple eras, connecting the 1665 plague with our recent pandemic experience through shared narratives of community resilience and loss.

Critics praised ‘Burials’ as "way beyond folk and folk in essence all at once" (Backseat Mafia) and "folk-rock looking back squarely at the early 1970s" (Financial Times), and 'Fen Creatures' promises to cement Fuzzy Lights' reputation as one of Britain's most vital contemporary folk acts. The album positions them firmly within the lineage of artists like Fairport Convention, Trees, and Comus who understood that engaging with tradition isn't nostalgic escapism, but a way of accessing older wisdoms about how to live in the world.

‘Burials’ press:

“...the musical battle between the fuzzy and the light makes Fuzzy Lights special.” MOJO ★★★★
“...a simmering, sinister undercurrent which often explodes with apocalyptic fervour.” SHINDIG ★★★★
“...subverting genre expectations and folk melodies.” FINANCIAL TIMES ★★★★
“Way beyond folk and folk in essence all at once, it's a record that’ll bring you much reward.” BACKSEATMAFIA - 8.3/10
“a genuine delight....a stirring and unsettling listen, goosebumps adding to the pleasure of timeless music played well, with perfect precision. Don’t leave it another eight years, eh?” FOLK RADIO
“...re-inventing the folk-rock playbook and dragging it screaming through an array of influences...Fuzzy Lights’ most unique, reflective and ambitious record to date” FOR THE RABBITS

Returning with its final instalments, Die Schachtel's Decay Music series extends its explorations of inspired contemporary experimental efforts of the ambient, ethereal, and emotively abstract with Luigi Turra and Elio Martusciello’s “Liminale” and Sergio Armaroli and David Toop’s “And I Entered Into Sleep”, two astounding electroacoustic gestures of blurred space and time, plumbing complexity of meaning bound to sonority. Creatively groundbreaking and inspired, radically rethinking the terms of what ambient music can be perceived to be, they stand among the most striking efforts to appear within the series to date.

Reconfiguring the notion of bridge building on a multitude of terms, it feels fitting that the tenth and final installment of Die Schachtel’s Decay Music series, Sergio Armaroli and David Toop’s “And I Entered Into Sleep”, was co-created by an artist whose work featured in the first suite of LPs issued by Brian Eno’s Obscure Records in 1975, the groundwork toward which Decay Music’s own efforts nod. Since that auspicious debut, “New and Rediscovered Musical Instruments” — his split with Max Eastley — David Toop has been regarded as a pioneer in British experimental and improvised music: a sonic voyager who has continuously challenged the sources and materiality of sound through rigorously thoughtful performances, a vast catalog of recordings, and a steady flow of highly influential texts. Be it as a member of Alterations, his group breaking group with Peter Cusack, Terry Day, and Steve Beresford that ran between 1977 to 1986, or through is noteworthy work with artists like Rie Nakajima, Thurston Moore, Paul Burwell, Rhodri Davies, Lee Patterson, Ryuichi Sakamoto, Akio Suzuki, Elaine Mitchener, and numerous others, collaboration has always played a central role within Toop’s singular practice, but few can claim the sprawling sense of beauty and intimacy that’s achieved by “And I Entered Into Sleep”, his first recorded outing with Sergio Armaroli.

A composer, percussionist, vibraphonist, and multidisciplinary artist, Armaroli has been issuing radical and forward-thinking musical gestures for decades, working as one of Italy’s most noteworthy interpreters of composer’s like Giacinto Scelsi, John Cage, Franco Evangelisti, Giancarlo Schiaffini, and Walter Branchi, as both a solo performer and member of the highly regarded Rib Trio, as well as forging a singular practice as a composer, intertwining his efforts as a painter, concrete percussionist, fragmentary poet and sound artist, within a total art, rooted “within the language of jazz and improvisation” as an “extension of the concept of art”. Like Toop, Armaroli’s career has been populated by many collaborators, notably with Riccardo Sinigaglia, Alvin Curran, and Walter Prati, among others, setting the stage for a remarkable meeting between the pair.

Featuring Armaroli on vibraphone and prepared vibraphone and Toop on electronics, “And I Entered Into Sleep” is “a sonic journey, a Proustian suggestion à la Recherche, into the unconscious between electronic and acoustic sounds”. Using a bell that sounds at the beginning of Proust’s “À la Recherché du Temps Perdu”, which reappears more than 3,000 pages later — signaling a transition of phases, as well an auditory trigger of memory — as a departure point, as an association to the percussive vibraphone pulses that thread the album’s two sides, the pair weave a striking interior world of immersive psychological depth. Feeling almost subaquatic at times, like captured glimpses of rumbling, shadowy ecosystems lost within murky ambiences, before washing ashore in a series of pointillistic, highly detailed alien landscapes of the mind, each artist’s markedly different sound-sources, and treatment of the subsequent material elements, dance in abstract grace, incorporating subtle nods to minimalism, free jazz, and musique concrète within its seamless total form of sparse texture and tone.

