The only woman featured on Worldwide FM's Sydney broadcast, and having recently produced her first old out all-female showcase featuring musicians, visual artists, poets and DJs, 20-year-old Ella Haber has worked toward her debut for 15 years.
Shocked by a hushed crowd reaction at her first public performance, Ella's realisation her voice could halt and occupy an audience's thoughts bleeds into all aspects of her life. With early demos of her debut EP, CLAY, reaching the ears of Brisbane-raised, London-based musician Jordan Rakei, the recent Ninja Tune signee - impressed with her vibrant songwriting and compositions - lent his production chops to the project, arranging and recording live instrumentation at Old Paradise Audio in London, while Ella worked on vocal recordings in Sydney.
'Ella's timeless vocals and mature songwriting sensibility was the reason I wanted to work with her on this project. In a climate where artists often take shortcuts, Ella's determination and strong vision will make her stand out from the rest. It was a pleasure bringing her songwriting to life and I can't wait for the world to hear her music!' - Jordan Rakei
A multi-lingual multi-instrumentalist deftly weaving her songwriting prowess with trumpet, piano, spoken word, fresh lyricism and powerful jazz/soul performance, Ella's ease within music is in stark contrast to her feeling for every other established structure. Set to release her debut single, Old Friends, written when Haber was only 17, she reflects on the impact Amy Winehouse's debut album, Frank, had on her songwriting: 'I had been writing music since I was a kid, but listening to Frank just gave me permission to write about love and all its pains and confusions in this way of transparency and brutal honesty I never had before. Old Friends was actually the first track I wrote from the EP, and, the first song I ever really felt proud of'
In a genre, and society, where identity is increasingly scrutinised, Ella Haber resists, comfortable only in the confines of music composition. Challenging, with full colour love and intelligence, she's not letting anyone off lightly. Her debut EP, CLAY, is out April 26 via Soul Has No Tempo.
Cerca:sensi
- A1: Glottal Wolpertinger Feedback Band 1
- A2: Glottal Wolpertinger Feedback Band 2
- A3: Glottal Wolpertinger Feedback Band 3 / A
- A4: Glottal Wolpertinger Feedback Band 3 / B
- B1: Glottal Wolpertinger Feedback Band 4
- B2: Glottal Wolpertinger Feedback Band 5
- B3: Glottal Wolpertinger Feedback Band 6 / A
- B4: Glottal Wolpertinger Feedback Band 6 / B
Jan St. Werneris A Critically Acclaimed And Internationally Recognized Sound Innovator. In A Myriad Of Ways, As A Solo Artist, A Collaborator, Through His Group Mouse On Mars, As A Producer , Or As A Course Instructor At Mit, Werner Has Challenged Traditional Approaches To Creating And Experiencing Music. The Sixth Installment Of His Fiepblatter Catalogue Series, Glottal Wolpertinger, Endeavors To Transcribe The Phenomenon Of Sound As Anarchic And Highly Sensitive Material. His Multilayered Presentation Of The Project Highlights The Ways In Which Sound And Music Can uctuate And Morph Depending On Context. In Keeping With The Series' Collaborative Nature, The Pieces Include Contributions From Guitarists Aaron & Bryce Dessner Of The National, Who Werner Also Collaborated With On Mouse On Mars' Dimensional People, And The National's Sleep Well Beast. Glottal Wolpertinger Was Initially Conceived As A Radio Installation For Documenta 14 With Each Of The Tracks Broadcasting Individually Over The Course Of Ten Weeks And Culminating In A Convergence Of All Eight Tracks At A Performance In Athens. The Pieces Consist Of Microtonally Tuned Feedback, Multispectral Drones Which Werner Modulated And Fltered With A Purposeful, And Indeed Vocalized, Emphasis Given To The Different Frequencies And Textures Used. Glottal Wolpertinger's Incarnation As A Recording Is No Less Potent Than Its Preceding Forms, But Serves As A Continuation Of The Project's Evolution As A Distinct Listening Experience.
Alien Transistor and Tokyo-based label Afterhours release a vinyl-version of tenniscoats' masterpiece "music exists". It consists of 4 LPs, which will be released over the year, full of intimate, wonderful, psychedelic folk-music. With the fourth LP, there will be a strictly limited box available, either for putting in your already purchased other 3 records, or as the whole glorious 4-LP-package.