Easily one of the most striking and memorable releases by either artist to appear in recent years, Sergio Armaroli and David Toop’s “And I Entered Into Sleep” traverses uncharted realms at the borders of literary reference, sound art, ambience and abstraction through delicately musical sounds, revealing new depths at every turn. Issued as the tenth and final album in Die Schachtel’s Decay Music series, highlighting inspired contemporary experimental efforts of the ambient, ethereal, and emotively abstract.

(10x12" box set, limited to 1000 copies, with premium finishing, uniquely numbered, incl. 10 records in individually printed sleeves, a booklet detailing the club's history & exclusive stickers) Boccaccio has secured its place among legendary venueslike Paradise Garage in New York and The Hacçinda in Manchester. Its bold fusion of emerging electronic genres such as New Beat, Acid, House, and Techno was way ahead of its time, drawing music lovers and clubbers from across Belgium and beyond.



Belgian label Music Man Records presents Boccaccio Life 1987-1993, a new compilation offering a fresh perspective on the legacy of the iconic Belgian club Boccaccio - often associated with the short-lived New Beat movement. The 40-track compilation highlights the raw and futuristic early house and techno sounds that were heard in the pioneering club.

Located in rural Destelbergen (Belgium), just a stone's throw from Ghent, Boccaccio has secured its place among legendary venues like Paradise Garage in New York and The Hacçinda in Manchester. Its bold fusion of emerging electronic genres such as New Beat, Acid, House, and Techno was way ahead of its time, drawing music lovers and clubbers from across Belgium and beyond. Sundays at Boccaccio were unlike anywhere else-offering sounds you couldn't hear anywhere else.

Boccaccio Life 1987-1993 is carefully curated by resident DJ Olivier Pieters and club regular Stefaan Vandenberghe, standing as the ultimate testament to a club that was more than just a venue. For those who experienced it, it was a community - a way of life. Hence the club's full name: Boccaccio Life.

This compilation stands as a testament to an innovative time in electronic music, capturing the raw, futuristic sounds of early house and techno. It sheds light on another side of Boccaccio, one that goes far beyond the short-lived New Beat scene. A carefully curated selection of 40 tracks, resonating with those who were there by offering familiar classics, while also reaching a new generation-those who never experienced it firsthand.

With tracks from Blake Baxter, Virgo, Frankie Knuckles, Tyree, and A Guy Called Gerald, the unmistakable influence of black American pioneers is clear-the originators of the firstanalog house and techno sounds. On the other hand, UK sound innovators such as The Orb and LFO bring both sharp textures and rough breakbeats to the table.

Club staple tracks include dreamy excursions from Roger Sanchez under his Egotrip moniker, the relentless basement house of Circus Bells by Robert Armani on Dance Mania, an uplifting take on a hip-house cut from The D.O.C. (Portrait of A Masterpiece in the CJ Ed-Did-It Mix), a timeless remix of UK Formation's Age of Chance from 1994, and an alternate take on The Tape by Boccaccio club regular and Belgian producer Frank De Wulf, taken from his B-Sides project.

While not always the obvious hits, these tracks have gracefully withstood the test of time, and were exclusive to Sundays at Boccaccio. Now, they are finally available to experience together in one collection, offering a timeless snapshot of a unique era.

Tuning the Wind was created in 2022 as an installation piece. Since then, it has been adapted into multichannel, 4DSOUND, and stereo installations, as well as performed live on numerous occasions around the world. The piece has a duration of 36 minutes and 15 seconds. For the vinyl pressing, it has been divided into two parts.

Composer Aimée Portioli, known professionally as Grand River, recorded various types of wind and then reworked them through layering and pitch adjustment to create a musical piece where the wind itself becomes a prepared instrument. At times, the sound of the wind is tuned to the 440 Hz reference, while at other times, the instruments are tuned to the sound of the wind. In Tuning the Wind, nature and music merge seamlessly. Synthesizers and wind recordings become indistinguishable, blending natural sounds with human-made instruments. The boundary between a gust of wind and an instrument-generated sound fades away. Human artistry and nature’s symphony merge to become one.

Wind is air in motion. It makes no sound until it encounters an object. The sounds it produces depend on the strength of the wind and the shape and material of the object it touches. When the wind blows, trees sway, buildings rattle, materials move, and sound waves are generated. Some believe that temperature changes create layers of air, and that the friction between them forms a unique sound—perhaps the true voice of the wind, which birds may be the only creatures capable of recognising. Sometimes the wind howls; at other times, it sings or whistles, shifting from a gentle murmur to an angry roar. The wind’s range of frequencies, tones, and timbres is vast and varied. Tuning the Wind is a piece about the wind, made with the wind—an abstract expression of our ongoing conversation with nature.

Concept, composition and production by Aimée Portioli. Wind recordings by Aimée Portioli and Pablo Diserens.
Mastered by Rafael Anton Irisarri. Front cover photo by Bárbara Cameán and Aimée Portioli. Back cover photo by Maria Louceiro. Design by Daniel Castrejón.

Red Motorbike maestro Eddie C drops on the ensemble with an anthemic ode to the most sought-after of desires. We’ve been keeping this secret for far too long; it’s time to bring U Be Mine into the light, complete with remixes from Lex, Da Silva and Marcello Giordani aka Italo Deviance.
It was just over a year ago when Eddie sent us his original demo of U Be Mine. I remember plugging i the speakers in my fat, pressing play. A fash from a place of love that wet, grey day. The lyrical bass, euphoric stabs, the iconic delay, the pining vox. There are times where things seem naturally bound, designed to intertwine. An instant essential. We couldn’t wait to throw it down in the disco. Much like the coveted desire of its vocoder-clad protaganist, we needed a club-ready fx. Eddie, getting the message, sent us over a quick master - the Eddie C ‘Cash’ Version. Over the next year, at parties from Lisbon to Ibiza, I saw how those swirling arps locked onto the foor, how dancers cosied up to its decadent groove. It was peak time, warm-up and wind-down at once. In the true spirit of the ensemble, we got to work curating a cast of balearic technicians to write their distinct shade of depth onto Eddie’s golden letter. And that’s where it lands.
Lex from Athens casts an exotic, eclectic spirit with his Plaka Remix, all shufing percussions and wild, breezy strings, rejigged baselines and NYC disco tackle. Label curator Da Silva ups the ante with his 7-minute club-ready fx: tight kicks and searing acid, all the bells and whistles for your peak-time excursions. Finally, Marcello Giordani shifts into hyperdrive with the ITALO DEVIANCE ACID CONTROL version, conjuring creatures of the night in kaleidoscopic confgurations, a trusted party roller for the most decadent dancefoors.
We’re releasing U Be Mine on 150 pristine discs only. Claim it as yours, forevermore.

"Waxwork Records is honored to present the release of the Original Motion Picture Soundtrack to George A. Romero’s horror classic, NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD. Written, filmed, and released in 1968 by a rag tag group of Pittsburgh based misfits, NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD is an American independent horror film that follows the story of seven people trapped in a rural farmhouse that is besieged by a large and growing group of living dead ghouls. The film is regarded as a cult classic by critics, film scholars, and fans and has garnered critical acclaim. The film has been selected by the Library Of Congress for preservation in the National Film Registry and is deemed “culturally, historically, and aesthetically significant”.

Filmed and released on a shoestring budget, NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD became a smashing success earning over 250 times its budget. The film is a first of its kind and ushered in a new way of writing, directing, and filming horror films. The overused script of romantic, fantastical tales of otherworldly monsters and creatures was completely flipped and tossed aside by visionary George A. Romero. As the film’s writer and director, Romero created a new, obvious threat, and one that is universally recognizable - Our very own neighbors. Due to an unseen force beyond man’s control, the recently deceased arise from the dead in seek of living human victims. These ghouls kill and feast upon the flesh of their victims, and the only way of stopping them is by destroying their brains.

From 2015 to 2018, Waxwork Records worked closely with the remaining members of the independent production company that made NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD, Image Ten, to produce a definitive soundtrack album featuring all music from the film. Much of the film’s music was thought to be lost or destroyed but was located in its entirety and faithfully restored and re-mastered for vinyl. This special release of NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD features the complete soundtrack, double LP “Black & White Hand Poured” colored vinyl, all new artwork by Robert Sammelin, a booklet featuring never before seen production photos, liner notes by Daniel Kraus (co-author of THE SHAPE OF WATER with Guillermo Del Toro), liner notes by Night Of The Living Dead’s dialogue recorder and sound engineer, Gary Streiner, and deluxe packaging."

It has now been four years since our return to earth in "2020 back to earth". There we had found a cold and inhospitable place, humanity was inexorably channeled on the path to extinction. We therefore decided to flee immediately in search of another planet where we could dwell.
We therefore came to New Babylon, a planet inhabited by humanoids but also by monstrous and ravenous creatures. There are "giants" that march about raising immense clouds of dust, stealing and plundering everything from people. Giants much like our corporations, they know no defeat and have no weaknesses, at least apparent ones.
There are old warriors like jarek who wait for war to feel like heroes, to feel alive. They find their dimension within the battle, where the line between hero and assassin magically blurs.
There are pyramids erected by men who think they are gods and turn the things life gives them into weapons and death, changing their use and meaning. Little men who think themselves omnipotent, burying knowledge of how life works under piles of lies.
We find a myriad of slaves, surrendered to live in huge troughs. They toil at nothing and find meaning in nothing. They prefer a convenient lie to an inconvenient truth.
In short, we realize that we have arrived in a world very much like earth. We are aliens but in a certain way we feel at home. We want to know, to understand, to evolve. We don't recognize ourselves in this deceived humanity, we don't give in, we believe. Nature, life is wonderful but when one thing loses its usefulness life gently explains to it that it is time to make room for something else. This existence has already explained to the dinosaurs.
Kayleth continue their journey, never stopping because who seeks will find itself.