Tenniscoats have devoted followers allover the world, but their releases were always hard to find outside of Japan. Except for their album "Tokinouta", which saw a very limited run on vinyl, and the seminal "Two Sunsets", their collaboration with the Pastels (and a small handfull of 7"s ), there were never any vinyl-releases, and also the CDs were hard to get for any-one, who doesn't speak or read japanese.
So, this is the chance to dive deep into the beautiful, unique world of the tenniscoats and their opus magnum "music exists".
The Tenniscoats are a duo that have enjoyed a long career in the music scene of their home country of Japan. They have collaborated with unique artists from different backgrounds (Tape, Pastels, Pastacas and Jad Fair), while maintaining their own laid back approach and sound. Their songs are built primarily from guitar and vocals with lyrical themes focusing on everyday life. It could be their expansion on simplicity that has captivated music lovers of all ages throughout their existence.
While the aforementioned collaborations produced bold and sensitive experiences and results, it has taken Tenniscoats five years to release an entire studio album of their own. The wait has not been in vain, as four discs will be released consecutively beginning with 'Music Exists - disc 1'. Music Exists saw a previously limited release on the Tenniscoats' own majikick label.
'We started recording around January of 2013 with just the two of us in our 10 tatami-room in Tokyo we were using as a private studio. Arrangements were produced without computers by overdubbing on an analog console with mixing assistance provided by Saya. As we sent selected songs to be mastered by Yasushi Utsunomia, we were able to see the tracks grown into a full length album.'
What turned into a huge 4 disc project began in earnest three years ago. Tenniscoats wrote and recorded themselves using an analog console, a microphone, and what few instruments they had. As the project developed, they were surprised to find that they had amassed several albums' worth of material.
'We tried throwing up the ideas we had in the beginning and not put too much of our strength into playing in order to develop the ideas of each song. Utsunomia, who did the mastering was the first person to ever hear the material for this album outside of the band. We sent songs to him carefully choosing an order that we felt would not make him bored. Thanks to his distinctive way of mastering, we were inspired to go further and further into the process.'
2016 marks the Tenniscoats' 20th anniversary together. You could consider 'Music Exists' as a sort of compilation of material stemming from these years spent together. With their unique combination of melodies, unexaggerated arrangements, and detailed mastering, Alien Transistor are extremely delighted to make this recording available to the public!
Warehouse Find!
Danish producer Paxton Fettel joins Delusions for his debut EP for the label entitled Night Waves. Despite his youth, he has notched up an enviable catalogue of original, eclectic releases including two LP's for Greta Cottage Workshop as well as EP's for Plumage, Kolour LTD and Apersonal. Paxton's unique sound and audiophile approach to production has led to remixes for Uffe on Tartelet, Chocky on Secret Reels and most recently Sunrom on edgling vinyl-only label The Bricks.
For his Night Waves EP we get a snapshot of the mans diversity across three original tracks. The opener sees Paxton in his most raw, jacking, dance oor focussed mood to date and the result is a high energy house track which punches hard on a big system. Featuring his own bass playing, snipped and squeezed through the sonic mangle, Night Waves steams along with big bold pianos, swinging hats and just the right amount of oating synths. Simple elements which combine to be so much more than the sum of its parts and one of those stand-out cuts that will be stuck in your head long after you've left the danceoor.
Flipping over we have Paxton going full-on jazz mode in Pacica 399 To Freedom. A track which once again has his beloved Sandberg California live bass part pushed to the fore, pianos, strings and synths building around the driving disco groove. Feel-good sunshine vibes oozing from the speakers as little melodies dance around the sizzling hi hats and encompassing pulse of the kick drum.
Finally we have a deeper note to close on with It's Clear. A repeating vocal hook runs throughout the intro while intricate drum programming gives a nod to the sounds of broken beat and live jazz sensibilities. The end result is a warm, loose and dubby jam which completes the package in ne style and leaves us looking forward to hearing more from this talented young producer from Copenhagen.