"New Babylon ranks next to Space Muffin as Kayleth’s best album for me and one that contains some of their best grooves of their career to date." - Outlaws Of The Sun
"Sit down and really take in We Are Aliens as it’s a joy to listen to, but are the aliens we think exist, just like us? Let Kayleth take you on their journey of discovery." - The Sleeping Shaman
"On this album the Italian five manage to translate heroism into wild and wonderful sounds, often sounding even more like a grungier, metal version of Monster Magnet, mixed with mix a definitive love for Kyuss, Orange Goblin and a prog rock outfit like Riverside." - Stoner Hive
"It’s a call to arms for the dreamers and the rebels, a reminder that no matter how dark the journey, there is always light to be found. This album is a must-listen for anyone into psych stoner rock!" - Witching Buzz
"New Babylon is a triumph. It’s an album that demands to be listened to in full, each track a journey through heavy riffs and cosmic themes." - Iron Backstage
"Listening to a piece like 'New Babylon's Wall,' you can appreciate the richness and sonic fertility of the group, with beautiful melodies enriched by the right amount of electronics, starting from a psych conception of the stoner sound, and there is no lack of prog elements, all with beautiful melodies. As mentioned earlier, a sci-fi band in both approach and essence." - InYourEyesEzine
"KAYLETH doesn't reinvent anything, but they absolutely crush it by the rules!" - Rock'N Force
"Stoner rock has rarely sounded as original, diverse and intoxicating as it does here!

Doom (2005) is a science-fiction film based on the iconic video game series, starring Karl Urban and Dwayne Johnson. The film is centered around a group of marines sent on a rescue mission to a facility on Mars, which quickly turns into a game of survival when the team encounters demonic creatures. This release marks the first vinyl release of Clint Mansell's score, which comes as a 2-LP gatefold set pressed on Black Ice vinyl, with original artwork and a poster by illustrator Micha Huigen.

"Waxwork Records is honored to present the release of the Original Motion Picture Soundtrack to George A. Romero’s horror classic, NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD. Written, filmed, and released in 1968 by a rag tag group of Pittsburgh based misfits, NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD is an American independent horror film that follows the story of seven people trapped in a rural farmhouse that is besieged by a large and growing group of living dead ghouls. The film is regarded as a cult classic by critics, film scholars, and fans and has garnered critical acclaim. The film has been selected by the Library Of Congress for preservation in the National Film Registry and is deemed “culturally, historically, and aesthetically significant”.

Filmed and released on a shoestring budget, NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD became a smashing success earning over 250 times its budget. The film is a first of its kind and ushered in a new way of writing, directing, and filming horror films. The overused script of romantic, fantastical tales of otherworldly monsters and creatures was completely flipped and tossed aside by visionary George A. Romero. As the film’s writer and director, Romero created a new, obvious threat, and one that is universally recognizable - Our very own neighbors. Due to an unseen force beyond man’s control, the recently deceased arise from the dead in seek of living human victims. These ghouls kill and feast upon the flesh of their victims, and the only way of stopping them is by destroying their brains.

From 2015 to 2018, Waxwork Records worked closely with the remaining members of the independent production company that made NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD, Image Ten, to produce a definitive soundtrack album featuring all music from the film. Much of the film’s music was thought to be lost or destroyed but was located in its entirety and faithfully restored and re-mastered for vinyl. This special release of NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD features the complete soundtrack, double LP “Black & White Hand Poured” colored vinyl, all new artwork by Robert Sammelin, a booklet featuring never before seen production photos, liner notes by Daniel Kraus (co-author of THE SHAPE OF WATER with Guillermo Del Toro), liner notes by Night Of The Living Dead’s dialogue recorder and sound engineer, Gary Streiner, and deluxe packaging."

Underwater Sounds To Lure The Fishes is the second release from Free Tala, a project by Finnish sound artist Juho Toivonen. This LP features deep-sea droning sounds designed to attract fish. It’s perfect for all fishermen and women out there, as well as anyone who wants to dive into the deep blue, feel the weighty oceanic ambiance, and catch a glimpse into the mental landscape of these aquatic creatures. It also works very well in freshwater lakes, especially when enjoyed on the dock of your favourite summer cabin.

Alliyah Enyo’s genius 2022 ‘Echo's Disintegration’ album infused William Basinski's "Disintegration Loops" with choral smoke, and she now returns with an even more immersive followup alongside ambient enigma and Kelela producer Florian T M Zeisig, making heady and translucent loop-finding vocal soundscapes.

In 2022, Enyo worked with the Edinburgh Sculpture Workshop on an epic two-hour composition made from tape loops inspired by selkies, mythical creatures in Celtic folklore. Contemplating memory, grief and time itself, Enyo devised a "sonorous myth" installation and performance that drowned her voice in the deep sea, using echo to help parallel the communication of humpback whales. It was powerful enough for her to net the award for Sonic Arts at the Scottish Awards for New Music last year, and it's this material that she revisits here, entering into a dialog with Berlin-based producer Florian T M Zeisig, here adopting a new avatar - Angel R.