- A1: Ich Will Dir Helfen
- A2: A La Manière (With Roya Arab)
- A3: Ondine
- B1: Aspiration (With Mona Soyoc)
- B2: One Of These Days (With Hafdis Huld)
- B3: Théorème
- B4: Mortel Battement / Nocturne (With Alain Bashung)
- C1: Organique
- C2: The Watcher (With Mona Soyoc)
- C3: Qu’est-Ce Qui M’a Pris (With Philippe Poirier)
- D1: Xr 116 / Messe Rouge
- D2: Untitled
- D3: Ondine (Alt Take)
- D4: Piasong
The sensitive mountain » (la montagne sensible) is the nickname Alain Bashung came up with for Arnaud Rebotini. At the height of his fame, after the success of Fantaisie Militaire in 1998, Bashung readily agreed to create an album with Rebotini. The two men didn’t know each other; their record label had introduced them. Bashung brought in “Mortel Battement” and “Nocturne,” two poems by Jean Tardieu, which he recited in a voice simultaneously warm and flat, and Arnaud produced an impressionist soundscape that ended with an apocalypse of metal. Bashung was so proud of their collaboration that he offered to give several interviews to promote the record. Today, listening back to this moving Léo Ferré influenced "talking singing" exercise, it’s hard not to hear the template for L'Imprudence, the album that Bashung went on to record with Rebotini two years later. In a similar way, the album Organique sparked a productive partnership between Rebotini and filmmaker Robin Campillo, which resulted in their being awarded a César for Best Original Music in 2018. The director, who trusted Rebotini to create the soundtracks for his films Eastern Boys and 120 Beats per Minute, never kept his love for the 2000 record a secret.
Yet it’s an understatement to say that when it was released, Organique was not in the spirit of times. That year was all about the French touch. The funky samples of Modjo’s “Lady” and Superfunk’s “Lucky Star” ruled the sweaty dancefloors. Although Rebotini was familiar with the electronic scene, he had something else in mind when he set about creating Organique. Under his own name or under the pseudonyms Aleph, Avalanche, Black Strobe, Maison Laffitte, and of course Zend Avesta, he had already released several quite bizarre and experimental techno, house, or jungle maxi singles on pioneering labels like P.O.F., Source, and Artefact, run by his friend Jérôme Mestre’s, whom he had met back when both were working as record salesmen at Rough Trade’s ephemeral Parisian store. It was at Artefact, still financed at the time by Barclay and Universal, that he naturally proposed this record project, which was a bit "different." It was his first real album.
Arnaud Rebotini has never hidden his love-hate relationship with the electronic scene. He’s a fan of rave music, Rex, and later Pulp, but he listens mostly to metal and contemporary music, mainly American minimalists such as Terry Riley, Philip Glass, Steve Reich. He wanted to mix this genre with a more French aesthetic inspired by Debussy, whose unconventionality fascinates him. From the first suspended guitar note of Organique, you can pick up another influence, possibly poppier. In the style of Mark Hollis, the erratic leader of Talk Talk, whose only solo album’s silences and dissonances left their mark two years earlier, we hear the fingers touching the keys of the clarinet on “Ondine.” The instruments have presence, character. Nothing is smooth. Everything is organic.
Although it’s sometimes labeled as electronica because of Rebotini’s career, there’s nothing digital about Organique. No "pro tools" editing or samples, only programmed drums and some synth layering. And his guest vocalists. Playing the role of electro producer, he invited Bashung, of course, to join him on the album, but also Roya Arab, who Rebotini first spotted while she was playing in Archive, and her sister Leila, Gus Gus alum Hafdis Huld, Kat Onoma’s Philippe Poirier on the “Samuel Hall” inspired track “Qu’est ce qui m’a pris,” and former KaS Product member Mona Soyoc.
The frustration of a tour where he had "little to do on stage," the desire to sing himself, and the creation of the Black Strobe project, a haunting mix of blues and rock, stopped Zend Avesta from putting out another album. Eighteen years later, the Organique we rediscover today has lost nothing of its strangeness, nor beauty. When it came out, Bashung said, "What is interesting for a musician is to feel that you have a piece of wasteland in front of you, something to clear.” That remains true today.
The first Redskins re-issue for many years, this is a 4-track celebration of their 1985 Top 40 hit, 'Bring It Down! (This Insane Thing!)'. Featuring their distinctive hybrid of rock and soul complete with their signature brass section and their unmistakeable 'call to arms' socialist sensibility.
In 2019, the World is shaking... our man Too Smooth Christ, prolific & sensitive composer invite to expand your body and mind beyond with its new release Emogreen Thoughts EP. Bringing you a good dose of Acid on one side, featuring two bangers flirting generously with Chicago House vibes and Detroit Electro gems, keeping the floor filled and your senses in orbit on the other side with two trippy, cosmic ambient sound scapes, perfect for creative excursions. The FUEGO 004 will come in a limited number of 300 copies, watch out!
It's easy to fall for a nostalgic approach to dance music, to cuddle oneself in the warm analogue sounds of late 1980's dance productions - especially with the heavy ongoing reissue trend going on. However, we have to stay focus: look out for contemporary sounds and means of production. Parisian producer Nathan Melja makes his debut on Antinote with an idiosyncratic three-tracker and our guess is that it sounds contemporary.
On the A-side: one tune: Deadrums. Both the name and the music speak for themselves. It's hard, it's efficient and at the same time, there's quite a lot going on, tiny bumps on the straightforward road to techno ecstasy. Nevertheless, Deadrums is a precise piece of machinery, an atmospheric banger, yes, but with deadly jaws made out of tempered steel to tear a dancefloor apart, piece-by-piece. On the B-side, Angels stands out as a perfect example of a song that has many dancefloor qualities but, like some of DJ Sprinkles' seminal recordings, turns out to be more of a late-night tale of urban wanderings on wet pavements (think Taxi Driver and its soundtrack by Bernard Hermann). Contemplative, melancholic and - let's say it - sad, its nagging melody can bring a little tear to the eyes of the most sensitive ones. Rounding up the 12' is Candy, a tune under the influence of bad boys like DJ Overdose, or Ghettotech legend DJ Assault - so that you can dry your tears.
It's Nathan Melja's first release on Antinote, but he's definitely not a newcomer. He's been around since Antinote exists, and we're glad to finally collaborate with him.
- A1: Arranha Céu (Skyscrapers) (Eumir Deodato)
- A2: Flap (Marcos Valle & P.s. Valle)
- A3: Rodando Por Aí (Rudy\'S) (Eumir Deodato)
- A4: O Jogo (Soccer Game) (Pacifico Mascarenhas)
- A5: Atire A 1A Pedra (Ataulfo Alves & Mario Lago)
- B1: Puma Branco (The White Puma) (Marcos Valle & P.s. Valle)
- B2: Passarinho Diferente (The Byrd) (Eumir Deodato)
- B3: Extremo Norte (The Gap) (Eumir Deodato)
- B4: Tô Fazendo Nada (Down The Hill) (Eumir Deodato)
- B5: Menina (Boy Meets Girl) (Eumir Deodato)
- B6: Carlota E Carolina (Carly & Carole) (Eumir Deodato)
One of Brazil's most prolific artists, Eumir Deodato has participated in the creation of over 450 albums, racked up 16 platinum records, won a Grammy (and received two more nominations), and sold over 250 million records in the USA alone. Over the course of his career, he has written for, arranged music by and played with artists including Frank Sinatra, Tom Jobim, Kool & The Gang, Earth, Wind & Fire, Marcos Valle, Aretha Franklin and Bjork, among others.
At the height of Deodato's productivity in the early 70s, Os Catedraticos 73 was recorded between Rio de Janeiro and New York, featuring a Brazilian rhythm section comprising Azymuth drummer Ivan 'Mamão' Conti, percussion master Orlandivo, and Sergio Barroso on bass, while the horn section features some of the big apple's top players from the CTI in-house brass.
A firm favourite with rare-groove enthusiasts and fans of Latin jazz alike, Deodato melds the musical sensibility of post-bossa nova Brazilian jazz with North American soul & funk, and the explosive Latin influences of '70s New York. Os Catedraticos 73 certainly swings harder than some of Deodato's earlier releases and opening track 'Arranha Ceu' (Skyscrapers) is a euphoric dance floor classic, which has been lighting up clubs for years.
With the blessing of Deodato himself, this official Far Out reissue has been remastered and pressed to 180g vinyl, with replica original artwork from the OG Equipe release.
Combo Lulo returns to Names You Can Trust for their sophomore single, digging deeper into the diversified sounds of the Caribbean that helped define their debut. While the first single took a Jamaican foundation south into the neighboring continent, fusing the sensibilities of rock steady with those of classic Afro-Latin orchestras, this single goes far east. Inspired by the heady and sublime sounds of foundational ska mixed with East African influences, (think Buster's Islam, Don D's Addis Ababa or Further East), The Sieve & The Sand is a brand new composition within this natural order, albeit with the fortune of different reggae eras and studio styles to draw from. Divided into two parts (but also available seamlessly as it was played in the studio), Combo Lulo's talented players move effortlessly from the galloping shuffle of ska into a deep and dark, Roots Radics-styled instrumental. It's a lovely ode to the original styles of reggae, but also another impressive accomplishment that will surely leave listeners and new fans in anticipation of the shape of things to come for Combo Lulo.