On the A-side, Enyo distills two hours of the original composition into 11 haunted fragments that ooze in and out of each other like a dream. Reworked at Glasgow's Green Door studio, she sculpts her voice into weightless Radigue-style incantations, leaning into the tape loops' corroded inconsistencies. Enyo's voice becomes the selkie's song: wordless echoes that sound as if they're being dragged slowly towards the sea bed. There are remnants of folk forms in there; we hear traces of church music and Celtic ballads - but she obscures her influences with dubbed reverb, distortion and repetition. Phrases disappear and re-appear, time becomes a loop, best absorbed in a single sitting to properly perceive its graceful, sinking bliss. By the end of the side, Enyo’s vocals are completely waterlogged, dimmed against Robin Guthrie-like shimmers, all brassy, blurred incantations emanating from the depths of a floatation tank.

Florian T M Zeisig responds on the B-side with three flooded, longer-form pieces that will appeal to anyone who devoured his album of corroded Enya loops a couple of years ago. Enyo's voice is now reduced to a whisper, blistered and gauzy expressions that float over dense pads on 'Untitled I' before getting lost in the weeds completely on the muggy 'Untitled II'. On the closing 'Gates of Heaven', he sculpts Enyo's voice until it's just an illusory, hypnotic reflection, slow-fading into the aether.

1982 erschien in Eigenregie die LP „Revival“ von Winterhawk.
Der ausufernde Hardrock mit Heavy Metal-Tendenzen und
vielen zweistimmigen Gitarrensoli fand einst nur im Raum
Chicago Verbreitung, doch irgendwann wurden Sammler auf
die Platte aufmerksam. Das rief 1998 das Label Monster
Records auf den Plan, die sich zeitweise auf amerikanischen
Hardrock und Heavy Metal zwischen Ende der Siebziger und
Anfang der Achtziger spezialisert haben. Recht schnell waren
Winterhawk in der Szene ein Name.

Die Sensation war aber erst perfekt, als sich die Möglichkeit
ergab, eine frühe Liveaufnahme von 1978 zu überarbeiten
und ebenso auf CD zu veröffentlichen. Mit bestechender
Klangqualität legt „There And Back Again“ sogar noch
eine Schippe drauf. Die Spielfreude ist nicht mit Worten
zu beschreiben und allein die zweistimmigen Gitarrensoli
müssten einen Grammy gewinnen. Dabei erinnert man immer
wieder an die Frühphase von Rush („Rusch“, „Fly By Night“),
während man

Ainu are a Genoese sludge/post Doom cinematic trio formed by Guitar / synth / samples (Dani) Bass (Jacco) and Drums (Gelso) and active since 2021.

The project takes shape from the passion for cinema and their close relationship with the sea, its stories and the creatures that inhabit it.

Their first album is a concept that moves between sound settings alternating power and emotional openings, at a slow pace between psychedelia and post metal.

An intense, dense and emotional experience that uses the descriptive foundations of sea men and the calls of huge animals to tell the connection between sound and the environment that composes it.

High Roller Records, reissue 2024, black vinyl, ltd 200, 425gsm heavy cardboard cover, insert, poster, mastered for vinyl by Patrick W. Engel at Temple of Disharmony

High Roller Records, reissue 2024, black vinyl, ltd 200, 425gsm heavy cardboard cover, insert, poster, mastered for vinyl by Patrick W. Engel at Temple of Disharmony

The title of the Lau Nau's 10th album, Aphrilis, derives from the Latin word aperire, meaning "to open." A fitting verb for the month of the year it is closely associated with — April. And while the images of plants and blossoms coming back to colorful life after a long, cold winter feels appropriate when listening to the rich and lustrous bloom of music on Aphrilis, another definition of open feels even more apt. For under the abundance lies the memory of times of austerity, the friction of hard choices, the acceptance that nothing is fixed and the future is unknown. This literal and metaphorical exploration of complexity and contradiction makes Aphrilis a multi-dimensional antidote for our troubled times, one that emphasizes the quiet and communal over noise and spectacle. Laura Naukkarinen, the Finnish artist behind this project, has long kept her mind and spirit open to whatever sounds and creative ideas felt appropriate for the moment. For the past six years that has meant primarily working with modular synthesis — learning how to build modules and releasing acclaimed work centered on its sounds like 5x4 (2023) or Puutarhassa (2022). Running parallel to this work, however, has been a continued exploration of acoustic instruments and group performances with her trio Lau Nau ja Seitsemäs Taivas. Aphrilis arrives then like fresh growth in a creative season cycle. A companion to her brilliant 2017 release Poseidon, the album, says Naukkarinen, "felt like a needed moment to embrace songs with lyrics again." And through the creation of this work, she remained open not only to her own creative muse, but also the input of her chosen collaborators. Each player on Aphrilis — Matti Bye on celesta and synths, Pekko Käppi on jouhikko, Hermanni Yli-Tepsa on violin and contrabass, Topias Tiheäsalo on electric guitar, Samuli Kosminen (Múm) on various instruments — was given free reign to arrange their own parts to accompany Naukkarinen's compositions. Kosminen’s lush fingerprint can also be heard in the mixing and production of the album, as with Poseidon six years ago. The moniker of this project may be taken from Naukkarinen’s own name, but Lau Nau feels more like a band than ever before. The delicacy and softness of the music is reflected in Naukkarinen’s lyrics. Each song is rife with imagery and creatures from the natural world. The spiders in the forest. The animals that keep a young woman company in her refuge in the woods. Wet grass. The feeling of the music is almost tactile, as if listening to the album will leave a bit of dew or sap on your fingers. The theme of this material, says Naukkarinen, runs even deeper. “The songs tell about cracks and changes of direction in different histories: personal, societal, planetary,” she says. “About moments when a yes can become a no and vice versa. The album wants to propose that at the moment of a crisis there is a possibility to influence the histories by our choices.” That may feel like a lot for such a fragile sounding collection of songs to bear. But Aphrilis is an album of surprising strength and resilience

After 20 years of living on the road in different places, Six Organs of Admittance had returned home to Humboldt County - a far country, to some, but still part of the world through which creatures of all kinds are moving through and contributing to. And some of them are human. Alone together - forming connection and exchange out of thought and expression - no different from the people on the other side of the Redwood Curtain. It was there, where Six Organs had long ago emerged, in the name of everything cycling, of circles that spiral concentrically and remain unbroken, the new music was conceived. In moments, it was as if the future had somehow wrapped around 360 degrees; elsewhere, the systems and patterns inside the writing and recording only became evident later - like a recognition that cumulus and nimbus clouds which passed through the sky the day before contained familiar shapes. Informing the songs accordingly as he went, Ben picked up on modes both musical and lyrical, threading backward through the time of Six Organs of Admittance. Almost marinating in it as a way of life. Working on the music and the vocals, then spending some time with them while stepping away from them. Walking the dog and coming back to them Time is Glass is made of that kind of time. Alone time. Recorded in the visceral environs of home, Time is Glass is sharply focused, even as misty impressionist mountains float through the background. Sweet and spiny, "The Mission" sings its purpose, before turning abruptly to the orchestral rumble of "Hephaestus": rural industrial psychedelia, ecosystem goth, synths arcing to lift a helplessly earthbound community into the firmament above. Winding almost imperceptibly back into song with "Slip Away", the time of the record becomes clear, moves fluidly, relaxed but aware, from event to event. People and things coming around again. The intuit, passing through wormholes and time, sounding deep then dissolving into the universal. The acoustic sounds ringing, layered suddenly, then clear again. Explosions of a new kind of distortion. Ecstatic melodies. Communing. The space of a day. The space of a season. Time is Glass, and Six Organs of Admittance is here and will be here, again.

Music is a form of world building. I love to develop sonic characters and set them into fictional ecosystems with unique textures, acoustics and atmospheres. Each song forms a different landscape, through which a vocal character guides us and tries to tell us its stories." — Ludwig Berger

Ludwig Berger's 'fictional' debut album "Garden Ediacara" unfolds as a musical eco-fiction, guiding listeners through a speculative ecosystem with synthesized vocals. Infused with storytelling techniques from sci-fi and fantasy, the album intertwines melodic songwriting with electroacoustic sound design. Inspired by hydrofeminism and eco-fiction novels, such as "A Door Into Ocean" by Joan Slonczewski, the album delves into the geological period of Ediacara around 600 million years ago — an era so remote it resonates as a glimpse into a possible future. The Ediacaran period was characterised by a peaceful and thriving ecosystem inhabited by soft-bodied creatures without eyes and bones, which were completely wiped out through the appearance of a new species. "Garden of Ediacara" alludes to this period, celebrating both the pleasures of biodiversity as well as mourning its inevitable loss. The narrative unfolds as an exploration of growth and interconnection in the shadow of a coming extinction. The track titles, written by Daisy Lafarge, reveal themselves as a cohesive poem and contribute to the album's narrative.

Informed by his practice of field recording that focusses on intimate encounters with plants, animals and geological phenomena, as well as his studies in electroacoustic composition, Berger expands his palette for his debut in 'fictional' music. The album prominently features a post-human, non-binary death metal voice synthesizer, physical modeling instruments, and microscopic field recordings of plants, insects, as well as aquatic and geological life. With impressionistic strokes, Ludwig Berger crafts vibrant worlds using glassy timbres and more-than-human voices, guiding listeners through emotionally ambiguous terrain, seamlessly oscillating between moments of intimacy and irritation, melancholy and playfulness.

Ludwig Berger is a landscape sound artist, educator and musician. In his compositions, installations and performances, he enables intimate and playful sonic encounters with plants, animals, buildings and geological entities. He is founder and curator of the label Vertical Music, which releases field recordings and experimental music. Berger holds degrees in electroacoustic composition, as well as musicology, art history and literature. As a sound researcher and teacher at the Institute for Landscape Architecture at ETH Zurich from 2015-2022, he studied the sonic dimension of Japanese gardens, alpine glaciers and urban landscapes, which among other things led to the release of the acclaimed album trilogy 'Melting Landscapes', 'Dammed Landscapes' and 'Buried Landscapes'.

toechter is an all-female trio operating from Berlin. toechter’s 2nd full-length album »Epic Wonder« sees its classically trained members blend elaborate string arrangements with ethereal indie pop and delicate rhythms. Katrine Grarup Elbo, Lisa Marie Vogel and Marie-Claire Schlameus exclusively use analogue sound sources (such as violin, viola, cello, and their voices), which were then electronically processed.