This EP focuses on the group's prescient dance-floor DIN-sync workouts which share sensibilities with contemporaneous early Detroit experiments by Juan Atkin's Cybotron, Ron Hardy's visionary Kikrokos tape edit, Shoc Corridor's extended 808
exercises, and 90s Techno Pop by Haruomi Hosono. Rounding off the EP is the existential electronic soul ballad Words. Remastered from the original reels, 45rpm DMM pressing.
Kansas City, 1983: a band formed, wires connected and synapses fired. Three friends, tired of guitar/bass/drums rock started jamming with newly acquired synths and Roland TR 808. They called themselves Short-Term Memory. Thanks to the vanguard technology of the time, these electronic instruments spoke to each other, and Jim Skeel, John Paul & Robert Duckworth could program their instruments, riding the DIN-sync wave. Weekly jams became more ambitious, and in 1983 they released their first album Every Head Needs Cleaning on their own Silly Poodle Music label. Over the 80s members drifted in and out of the group, and they released two cassettes, an LP and a 7' EP. By the 90s Jim Skeel was at the helm, the only original member, and joined by Tim Higgins he continued to record in MIDI mode for a few years before pulling the plug, leaving recordings and memories that resisted the great fadeout of time, and today sound vibrant and more visionary than ever.
Will Miles, Virginia Born Junglist badman, finally joins the Inperspective family with 4 glorious cuts of hardstep futurism.
Music that captures the old school sensibilities while still maintaining the forward thinking ethos that has become the Inperspective staple.
Title track Choose Wisely brings a side to repertoire that isn't often seen. Stomping Amen of the highest order. Does the damage that needs to be done.
Medicine brings the pain is a starkly different way, steppy hard break with a morphing darkside bassline is the order of the day on this one, encapsulated with the sinister atmosphere.
Bringing in the element of diversity of the EP we have Pulsation, a quirky, Dubby Footwork/Jungle hybrid. Has been shocking audiences all over with it's skippy progressive style.
Finally, Want Not, brings the beauty. Hardstep Liquid vibes are what makes this tune fairly unique in the Inperspective catalogue, but don't let the haunting piano and chilling vocals confuse you. The bassline in this one comes from the depths of Hades!
Following on from last year's releases by Neue Grafik and Selectors Assemble, CoOp Presents step into 2019 with a new 4-track EP courtesy of Oliver Night; a DJ, producer & singer born and raised in North London.
In addition to joining the Selectors Assemble family recently, Oliver is a member and producer of Roots Manuva's Banana Klan. He established himself as a DJ some 15 years ago, and has since played across the capital, from the Tate Modern to Boiler Room. His music has been supported in the past by the likes of Tony Humphries, Kerri Chandler & Seth Troxler,
This four-tracker illustrates Oliver's diverse range of influences, from the initial inspiration of his Jamaican uncle, musician Hughie Izachaar (who worked with Lee Scratch Perry & others), through to his passion for London's broken beat movement. Oliver's sound epitomises tru-skool UK sound-system ethics; grounded in reggae and dub production sensibilities, whilst built solidly for the bruk and house music dances of today.
The set kicks off with title track, 'Make Believe', featuring the powerhouse vocals of BB.JAMES aka Bethany Barnett Bywater, who's had previous releases with EVM128, Spoek Mathambo and Waze & Odyssey. London-based singer BB is a talent to watch in her own right, as proven on this monster of a track, which has all the ingredients to crossover & damage dancefloors underground and over. Sassy soulful vocals ride a woofer-shattering b-line and synth stabs with devastating effect - a sureshot future anthem.
Next up is 'Swing For Life', an instrumental jazz-house affair, which features the talents of Vancouver-born trumpeter, Jay Phelps - a highly-prolific, highly-acclaimed musician in the jazz world, who found his base in the capital over a decade ago and has since worked with a veritable who's who of international jazz artists, including Courtney Pine, Wynton Marsalis, Amy Winehouse, Hugh Masakela & George Benson, to name a few.