Named after the Greek god of the wind, toechters 2022 album »Zephyr« exhaled deeply with concurrently invigorating and confusing sounds. »Epic Wonder«, their second album, was created in the spring and summer of 2023. Playing with forms and contours, the music sounds like the awakening of something new. One seems to be listening to an ongoing conversation, an exchange about what music could be, where it wants to go and how it contributes to our view of life. It all rests on a simple premise:

»Every sound you hear in our universe comes from us. The string trio is the core of toechter, the starting point of all our work.«

Those looking for new worlds of sound can find them in the work of this classically- trained musicians. Whether they add voices or percussive instruments, sample the sounds, or manipulate them electronically; ultimately they are exploring the string trio's place in a world shaped by the digital.

»Prelude« opens the album, seemingly a conversation, yet not only between humans. We catch the word ›love‹ which soon morphs into pure sound images, while a violin theme tentatively takes over. Is it the dawning of a new day? The chorus of sound transforms into a fascinating rhythmic figure, creating a club-like experience that fades out in delicate structures. A perpetual transformation.

According to toechter, »Epic Wonder« is all about making connections. Connections between people, animals, plants, fungi, rocks, soils, oceans, ice caps, stars, and planets. One imagines oneself in a folk-pop song of the 60s, or even blown around by Morricone's desert wind:

»The world as we see it is in desperate need for a deeper understanding; for compassion, for empathy. We have to understand that we are all part of the same organism. Epic Wonder is a dream, a wish, a longing for kinship between all species that share the world - all that is alive.«

The acoustic throbbing and knocking in »Sea Of Serenity« makes you think of encounters with mythical creatures or planetary oceanography; and out of the mechanically clacking groove of »Shift Souls« a gentle, but steady movement awakens with voices that seem to sound from the depths of the sea. Everything is in flux, floating in and out of dimensions and elements.

The album ends with »Mercury«, spherically elegant and almost science fiction-like. Here, a pizzicato melody leads us back to the baroque, simultaneously representing a detail of intertwined sonic worlds, while the steady, housy baseline develops its driving theme.

»Creating the music for the album, we allowed ourselves to waft away with the aspiration that connections are possible. Sometimes dwelling on subtle, yet marveling phenomena like the evening fog covering a valley on Midsummer, sometimes on grandiose splendors like the genesis of mountains or the birth of a child - letting interactions and encounters with other beings float through the musical universe as drips of emotional perceptivity.«

For the visual manifestation of »Epic Wonder«, toechter has engaged with Finish up-and-coming lens-based artist Aino Kontinen. Her work will grace both the cover art of the album and accompany the first single and video as an ephemeral tale in motion.

The entity known as ALTERNATIVE TENTACLES, would like to express its excitement to be working with the Seattle, WA based BAND Sandrider, and enjoyed the previous relationship of Damm and Weisnewski in their former entity known as AKIMBO. ALTERNATIVE TENTACLES is very much a fan of previous work from the BAND on Satanik Royalty Records and highly recommend new listeners investigate the discography further. The upcoming 2-song single by BAND, hereafter referred to as AVIARY/BALEEN has a limited-edition initial pressing on blue and white splatter vinyl pressing of 300 copies, and successive runs will not be as colorful. Immediate orders are encouraged. This cheeky duality of Sandrider is also captured perfectly in the subject matter of the EP’s two tracks: The explosive first track, “Aviary,” portrays the modern hellscape of social media as sinister, soulless mama bird, willfully vomiting disinformation into the eager mouths of enthusiastically consenting participants. “PLEASE MOTHER, FEED THEM YOUR BILE. DOUSE THE BABES WITH YOUR WHOLESOME RETCH,” vocalist/guitarist Jon Weisnewski wails over massive, frenetic riffs, rounded out by bassist Jesse Roberts’ warm low end and drummer Nat Damm’s ultra-hard, punch-like beats. The song concludes in a frenzy of danceable beats, with Weisnewski doing his best Painkiller-era Halford screams as he commands you to flood the whole damn thing – drown those who wish to destroy us. As pissed off as the song is, you’ll feel triumphant by the end anyway. Side B’s “Baleen” on the other hand (while ironically the angrier-sounding song of the two), is about a lighter thought that keeps Weisnewski up at night: Do you ever think about how fucking weird whales are? They’re enormous floating creatures that can't handle gravity, and they hang out in the deepest oceans. Yet they can’t breathe underwater, so they have to stay near the top and come up for air all the time. Seems inconvenient. And you’d think that the biggest mammal that ever lived would be a brutal carnivore, right? But no. They eat the tiniest creatures, through a bunch of hair in their mouths. What the fuck? Anyway, ponder on that while you bang your head along with Sandrider’s signature primal, hypnotizingly heavy riffs.