Finally, the flipside brings with it two versions of the cut 'U Got To', remixed by Selectors Assemble family, Cengiz, and label founders IG Culture (fresh from receiving a 'Lifetime Achievement Award' at the 2019 Worldwide Awards) and Alex Phountzi (formerly of Bugz In The Attic) aka NameBrandSound, delivering more of their signature bassweight business. Oliver unleashes his own vocal talents on this track, deftly demonstrating a rich, soulful Omar-esque quality to his voice, and completing a truly heavyweight debut for the label.
This record is huge. Essential business, no BS. A truly firing start to the new year for CoOp Presents.
Limited vinyl & digital available on ********
Lyrics, ideas and sounds were exchanged at the speed of broadband with Maite (Mursego). Aiora (Zea Mays) required only two lines, executing like an emotive, humanity-filled machine. Gaizka & Ager (Audience) arrived as they always do, fitting their music into impossible spaces. Miren (Mice) voiced her heart while opening up her throat, while Rafa Rodrigo really strummed his guitar. Ainara LeGardon brought the extremes, the excitement. Our cries arrived while listening to hundreds of horses galloping across the plains, dust floating in the air behind them. The feeling of everything falling into place, finally.
All of this had just become an album. Aitor Etxebarria closed the door, elegantly. Moxal is the name given to a foal. Sensitive to the environment, the places it wanders and the beings around it. Sometimes doubtful, impatient, though always ready to listen while growing and learning to walk alone. Moxal is a project coordinated by musician and producer Hannot. After Audience, his new proposal is a space for others to inhabit.
Though wild, Moxal lets people come close, basking in the warmth, assembling things and building oneself through proximity and untamed listening.
My love wears forbidden colours My life believesMy love wears forbidden colours My life believes in you once again
Chemistry between individuals is an amorphous and elusive notion. It is usually seen as something that occurs between two people who are sharing a physical space, with access to each other's body language and energy. However, modern technology has provided many other opportunities for chemistry to blossom and be explored and this record is just one example of that: Vent is proud to present Kina, a double LP of musical collaborations between MAYa and Tolga Baklacioglu.
Tolga Baklacioglu is an associate professor in aeronautical engineering. He is also a musician. For several years, he has been steadily building a body of work that explores the outer boundaries where techno and abstract textures merge and blur. In 2014, Tolga created a label, VENT, as a platform for his explorations and those of likeminded travelers within this sonic realm.
MAYa Hardinge works in film. She is also a musician. She has collaborated with numerous artists. Beginning in 2008, She released 4 EPs under her solo guise MAYa. Considering her background in film, it comes as no surprise that her work has a strong visual element. Pre- dating Beyonce´'s Lemonade by many years, her last two EPs were visual albums made in
collaboration with various directors.
It makes total sense that MAYa and Tolga should have made an album together. Their interests and backgrounds overlap and diverge meaningfully in a way that has all the hallmarks of good musical chemistry. There is however one unusual element to their collaboration: they have never met. Tolga lives in Eskisehir (Turkey) and MAYa lives in New York City.
Always on the look out for inspiration and new collaborators, Tolga stumbled across MAYa's videos online. What he saw and heard inspired him to reach out and contact her. After some correspondence they decided to experiment with the prospect of making music together. Perhaps deprived of the traditional notions of chemistry defined by proximity, they found inspiration across time and space in the name of exploration and discovery. Tolga began by sending MAYa files of beats and ambiance. Upon finding the ones that spoke to her, MAYa went to work disassembling, adding, subtracting and rearranging. MAYa's work would then go back to Tolga, a world away, for further input and then back again. In this way each track was painstakingly constructed and a true chemistry was born. One built on sensitivity, support and honest artistic communication. In a word: LISTENING.
The songs cover a broad spectrum of topics, from the deeply personal feelings and experiences, to world events, and the fundamental aspects of life and death. Kina is a document of two artists from different backgrounds and their shared visions of the interplay
between one's private microcosm and the global macrocosm of our time; a testament to the fact that, for all its vastness and diversity, this world offers inspiration and potential collaboration around every corner. The music contained within has traveled around the world many times before reaching your ears. As MAYa and Tolga have done before, it is now your turn to LISTEN.
Welcome to the richly rhythmic and deeply esoteric world of Zaliva-D. Based in the Chinese capital of Beijing, they've been circling the country's borders for more than a decade due to the extreme difficulty of streaming music there. Zaliva-D consists of musician Li Chao and Aisin-Gioro Yuanjin, who's responsible for their stunning live visuals. We're very proud to present Forsaken, their 4th album, but first ever vinyl release. Wrapped around a core of gut wrenchingly ferocious kicks and haunting vocals, these tracks possess a mantra-like quality and drown the listener into a world of Chinese and South East Asian textures. Forsaken, mastered by Wouter Brandenburg, is their most well-written, organic and esoteric record to date, showing a more fragile, sensitive side. Soon Zaliva-D will perform on European soil, accompanied by this Knekelhuis debut.
Genre: Electronic, World (Arabic). 180gram vinyl includes 12'x24' art print poster + 320kbps DL card. RIYL: Matar Mohammad, Pauline Oliveros, Nadah El Shazly, Lucrecia Dalt, Chino Amobi, Sote, Arca, Fatima Al Qadiri, Tacita Dean, Stan Brakhage. Jerusalem In My Heart (JIMH) returns with Daqa'iq Tudaiq, the third full-length album from the Montréal-Beirut contemporary Arabic audio-visual duo, following the acclaimed 2015 release If He Dies, If If I f If If If (ye ar-end li sts at The Wire (#39), The Quietus (#24) and A C loser Listen (Top 10), among other accolades).
Featuring voice, electronics, buzuk and other instrumentation from composer-producer Radwan Ghazi Moumneh (Matana Roberts, Suuns, Big Brave) and abetted by the 16mm analog film work of Charles-André Coderre in live performance, JIMH continues to expand the horizons of its profound conceptual and aesthetic engagement with Arabic/Middle-Eastern traditions. Daqa'i q Tudaiq translates as 'minutes that bother/oppress/harass'—which presumably needs no further explanation—and features two distinct album sides of music. Side One realizes a long-held dream of Moumneh's to record a modern orchestral version of the popular Egyptian classic 'Ya Garat Al Wadi' by the legendary composer Mohammad Abdel Wahab. JIMH assembled a 15-piece orchestra in Beirut, enlisting the celebrated Montréal-Cairo composer Sam Shalabi (Land Of Kush) as arranger and musical director for the session. Anchored by the stately hypnotic pace of mallet and percussion instruments (riq, santur, derbakeh, kanun), the piece unfolds with lush, languid, reverb-drenched manoeuvrings through virtuosic Maqam shifts (Oriental scales). Moumneh's melismatic lead vocals and electronic production sensibility pay homage to the genre's documented historical recording traditions, while pushing things subtly and respectfully into new territories of sonic distortion and noised, artefact-laden transmission.
The song's original title (with lyrics penned in 1928 by the poet Ahmad Shawqi) translates as 'Oh Neighbour Of The Valley', but JIMH takes a different line from the original lyric as the new title for its orchestral-electronic re-interpretation. 'Wa Ta'atalat Loughat Al Kalam' (' The Language Of Speech Has Broke Down') is an expression of wordless love and transcendent communication between two lovers' eyes in Shawqi's poem; JIMH re-titles the song with this line, exploding the sentiment with more complexity, tragedy and socio-political meaning - also prefiguring the formal aesthetic ruptures JIMH bring to the piece itself. Love in a time of politics, politics in a world conspiring against love, and the specificity of Arab diasporic experience in our brutish 21st century. Side Two comprises four tracks of non-ensemble 'solo' material by Moumneh which push rupture and decomposition/recomposition of tradition further into avant-garde territory - voice, buzuk and electronics take the lead on a suite of emotive and evocative songs, including the percussive loopdriven instrumental 'Bein Ithnein' ('Between Two' ) and the stunningly unsettling processed vocal track 'Thahab, Mish Roujou', Thahab' ('(The Act Of) Departing, Not Returning, Departing'). Daqa'iq Tudaiq is a masterful, mesmerizing artistic statement and confirms Jerusalem In My Heart as one of the most engaged and forward-looking avant-Arabic projects at work in contemporary music today. Thanks for listening.
Schmer has tried to stop, we've all gone into therapy, but there's no hope, short of setting the world ablaze: we can't stop smoking! 2019 see's Schmer pressing TECHNO records in the EU and PRICED in Europe as a domestic release. As if the continent didn't already have enough problems, here we come with our latest COMPILATION!