Emerging from the heart of Brussels, the captivating five-piece Azmari is set to release "Maëlström" on October 20. For Maelström, the follow up to their acclaimed debut album Sam?'? (with raving reviews in Uncut, Songlines, Uk Vibe and Electronic Sound), the group has delved into uncharted musical territories creating a mesmerizing "azmarian" identity and melding intricate jazz textures with intoxicating oriental influences, otherworldly ethio grooves, enigmatic dark funk, and the pulsating beats of dub music,

For the creation of "Maëlström," Azmari embarked on an intensive one-week recording journey. During this time, they meticulously honed the sound of their instruments, blending the nostalgic notes of old-school clavinet keyboards with cutting-edge synth sounds, resulting in a distinct and alluring atmosphere. Enriching their traditional instruments with balanced pedal effects and special amplification, the band added new flavours to their sound.

Founded in the vibrant musical haven of Brussels in 2015, Azmari have been crafting a truly unique tapestry of musical exploration. Azmari defies conventional labels to weave a narrative of sonic innovation and artistic liberation. Influences range from an eclectic array of artists, including Okay Temiz, Heliocentrics, Whitefield Brothers, Surprise Chef, Antibalas and Sons of Kemet.

From the band: "For the third part of our musical journey, we dug into a deeper creative process. We literally immersed ourselves in deep waters during a unique two-week aquatic residency. The tracks on this album are thus directly imbued with distinctive underwater frequencies, the sounds of abyssal creatures, and the beauty of the seabed. Convinced by this creative experience, and guided by captain (and producer) Frederik Segers, we brought this album back to the surface and reveal a resolutely scaly, sandy, and deep soundscape."

Imagine a world in which you are permitted, by a warlock, to go back in time to use an advanced yet primitive submarine to investigate the deepest waters in and around Japan, for the first time in human history. You are not permitted, but two Japanese scientists were allowed on such an aquatic adventure!

Here we have an underwater in-submarine field recording of their adventures, intermixed with a slippery-watery score, that surely represents the lurking fresh surroundings of the deep as they retreat further and further to the bottom of the ocean. The cameras, the retracting mechanical sea tentacle, their communication devices, are all audible now for you, as Deep Sea Animals is played out as a fresh digital radio play. All the audio has been preserved at Studio Isabellalei, by Milan W. from the original laserdisc, which was a part of the cinematic curatorial program at the opening for Spencer Clark’s album Avatar Blue, in Antwerp, Belgium.

With a purchase of the vinyl album of Deep Sea Animals on Pacific City Discs, you not only return to the prehistoric times of 1986, when two brave Japanese submarine pilots were to record deep underwater creatures, but you are also thus thrust back in time to Antwerp 2018, to a romantically titled, Event Horizon Cactus Cooler Laserdisc Theater. Just as well, the proceeds of this disk, tirelessly edited by Spencer Clark, will be donated to the preservation of the ocean, via the inspiring Sylvia A. Earle’s foundation, Mission Blue. Its not that you may or may not believe what I am now discussing with you, its that you can believe, because this disk is real, and thanks to Pacific City and Discrepant we will ride further into the super-natural realms of real life.

Remastered Reissue des Debüt-Soloalbums MANTARAY von Siouxsie Sioux, das ihre ersten Auftritte im UK, Europa und den USA seit über einer Dekade begleitet. MANTARAY wurde von Miles Showell in den Abbey Road Studios remastered, audiophil auf halber Geschwindigkeit geschnitten und erscheint erstmals seit dem Originalrelease 2007 mit neuem Artwork wieder auf Vinyl. In MANTARAY erweiterte Siouxsie in einem Gefühl der Freiheit den Horizont ihrer vorherigen Arbeiten, was Fans und Medien gleichermaßen begeisterte und zu einer restlos ausverkauften Tour führte. Siouxsie Sioux veröffentlichte mit den Banshees, The Creatures und ihrem Solowerk insgesamt 16 von der Kritik gefeierte Studioalben. Ihre letzte Soloarbeit war der Songbeitrag LOVE CRIME (2015) für das Finale der TV-Serie HANNIBAL.

Remastered Reissue des Debüt-Soloalbums MANTARAY von Siouxsie Sioux, das ihre ersten Auftritte im UK, Europa und den USA seit über einer Dekade begleitet. MANTARAY wurde von Miles Showell in den Abbey Road Studios remastered, audiophil auf halber Geschwindigkeit geschnitten und erscheint erstmals seit dem Originalrelease 2007 mit neuem Artwork wieder auf Vinyl. In MANTARAY erweiterte Siouxsie in einem Gefühl der Freiheit den Horizont ihrer vorherigen Arbeiten, was Fans und Medien gleichermaßen begeisterte und zu einer restlos ausverkauften Tour führte. Siouxsie Sioux veröffentlichte mit den Banshees, The Creatures und ihrem Solowerk insgesamt 16 von der Kritik gefeierte Studioalben. Ihre letzte Soloarbeit war der Songbeitrag LOVE CRIME (2015) für das Finale der TV-Serie HANNIBAL.