First to drop a match is Amber Shoshona aka Bastet. She is a live electronic music performer and DJ based in Baltimore, MD USA. Her live set is coarse-grained and atmospheric, developing a slow-burning, hypnotic groove. In the studio she creates genre bending electronic experiments. For Schmer she made 'Torn', which sneaks right up to you and lights you up.
Delivering oil to the blaze from deep in the Russian arctic is Maxim Makarenko aka 777minus111. The unknown hero from the Russian Techno label he remains in the shade and keeps it real! He runs underground parties in Moscow and is a member of Vinyl Ambulance project in India. He keeps our compilation 'Getting Dirty Quick' with his Dan Bell inspired MINIMALISM.
On the flip the fires start with Vague Audio Tapes label head Dominic Martin aka Hero/Victim. Hero/Victim is a sonic attempt at translating unanswered and unheard emotions. Visceral and physical; so as to both, engage and purge the evolving dissonance. Never content. With sound as a context-sensitive metaphor, stories are heard. He also makes weird electronic music and then Schmers all over us with a 'New Stress'.
Schmerhead BPMF hides a track from another release in this inferno. Its super short as in it goes on FOREVER with a LOCKED GROOVE at the end. If you're gonna be an emcee, do it in a Wormhole on a LOCKED GROOVE so that the rock will never stop.
Liza Weinstein, Zach Vietze and Jason Szostek were Jack Move. In 1994 they may have made two tracks together, but this is the only one we found lying around in the basement floor. Long before the skinny jean hipsters were rocking beats deliberately designed to confuse the dance floor with their lack of flow, The Jack Movers were experimenting with cryptic funk... It was a Jack Move on their part and they immediately ran out of town to escape retribution, leaving behind their 'Krippy Shit'.
We Can't Stop Smoking so you'll always be able to find us because where there's smoke, there's fire... and where there's TECHNO there's SCHMER!
- A1: Black Bells Group - Sweet Sidney
- A2: Charly Kingson - Nanga 'Boko
- A3: Gyedu Blay Ambolley - Highlife
- A4: Dikalo - Fine Biscuits
- A5: Mekongo President - Angona Mana
- B1: Fotso - French Girl
- B2: Tala Am - Sugar Lump
- B3: Jk Mandengue - Chibidaba, Chibidaba
- B4: Jide Obe - Too Young
- B5: Mulamba - Dashiki (Version Instrumentale)
It's that time again. The skies are calling and its time to board our trusty jet for the 5th outing of Africa Seven's premiere class compilation Africa Airways. For volume 5 its time to brace yourselves for 10 slices of Afro boogie goodness.
We up the boogie time groove with The Black Bells Group (the first band of lead singer Sidney 'Patrick Duteil' who went on to become the godfather of French hip-hop and a well know TV presenter. Here the groove is swinging... the perfect opener. Next up is German-based Cameroonian musician and cousin of Manu Dibango, Charly Kingson with this bass-synth boogie stomper. Big brass and jazzy trumpets add layers of sparkle too.
Next its time for some highlife inspired boogie from Ghanian Gyedu Blay Amboley. Highlife fused with reggae, disco, boogie and jazz just as the lyrics say.
Next we pair up with Africa Seven friend Eko once more under his Dikalo guise. The Cameroonian master musician is on fine form with his heavy brass and deep percussion with a driving afro boogie groove. To round off Side A its off to Cameroon again to groove with Jean 'Mekongo President'. Think Bernard 'Chic' Edwards on the bass with some African style and you can see it's the bottom end groove and afrobeat drums that power this gem along.
We open the second side slowly and purposefully with the highly sought after 'French Girl' from Fotso. Drippy bass synth grooves and a wondrous percussion and drum shuffle pair with piano riffs to make this a unique sounding track. Our friend Tala AM is next with the foot-stomping 'Sugar Lump'. JK Mandengue is next with most definitely the catchiest chorus you will hear today. Nigerian Jide Obe gets synth and clavinet rich with his doe to sensible dating advice 'Too Young'. We close off the album with a track from label good friend Jo Bisso under his Mulamba guise. Sounding like a long lost TV theme from a late night TV show circa 1977. Let's get down and boogie with the brand new dance in town folks... the Dashiki.
Until Volume Six takes flight it is time to unbuckle those seat belts folks.




















